images from the top of a London bus // Street

The website http://www.ftud.net/ (From the upper deck) which is where the general public can post images that they have taken from the top deck of a London bus. This is what the current top post looks like.

I took inspiration from this website by taking images of what was happening and what I could see whilst I was on the top deck of a London bus. The bus we caught was from Oxford Circus to Trafalgar Square, so this meant that we were going along the main tourist spots - therefore there was always something happening and you could get some quite interesting photos by doing this. The images that I took are below.

This image has been taken along Oxford Street of busy shoppers. Each of the people within this image are all doing the same activity, but are all looking in different directions, walking at different speeds, all having different facial expressions adorning their face; this then conveys that each person is completing the same activity in different ways, the viewer could then want to know what each subject is thinking and where exactly they are destined to. You can also see how each person is tolerating the rain and what they are doing to divert it from landing atop of their heads, but the image suggests that most people don't mind about the rain or that they just don't have an umbrella or hood on them. Each subject have been to different shops but they have all come together in this image to complete the same activity just at different places within the same street.

 This image shows the speed that the bus was travelling at while I was trying to take pictures. It also portrays the idea of the amount of people that walk on Oxford Street everyday, which is a significant amount. One of the things I quite like about this image is that with it being quite blurred, you can therefore see all loads of bright colours coming through within the image. It also gives the effect that since it was raining, everyone was attempting to run in the opposite way of which the bus was going to try and get shelter and keep dry, but also they could be trying to get their shopping on Oxford Street done quite quickly.

 I am quite happy with this image that I took as you can clearly see textures and tones running through it, this has been created through the light and the rain that was happening when I took the image. Another thing that I quite like about this image is the idea that my DSLR camera has auto-focused on the black bar of the bus stop, by doing this it looks almost as if this image has been made up of two different images of the top of the bus stop and the underneath part of the bus stop where the three people are sitting. The three people sat at the bus stop are bundled up in warm clothes and are looking incredibly fed up waiting for their bus, each of them has a slightly different facial expression adorning their facial features - this then helps to communicate that each of the people are as bored as each other but are still different people in their own right. With the camera having auto-focused on the black bar, this has made it so the three people aren't totally in focus in the image, this has therefore created more of an effect that the viewer is then looking down at the people. Each of the three people are looking in different directions, which then makes the viewer wonder what they're looking at; then adding their individual facial expressions to this concept, it then makes you wonder what each of the people are thinking about.

                                                                                                                                  I find this image that I took quite striking and powerful for a number of reasons. Firstly, when I took this image I managed to capture lines going through the image which I am pleased with; these lines are the edge of the bus window, and a line of Barclay's cycle hire bikes which are commonly known as 'Boris Bikes'. The 'Boris Bikes' add an interesting effect to the image by them all being in a line and all having their back wheels featuring the light blue Barclays trademark colour, so they can have an advertising panel on it's rear wheel. Towards the upper right corner of the image there are a multitude of people's personal bikes bundled up together against a few street bike racks, this has been done by the bike owners to protect their cycles against theft. This is powerful and striking because there is that line of 'Boris Bikes', the across the road from them is people's personal bikes; this conveys that bikes is a significant form of transport for Londoners, it could also convey to the viewer that bicycles is one of the main focus' of the image. Also going through the image are a few roads, this then adds to the idea of transport of bicycles as they are all situated around a few roads, which would be the suspected area for them to be kept along public roads.