Sunset from the rooftops

It's been a couple of weeks now. Almost every day I see people on the roof of a building I know to be broaded up. And of course, I want to get on that roof too.

I made a first attempt on Sunday but unfortunately couldn't find access. In desperation, I decided to email JB, who specialises in shooting London from the rooftops. Perhaps he would have an idea on how to get there.

I met JB at the meeting of my photo group where he persented his work. I chatted to him afterwards and offered a couple of leads of possible places I could use for future shoots. JB kindly offered to meet up to try and find out a way.

First we went to a nearby building and took a few shots from there before having a walk around the Heygate estate. Finally we managed to find hidden access and found ourselves on the roof just in time for sunset. We weren't alone there. Street artists were at work already and other visitors joined us later. It is clearly a popular spot.

That's how I spent an evening on a rooftop with a (straight) guy admiring the views. Romance... (almost)

The images can be viewed on flickr here, while all my heygate images are gathered here.

Another visit to the Heygate

The demolition of the Heygate Estate is apparently soon to begin. Technically it already has, with phase 1 of the project, at the far south east of the site, already flattened for some months. I'm talking about the main building, those big looming slabs of concrete that delimit the site. First they will start by the buildings south of Heygate Street. That should happen by the end of this year. Within 3 years, it should all have gone.

In the meantime, street artists are taking over the place with Southwark Council desparately and ineffectively wasting paint and money to try and keep everything a uniform grey. Urban gardeners, photographers and parkour adepts are also at it and the place though decrepit still welcomes a surprising amount of activity.

Goaded by the sight of people on one of the rooftop, I made my third proper visit to the site yesterday. Sadly, I couldn't figure out how to access that rooftop but I got a few nice shots.

Yesterday's images can be viewed on flickr here, while all my heygate images are gathered here.

Going mobile to find him

Gaydar's new Find Him feature

Apps for smart phones have become all the rage, we all know that. You can get one for just about anything. And while they are an effective tool to reach customers for any brand wanting to appear modern, they do present a big problem for developers and to a point for users: The need to comply with whatever rules the owner of the shop/OS carrying your app decides to impose on content and format.

There are also fears that apps could lead to a ghettoisation of the Web, where it is no longer possible to move easily from one platform to another.

From a gay user's perspective, perhaps the most obvious manifestation of those restrictions on content, are the policies on levels of nudity allowed in geolocated "dating" apps; policies, the implementation of which has been known to be patchy and inconsistant, not to mention, for the developer, (no doubt) costly to enforce and police.

It is therefore interesting and perhaps not altogether surprising that Gaydar, the enduring gay dating website, have decided to complement their current offer with a new mobile version of their website. They launched an app a few years ago, no doubt spurred to do so by the inexorable rise of that other big boy of the gay meet with whom they share more than a few letters in their name: Grindr.

Founded in 1999, Gaydar had for years been cruising (pardon the pun) on its position as leader of the market. Having had a (fallow) profile since 2000 when I moved to London, I can recall very little changing in the look of the site for close to a decade, but eventually, it was time to do something and in recent years some visual changes, perhaps not always altogether successful, have been implemented.

This need for change has been made all the more pressing by the popularisation of smart phones, and eventually a more thorough redesign, an app and now a rebrand (away from their original orangey yellow) and this new mobile site were born unto us.

The mobile site comes with a more user-friendly version of the advanced search of the main website, allowing you to refine your geolocated shopping list for Mr Right, Mr Rightnow or Mr Letsbefriends, down to their age, height or even hair colour. This is a level of selectivity that other players on that scene probably don't offer.

I suspect such level of pickiness will however only be effectively possible in Soho Square on a sunny summer day, Vauxhall around midnight on a Saturday or at a concert of the London Gay Men's Chorus, when your phone is at risk of exploding under the pressure of all the possibilities. Forget it though, if you live in the middle of Shropshire, unless you have a touch of the old wanderlust.

