TRAVEL PHOTOGRAPHY Interview with Felicity Handford
All images ©Felicity Handford
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elicity has been a member of Viewfinders since about 2010. At various �mes she has shared images of some of the fascina�ng countries she has visited, giving us glimpses of their cultures. But what makes a picture a good travel photograph? Clearly it is far more than an image being technically correct in terms of focus, exposure and framing. A good image draws the viewer in and causes them to stop and look at it. I enjoy looking at images that make me wonder about what is going on, that make me curious about who this person is, or what has (or is happening) in that place. For me travel photography is photography that takes place outside the area that I live in, that I’m not familiar with. For me it includes landscapes, cityscapes, buildings and of course people and what they are doing. The ‘people’ photography might be documentary, or it might be portraits. Felicity, how long have you been travelling and how did you discover your love for photography? I started to travel and take photographs seriously in 2011. I’ve always enjoyed taking photographs, but I really wanted to travel to Iceland. I realised that if I was to really get the most out my trip then I needed to buy a DSLR camera and learn how
to use it. So, I enrolled in a basic DSLR camera course and looked for photographic workshops in places I wanted to visit. Every country I have visited has been interes�ng, and going on photographic holidays means that I’m with a group of likeminded people. The trips are arranged with photographers in mind, and being pushed out of my photographic comfort zones means that I have learnt about different genres of photography, and it has helped me to begin recognising what interests me most, and to begin to develop a personal style. What would a�ract your a�en�on and make you take a picture? I try to take images that say something about the place or what the person is doing and feeling. I’m only just beginning to understand something of how this might be done. It’s what interests me about photography, it is a constant challenge to learn and improve. In observing people from across the world I have begun to realise how similar people are to us, even if they live in distant countries, and despite their different clothes and cultures.
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