Articles on Photography

Articles – short written pieces on photography

This page brings together articles on street photography, documentary work, and the ideas behind making images. Some pieces are reflective, some are practical, and others look at how photographs are read, shaped, and shared.

What AI thinks of me
23 March 2025
In a moment of vanity or masochism (it could have gone either way) I decided to let AI loose on me. The prompt used was “Tell me about the photographer John Gill from Yorkshire in…
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Review of the Year 2024
17 December 2024
For some reason, I’ve taken far fewer pictures in 2024. Maybe it’s a lack of motivation, maybe it’s because I’ve exhausted the ‘best’ subjects, maybe it’s because Castleford is dying and there’s less and less…
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It’s not all black and white – some colour photography
26 May 2024
So why a series of colour photos? I think we need to place that responsibility firmly with Batsceba 🙂 After all, 95% of my pictures are in black and white, every picture in the ‘After…
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Life’s A Drag – The Smoker’s Gallery
4 March 2024
I think I might be an incredibly dull person. I don’t eat meat; I don’t drink and I’ve never had a cigarette in my life. And yet I seem to have accrued a considerable number…
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Yorkshire History & Heritage – After the Coal Dust article
24 January 2024
Last year I was asked to write an article on After the Coal Dust for Yorkshire History & Heritage Magazine. The full article is featured below. AFTER THE COAL DUST If we were to do…
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One Hundred Faces
13 December 2023
I never really set out to create the ‘100 Faces Project’. All I really do is wander around and point a camera in the general direction of strangers on the street. It was all just…
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Masks – Street Portraits
13 December 2023
On the street, in real life, there is no Rembrandt or Butterfly lighting arrangements. We are illuminated by the fluorescent lights in cafes or the glow from a charity shop window. This is who we…
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Photos & Thoughts – August 2023
31 August 2023
Toby jugs and vibrators – tales from the car boot sales
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Photos & Thoughts – July 2023
24 July 2023
Travellers horse fair and internet ‘experts’
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Photographers, perverts and paranoia…revisited.
13 June 2023
A while back I posted an article called Photographers, perverts and paranoia – it might be time for an update. I had an interesting, if somewhat tense, discussion at one of my recent presentations that…
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I’ve Broken the Internet!
19 May 2023
I’ve broken the internet! A couple of days back I posted this photo from a few years back in to a Facebook group. I quite like the photo. It’s a decent street picture; a bit…
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I do like to be beside the seaside – Scarborough and Bridlington
30 April 2023
When I was a kid, we didn’t have holidays. There was no car, no money, and my father had long since disappeared with his debts and booze. What we did have was a once-a-year day…
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