After the walk around the zoo I headed into the town and dropped off my umbrella and big winter coat. I’d had these on as it was freezing and throwing it down with rain when I first got out of the car. I ended up carrying the brolly awkwardly around the zoo as it wasn’t needed and the sun came out a little.
Once the brolly and coat were back in the car I headed up to the main shopping areas to take some street photography and see if I could find any interesting structures.
Up the street from the Malt Shovel pub where I had parked was a building that once was Dudley Fire Station and is now a technical college. The red doors and the fact that red buses were pulling up outside it caught my attention so I stopped to make a couple of images.
Market Street
There was an outdoor market that was covered with Blue & Yellow covers and there were a couple of stalls left with people behind and selling products from vegetables to DVDs and old collectable coins and stamps. There were a couple of people in here that sounded proper Black Country so I snapped a few as I was walking around. There were some people who were experiencing homelessness by the look of it but I don’t tend to capture images like this unless there is a reason.
Concrete
A building housing Halifax and Cash Converters caught my eye as a lovely bit of concrete with non-flat windows, almost bay-like. The light and sky reflected in the windows was really pleasing and I wish now that I’d walked up to it square on and captured the frontage from directly underneath it, I think that would have been a much better, less cluttered shot.
As I continued to walk around, I was setting up photos and capturing scenes on my 35mm film camera (Leica M6) and on my digital mirrorless (leica Q3). I like to notice old style building works and this next photo reminded me of the construction of my old school which is in the process of being demolished as I write this. The yellow parts of the glazing initially sparked my interest and I then spotted the old concrete building next door. What I like about the floors above the Infinity shop is that the windows are leaning forwards for no reason other than to fit in with the aesthetic at the time the building was constructed.
From this scene I like the way that the upper window is reflecting a cloud and blue sky whilst having a jagged hole smashed through it. The lower window reflects the blue and yellow market stall covers whilst the adhesive silicone holding the wood over another smashed pane of glass creates a disordered game of GO or Othello.
The main shopping street in Dudley town centre does contain some marvellous examples of great named shops, as do the streets off the main drag. A good example of this with people strolling past is EXTRA MEGA BARGAINS. It does what it says on the tin I guess and the fact that there are many of these style of stores around must be representative of the economy of the area.
Reflections
Still wandering around pretending I know where I’m going and walking away from the main street I found the following building with a lovely concrete blocked frontage, similar to what I’d seen on the front of the Tokyo Science Museum in January. The building looked a little less cared for and some of the concrete was painted white, while the neighbouring part above the music shop remained in the bare state. I took a couple of images and then spotted a large puddle that I might be able to make use of. Sharif and Sons looks to be a one stop shop for lots of people and it seemed very busy.
Past here I carried on ambling along and eventually found a bridge with a spiral stair case that looks like it’s been around for a few years linking the Churchill Shopping Centre to the Flood Street area. I really struggled to get a photo that I was happy with off these spirals, the further I stood back, the messier it looked and the closer I got the more uninteresting it looked.
Tired Architecture
Walking up some of the other streets in the area I found another old shopping centre that looked the worse for wear and was obviously state of the art at the time. The covering of the walls looks like small mosaic pieces made up into large panels, but some are missing and looking ragged. Other parts of the taller building look to be in various states of disrepair and all the windows have been covered over in the top most levels with boards. It still holds a charm to me though and there is a lovely mosaic of a four sided cross with circles that looks like it must be the original logo of the shop or the name of the complex when it was originally built.
You can just see in the left side of this image that there is a big YOW on the wall of the taller building and as I walked up there I spotted the wonderful eye-catching colours that existed there. I was asked by a guy sitting on the floor outside the shop for some food or drink but politely declined. Then one of his mates arrived so as I was taking photos of this building I was keeping an eye open to the whereabouts of these chaps. Probably not required, but if I have someone come and stand close to me I am always on edge ready to make a run for it. It is a concern carrying around expensive camera equipment so I’m always on my guard. It doesn’t matter who it is, but if my spidey sense starts tingling I don’t tend to ignore it. I can keep an eye on behind me whilst using the Q3 as I can see a reflection in the viewfinder or on the LCD screen.
