Top Deck: Brum through the Bus window
This is a photo project I've been working on since mid-2021. It features images from in and around Birmingham, a passenger's eye-view captured mostly from the 'Top Deck' of local buses. This series was inspired in part by David Bradford's moody, blurry, black and white images of New York, shot from his taxi in the late 1990s. My approach has been deliberately lo-fi, shooting with a point & shoot camera (Ricoh GRii), all in black and white, with only very basic editing. I've used slow shutter speeds in an attempt to capture that familiar lurching stop-start motion of travelling on a Bus. I am a devout Non-Driver so I rely on public transport, I love Buses as much as I hate them. This series is simply what I've seen looking out the passenger window whilst traveling around Brumtown, often during my commutes to work or elsewhere. I spend so much time on buses, I thought why not chronicle what I see? The view from the 'Top Deck' of a bus is unique and ever-changing, as the passenger's viewpoint hovers just above the City virtually unnoticed we pass by. It's that anonymity that attracts me, catching those fleeting moments of urban life is something I find really exciting. As I develop the series I will add more and see where it takes me. This project is a creative exercise for me as an idiot with a camera. All images taken 2021 and beyond.
