A series celebrating the talent of our friends over in the Londonist Flickr pool. Here, they introduce themselves and share their favourite London shots. This week, mrdamcgown. AKA Dave...
I was born and bred in South East London and have lived all over it. For the last decade or so I've been fortunate enough to live in Central London and am now set up in Covent Garden. Brixton, too, is a particular stomping ground of mine. I believe work is over-rated and am a keen idler. I DJ, write songs, sing in a band (occasionally) and am currently honing my creative writing skills at City Lit.
Every time I step out of my front door I love it. London's constantly changing and there's always some thing or place you've never noticed or been to before (or a pub to investigate). There's nothing better than getting about a bit. I'm drawn towards London's darker side and am fascinated by the mundane and the minutiae. This is what I want to show people. I always go down alleys and peer into dark stairwells or investigate piles of rubbish. I found a stuffed armadillo in Pimlico, once. I could NEVER live permanently anywhere else. I would pine away. London is like a parent to me.
I'm relatively new to photography and no great technician (conveniently my lack of technical skills ties in with my old punk philosophy). The majority of shots on my Flickr photostream were taken with a Pentax film camera or a Nokia 6000 series phone. In the next few weeks I'm intend to purchase a digi SLR (probably a Canon EOS 400), a digi compact (possibly a Leica D-Lux 3) and an old mechanical Pentax, all second-hand I hasten to add. I recently took a second basic course at The London School of Photography and hope to learn even more about the workings of the magic box. I've learnt to use the dark room, which is great fun and have a picture framer mate who kindly allows me to use his facilities. These factors, I hope, will one day come together to enable me to exhibit my photos.
Check out Dave's Flickrstream, blog and band for more