The difference between film and digital. Here we can see above the digital shot and the film photo beneath. There isn’t that much between the photos but the film image seems a little warmer to me.It might be something to do with the way that AG Photolab have scanned it, but I do like this image.
This sort of image is the reason why I don’t wholly shoot B&W, I would miss out on these details if I was restricted. On top of the coloured walls I’ve got an unusual tiny car parked near and older type of lamp post, with the uncared for building rising above the street level. This and the Dudley Fire Station Photo are probably two of my favourites from the day.
Still Life
Just up the hill from here was the corner building called Provision House, and it looked like an old style department store, but all of the windows were covered with a wire mesh. It is a charity hub that provides for people less well off and looks to be a wonderful enterprise to help out local folk. As I was walking past the frating covered windows I looked in and noticed a scene that was reminiscent of an old still life painting so I altered my aperture to around 6.3 to avoid getting the mesh in the photograph.
It could almost be a painting and I loved the overall aesthetic of it as the items on the table do not automatically tie together in terms of styles, but then I’m not an interior designer or anything. The two edges of armchairs visible were mismatched and reminded me of a nursing home or similar.
Another Car Park?
After a quick visit to the local Wetherspoons for a can of Guinness zero and the use of a toilet I started thinking about heading back to the car, and I walked past an underground car park which look dark and brooding. There were no signs to tell me not to wander in so away I went. In through the front and down a small ramp that to the side was stacked up with lots of rubbish and a pile of pigeon shit so high it was unbelievable, I know pigeon droppings can be bad for your health so I slowed my breathing down a little.
A guy was reversing his vehicle so I kept out of the way and then wandered in and set up a few images, that kind of fitted in with my Liminal Space ponderings last academic year.
As I was bending down to get a lower angle on the keep clear and arrows into the corner someone spoke to me from very close by. I hadn’t seen anyone come in through any doors or down the ramp so it made me jump a little, and no I didn’t see them in the reflections in the viewfinder. It wa a security guard who startled me and he was wondering what I was doing in this car park, I explained that I’m a photographer and showed him the photo I had just taken and he was trying to usher me out. He said that he’d waved at me from his car when I walked into the garage and he thought I’d seen him, but I hadn’t. The photos from this spot are very pleasing to me also, I love the arrows all pointing upwards with a warning on the deck that advises us to not hang around here, and when I was walking out after the brief chat with the guard I spotted the light and the double arrows on the ramp so I stopped to snap a couple here. I also shot a couple on film here too. In the film version beneath there is a shot with the cars in the background too, and they are only red and white vehicles which aligned with the colours of the arrows on the pillars. I was pleased with this photo too.
It was time to head back to the car as the town was virtually empty now and I’d lost my mojo a little so I hopped into the car and then remembered that Dudley wasn’t far from Halesowen.
Halesowen
I drove over and parked easily in the Cornbow Multi-storey car park then had a wander around to see if there were any decent buildings around. Another great name for a shop “More Bargain Store” was awaiting me between the Cancer Research Shop and the TSB Bank. A woman in red walked past after I waited for a while but again it’s another shop that would look right at home at a Sunday Market on a car park somewhere, Hi Vis jackets and luggage for sale as well as a couple of buckets of umbrellas.
There were not many people around in the town centre, the shopping centre was a bit quiet but I found that another car park here was nearby. It was a car park that I’d seen in a couple of photos from Noah on last year’s course, with the angular concrete structures atop the highest level.
Another Multi-Storey
When I got to the car park I jumped in the lift, which was a bit odorous and then pressed the level 4 button, only for it to be unresponsive. I went o level one and then alighted with a view to go up the stairs. The stairs were blocked off with big wire gates and the same was true of the ramps upwards too. There seemed to be no way of getting to the top so I spent some time exploring the lower levels, found a couple of floor tubes that were flashing, so I did a couple of 15 second videos, it’s something I’m doing at the moment when I come across a flashing / faulty light.
