Abandonment (Photography)

For this week's assignment, we needed to delve into the theme of 'Abandonment'.  I sometimes feel like these assignments are designed to get us injured or arrested.  Birds Eye View making me want to get high up and peer over dangerous things, Street Photography making me want to ambush people at the risk of being punched in the face, even Reflections had me hanging over a river.  Abandonment was no different, creating a desire to break into old buildings.  But... that didn't happen.  Due to lack of fence climbing abilities.

Unfortunately, that left a lot of these images with another theme... Compromise.  The first one, pictured above, is an old weathered sign that I assume formerly read 'No Ball Games'.  But, neglected and abandoned, it's now in a poor state, it's message since forgotten and twisted. 

This is probably my least favourite of the photos I took.  I found this car on my travels, I could tell right away it hadn't moved in a long time.  This flat tyre, along with a few other hints, suggested it's owner had long forgotten about it.  Unfortunately, it was wet, and the car looked rather clean.  I was hoping for something more mould covered and rusted.  All I managed to find was this deflated and uncared for tyre.

This image shows the only abandoned building I was actually able to find.  I really wanted to get closer, explore the surrounding area more, but unfortunately everything was fenced off and I couldn't get any closer without moving or damaging something.  I love the exposed pillars and beams of the attached roof, making it look skeletal.

From the same park as the 'All Games' sign, this photo is of an unkempt rocking horse ride.  It just looks so old and worn, the paint on it's face and back almost non-existent, it's so faded.  Although it's in a populated area, it just feels like it's been left to the mercy of time.  I'm sure this ride gets used often, but it just feels so neglected.

I also stumbled across this old Telephone box.  This was an item I fell in love with, but it didn't really photograph well.  I wasn't sure how best to represent it.  It's paint so faded it was a pale pink, broken glass, covered in spider webs, even the old phone was hanging bleakly off the hook.  I took several pictures of this from many angles, but none really captured it, I felt.  This one was alright, but it didn't show up the spiderwebs in the broken pane, which I really hoped it would.

Other picture of the same phone booth, this one just really showing it's decaying paint and forgotten state.  This one to me was more of an 'establishing image'.  More than the other shots that were up close, this was the one that really screamed 'phone box' to me.  It feels like a very literal image, if that makes any sense at all.

I was disappointed with how these came out.  I had some great ideas, none of which I was able to explore or execute properly.  I loved the idea of exploring ruins or an abandoned building, but I never found anything that was even close to what was in my head.  I wanted to pick up some items from charity shops too, like old toys or such, and leave them in woods or forest, create my own subject matter.  But I ran out of time, and I couldn't get to any shops and take photos within daylight.  Before I knew it, it was Wednesday night.  I could've done better with this, and I'm annoyed I didn't.