A series celebrating the talent of our friends over in the Londonist Flickr pool who make our site look pretty with their fabulous photographs. Here, they introduce themselves and share their favourite London shots.
After being unceremoniously dumped I came to London nearly 20 years ago. I've lived all over and currently reside south of the river in 'up and coming' (not my words by a long way) 'sunny' (well today it is at least) Sydenham. (Yes. It is in London)
London quickly became a passion for me. I don't think there's another city in the world that has such a rich and varied population or history or that has such a passionate following amongst it's inhabitants (although that feeling has been rocked slightly by the incredulous voting in of the unmentionable as Mayor).
Nearly seven years ago I started my photoblog dicksdaily.co.uk with the aim to take a picture everyday and in so doing, make sure I had my camera with me wherever I went. Dicksdaily is still going strong with a picture taken everyday for those last six and a bit years.
Dicksdaily and my love of London led me to set up The Way We See It – a group project where a different London location is posted each week for people to go out and photograph.
Lost tourists are quickly becoming a bit of an obsession for me .... one day I might even ask them if they want some help.
For me photography is a great excuse to get out and be nosy. Where does that street lead? What's that bloke doing? Who lives/lived there? Why would anyone want to write such an inane message on a post box? I don't feel you could call many of my pictures 'beautiful' although I do personally find a certain beauty in upside down men at work signs, lost gloves, urban decay and lost tourists (to name but a few). It's also a good excuse to indulge my infantile sense of humor.
I shoot film mostly, although I'm no film evangelist. For me I find it helps me to be more selective and to look more at what I'm trying to capture knowing I only have 36 or 12 shots as apposed to 12 zillion on a memory card. And I can't help feeling that the images do look a bit nicer!
Check out D I C K S D A I L Y's Flickrstream, DICKSDAILY and The Way We See It for more.
If you're a Flickrist don't forget to join our group and tag your quirky London photos "Londonist".
