The New Year

Hello and welcome to the year round up of what happened in the year 2024 with my photography. Like the 2023 blog I will be splitting this into a few parts as there is a lot to cover. In this multi part series I will cover

Part 1:

First trip up to London (with my broken foot)
Heading down to New Forest for a small weekend away
A few more trips to London (of course)

Getting some new lenses

Part 2:

Taking a very lengthy walk along the River Thames
Heading down to the south coast to two seaside destinations
Visiting a motor museums and also a very beautiful location along the coast
A short weekend away to Oxford

Part 3:

Heading back to the airshow (RIAT)
Taking a trip down to Devon for a wedding/visiting some new museums
I won’t be covering it in full as I will make a separate blog about it but my two week trip to California.
TBC as I don’t know what else could be happening this year for me and my photography

A New Chapter

The New Year began and we welcomed 2024. We left off with that I had a broken foot in the middle of December which wasn’t ideal and did put a damper on me doing any sort of photography. I did make my way to London very slowly on my boot, I was celebrating New Years with my partner for the first time which was very exciting.

The next morning we went for a little walk to grab some McDonald's breakfast because thats what you do after New Years. While we out I started to take my first photos of the new year. This is something I haven’t done since going into the year of 2020 (just before the pandemic).

I was debating on writing this or not into this blog but I felt like I wanted to. The beginning of 2024 was a very difficult start to my family, my dad was currently (1st January) in the Royal Marsden Chelsea Hotel fighting a very strong battle. I hadn’t seen him since he went into hospital (19th December 2023) but I wanted to try and cheer him up while and took him our mascot to get him through this really hard fight.

During my journey up to see him which was in South Kensington I captured some photos which then got put into the category of my favourite photos of all time which is crazy as this was day one of the New Year. The photo that will appear soon is the last photo that I ever got to show my dad.

On Saturday 6th January 2024 my dad passed away peacefully at the Royal Marsden. His life for me will forever continue through all the passions he had. He really loved nature and nature photography he always enjoyed when I came back and took pictures of the beautiful wildlife. I just wanted to take a moment to remember my dad, the love and support he always gave me through everything in life with me and supporting my passions of being a photographer. Thank you!

50th birthday adventure to the west coast of the USA.

The first set of photos are some from my little walk in the morning on New Years day. Then after is my journey up to see my dad and capturing some of my favourite photos of all time.

As many of you know I do love the London Underground, it’s not something I do choose to use every time I go to London as I always like to walk around the city, but I do love taking pictures of the roundels and something I have been doing more recently is taking pictures of station names to keep a pictorial evidence of which ones I have visited. There has been a style which you will see that I have adopted more when it comes to taking pictures of these different station names on the Underground line.

Around where my partner lives there are plenty of flats and apartments and has a very modern theme to them. I really like the different designs of the buildings that are adjacent to the river. Like this building above and see the curves leading up and around
Date-1st Januray 2024

Of course I was using my trusty 24-105mm lens to capture these photos, like I have stated before it is my go to lens for anything really as this can capture more on the wider angle and then has a bit of a tele zoom to it as well.
There was this really cool cloud base which looked like some sort of force field area between the ground and the sky.
Date-1st Januray 2024

My favourite photo of the day and my favourite photo of the year, now I do understand that this is day one of the New Year but in the case of writing this (July 13th 2024) it is my favourite photo of the year, or is it??
I slowed down the shutter speed so I could capture the motion of the underground as it was pulling into the station. I made sure that when I edited this photo I would focus on the centre subject which is the roundel. It is a photo that I am very proud of and I don’t say that too often about my photos but this one defiantly takes it for me (no pun intended)
This photo also has a lot of meaning behind it as this was the last photo I ever showed my dad before he passed. He saw the unedited one which still looked alright but he never got to see the final edit. I remember sitting by his bed and showing him this photo and he put his thumb up (as he couldn't speak). It has instantly gone into my favourite photo of all time, both for the look of the photo and also the emotions as well that roll with it.
Date-1st Januray 2024

I captured it again while the train was slowing down (on burst mode) but of course having this roundel made it the perfect opportunity to make it a ‘hint of colour’. Focusing on the colour of the rounded and also the bench too and keeping everything else black and white.
Date-1st Januray 2024

