Actually, my first idea had been to stop people walking through Cheylesmore, offering to show them how to use digital cameras so they could record the neighbourhood. But no one seemed interested, so I had to look for a new way of engaging with local people. This is how the idea came about for panoramic pictures.

I had a few ‘rehearsals’ with a tripod and camera, to find good locations around Cheylesmore. Then, starting on a Monday morning in October, I asked people to stop and pose for pictures.

Hunting for pictures

I think most people have a pretty low opinion of Cheylesmore. It’s not a wealthy neighbourhood, it’s not what you could call a great area. I lived here for about a year. My aim with these pictures is to show this place from a new perspective – curved, hooked, and oblong.

In Cheylesmore, everything happens close to Daventry Road, which is busy street with small shops – a laundrette, a barber, restaurants, a fish and chip place. The people in the photographs are people I passed on my way to next location. They live, work, visit or shop here.

I asked them to stop, to give me a few minutes. I asked them to be still, to be silent, not to change the position of their head, hand or even eyelash – because in order to create one picture I had to take at least six photographs and stitch them together afterwards digitally.

This situation, requiring such stillness, made me feel a bit like a photographer from the beginning of the twentieth century. I had to take my time in order to get the results I wanted. But people do not expect for strangers to ask them to wait, to pose for a length of time. Also, we tend to think that using a digital camera means everything will be finished in a few milliseconds. I had to kept telling myself to stay calm, to be precise. It usually worked. Sometimes it didn’t.

The number of people who agreed to be photographed surprised me. They were people of different ages, from different countries and cultures. They set down their shopping bags and they were ready. They stopped for a while in place they usually just passed – taking a minute for a cigarette or to look at the sky and then posing consciously.

A camera- a photographer – a picture

I wandered for hours around Quinton Pool with a tripod under my armpit, trying to balance a spirit level on the damp grass or photographing pavements.
The brave ones asked questions, asked me to go away, asked if I had permission, asked who sent me and for what purpose. Surprised that it wasn’t for a local newspaper or a student project, they wanted to know who I was.

‘Photographer’ doesn’t sound quite right to me. Photographers have artificial lights, a studio, a posh camera, a certain outlook. I have none of these.

They asked what I wanted from everyday people in Cheylesmore – people who buy their fruit from Rosie, who sit on a bench with a view that hardly changes, people who feed the ducks, who meet by the charity shop, people on their way home with cigarettes, newspapers, milk, flowers, chocolate, stamps.

Two boys wrote down all my details, apart from my national insurance number and blood type. Just in case I work for a local gang of paedophiles? Or maybe in case I stole their ‘image’? In case it becomes something important, not just another picture?

Working on pictures

I knew from the beginning that I wanted to show the pictures to the people I had photographed. But I also needed to spend time on the computer putting the images together and this presented a challenge. I felt that people should take part in decisions about what to do with them, where to show them. I wanted people to have a voice in the life of their pictures. So, I worked on the digital images but I knew they couldn’t be finished without input from participants.

Tea and biscuits

I invited everyone I had photographed for tea and biscuits at the local pub. They had a chance to see the images, share comments and thoughts, to have a copy of their picture. I asked them what they thought, whether they liked it or not, where (or if) they wanted the pictures to be shown.

Connor was delighted when saw his feet twice on one picture. “I’m staying and I’m going away,” he said. And then, “I wish I was wearing my other trainers”.

Rachel, Stacey and Charlotte didn’t accept their photo. They said it was just bad. “Too fat… too thin… not attractive… wrong clothes… no makeup.” They were strict and clear about other pictures as well. “Too dark… too bright… too green… stupid background… I know him… I don’t know her… nice.”

I called or e-mailed all the participants. Quite a few gave me wrong numbers or fake e-mail addresses. So I couldn’t reach them again. Many said, “Thanks but I won’t come”. Some said they would, but never appeared. Those who came shared tea, chocolate biscuits, pictures, ideas, time, and memories.

The gathering at the pub was a good time. The photographer as a sponsor of refreshments, the photographer without camera, the photographer showing pictures to people and asking questions. Questions about Cheylesmore, about the weather, about their afternoon, their hobbies, if they have milk and sugar. “A dash and one, please.”

And they tell me. They weren’t been expecting them to be like this – the quality, the size, the point of view. They say that in these pictures Cheylesmore is bigger, wider, greener, livelier, more interesting. They say they would like to see pictures on or in buses in Coventry, maybe as postcards. “But who will buy Connor’s legs?” and “Who wants to send Quinton Pool abroad with Bob sitting on the bench?”

Attempts and mistakes

Of course, some pictures didn’t work out. There is so much to blame – my shaking hand, gaps between the photos, an uneven surface for taking pictures, backgrounds are too busy, the light is unflattering. They are not joined up, but I keep these images. They too mark my interactions with the people and the place.