When I went on my day trip to Manchester, I wandered into the Corn Exchange, which is a grade II listed building. Originally used as a corn exchange it is now home to a selection of restaurants and bars.
It is a beautiful old building and while inside I started taking a few images. As I clicked away I saw Junior , who beckoned me towards him. I thought he was going to tell me off for taking photos, but Junior told me there was a good vantage point for pictures in the mezzanine area.
Junior’s job title was “Host / Security” and he was the friendly face of the Corn Exchange. I thanked Junior for the information and told him I was an amateur photographer from Nottingham, visiting Manchester for the day.
I asked Junior if he was a Mancunian, he smiled and asked me if I recognised his accent Jamaican accent. I then asked him did he know Ricardo Gardner, who was one of my all time favourite Bolton Wanderers players and also came from Jamaica.
“Everyone knows Ricardo” said Junior, he told me ricardo's son was in the Corn Exchange a few days ago as he was playing in a football tournament. I told Junior I didn’t know Ricardo;s son was a footballer, but Junior told me he was only about 8 years old !
I then introduced the concept of 100 strangers to Junior and asked him if it was OK to photograph him for my project. Junior said that was fine, he was at an age where he didn’t mind being photographed. He had no issues at all.
As it was inside a building, I bumped the ISO up to 640 and opened up the aperture wide, The net result is a lovely photo of Junior with some great bokeh background.
I gave Junior one of my cards and asked him to email me if he wanted some copies of the photos. Junior said he would look me up online and check the photos, but didn’t want a copy of any photos.
I thanked Junior for his time and shook his hand.
I edited the photo in Darktable and GIMP.
Thanks for being stranger 178 in my project Junior, I really hope you like the photo once you look me up.
Find out more about the project and see pictures taken by other photographers at the 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
Thanks everyone for your lovely comments, I really enjoy my strangers series , I've got another stranger to post tonight, which I hope you will also like .