This first photograph I took of my friend Josh on Chapelfield Road, just outside Chapelfield Gardens, a local children’s park in the city. With this image, I wanted to really try and capture the modernist feel of a city, with the vibrant (traffic) lights mixed with the tone of the moonlight, to create a sort of cyberpunk atmosphere in the final image. As my camera settings weren’t the best, I adjusted the noise levels and raised the exposure slightly to increase visibility. I also increased the contrast and strength of the reds and oranges, which gave the final image a vintage, grainy aspect to the piece that I quite like. I also took interest in the concept of Josh being the only person in the photograph, as it was actually taken rather close to the city centre on a Friday night, which could inspire imagery surrounding isolation even in a bustling city full of people.

These two photos were taken of another friend of mine, Ben, a young farmer I’d met that night walking around the city after leaving a farmer’s association meeting. Taken inside a McDonald’s just outside the Junkyard market, he was eager to model for the photos and tried to find different props that would work, deciding on a cigarette as it fit the personality that his sharp, expensive suit emanated.

This set of images works well as a singular piece, taken in a sequence that follows Ben’s movements in the frame. I adjusted each element to be consistent throughout each photo, and I love the way it looks. It displays him in a similar light as the last two pieces, but the less saturated tones create some sort of indescribable feeling that I find to be very intriguing.

This next photograph of Ben was taken on a longer exposure by accident, but I liked the way it looked enough to develop it further in Lightroom and I think that it’s also a very unique and extraordinary piece that is almost disorientating for a viewer, providing a feeling of overstimulation with the garish, lurid tones that surround Ben.

Finally, this last image of Ben was shot outside a shellfish stall in the market and is rather easy on the eyes given the primarily red and blue colour palette that blends into dark purples across most of the photograph. I believe that the sign on the front of the stall is a key focal point of the image, as the cyan tones heavily contrast the rest of the piece in brightness, breaking up what a viewer would see as they process it, which I think brings the composition together nicely.

These photographs of yet another friend of mine, Emily, work well as a set of four, much like the images of Ben from earlier. Once I’d figured out how night portraiture settings worked on my camera, I found that each picture turned out in a similar style to the work of Bruce Gilden, thanks to the high quality and strong artificial lighting from the camera flash, which I decided to keep reusing for the rest of my night time photographs. I like how Emily’s body language captures her too, depicting her as the same kind, welcoming person that I’d met last year, which adds to the background of the city library, known as The Forum, behind her, as she studies at college in the city during the week. I didn’t stress too much about the editing for this set, as the pieces were good as-is.

Jayden and Jess, a couple I’d met on my last visit to Norwich were amazing at helping me find my way around the city and were happy to have their photos taken. I shot this picture as Jayden rolled a cigarette on some stairs opposite The Royal Theatre, and found that I’d gotten this absolutely fascinating image. While Jess is looking at her phone, Jay’s direct mode of address with the camera creates this strange ‘fourth wall break’ that is strengthened by Jess’s unawareness of the camera, isolating him from the scene and bringing the viewers’ full attention to him. I used another editing preset and modified it to the way I wanted it, to give off the illusion of a vintage photograph, like a lot of these images, to create a sense of nostalgia; as memories captured by teenagers on a night out.

With these two photos, I didn’t really have a style in mind, but I thought that it could turn out to be quite a visually pleasing image. They work well as a diptych, displaying Emily’s movement as she takes a drag. Again, I went with a vintage aesthetic when editing this in Lightroom, and I think it suits the tones of the piece quite well.

I shot this while testing my camera as we travelled to Great Yarmouth for a day out to Pleasure Beach, which was cut short by a bout of rain and early closing times due to a bank holiday. It features Josh with his girlfriend, Summer, another close friend of mine. I decided to bring out more of the blue hues within the image in Lightroom, as it was the most prevalent colour in the composition. Originally, I wasn’t planning to use this, but I do think it captures a lot of emotion that I hadn’t yet gotten on this trip.

After we came back from Yarmouth, the three of us took shelter in my guest house waiting for the rain to stop. I thought it would be a good time to shoot some photographs of my friends and I loved this image of Summer. I used a monochromatic filter and intensified the red hues to increase the atmosphere and darken some of the tones. It’s quite an artistic piece and I could easily see this being displayed in a gallery.

This set of images works perfectly together as a single composition, showcasing Summer’s movements as she posed in front of the camera – and I think that the motion blur in some of the shots accentuates this. I really love the soft lighting in the background, as it builds a strong contrast to the harder lighting on her body. The tones – the hot pink in particular – are also very visually appealing and bring a viewer’s attention solely to Summer.

This was a photograph I’d taken toward the beginning of my trip. I’d met Josh to go and visit the fairground and thought it would be a good chance to take some images. I was infatuated with the way the bright lights reflected on his face and across the rims of his glasses, and the sharp focus really brought this out.

Later on that evening, Josh thought that the scene of the bright red bin amongst the lights would be a great photograph, before walking over to it and opening it while I was taking the photos. Out of the eight or so images I took, I’d say this was the best one, so after editing it, I have to say Josh was definitely right. The subtle blue hues from the lights and the gaudy red bin bring the composition together, combined with the shadowy background gives it an air of mystery that I couldn’t stop looking at.

On one of our nights out, we went to that same McDonald’s again and I was already pleased with the photos I’d taken in there previously, so I took a few of Emily drinking a coke from a disposable cup. This photography came out with a nice, shallow depth of field with a very sharp focus on her – The tones also follow a very orange/yellow palette, with a few exceptions being her hoodie, the wall behind her, and some streaks in her hair.

After we left the McDonald’s, Ben thought a photo of all of the lights from the Junkyard Market looked similar to a retro arcade, so I pulled out my camera and shot a few images of him. Jess also jumped in behind him for a few of them and I thought the additional subject added to the scene, as it was near pitch-black where she was stood anyway. During editing, I brought out the blue hues a bit more and increased the exposure, and was left with this.

Back when we were taking shelter in my guest house from the weather, I also shot these photographs of Summer as the weather cleared up. I thought these would be a pretty good set of four, as they have almost identical compositions, excluding the tones, which were edited later in Lightroom. For the three images that are in colour, I tried to portray an atmosphere of Spring, which looks quite successful to me, mainly due to the green hedges and blue skies.

In my opinion, this trip was an opportunity to develop my photography skills in another environment, which also made it easier to ask people if they could model for me, as I wouldn’t see them for a long time anyway, or maybe even ever again. I’m proud of the work I produced in Norwich and can’t wait to take more photographs in new places when I travel next.