I am just an amateur photographer who takes pictures for my own personal pleasure. As such, my digital footprint is shocking (I have an Instagram account, which I drop a load of pictures on when I remember to, but it’s nothing fancy).
I have always been interested in photography from a young age and did actually take photography as one of my course choices at school. We used black and white film and processed and printed the negatives. I wasn’t very successful and quite appropriately, got an ‘F’ for photography… Ah well…
As far as Ratcliffe power station goes, as a young boy of around 5 years old, my Dad took my brother and me to visit the site, and we stood inside one of the cooling towers. As you can appreciate, the colossal size made a big impact. Due to circumstances, I never saw my Dad much after that. He finally made a brave attempt to get in touch around 6 years ago. He and his wife had moved to Spain, and he visited England once a year. His wife virtually pushed him out of the car and told him that ‘if he didn’t do it now, he never would’… We kept in touch after that through email and he visited once a year. Sadly, though, he passed away 3 years ago.
As to photographing the site at Ratcliffe, I discovered Michael Kenna’s book a couple of years ago and was inspired to take some photographs myself. This particular photo was taken after the site had begun being decommissioned. The news of Ratcliffe being decommissioned had a surprising impact on me. I think I felt that a link to my Dad was disappearing, and I felt quite sad about it. On this particular morning, I was trying to find pictures that portrayed the silence and abandonment. As I walked around the perimeter of the site, I was drawn to the bright red and yellow safety fences. The sheer size of the towers dwarfed them and made them seem almost pointless…
What are the TWO most impactful features that make your image a good photograph? Don’t be shy!
With the amount of amazing work in the FRAMES community, I feel almost embarrassed to think of this as a ‘good’ photograph, so thank you for picking this one out. With this photograph, you have the contrast between the blue/grey concrete and the bright colors of the fences, and the strong geometric lines. I also find my eye drawn back to the bright yellow sign in the bottom left.
If you could make this photo again, what would be the ONE thing you would like to do better or different?
I would like the yellow metal fence to be made of thicker steel so you could see it better!.. But realistically, I’d like to see how it looks with more directional light from the left to give a bit more dimension to the towers.
Simon Willies shared this photograph with theĀ FRAMES Facebook Group.
Photographer
Simon Willies, Derby, UK
Equipment and settings
My trusty Olympus OM-1 with the 12-100 f4 pro.
I use Darktable to process the raw files.
Simon Willies
February 3, 2025 at 15:17
Thankyou Tomasz for sharing this.. I feel very honoured..