Hi, Hola, Bonjour , Ciao , مرحبا, 您好, bok, hei and welcome.

My name is James Murray and I live in London, England but love to go exploring in foreign climates. Coming from a design background I look at photography as an extension of this, recording the lifestyles and architecture that make up are world.

My passion for photography started when I first picked up a film camera (wow I miss the darkroom), capturing the moments of my accident filled childhood. I transferred this passion into my studies mixing in all of my design influences to create my own style.

Architecture and photography are the perfect blend each complementing the other. As a HDR (High Dynamic Range) enthuiast, I use this technique to enrich my images.

I have worked as a photographer since 2010, taking photos of the enviroment that I lived in around London, selling images as artworks and to companies. In 2011 I worked for Disney on their cruise ships with the big mouse himself. Onboard I worked as a portrait and wedding photographer, learning new techniques and feeding my travel bug.

Every photo is a memory; there is no better way to capture it then how you see it, not how the camera sees it.

 

Stacky Theme by Andrew

Rugby

I walk past this shop in Covent Garden every day to get to work (although as you can tell by the christmas trees) this was taken before I started working here. Its probably a shop that I will never step in, unless I win the lottery or marry someone really really rich (I am fine with either of those by the way).

It is of course the Ralf Lauren shop in Covent Garden, placed right next door to the Apple store there. I used Nik Software’s HDR Efex Pro to process this image for a change. I never used to like using it due to the fact that it was very very slow on my old computer but it works great on my Mac. It gives a very different effect to Photomatix so I will have to keep on using it of I want to know the settings. Perhaps one day.

Through the Structure

A week ago I posted a picture of the tall wheel that was at the Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park, London over christmas. This is the same wheel but taken from the bottom of the structure. Its great that you can see the structure through the movement of the wheel. I added some photo tools filters to my photoshop edit to give it a more grungy look.

This week has been great for me. A new job up London will allow me to get out and around taken lots of photos. After I settle in there I will go out about twice a week. My photo valet is getting bare so I need to take some decent photos that I am happy with.

Countdown

Well I still have a backlog of Christmas images to post so I hope you don’t mind but here is another. Ok it has another theme aswell. Now it is 2012 London is going on a massive high for the olympics, especially recently where tickets went up for sale for different events. Naturally none got what they wanted and no I didn’t get any but I will be in London this summer and perhaps will stalk the Olympic village for photos. 

With the christmas tree in Trafalgar square was (and still is) the countdown clock to the olympics. You can work out when this photo was taken by looking at the countdown or you could cheat and look at the name of the photos, but thats no fun.

Christmas Still?

Is it too late to still post christmas photos? I’m gonna say that its never too late. Does Covent Garden still have their decorations up? I guess they have until the 6th January until their bad luck sets in. 

Its so easy to take good christmas photos in London. Everything looks so christmassy (if thats even a work). These giant ball balls reflect the light so well and turn into huge disco balls. All you need is some club music and the night is sorted.

Southbank of Wonders

On London’s Southbank next to the London Eye lies a wondrous place unknown to me until recently. This place is called Wagamamas. Of course I had heard of the restaurant but had never eaten there until this month. While christmas shopping I was taken there by one of my friends. It is a noodle bar with a huge selection. I was determined to eat with chop sticks, even though I had a chicken noodle soup (that by the way was gorgeous), I managed. 

Spinning Neon

Earlier I posted a shot of a ride at the Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park. This is the same ride from another angle. I am not sure what I prefer. This one shows the ride spinning while the bright neon lights draw in passers by. The tripod I was using had to be modified for this shot to fit thorough the railing of the ride. I saw modified, I mean used as a monopod while it precariously rests on a ledge with me trying to hold it steady to the best of my ability. As you can imagine it took a few tries until I was happy with the brackets.

Now christmas is over its time to plan for New years. We have a rule in my house that it cannot be called that. We call it my birthday for obvious reasons. The bad thing is that New Years Eve is always an anti-climax, especially this year as I will be working on a boat on the Thames.

Rudolf the giant green reindeer, has a very shiny nose.

Merry Christmas and all that jazz. I hope all of you had a great christmas day bout for some of you the festivities are only beginning. If your family is anything like mine you will now be preparing to the mass family get together. That means all cousins, young children and distant family relatives will be sitting on chairs of all different heights around a dinner table.

For those of you who are all christmased (yes I made up that word) out now of the time for shopping in the sales; although for those of us in London will perhaps not have that joy as the Tube strike is now on making like hell for Londoners.

This giant reindeer lives in Covent Garden for christmas. People always gather around it as a meeting point this time of year. 

Anyway, what ever you do today I hope you enjoy it!

Happy Christmas Eve Eve everyone!!

Such an occasion merits a christmassy picture and I would say the Christmas decorations at Covent Garden deliver. These are hanging in the famous Apple Market, small niche shops littering the walls. You can see the string bank players at the bottom of the stairs. There is always some band playing there selling their CD but on this occasion I think that they were just singing carols.

I hope you all have a fantastic christmas and drink lots of eggnog (or other alcoholic beverage of your choice) and eats lots as you should at christmas. See you all on Boxing day.

The Ultimate Sweet Shop

There is a a very popular show on Leicester Square that I have never been in. It looks incredible from the outside and is full of M & M’s. This was taken recently so a christmas blanket has been thrown over the place adding to the bright colours from the decorations. It is always packed with people and it is on my wish list to go in at some pint and spend a fortune. I don’t know how many  M & M products there can be. To be honest its hard o think of things that can fill up the place but they seem to of managed.

Christmas in Trafalgar Square
Trafalgar Square is given a Christmas tree every year from Norway. It has happened every year since 1947 to say thank you for Britain’s support during World War II. The tree is normally a Norwegian Spruce and is over 20 meters (70 ft) tall.

The Christmas tree remains in Trafalgar Square until just before the Twelfth Night of Christmas as after it is meant to be bad luck; although in my house we take the decorations down well after new years. We must be plagued with bad luck.
The countdown clock on the right is the time until the London Olympics in 2012. only 267 days it seems.

Apple on Apple

London is full of christmas lights for the festive season and on this trip I fully intended to just take photos of those stunning lights but something else was on my mind. I had ordered a Macbook Pro so when I was going through Covent Garden I stopped to take a photo of one of their flagship London Stores.

This was the first photo that I processed on it after 2 days of transferring files, programs, reformatting hard drives and adding plugins. Who new transferring to apple would be so much hassle but it well worth it.

I recently went to the Winter Wonderland in London’s Hyde Park. I hadn’t been to a circus in years so had to go to a performance. They are very cheesy but I guess they are for kids. Still was fun to revisit my childhood.