The third photo from the burst is when the train came to a complete stop and the doors opened. When I look back on it I have had three different editing colours to each photo but also that woman who was standing on the right hadn’t moved at all. This photo for me feels more film like than many other photos ive taken.
Date-1st Januray 2024

Due to the limitations of me walking in a boot because of my broken foot and the passing of my dad, photography slowed down a bit as we as a family was processing the tragic passing. We did have something to try and take our minds off a little bit. As part of my mums Christmas present I planned to take my mum, brother and I to the Disney 100 exhibition located at the ExCel Centre. As the three of us are big Disney fans this was a perfect day out. I won’t included any of the photos from the day, with the limitations of not having a low aperture lens I had to increase the ISO which meant bringing in noise. Luckily the new Lightroom feature means that you can take away the noise which then ended up working for a lot of the photos. It was something different that ive not really captured before but I enjoyed it.

Another trip to the capital

Having London on your doorstep is very handy and such a blessing, so much to see and do around the capital. My mum had to take a trip up to London for a medical appointment and I offered to go with her. This meant that I could bring my camera with me and capture a small amount of photos while she was in the appointment.

We start off with this photo, a photo that I will never take again. This is the Royal Marsden located near South Kensington Underground station. This photo is also dedicated to the amazing team at the Marsden who put 100% effort in each day looking after so many people including my dad. The team was amazing to him and our family up to the last minuets before he passed. This is a photo that I do hold dearly to my heart and the a huge thank you for the amazing team at the Marsden when looking after my dad not just for the short period in hospital but actually his whole cancer journey.
Date-31st Januray 2024

As some of you know and some may not, I am really into cars, I love old and new cars. Spotting them around in London on the street and finding a way to capture the car in its beautiful state. This car was in a beautiful colour and I think I have taken a picture of this car but in a different colour. Setting the aperture to ƒ4 so I could get a bit of blurrier background while having the car as my subject. In editing I added a bit more texture and clarity to it so you could see the lines of the car.
Date-31st Januray 2024

Turned around the corner and noticed a beautiful old Rolls Royce located outside of a posh London hotel. The very wide front and long bonnet of the car it just reminds me of the Rolls Royce from the Thunderbirds and I am expecting Parker to come out and start driving this one.
You can see from the chrome front an outline of me taking this picture

It still surprise me to this day how many telephone boxes are still around on the London streets. How many that are working is another question but they always make for good photography. Id say if you are in London and you're a photographer or not always grab a picture of the telephone box.
The ‘Hint of Colour’ was an instant when I took this photo and I didn’t just want the one telephone box to be in colour I wanted to have both as you can see through the first one to the second one.
Date-31st Januray 2024

I jumped on the Underground at Gloucester Road but before that I wanted to try again with the horizontal photo and trying a bit of symmetry. What would have made this photo perfect symmetry is to have a bench on the other side but apart from that this photo I do also really love. Quite a few of these style of photos I really love doing. Really focusing on the roundel to make sure that was in the centre part of the frame.
This was shot at 70mm, aperture ƒ4, shutter speed 1/60 and ISO 2000
Date-31st Januray 2024

Zooming back out to 50mm really capturing the length of the station. I was waiting to have a subject walk into my photo, it was my plan all along. I took a burst just to see which one would be best for me, I didn’t like one where he walked in the middle of the roundel as I really wanted to still have that shown.
Date-31st Januray 2024

Talking of symmetry this is a perfect example of just that. I caught the train and went two stations down to Sloane Square. I walked back over to the other side and captured this photo of the station roundel and the things around it. What really makes this a good symmetry photo is the two posters to each side, the name of the station and way outside signs at the top. When taking these types of photos I really find the sweet spot of getting it in the centre frame.
Date-31st Januray 2024

Finally another rounded that I haven’t captured a picture of. This is one of the last remaining ones I needed to capture as I have the Undergound, DLR, Overground, Taxi, River Cruise, Superloop as well. The coaches is located at London Victoria station. You can catch a coach to basically anywhere in the UK.
Date-31st Januray 2024

