Ban White Vans!

The good thing about working in the city is that I have infinite opportunity to take photos. I tend to snap everyday scenes of life and events for posterity and even try and attempt to create images with some artistic merit (this last part I achieve on a fairly infrequent basis). Today was a good day to wander around the streets during my lunch break, plenty of late winter misty, low angle light. I found myself heading towards Melbourne’s China Town area and fired off a few digital shots (digital has made my photography hobby about a million times cheaper than my 35mm days). Anyway, after a few minutes I realised that virtually every photo I had taken contained a white delivery van in it somewhere. Whether it was parked on the side of the road, nosing into the shot from the edge, or more often, flying into the viewfinder out of nowhere just as I am about to press the shutter.

I took one picture I was absolutely positive was white van free. The picture was of an old vacant and almost derelict jewelers shop that looked like it had closed as usual one day in 1956 but the owner had forgotten to come back and open up ever again. Then, when I reviewed the shot in detail a little later, there in the reflection of the shop window was the white van. From this experience I am now tending to think it is becoming less and less likely that a photo taken in the city (or anywhere in the vicinity of a road) can be taken without inadvertently capturing a white van somewhere in the frame.