After taking some photographs at a petrol station as part of my systems and processes brief I have decided that for the commercial products section on the Objects brief to concentrate on Petrol. This is because of two reasons; one being I found some really interesting subject matter and secondly I didn't really want to do it in the studio.
Petrol is the commercial product that I will be focusing on but I will be keeping the subject matter much more open. My two main ideas are the station itself or the pumps.
I have chosen this as there is something quite political
about it. One day oil is going to run out and therefore petrol stations in their current form will be no more. Yes, there might be similar stations selling things like hydrogen but they may be much different than petrol stations as we know them. I would like to capture all different types of petrol station from big commercial ones to small family-run type station and old, derelict stations to highlight the issue of petrol and oil running out.
Originally I was inspired by an image by Alec Soth which you can find lower down the page as well as in this post. Its the typical American fuel stations that you find in many documentary photographers images that inspires me. They are a terrific subject and always seem to create atmospheric photos. I am going to try and re-create this look in some of my images but by using a more modern, European style petrol station. The lights at night will be very helpful but I aim to be a lot more broad about when I shoot them.
I love this image and it is definitely one I will look to when photographing at petrol stations. I love the atmosphere created by the lighting and background. The contrast between the very urban kind of foreground and the very rural, undisturbed background adds quality to this image. Negative space is used really well in this image.
As of the 7th December I have been to around 3 petrol stations so far. One for my Systems & Processes brief and the other two for the Objects brief. The first petrol station that I visited; for the systems & processes brief was my local Spar in Accrington. The second two were two abandoned petrol stations; one in Whalley and the other in a village near Longridge called Whitechapel.
I found the latter to produce the best of the images so far. To put it into words, it is an old derelict garage; one that would just service cars with two extremely old, American looking pumps. In the very rural location that it is in, it is a place that very much reminds me of a horror movie. Something like The Hills Have Eyes or The Texas Chainsaw Massacre etc. It was quite a creepy place that had not many people and was very spread out. This produced a certain atmosphere to my images and added a quality to my photographs. Below are a selection (2) of images that I have taken at Whitechapel Garage.

This to me reflects what I have set out to do quite well in that the meter looks very much like a clock. It represents that one day in time petrol will run out. This is also reflected in he closed sign next to the pump and how old the pump actually looks. I really like this image, I like the strong contrast and tones. This adds atmosphere to the image; It reflects exactly how creepy the place was and how I felt taking the image. There was a lot of noise and muttered chat going on from a farm behind the garage. This made a creepy atmosphere so to add a creepy look to this photograph was something I wanted to do. I am very pleased with this image overall.

With this image I decided to include the surrounding landscape to add a lonely feel to the 'dereliction'. This again creates a creepy atmosphere. I like the 'aged' look it has. I did this by using a lightroom preset and then desaturating it ever so slightly. I adjusted the highlights and tones to bring out some detail in the clouds. This made the image much stronger.

This image is very different really to the others. This is a newer petrol station but one that is still derelict. This to me still has a foreign sort of feel to it. Maybe more of a European feel. I like the editing to this. Originally I tried this image in black and white but this didn't really work due to the sky. I de-saturated it and upped the clarity; I feel this made the lighting look really nice. My only problem with this image is I have cropped it just a little bit too much. On the left side of the the frame the container that once contained gloves or wipes has a bit missing off slightly. This is one thing I will look to change.