While on the bus back to London Waterloo station (recommend the 211 bus from South Kensington to Waterloo) you drive past some very famous spots in London and this being one which is Westminster Abby but not just that you will also see Big Ben as well. We stopped as you do in London and I was able to capture this shot of the three famous landmarks located near each other
-London Eye
-Big Ben
-Westminster Abby
It was a greyish day which for winter is usually natural, but I knew when I wanted to edit this photo I wanted to make it a bit more gloomy and dark. This is when I was using the dark cine present to make it a bit more film like. Most photos I tend to edit I use a more earthy toned one but I didn’t like that present or black and white.
Date-31st Januray 2024

Using the same preset I wanted to make Big Ben look more film like and have that gloomy grey sky behind as well. Using the masking tool on Lightroom I made the sky darker so I could have Big Ben pop more out in the picture.
Date-31st Januray 2024

Into the Forest

February came around and a few days after the funeral I was heading to the New Forest with my partner for a romantic weekend away. This was a time for both of us to relax and for me to be distracted as well. We took a drive through the forest and stayed in a really beautiful go cabin in a near by forest. On the Saturday we took a trip down to the coast to the beautiful seaside town of Bournemouth. It had been a while since I went there but I was very much looking forward to revisiting. The Saturday turned out to be really sunny and semi warm which was really nice and which meant we could also enjoy a cheeky ice cream.

Pile of logs waiting to be used for either log burning fires in the lodges or open campfires, sadly it did rain the day we was going down to the New Forest (typical for the UK).
Date-10th Febaury 2024

This was one of the first pictures I took when we headed into the forest and I loved the lines of trees and the small pathway in the middle of it all. I used a higher aperture around ƒ8 to grab more detail into the picture instead of using ƒ4.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

The first morning headed into the first which was on our backdoor which was really handy, we was surprised how not muddy it was but we took a nice peaceful morning walk. It had been a while since I took photos while in a forest and had to get the balance right for the right exposure. I used the earthy tones preset to bring out more of the oranges. and try and highlighted the greens in it too.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

It was really peaceful as there wasn’t many people out and about in this part of the forest. There was a lot of leading pathways through he forest which had no one on it so some pictures made it look like its been abandoned or unused for a long time.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

I played around with the sky masking so I could add some more blue sky into the photo. Luckily it did start to clear as it is so I didn’t need to make too many adjustments. It’s interesting to see so many different style of pathways in the forest, some mud, some gravel. I should say that I did take both my 24-105mm and my wide angle 16-35mm but I didn’t end up using the wide angle which is a shame but don’t worry I head to another forest later on in the year and i used my 16-35mm.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

Location of stay in the log cabin.

Off to the beach

Like Brighton, Bournemouth also has its own pier as well, me and my partner didn’t go on it but I quite liked the design of the main building located on the pier. I would have loved to revisit this place when it’s sunset in the summer so I could try a long exposure shot. It was a nice temperature and also a nice coastal breeze to balance it out, this meant the waves were good for surfers.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

Located along the beachfront are these wooden stacks going out into the sea. At the edge of one of them was this end point which gave me an idea for this photo. What if I stand in the middle and capturing looking towards it. I set the autofocus point to focus on the end point so I would be the shaper point of the image. I did create a ‘hint of colour’ which I didn’t know if I liked or not.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

A side on picture of both Bournemouth pier and also the end point of the stack with the waves crashing through.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

Talking of crashing waves… there was another stack where the waves were crashing on through. I set the auto focus to servo which meant it could track and then find the sweet spot of the pillar in the middle. With that I also did set it to be burst mode as well so I could have many of them and pick the best one to edit.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

Another favourite from the year is the beach huts that Bournemouth is famous for like other seaside towns. I had two versions of this type of photo, one with the woman and one without and I preferred this one as it adds another subject into the photo which then becomes centre of the frame.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

So you probably saw in the side on image of the pier there was a big tower at the end of it… well turns out this is actually a start of a zip line which takes you across part of the sea which did look really fun. They have something similar in Brighton but you don’t go over the sea.
Date-10th Febaury 2024

Back to the capital…

Yes we are back in the capital city this time it was for a shorter trip. The weather was suppose to be really nice in the city so I jumped on the opportunity to do some photography. I was debating on taking both lenses with me but decided on taking my favourite which I captured some different London photos compared to last time. Lets see what sort of photos I captured…

