Edinburgh a city I’ve always wanted to visit and photograph, but never had the chance to do so, until now. My family and I had decided to spend this Christmas in Edinburgh, we all thought it would be amazing and boy were we right, we have all fallen in love with this wonderful place and not one of us wanted to come home. The best way I can explain Edinburgh is to say it’s overwhelming. The place is a dream for a street photographer like me, so why didn’t I get the photos I was looking for. I was there for 6 days and for the whole trip the weather was warm (for the time of year) and for the most part sunny, so perfect conditions for street photography and yet I couldn’t find my stride, I was forcing it instead of relaxing and for any photographer this is a bad thing.
I’d been looking forward to the trip since I’d booked it and had been doing lots of research via the internet, I wanted to get some very different looking street photos, ones that looked like they had been taken in a different place and this is where I started to go wrong.
As I say above the city is overwhelming, there is so much to see and so many places where I could get great looking street photos and for me, that was my undoing. I just couldn’t find my footing, we all dream about to going somewhere new to photograph and for me at least I went into this trip with the wrong mindset. I was hoping my photos would look like Edinburgh, so as example shooting through the windows for me just wasn’t working, in my mind they could’ve been taken anywhere and this again is where I was going wrong. I started to get some ok photos when I was up by Edinburgh castle or up Carlton Hill, taking silhouette shots against the sunset like the ones below:
Don’t get me wrong I like these photos but I was hoping for something more, maybe I’m just being too harsh on myself. I was just over thinking everything and I didn’t really find my mojo until the last day, I think this was because I’d just given up trying to get those photos I’d had in my mind and I finally relaxed and started to enjoy being out with the camera and I know the photos show this.
Edinburgh has lots of old dark side streets that I would love to spend more time exploring and on this trip, I just didn’t have the right amount of light, plus I was forcing my photography too much and so again I wasn’t getting the results I wanted.
This is blog sounds like I didn’t enjoy my time in Edinburgh and that's just not the case, I loved every second of it and to a point, I didn’t care I wasn’t getting any good photos, well ok that's a lie. I do wish I would’ve come away with more in the way of street photography, but at the end of the day I had a wonderful time exploring this amazing city with my wife and son and I look forward to heading back up there. Before I finish this blog I would like to point out that my 16-year-old son got better photos than I did, including this one:
But he does have a good teacher.
I’ll leave you with a piece of advice, when visiting a new place don’t force your photography, relax and just shoot the way you always do, until next time.
Enjoy the photos
