The Butter Mouse is right. It is easier completing this task today than it was twenty years ago. Only now it is the disposable camera you do not have to muck about with. A few clicks on your smart phone, and your photos for this month’s task are sorted.
You might get in trouble if you started snapping away down urban streets with a normal camera. But people expect you to have a smart phone in their hand. And during normal working hours, my prime time for completing my Butter Mouse assignments, you are lucky to see anyone.
I now understand how you complete these challenges. This was not about scouring the roads of Clifton looking for something blocking the sun. Instead I think about the word ‘shadow’ and what it means. What else could represent a shadow?
The three of diamonds. Three photos. Easy peasy.
To begin with, I took a photo of the remains of 20th Century Flicks, the video shop where you could get any film you wanted. The shop is long closed, the boarded up hiding the remains within, but a fragment of signage remains. I wonder if anyone had ever tried to buy that remaining piece? Will this building ever open as a business again?
Amazingly, 20th Century Flicks lives to this day on Christmas Steps. You need a physical object to cast a shadow after all.
I captured the next shot near the Downs.The fact there is a long shadow in the picture is a total coincidence. I only chose this spot because it is where the ice cream van sits in the summer. In these cold winter months the concept of a truck selling frozen treats is a shadow of another world.
The final image is a scruffy piece of land near one of the benches overlooking the bridge. I took it because one of the poles was in shadow. Simple as that.
I appreciate these photos are not the most aesthetically pleasing, although I have cropped and colour corrected them. But they show off the small businesses of the Clifton, and the rolling fields as you head towards the bridge. Clifton is the sort of place where you could still imagine someone operating out of their basement.
Three photos was the right choice. Eleven would make my brain itch. The story is still bubbling at the moment. But something will come together. I have trust in the Butter Mouse.