I climbed into the centre of the spiral ramps and pointed the camera upwards to capture some of the circular features of the concrete structure. I took a few photos of the upper layers from below and then went back into the lower decks.
Once I’d finished in the car park I headed back to the car and took a few photos on the way, mainly opportunistic images, and a couple to document exactly where I was. I also saw my first Black Country flag in the wild in the Cornbow shopping centre on my way to the top level again. There were a few hung around the fences on balconies over the shopping centre. I can’t believe I didn’t see many of these all throughout the day.
Once back in the car I banged a podcast on (Hannah Fry’s google Deep Mind Podcast) and made my way back home.
Film Studies
I’ve included a couple of the film shots in the above post, shot on Kodak Ultramax 400 in my Leica M6 with a 35 mm Voigtlander Nokton Classic 35mm f/1.4 lens. I sent the film to AG Photolab on Monday whilst out with the group taking Off Camera Flash shots and then on Saturday I had an email via Wetransfer to download the scans. Only when I opened up the files there were lots of different photos, but none of them mine. They were images of someone travelling in Asia and meeting what looked like their family, before going into a New York subway train and then a random shot of my home town from a high spot by Shrewsbury School. It was definitely not my film so I informed AG and they resolved it pretty swiftly, sending me the scans for my film.
The photos came out ok in the end and there are a couple that I like, that I’ve included above but also a few of the multi-storey that I haven’t included. You can see the lightroom version of a contact sheet here below. These will be good, along with my digitals, for the first shoot of my project to fit the brief presented by Sam, “The Matter Of The Black Country” I’ll discuss with him as we get together for a tutorial on Monday.
Reflection on trip
Dudley and Halesowen were very good places to visit for some of my style of photography. I’ve never been to either place before in my entire 51 years of life so it was all new to me. There were some lovely old buildings and some that were falling apart and slowly becoming more dilapidated.
There were some good characters around on the streets for candid street portraits but there were not enough to be able to walk along shooting at will. I had to physically aim at people, walk that way and then grab an image whilst there. There were no points when anyone got angry with me for taking a photo but I was nervous once when there were a couple of guys who seemed to be aiming at me.
In terms of the Black Country, there were not many signs of the old industry that used to dominate the skyline all of those years ago and the older buildings in the towns were refurbished and turned into apartments like the old Dudley police station or the technical college in the old Fire Station. There were still some of the old buildings that I enjoy seeing in and around town centres and the names of the street represented som eof the important people from history or some of the old occupations but not much to see in terms of the old industries.
The shops around the town centres were all similar, bargain stores, coffee shops, charity shops and barber shops. It seems that the town centres of many towns around the country are struggling and these fill in businesses are starting to become ubiquitous.
In terms of the people, there were smartly dressed people and one man who didn’t have a shirt on under his mac. Rich and poor people move through the same areas but there is a feeling that more economically challenged people are visible. It appears that the employment rates have increased according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS) but I wonder what industries people are now working within.
There were not so many of the big name chain stores around in the town centre, such as would be seen in Birmingham or other cities, and it looks a bit grey and depressing.
The heavy industry for which the Black Country is well known, doesn’t appear to be anywhere to be seen. Just converted old buildings, run down buildings, and areas that could do with a bit of investment to get the people back again. The Zoo and Castle are always busy and I think that this brings in some good money for the local authorities, but some of this also looks a bit tired and in need of further TLC.
In terms of my photographs from the day trip, I had some good photos of car parks, either underground or multi storey, and also a few photos from shops or people that show the state of the place and the manner of the people who live here.
Busy Times
Next on my list of places to go shooting is West Bromwich which will likely be in a couple of weeks as my wife and I will be away for a few days to use up some of our holidays. I’ve also got a presentation to finish writing before tomorrow night so that it is ready for a trip to Bingley Camera Club in Yorkshire on Monday to discuss my Car Park Zine and also the other urban photography opportunities that have come my way since getting further into photography.
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