LP and Urbex Pt5 + RGB-Man - The Explorer

Hi there fellow Light Painters, Photographers, Urbexers and any other creators. It's been a fair week and the weather seems to be getting calmer and a little more suited to getting out and about to create some more images in the dry.

I'm still posting my work on the HIVE in a chronological order so that my blog is a way of seeing some kind of progression in my images and how I create them. So the following images were created between 2014-2016 and again are focused around my early days of LP with my mate Matt and also shows our secondary interest of Urban Exploration. Finding old WWI and WWII sites is not that difficult in the UK and many sites are fairly accessible, although not always in a good state or internally accessible but always worth a visit.
A quick search on Google Maps showed a building on the hillside next to the abandoned village of Tyneham in Dorset. This area is part of the Lulworth Camp Army Ranges with many targets and distance markers which can be spotted all over the hillsides. The building we found was used to control the automated targets around this part of the ranges in the times when the ranges were totally out of bounds. Looks like one of the operators has slipped out for a quick smoke but he may have been spotted.

Target Control Post

Target Control Board

Instant Art

My first attempts at LP ended up with me just swinging Fairy Lights or LED strip around , trying to make some kind of repeatable pattern, something that I could create again in different locations. But many of those images of my Instant Art ended up being random and not repeatable. Inspired by the silhouettes created by the formidable Dennis Calvert and LAPP-PRO, I realized that the human form would be a shape that I could re-create without using my poor drawing skills, just draw around another person and there you have it.

Abandoned Methodist Church (permission visit)

1st live stencil

I use a lot of stencils in my current images and this is the 1st example of putting a live stencil (in camera) into the shot. I had taken ages on Photoshop to adapt the image of the King and make it suitable to use as a stencil, I also adapted Elvis's belt buckle so he could be a part of Team Lace. I learned a lot during this process, especially that the stencil does not have to be life-size and that a light scan across the back of the stencil worked better than a strobe flash.

Elvis is Leaving the Building


One of the early images that I later gave the name RGB-Man, at this point it was just another technique I was using. Created at one of the many explores/Light Painting adventures and one where we were restricted for time and space in this disused Coastal Gun Battery, built between 1901-1903. The site is actually inhabited but the furthest gun placement is just far away enough to not be seen and of course the inhabited site keeps the vandals away, so not one mark of graffiti just the original signage painted on the walls and door headers. The trouble was the access was over a steel chain fence which lead to a rusted and unstable stairway. undeterred we then crept down the final 15-20 feet into the magazine entrance. The areas under the gun placement were fairly large and would have been mainly used for storage of ammunition and large shells, there was also an area with a wood/coal fired stove just outside the two storage areas.

RGB-Man The Explorer

Shine-a-Light
I hope you enjoyed looking at my images and reading my post, I try to be as honest and inclusive as I can in my write ups and try to remember to mention those people who have inspired/taught me many different skills and techniques to play with in the creation of my images. I don't want to appear sycophantic so will not spend to much time on that. Those who know me, know who my LP influences are and I am grateful to them.

WHAT IS LIGHTPAINTING? Lightpainting is a photographic technique in which exposures are made by moving a hand-held light source while taking a long exposure photograph, either to illuminate a subject or to shine a point of light directly at the camera, or by moving the camera itself during exposure. Nothing is added or removed in post processing. Single exposure Light Art Photography /nolayer /notricks /nophotoshop YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE MORE LIGHTPAINTING HERE?
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