#NPMonthlyWord September
Hello again and let me start with the obligatory ‘what a month/how this month/time has flown’ greetings. As is customary for the beginning of the month, I’m here to talk about the #NPMontlyWord, which for September was return.
As I’ve said before it’s always difficult about being 100% completely honest in this blog as you never know who’s reading, how they will interpret it and what will come of that. (hello prospective employers, sit down, make yourself comfortable, want a brew?) But for this blog, I’m going to have to give an honest opinion. And that is that I’ve been struggling with the ‘return’ back to school type image I had planned. With hindsight it has was quite difficult idea originally thought of. My thought were along the lines of a classic stock type image that may possibly sell. Part of the problems were my lack of involvement in the whole school thing, think I got caught up in the mood and now here we are.
That’s not to say I haven’t made anything of course and if I do say so myself think I’ve got quite the nice image for the brief, but we’ll see, here’s the images, of which there are seven, although I’m still unsure of a few.
The first image was a combination of weather conditions were just peachy for this type of shot, usually there is all sorts of background distracting paraphernalia, taking your eye away but as the seasons change the weather starts helping out in these types of situations and Voilà, we have the word ‘return’ in an image, yes/no?
The second image is more a literature return and is from a return to a seminal book that I first started reading nearly 30 years ago, this book has hit differently on this read and forced me to return to some principals and thoughts. Realise that this may be a bit of a tenuous link, but such is the impact of this book that I had to include it.
Third image is a return to my long-standing project on the Mancunian Way and the fact that this work had been split between my research practice and NathanPhoto but is now making a return to NathanPhoto again, I believe, slightly tenuous again but it marks a return whether that can be seen in the image is up for discussion.
The fourth image is a new return to project where I’m going to document this space each time I go past, so will be returning to it many times over the next year, this is such a fascinating space to me as now it’s almost completely functionless, the area surrounding it has moved on so much, it’ll be interesting to see its development over the year(s).
The last image is one I’m returning to again as part of assessing my stock photography options as I think this image has a lot to about housing versus entertainment usage in modern cities, think this symbolises my thoughts but I want to see if others see that in the image too, thoughts are to put it out via stock imagery section of the website to see what the reactions are.
The second two, on looking at them again and returning to look at them again do not fit at all but if you read this and would like an original copy of them, signed and numbered then email me somewhere I can send it too and with the email subject line, ‘I spotted it now where’s my free print’ and I’ll sort one out. How’s that?
There we have September’s submission and the winning image for this week has to be number one this time, I think it works well for both the brief of return and the idea of having a slight commercial/possible stock option, we shall see how that goes. It also can work flipped depending on if you read left to right or right to left so that could open up markets possibly? Here’s the winning image for Septembers #NPMonthlyWord.
Number 1 image here
A Plane coming into land at Manchester Airport on a sea of clouds that cover the surrounding landscape.
Great and as ever we’ve talked about images, I will leave you with a quote, with so much reading for my research practice I’ve had so many options but this one shone out as a typical NathanPhoto-esque quote:
“Surrealism and the exotic are as much a part of
the photographer’s kit as an 85mm lens.”
That is by Karen De Perthuis in the essay ‘The Complex World of the Fashion Photograph.’ As Read in the excellent ‘A Companion to Photography edited by Stephen Bull.
Now what does October bring us? A change in seasons, nights drawing in and that lovely light that slings low across situations, highlighting spots you hadn’t seen before mm mm it’s just delicious. The decision for October is a tough one again but I think a double edged one might lead to interesting images so Octobers #NpMonthlyWord is ‘scary’. That word again is ‘scary’
Thank you for reading, any comments, feedback or thought please get me by the usual channels.