Urban Gold | Weekly Photo #120
Last week, after feeling a little uninspired with my photography, I decided to leave my heavy bag at home and head into London, a city I love to photograph and walk my favourite route along the Thames. Taking with me my Fujifilm X-T30 camera and 23mm f/2 prime lens, I took a walk with this lightweight setup along the South Bank from Tower Bridge to the Tate Modern museum and then across to St Paul’s.
It’s such a popular stretch of the river and I’ve photographed it hundreds of times, taking in the iconic views as well as seeking out some of the less obvious angles and vantage points. During this visit, I headed out before and after work, walking in opposite directions snapping away as I went. I ended up with quite a few photos that day and I’ve decided to share some of them across two on-location blog posts over the next week or two. So, keep an eye out for those.
Fujifilm X-T30 | XF23mm F2 | 23mm | 1/280th Second | f/5.6 | ISO160
Starting off at More London, near Tower Bridge, I wandered along the river and absolutely couldn’t pass by London Bridge without hopping on and photographing this famous view of Tower Bridge and HMS Belfast. I’ve shared a couple of photos from here in previous weekly photo blogs. Read more about them by selecting clicking on one of the photos below.
#55 FOGGY LONDON
#64 LONDON’S BURNING
There was a slight haze in the air and with the sun being up for around 45 minutes, it was just high enough to cast this beautifully defused golden light across the scene. It was just magical to witness and with the relative pre-rush our quiet, I was reminded why this is by far my favourite time to be in the city.
In terms of composition, I like the texture in the water far more than the featureless sky, so I placed the horizon in the upper half of the frame to avoid including too much empty space. I also paid close attention to the position of HMS Belfast in relation to Tower Bridge, making sure it lined up centrally between the towers to avoid any overlapping, keeping that area clean and ensure it stood out over there in the distance.
Next, the exposure. I decided not to bracket any of my photos as I wanted to keep things nice and simple during this photo outing so with the bright sun just off to the left of this scene, I focused on the highlights, allowing them to clip just a little in the brightest area close to the sun rendering the overall photo a little underexposed which could be sorted out later in post. With the sun being the brightest thing you’ll ever see, allowing it to clip (render white in the photo) is ok in my book as long as it looks natural.
With the composition and exposure all set, I took the shot.
As I mentioned, I have a bunch of photos from my day in London that I plan to share this week but, in the meantime, here’s a post from last year when I took my small Fujifilm X-T30 camera and 35mm prime combo out, following a similar route along the Thames at sunrise.
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.