Title • on the seafront

John (shotsphotography.co.uk) came over to Blackpool the other day but I didn't have time to go shooting with him as I was laying our new kitchen flooring. He was only out for a couple of hours but he managed to take some wonderful portraits that I've been marvelling at over the last few days. Anyway, my reason for mentioning John and his recent work is that it finally decided me that I desperately need to take more portraits and that I need to go out and engage with people.

So here's my first attempt.

Part way between the North pier and the Central pier is a bandstand, of sorts, that's the hangout for a group of skateboarders and other teenagers. So today, instead of walking past in search of something innanimate to shoot, I decided to stop and talk instead. What I forgot to do was ask their names, but I did give them the url so perhaps they'll stop by and introduce themselves.

Oh, and a few people have emailed me asking me how I produce my black and white shots. In this case it was simply a matter of using Hue/Saturation to desaturate the image after which I applied a Curves adjustment layer to slightly boost the midtones in the red and green channels.

4.33pm on 22/7/05

Canon 20D

EF 17-40 f/4L USM

31mm (50mm equiv.)

f/5.6

1/200

aperture priority

+0.0 (-2/3 FEC)

evaluative

100

580EX

RAW

C1 Pro

minor