For some unknown reason, Gaydar decided to get in touch with me with a bunch of nice goodies prior to launching the site. In my exchange with them, they seemed very confident that this new "Find Him" feature would allow me to meet my Prince Charming in no time. They would say that, I suppose, and I am sure that many of their users will love twiddling those extra new knobs on their screen, but I am personally not holding my breath. I am as bad at online encounters as offline and I am resigned to the fact that for little old me, as Quentin Crisp used to say, there is no great dark man. Don't let that stop you, though.

Gays are often vaunted as trend-setters. We certainly were the first to get on the smart phone "dating" act. Could this move from Gaydar be the first frisson of some online rebellion against the hegemony of the likes of Apple and Google, and a return towards a more open and free mobile web? It would be nice to think so.

As for Gaydar itself, the fact that it recently passed into new hands may herald even further changes.

Disclaimer: I received a 30-day unlimited membership and several goodies from Gaydar.

Very Personally Trained

VPT. Very Personal Trainer. That's how they call personal trainers at Gymbox, a slightly pretentious chain gyms, a branch of which I joined in October after an office move.

They are not cheap and boast inspiration from the club culture for the decoration (they even have resident DJs) but they were the closest to the new office and the equipments are quite good, I have to admit.

I must have been going to gyms for close to 20 years now (with mixed results, as we know) but I've never had a PT, let alone a VPT. I had never really felt the need. Recently however, with my body apparently finally willing to show signs of reacting to what I was doing to it in the weight room, I started to feel the need for some help to get better results faster.

As luck would have it, two weeks ago, a new contingent of VPTs was unleashed on the unsuspecting members of my gym, all smiles and bulging pecs, hungry to build a client list. Within a week, I attracted the attentions of not one but two personable young men, eager to make my acquaintance, it seemed. Not a situation I am familiar with, by a long stretch.

The first one offered a few bits of advice on shoulder exercises and suggested I request his card at reception and contact him. A couple of days later, a colleague of his approached me and offered to take me through a set of arm exercises, after which he offered a free training session for the following week.

Let's hope I am not again the cause of some resentment like I was for another hitherto friendly VPT who decided to blank me after he saw me taking two free sessions with one of his colleagues.

In any case, the free session with my second suitor came and soon we were discussing, programme, diet and fees...

I am now furnished with a PT, sorry, a VPT, for the next four weeks at least.

And while the exercising shouldn't be a problem, I must confess to some difficulties with the diet I have been given to follow. I am apparently required at eat a kilo of meat everyday, spread over 7 meals. This in addition to multiple eggs and protein shakes. Even when disregarding the cost and practicality of such diet, I don't think I will be able to stuff so much food down my gullet.

I am however being guaranteed results. On Friday, I was even measured and photographed topless for a "before" picture... Watch this space...

The rooftop of the EU: At the top of the Shard

At the beginning of December, I learned via Twitter that the owners of the Shard, the EU's tallest building which has recently being completed, had donated 4000 tickets to access The View from the Shard, the viewing galleries on the 68th and 72nd floors of the giant to Southwark residents. All we had to do was go to our local library with proof of residence and collect our tickets.

I did and this Saturday, a week before the viewing galleries open to the public, I got to admire the views over London. Luckily, after a week of snow, the weather had turn to a more sunny disposition and we were treated to the extra spectacle of window cleaners abseiling the southern side of the building and playing to the gallery.

As can be expected the views over London are unparalleled and my worry, based on the pictures I had seen so far, that we may end up being too high and therefore at the wrong angle were unfounded.

From the entrance on Joiner Street, we queued to have our bags scanned and our picture taken in front of a green screen before taking a lift to the 32nd floor where we got on a second lift to the 67th floor. The lifts, travelling at 6m per second, are very fast and very smooth.

From the 67th floor, we are free to wander to the floors above; the windows directly opposite the lift doors are partially blocked with images of clouds to avoid a bottle neck effect.