Heading across Charing Cross it has the main train line bridge and two very interesting designed bridges. They span across from the Southbank side located near Waterloo train station and ends on the other side near Trafalgar Square. I set the focus point onto the couple close by to make them the ones in focus.
Date-1st March 2024

Through the gap on Charing Cross bridge you can catch a glimpse of the London eye. This was a perfect through gap to capture the pods on the eye. I was trying to make sure that the eye was the centre part of the image.
Date-1st March 2024

Embankment is on the other side of the bridge but also links into Charing cross as well. I made my way down the stairs, stood back and took a few photos of the entrance. This one was my favourite of the ones I took. I always love doing ‘hint of colour’ with the London Underground and only making the roundel as the one in colour.
Date-1st March 2024

Heading down some different sides streets I came across this road that I have never been down or never looked around. Located on each corner was this Metropolitan lamp which looked really cool but only on one side is a red telephone box which made for a good composition for the photo, deciding which one to have more shaper in focus I chose to have the telephone box.
Date-1st March 2024

I stood on another corner and found two street names and another lamp. I really like this because the lamp looks like it is splitting the two streets apart. I have come to also realise a lot of my shots in 2024 are shot horizontal instead of vertical. I think I prefer shooting landscape as I want to make it more cinematic feeling.
Date-1st March 2024

Making my way into Covent Garden (a very fun place to capture some good photos). Located by the Apple Store was another red telephone box which is unique because it still has the Queens crown which hasn’t been updated but I don’t think will be updated to the new Kings crown.
Date-1st March 2024

This is a photo i’ve always wanted to try as I was trying to frame this photo I thought to myself I should have used my 16-35mm lens for this photo. Somehow I did end up getting a similar photo which I did quite like, I changed the aspect ration to 1:1 instead of the 16:9 aspect ration I have been using for my other photos.
Date-1st March 2024

One of my favourite ‘hint of colour’ photos is this one located in the back-streets. The iconic red telephone box is always a favourite of mine to edit with as I know I tend to make it that ‘hint of colour’ edit. The car was in the right place as I felt like the telephone box was slap bang in the middle of the car as well.
Date-1st March 2024

New Equipment

In April time I made some purchases of some 2nd hand lenses, buying new ones are very expensive. Heading onto eBay I had a look at a few lenses, I sold my 70-200mm ƒ4 and thought id get an upgraded one which was the Canon 70-200mm ƒ2.8 Mark ii and alongside that I also purchased the bulk of a lens the 85mm ƒ1.2 which is a massive piece of glass if you have never seen one before. I didn’t have a picture of it but I also brought the Sigma 50mm 1.4 which was defiantly an upgrade from my Canon 50mm 1.8.

Over the last few months I have been getting to know these lenses and the capability of how good they are. The 70-200mm is one of the lenses a photographer should have. I am starting to use the 50mm more and more and it’s up there with my 24-105mm.

Hey let’s go to London again shall we…

With the newly purchase of the lenses I decided to try them out in London. To see the capability of how good they work in a street environment. This was one of the first time I went to London without my trusty 24-105mm. I started off using the 70-200mm then I swapped over to the 85mm when I crossed Westminster Bridge, then finally swapped to the 50mm after being on the Mall. It was a slow learning curve with the 85mm as it’s a lens i’ve never used before but I have used the 70-200mm ƒ4 version.

It was a short time in London as I was going to the Southbank Centre to watch a live orchestra concert play some Fantasy Film Themes.

Once again we start with the obligatory London Eye photo. With using the fantastic 70-200mm lens it means I can capture the detail of the pods on the eye. As much as I do love having blue sky in the background of the photos I really like clouds splitting up the sky. They always say that clouds really help with photos which when I look back at it it is true.
Date-13th April 2024

When I go to London I never really have a set plan of where I go and what I want to take pictures of. Sometimes you come across a certain angle and something happens at the right time. As I grew as a photographer I thought more and more about compesition of a photo. This one for example has depth in the photo where you have stuff in the foreground and stuff in the background with the added bonus of the boot on the River Thames.
Date-13th April 2024

