Microgrants/Photographing of London/Results

List of trips

Date	Type of transport	Costs	Number of photos	What was photographed?	Status	Sample photo
2013-04-06	both ways on foot	0	71	Wormholt Park, St Lukes Church (Uxbridge Rd), Uxbridge Road, Galloway Road, Bloemfontein Road	uploaded
2013-04-07	both ways by bus	£2.8	126	Charing Cross Hospital, Margravine Cemetery, St Paul's Girls' School, Brook Green, Campus of Ealing, Hammersmith and West London College, Barons Court tube station, Hammersmith Library, Hammersmith tube station	uploaded
2013-04-14	one way by bus, second walk	£1.4	83	6 statues in Hyde Park (Genghis Khan sculpture, Diana Memorial, Peter Pan, Physical Energy, Still Water sculpture, Isis), Marble Arch, Oxford Street, Norfolk Square Garden, Selfridges	uploaded	File:Genghis Khan sculpture at Marble Arch in London, spring 2013 (1).jpg
2013-04-20	one way by bus, second by tube	£2.9	122	Freeman Family Drinking Fountain, details of Albert Memorial, Speke’s Monument, Memorial to the Great Exhibition, statues at Victoria and Albert Museum, Queen's Gate	uploaded
2013-04-21	twice by tube	£4.2	114	2013 London Marathon	uploaded
2013-05-16	twice by tube	£4.2	120	Canary Wharf tube station, South Quay Footbridge, Construction of 25 Churchill Place, 45 Bank Street, Construction of Riverside South, Heron Quays, St John's Churchyard, 25 Cabot Square, Dunbar Whard, East London Business Place in Heron Quays, King Edward VII Memorial Park, 30 St Mary Axe, St Katharine Docks, Narrow street in London Borough of Tower Hamlets	uploaded
2013-06-03	walk	0	60	Westfield shopping center, Whity City tube station, Shepherd's Bush Common and streets around	uploaded
2013-06-05	twice by tube	£4.2	110	Great Portland Street station, Portland Place, Greet Portland Street, Primrose Hill, Regent's Park, Boating Lake	uploaded
total	8 trips	£19.7	~806	Browse category with images	all OK	2 so far (1,2) 4 so far

Summary

In the end of March 2013 I requested about Microgrant in the aim to produce high-resolution images of different parts of London. This microgrant was approved by 3rd of April 2013 with maximum budget of £100. I started with Oyster Card top up by £30, lower amount then originally discussed because I wanted to see how fast I will be in spending money (it was showen later that these amount was sufficient for whole 3 months of this first microgrant run). My origin plan was to make 1 to 2 trips per week and produce between 50 to 100 images per one trip. Unfortunately, I was not able make trips as often as I wanted for several reasons (listed downer) and this might be judge as part failure in the grant planning. On the other hand I took in average 100 images per trip fitting into previously predicted value with quite low costs. The main reasons, why I did not take as much trips, were:

• I did not have finally as much free time for traveling through London as I thought before because of my real work
• It is much harder describe and categorize taken images in London on Commons as I thought before.
  • This is because I am not familiar with the geography of the London city and with best (map) portals where to get information. I spent much more time with searching information about buildings/statues/streets which I photographed then typically in the Czech Republic (where I was active before) therefore description of images for uploading took me incredible amount of time after photographing. Typically 1 hour of photographing = 2-3 hours at home by searching…
  • The categorization of London on Commons is not ideal and not prepared for larger image uploading. Many important (and of course small) streets do not have own categories and even often significant sightseeing do not have them. Therefore I had to create many of these categories, search for corresponding articles on en.wiki and spent many hours by this activity on Commons not related with microgrant or with photographing.
• The weather is much less stable and suitable for photographing

And how I passed the results? I made together 8 trips which cost £19.7. During them I produced and uploaded around ~800 images from different parts of London. This is giving the image prize roughly £0.02 per photo. Also, I visited interesting event (2013 London Marathon) where I documented many famous runners. 2 images were evaluated as Featured Pictures and 4 as Quality images so far on Commons (as you know the nomination process is somehow time-consuming activity and I am planning target about this more in the future; in winter time where photographing is not possible). I was using tele-lens which helped me took details of many buildings and statues not available before. As one disadvantage I can see that all visited areas were in the Zone 1 or 2 (often tourist parts of town?) and I did not visit any further areas. On the other hand visited places were not really good image covered and there are still a many more…

I would like to encourage everybody, who would like to run similar activity, count more time on later activity not directly associated with photographing and associated with Commons work. But yes, do the same :) I really learned a lot about London and get much more familiar with the town.

And yes, I’d be really glad if I can continue with this microgrant till end of August 2013. I am not sure how often I will be able travel and photograph but I will try to do my best to produce more images. So please, evaluate my current activity and let me know your opinions about my current work. Feedback is really welcome. Best regards --Chmee2 (talk) 19:46, 21 June 2013 (UTC)