Streetzine2

The first encounter of a 'Camden Local' was just outside of Chalk Farm Tube station. He was joyfully mocking me as I photographed the illuminated Chalk Farm tube sign and began to ask questions. I explained about the project briefing and ask him a few questions about the local area. He lived in nearby Primrose Hill and had been drinking in The Enterprise for years. He was also their resident painter and decorator. He said 'Camden is the best place in the country because everybody's nice. I'm on freeview, I'm Dave'.



Our second encounter of a 'Camden Local' was outside the Enterprise, a man named cliff who had been living in Camden for 36 years. He went into greater detail about the local area; telling us some interesting stories about how it had developed over the past twenty years, how the music scene had always been big in Camden. However the problem of commercialism had meant that his local would be swarmed on a Friday and Saturday night by who he referred to as 'Hampstead Wankers'. Cliff told us about a band called The Bad Robots who would be gigging on Thursday night in the Stables.

For this portrait i used a bit of tissue paper to act as a diffuser that covered my flash. In comparison to my other portrait shots you can see that the harshness of the light has been reduced allowing more details to come through in the image. It's a technique worth considering!

On the way down to check out the stables we stopped off to talk to a woman outside the popular bar/music venue Barfly. Her name was Catherine and she had been working at the Camden Barfly for about 5 months after a transfer from Brighton.



She said that Camden was more violent than Brighton and that it was mostly due to the amount of drugs easily available. 'A thirty year old woman took acid and crawled around outside like a cat, then pissed herself'. She also explained that there was a psychiatric institute in Camden that let out its patients during the day, it sounded like something out of a horror film. But on a lighter note Camden, and the Barfly especially are renowned for promoting new music and hosting epic gigs. Such as the likes of Bloc Party.