It’s been such a busy summer. As much fun as I’ve had doing the photography I’ve been doing, I’ve not had a much time to do much photography for myself.
My good friend & upcoming photographer James Lester & I like to snap urban dereliction by doing what we call ‘UrbEx’
‘Urban Exploration’
It’s basically getting into (not ‘breaing into’!) derelict buildings. They’re so interesting & filled with what happens to a place when it’s left to the elements.
They give me chance to try and get creative with my photography.
I remember, back along, we took my 5DmkII along to a mill to test out my new ‘glidetrack’ gadget, & this came out of it:
Anyhoos – today, Myself, James & two of his Photography coursemates, Aiden & Chris, decided to see what we could see…
After a serious recce around somewhere James & I’d been before (blog here), to no avail, we found a cool old office blog with easy access
I’ve always admired the industrial view of this aluminum works from the flyover
In fact the flyover itself has a rater city-of-the-future look to it
The spot on the left is where the busses go to sleep at the end of the day.
Aww
We were all on different floors at one stage, so this shot seemed a good idea!
Refreshers: the best UrbEx fuel
A cheeky groupshot
I rather like this catch of Aiden
And one of Captain Lester, lookin towards the light
This was my fave of Chris, James & Aiden’s uni pal
Under the bridge
While we were waiting for teachers to stop smoking outside a school in the way of access to an interesting spot, we went and got a picnic.
This is my kind of Urbex Fuel
And these crisps were possible the best thing we’ve ever tasted.
This was a church we were interested in noseying round, but it was locked up tight, as derelict buildings are.
It’s our policy not to make access to these places, only use access if it’s there…
So, unable to find a way into the last two spots, we decided to explore a waterway I knew down near my old flat in Leeds Centre
It winds its way all over the place, about 10ft beneath road level
The graffiti kids like to get creative down there.
Either that or play paintball
I once took a guitarist down here for a shoot, as it’s a bit ancient and interesting
A quick snap of Mr Dunbar, giving it photo hands. Photographers don’t usually like doing this, but I rather like it
So we ventured into the darkness of various tunnels in the area, with only our phones & the strobocopic flash of my flash for vision
See!
This round tunnel had an impressive echo
A view as we emerged from yet another tunnel
A bit of a smackden we found
A few times it was necessary to manually bridge the gap, and I like what Lester did with his arms.
Sadly, after walking through far too many spiderwebs to get there, we reached the end of the line & had to head back to our original access point.
But it was a fun experience all round & grand to get out with the boys for an explore.
If you’d like to see more urbex I’ve done, just go to the top of the blog & type Urbex into the search bar. The Leeds International Swimming pool, that’s since been demolished, was a particular highlight.
Adios, y’all.