The football season is well underway now and my visits to watch Bolton Wanderers always provides potential strangers for my project.
Today Bolton played host to Oldham Athletic and as I walked around the stadium with my mate Bill I asked him to look out for strangers.
It was me who spotted stranger number 49.
"Do do you think the coach driver will make a good stranger Bill?"
"Yes, pass me your bag and go and ask him"
So off went and introduced myself to Matt.
Matt is the official coach driver for the Oldham Athletic football club first team .
i explained my project to Matt and he said "Yes, go ahead fire away"
I asked Matt to stand in front of his coach while I photographed him. Matt's shiny coach making a nice backdrop to the shot.
I took a few shots of Matt stood directly in front of the coach and some by the coach steps with the stadium as the backdrop.
After showing my wife several edits of two pictures, she decided this edit was the best :)
I asked Matt how long he had been the official coach driver for Oldham. Matt told me he had been driving the team for just over a year.
I showed Matt the images on the back of my camera and asked if he wanted copies. Matt liked the images but said he should have worn his sunglasses.
"Do you wear them to make yourself look cool or do they help your vision?" (what kind of a question is that Phil , I said to myself !!)
"I always wear them, whatever the weather, I don't know if it improves my driving, but I like to wear them"
The background is cluttered with windscreen wipers, sun visors, license disks and other coach related items, which you could argue are a tad distracting. However, I think they help tell the story, which is what the 100 strangers project is all about.
As for matters on the pitch , the Wanderers kept a second successive clean sheet and scored two goals, to take us up into third in the table.
Edited in Rawtherapee with an Fuji Superia 800 Film emulation.
This picture is number 49 in my 100 strangers project. Find out more about the project and see pictures taken by other photographers at the 100 Strangers Flickr Group page
100 Strangers Flickr Group page
https://www.flickr.com/groups/100strangers/
My own strangers can be seen here:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/57144254@N08/albums/72157657822400168
@happypat the journey home was only a short hop along mte M61 / M60 / M62 Pat. Glad you like this shot
@sangwann lol oh yes Dione, I see what you mean the "coach" LOL :)
@ivan cheers Ivan , many thanks for your kind words and support