An hour and half and several dozen pictures later we made our way back to the ground where we were offered the possility to purchase the picture taken on the way in superimposed on a view of the city from the top. Prices seem to vary according to the options available by £20 seems to be what people are being asked for this.

There is a small souvenir shop on the 67th floor and a bigger one on the ground floor. It's quite clear that the owners are gearing up to milk the opportunity as much as possible. Tickets are £25 if you book online, £30 if you book in person and £100 if you book on the day!

For those not willing to pay so much another option may soon become available on the 31st floor, where the lobby of a posh restaurant will offer viewing opportunities. They plan on enforcing a cover charge to deter tourists but it may still be cheaper.

Otherwise the staff were very friendly (though they may get tired very quickly in repeating the same things all the time) and it's good that the visit does not seem to be time limited.

Of course I brought my camera with me. My images can be viewed on flickr here.

Bye Bye Instagram

Last night, The news that Instagram has decided to assume ownership of the content generated by its users with the view of possibly selling it on and make money from it spread through Facebook and Twitter like wild fire.

The change to the terms of use of the popular instant photography app took place very discreetly (if one excepts the online backlash already brewing). As a user I wasn't even aware that any change had occurred. And there is no option to opt out other than by deleting your account. We have kindly been given a month's notice to decide.

Instagram, which is now owned by Facebook, implementing a strategy familiar to its new parent company, is, it seems, already backpedaling, telling the BBC that "the updated policy will not change how it handles photo ownership or who is able to see a user's pictures". It's apparently all to do with better Facebook integration.

As far as I am concerned the damage is done, though, and I have decided to leave the app, as shown by my last post, reproduced above.

I started using the app at the end of March this year, out of curiosity rather than from a real urge to do so. To my surprise I did enjoy the experience and have found it somehow liberating. I got to experiment with the square format which I have grown to like and though I tend to use filters with moderation, they do sometimes help create some interesting effects.

In those eight months or so, I have gathered 252 followers, followed 43 people and uploaded 435 images.

Due to my enjoyment of the medium, I was a little reluctant to delete my account but, as luck would have it, Flickr, where I've had a paying account for several years, just happened to release its new app this week. It looks very good indeed and it includes Instagram-like functions (social media sharing, filters). This finally swayed me.

As one of my contact pointed out, deleting my account without really knowing how the new ToS would be implemented could appear to be a knee-jerk reaction. After all, Instagram may not actually plan to sell our images (most of which are probably not salable anyway) and even if they did, the chances of my own images being chosen are pretty slim.

However, beyond the facts that Instagram has recently been plagued by a lot of spam, that it is not really easy to see your images outside the app (ie online), and that I rather do like the idea of having all my images in the same place, there is a matter of principle at hand here.

For a company to lure people to entrust it with their images and at some point turn around and say that from now on that company will own those images and make money out of them is simply astounding and should not be allowed to happen unchallenged.

Things may have been different if that transfer of ownership had always been there or if they were offering to share the proceed of the potential sales. As it is they would be profiteering from the vision of other people without offering any real compensation.

This is simply not right and this is why I am saying goodbye to Instagram and I hope many others will do the same.

Update (18/12/12 - 22:39): Instagram's co-founder has released a statement explaining that it was all a big misunderstanding. Fair enough. For it's too late though, I won't come back. Because of it's limitations I don't feel a particularly strong brand loyalty to Instagram, certainly not as strong as the one I feel for flickr, which is now offering what I was getting from Instagram without any worry of future cock-ups. So Flickr, it is. It's good that content producers have been perceived to win though in this story. That should make other company think a bit harder before make similar moves in the future. fingers crossed.

Photoshoot - Ross

During the summer I stumbled on a photographic exhibition installed over the 21 floors of an empty office block in Vauxhall. I have to admit I didn't pay much attention to the exhibition so focused was I on the fabulous views of London I had been given access to. I was lucky to have my camera with me, and of course I took loads of pictures.