There was protests in London with the ongoing war in Israel. I swapped out to the beast of the 85mm ƒ1.2 which I was blown away with the sharpness of the lens. I capture the police officers from behind with the protest in the background which makes this image a bit powerful.
Date-13th April 2024

A single police officer watches on while the protest walks through and heads towards Parliament Square.
Date-13th April 2024

Located in Whitehall is the Cenotaph. This is a beautiful monument that is memory for all fallen soldiers we’ve lost throughout the wars from World War One all the way to current wars that soldiers are fighting around the world. I really liked the sunlight hitting on the side of the Cenotaph and hitting agaisnt the flags of the armed services.
Date-13th April 2024

The archways that come off from Whitehall and lead towards St James Park.
Date-13th April 2024

As I entered St James Park I swapped over to the 70-200 and captured the Union Flag through the trees. I love the reach of what the 70-200mm can capture. I switched to manual focus in this photo because it kept focusing on the tree instead of the flag.
Date-13th April 2024

Something I didn’t realise is there is a Queen Elizabeth ll statue located along The Mall. Located behind the Queens statue is her father King George who she succeeded from when he died in 1952. From then onwards the Queen ruled the UK for more than 70 years.
Date-13th April 2024

Cars in the city is always favourite of mine when I am in London. I used my other lens which I took with me which was the 50mm ƒ1.4 which as I use it more and more as the year goes on I absolutely love the lens actually more than the 50mm ƒ1.8 from Canon. This car was located down a quiet side street and I waited till no one was walking in the photo.
Date-13th April 2024

The posh area of Mayfair you are bound to find some very nice cars sadly I didn’t see any luxury cars but did find this really nice Porsche located outside one of the stores in the area. I am not sure if the stickers on the side makes it better because it’s not really a racing Porsche.
Date-13th April 2024

I remember back in 2022 in December time I took a similar photo where a lady was standing outside next to this Kebab logo. That was at nighttime but this time I wanted to take it during the day. Having the sharpness of ƒ1.4 means that a lot of the subjects around will be blurry except the focus point. A lot of the photos from now onwards I am tending to use a Dark Cine preset which I really like because I always want to capture more of a cinematic
Date-13th April 2024

Later on in the day I decided to take a small break and sat down in this beautiful garden which was located near Charing Cross. There was so much colour throughout the garden so this gave me the perfect opportunity to capture the variety of flowers and beautiful colours.
Date-13th April 2024

This made its way into my top photo for this year it was an instant like/ instant love. I found this beautiful red flower within the small blue flowers and stood above it to capture looking down at the details of the flower. I mean the RAW image was still really good but I knew I wanted to add a bit more vibrance and saturation as well.
Date-13th April 2024

Like the one above this was one that I instantly loved but this isn’t in my top 30 of this year, it was very close but the red flower took that spot. The vibrant yellow against the blue really caught my eye. I used the single focus point so I could singly focus on the main yellow flower.
Date-13th April 2024

This brings us to the end of part l of what happened in 2024, I should say while in the garden I did have a lovely lady ask for a photo which I took a picture of and sent it to her with respect of her I didn’t add it into the blog. It was a really nice thing to be asked for.

2024 started off very upsetting but slowly and gradually grew to live this chapter of my life without my dad. As the months went on I gained some new lenses and capture some of my favourite photos for this year and also favourites of all time.

The next part of the blog will include some very beautiful photos from the months of May and June. The content increased over the next coming months and slowly increased more and more as the months went by.

Thank you again for all taking the time and supporting this website and blog series. It can be slow at times due to work commitments but I am always committed to making sure I write the multi part blog series of this year as there is so much to cover. Anyway I will see you in the next part to come where we dive more into 2024 and the photography journey continuing.

What happened in 2024 Part I

The New Year

A New Chapter

Another trip to the capital

Into the Forest

Off to the beach

Back to the capital…

New Equipment

Hey let’s go to London again shall we…

Mr_AGH_Photography

What happened in 2024 Part I

The New Year

A New Chapter

Another trip to the capital

Into the Forest

Off to the beach

Back to the capital…

New Equipment

Hey let’s go to London again shall we…

What happened in 2024 Part II

Leg-godt (Play Well)

Mr_AGH_Photography