Beacon | Weekly Photo #57
A couple of weeks ago, I made my first trip back into London after the lockdown started to ease here in the UK. It was a slightly odd experience as the city was still quiet and void of commuters and overseas tourists. From what I could tell, those that were wandering about, enjoying the gorgeous weather seemed to be mostly made up of locals enjoying this rare and unusual time where they can have the entire city all to themselves.
Fujifilm XT2 | XF16mm F2.8 | 16mm | 1/60th Second | f/10 | ISO200
As I arrived at London Bridge Station, it was still pretty early so I decided to have a wander around the Square Mile with my Fujifilm XT2 camera and FX16mm f2.8 prime lens. So, off I went across London Bridge into the financial district and to quote the famous words of Björk, it was “Oh so quiet!”. If it were a Sunday, I’d think nothing of it as this part of the city is normally quiet on the weekend but on a Monday evening, this area should have been a hive of activity with city workers spilling out of their offices and either heading home or to the local bars and pubs. Snapping the odd pic along the way, I continued to St Paul’s Cathedral, then across the river, past the Tate Modern and arrived back at More London just as the sun was going down. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t thinking too much about making photographs while I walked, I was just soaking up the sunshine and enjoying being back in my favourite city after being away for so long.
On my way back along the river, I noticed The Shard had turned on its blue light in recognition of the NHS and keyworker’s efforts on the front line during the pandemic and it’s then that I decided that if I took just one good photo during this visit to London, it had to be of The Shard, with its blue beacon of light representing the heroes acting as beacons for all of us.
To get the photo I wanted, I had to time it right. I wasn’t necessarily after a night shot but taken too early and the blue light against the blue sky wouldn’t stand out enough so I waited for another 10 to 15 minutes after the sun had set before I took the shot. I chose a composition I know works quite well with the wider 16mm focal length as it takes advantage of the sweeping lines of the rail which leads the viewer around the image to The Shard and up to the light on top.
The biggest challenge I had was the light on the pole in the centre of the frame (I’m sure it has a name). With a well-exposed photo, the light was so bright, it was totally burnt out of the frame and I couldn’t recover any detail at all in post. Knowing this would be an issue, I decided to take a separate, underexposed image and during the editing stage, blended just the light into this frame so it didn’t look like a bright white blob in the centre of the image.
I really like how this image has turned out. The slightly desaturated tones, the strong lead-in lines, the subtle light reflecting on the rail and most importantly, the way this photo is my own small tribute to the heroes that stepped up during these difficult times.
Until next week.
Trevor
This post is featured in my Weekly Photo series where I post a new photo every Monday. To have this delivered directly to your inbox, you can subscribe to the mailing list here.