Having visited the website of the exhibition's organisers, I had discovered that they would be back with a different set of images in December and so, thinking this was too good an opportunity to miss, and despite not knowing if the set up would be similar, I decided to take the chance and bring a model with me for a spot of guerrilla photography.

Ross had never modelled before and was introduced to me by Mark, one of my previous victims, but he took to it like a fish to water. He's even asked for more, so watch this space.

We did get access to the top floor and the views, and it was a beautiful, light day out there, but we couldn't get to the roof. There were also issues with lighting. Knowing This could be a problem, I had brought parts of my lighting kit. Unfortunately, power had been cut off in most of the building and none of the plugs seemed to work. While I did manage to get some decent shots, the experience didn't completely fulfill my expectations. Something not uncommon in life, I hear...

The images can be viewed on Flickr, here.

But is it art: A visit to the Klein + Moriyama exhibition at Tate Modern

This afternoon, thanks to a friend's generosity, I went to see the William Klein + Daido Moriyama exhibition currently being shown at Tate Modern. As the photographer I am striving to become, I found what I saw very thought provoking. 

I was totally ignorant of either artist before entering the rooms of the exhibition and I only recognised one image of all those that where on display, yet I didn't find myself in totally unfamiliar territory.

Perhaps due to the influence that those two photographers have had on our modern visual landscape, I found myself pointing out the Instagram-like qualities of several decade-old pictures. I was also pleasantly surprised to look at images, the sisters of which, by virtue of their subjects and compositions, adorn my flickr photostream.

I am currently at a point where, trying to take a more serious approach to photography, I am strongly questioning the quality of my output. A few of my pictures are reasonably good but I feel that the vast majority are mediocre at best. I am confident of my eye for composition but I feel let down by the technical side of things much too often.

I approached today's visit as a means to further my reflection on my own work by looking at that of recognised fellow practitioners of the art (however pompous that sounds).

It didn't really help.

It was amusing to see books on the rules of photography on sales at the end of the exhibition when it is evident that for Klein and Moriyama rules were made to be broken. I can't help but wonder however if they went too far in that direction.

For me, too many of the works on display were blurred, too grainy, and not particularly well composed. I can certainly admit to regularly deleting many of those shots from my own camera. Perhaps this is where I am going wrong!

A random selection of Moriyama's 1972 work (Farewell Photography) only slightly made more unclear by my cameraphone.

This display of what seemed shoddy photographic work, nothing more than bad snapshots, felt at times like disrespect toward the viewer and toward other photographers who work hard to add technical quality to the artistic merit of their work. 

Hanging next to those images were also beautifully composed, razor-sharp shots; testaments to the artists' technical abilities. This was particularly striking in Moriyama's 1980s close ups, towards the end of the exhibition.

That the artists released those images proves that they were happy with how they looked and what they expressed but I was led to question what makes a "good image"; the eternal "my five year old could do just as well" dilemma. If it is at all possible to define one, which yard-stick can we use to measure the quality of a photograph? 

Has it to do with the technical qualities of the image; how sharp and well-lit it is? Has it to do solely with the subject? Has it to do with the artist's creative decision only ("this is a good picture" and so it is)? Is it a mixture of all this?

Or has it to do with the fame of artist? The cynic in me can't help but wonder how the public would consider the same shots if they weren't on display in one of the world's major art galleries, claimed by a recognised photographer.

The viewing figures of my more unorthodox output on flickr (which doesn't resemble what I say today), seem to indicate that such images generally elicit little interest.

Of course much of art's appreciation is highly subjective but it is one thing for an artist to decide that one particular piece is of value, and it is quite another to convince other people that this is the case and to build the type of consensus (however limited) enjoyed by renowned artists. 

Most probably it is only a measure of my own limitations that I failed to see merit in so many images displayed in that show.

Unfortunately, there were no answers along with all those questions I stumbled upon today and I am possibly even more confused than I was before. I am going to have to carry on looking for them and hopefully have fun creating interesting images in the process...