With plenty of research in the bag in terms of the history of Birmingham I have established a core twelve buildings that give a summary of the progress of the city's architecture over the last 500+ years.
I therefore wanted to capture images of each so that their 'motif's could be created and a dull cloudy day in Birmingham gave me the perfect chance to do that. Ironically this style of photography suits the dull cloudless sky as it ensures distracting clouds are not captured, which tend to look odd when multiplied into the kaleidoscope effect. Obviously photoshop can always fix it, but trying to remove bits of blue around the edges of buildings is a headache.
The twelve buildings have been selected to take the viewer through the different architectural eras in Birmingham's history.
The Old Crown - Medieval
St Philips Cathedral - Georgian & Regency
The Town Hall - Victorian
Curzon Street - Victorian
The Council House - Late Victorian
The School of Art - High Victorian
The Hall of Memory - Edwardian
Grosvenor House - Art Deco
The Signal Box - Brutalism
The Rotunda - Post World War II
The Cube - Contemporary
Aston Place - Modern
This initial twelve is a work in progress and I may look to take a photograph of St Chad's Cathedral in the coming week, as this is an example of The Gothic Revival, a period not reflected in the above. Curzon Street may have to be dropped if this is the case, or I will increase the portfolio to sixteen images.
Having taken the images, along with a close up of the buildings texture I am editing the photos and then multiplying them to create the final photograph that is its motif.
The draft twelve images have now been produced with the motif backgrounds deliberately left white at this stage. I intend to experiment with different background techniques and textures as well as explore the possibility of creating the motif into a 3D shape.
Lots more to come, but I am pleased with the progress so far achieved in this project.