Back to the Coast

After the hustle and bustle of Christmas was out of the way it was time to return to the coast to try and make a little progress on Lancoast.

I started Lancoast at Lytham last year and that shoot had gone well.  In August of 2014 I had visited Blackpool and had struggled with that.  Making a monochrome image there was difficult.  My eye kept looking for the colourful and garish instead of focusing on producing a monochrome image.

So the return to Lancoast was to start in Blackpool.  This time the shoot went well.  I managed to get a couple of shots that would make nice monochrome images.  I felt enthused again.

Starting quite early in the morning and knowing what I wanted pretty much meant that I was done in Blackpool within an hour.  The next stop was Cleveleys.  I’d seen some images of Mary’s Shell and that was something I wanted in the essay.  So off I went.  On the way there I came across a roundabout that had a cheeky little character peeping out from behind the cover.  It’s made quite a nice shot although it wouldn’t work in black and white.

Next up was Fleetwood.  I got a couple of cracking shots there.  My favourite being of the England house.

I’m a planner.  I like to plan my shots and projects quite carefully but what you find is that when you do start shooting they take you on a journey.  I’ve found that if you fight the journey and stay true to your original idea and planning then you end up with something that seems a bit more contrived, somehow less real.  If you go with it you end up with a far better end result and you also genuinely learn something along the way.

Originally Lancoast was set to be a wholly monochrome essay but by going on the journey it has become something else.  The main focus will still be monochrome.  At the end of the day the outcome has always been to produce a set of salt prints form the images and that is still the case.  However, now it will also have a colour element to it.  It maybe that I transfer the digital files to film and then process them as colour prints.  Don’t know haven’t decided yet.  We’ll have to see where the journey takes me.