chatting to them and all of the sudden
they will interrupt and say whoa look at
the lady’s shoes or oh what a pretty
flower over there or I’m sorry but I
have to say your top is so cool
have you seen Finding Nemo I’m dory I’ve
been distracted and absent-minded all my
life my friends got used to my
scatterbrain and is my fascination for
little details and the ability to frame
things with my eyes that later drove me
to fall in love with photography in fact
is these two qualities that I use to
decide what makes a good photo one of my
main influences is Japanese philosopher
and amateur photographer Daisaku Ikeda
he writes in this hectic age it is
important for us to stop from time to
time take a deep breath and look closely
at ourselves and the world around us
some of Ikeda’s photos were taken during
brief moments of rest on his travels and
just like him I was also traveling quite
often when I started doing photography
one day I was waiting for my train
connection and I saw this amazing winter
dawn and I felt so much gratitude for
being there and seeing it that I felt I
had to share it with others so I took
out my mobile phone and I took a photo
of it and then later on I discover the
macro button on my mobile phone and I
started
in fig pictures of little details
flowers in street gardens tree branches
and flowers in the tree branches it’s
just fascinating so much fun and not
only that I found that these images also
gave joy and made a difference in the
day of the person that I share it with
my friends my family via email via
social media so photography became a way
to express gratitude for what I see and
share positivity with others you might
think there’s nothing special about this
but the truth is for the last fourteen
years I have been slowly losing my sight
so why do I do photography if I can’t
see very well
let me tell you I have an eye condition
called retinitis pigmentosa which is a
bit of a mouthful so I call it one key
vision what it means is that I am slowly
losing the ability to see around the
corner of my eyes and in dim light so
this is how I actually see that photo to
make life even more interesting I’m also
very short-sighted and overly sensitive
to the light so you see I’m the typical
blind person with dark glasses and white
cane who can actually see we do exist
over time my photo collection grew and
grew photography became a way to get in
touch with my creativity to say you know
what I can still see and I’m grateful
for it and I’ve been able to take part
in very interesting projects and meet
lovely people
this passion of mine I’d like to share
some of my journey with you today a
couple of years ago I started going to
gigs with this friend of mine who wanted
to start what’s on in the worship music
scene so she would go out write reviews
about gigs on her blog and I would
collaborate with photos and this is how
plugin amp her project was born soon
enough my photos started being used by
artists in social media they started
appearing in newspapers and the band’s
thanks to that exposure started taking
part in festivals signing on to PR deals
and even going on to tour on a national
level now if you can’t see very well
going out in a dark music venue to take
photos it’s a little bit crazy and I
have to be honest I was terrified I
thought I’m gonna start tripping over
musicians instrument I’m gonna start
walking into everybody I’m gonna get the
shot wrong is going to be a disaster but
the little story voice in my head said
what did you try this why don’t you use
the camera like that so I found creative
to create creative ways of navigating
music venues avoiding
walking into people editing images it
was good and I’m actually quite proud
with the resultant we saw these are also
a few of the bands that have got quite a
bit of exposure out of plugin am still
from certifier and speaking each others
also do check out plugin um music
network on Facebook some facts the theme
picking up researching for this talk the
link between creativity and resilience
has been well studied and resilience is
the ability that we all have to recover
from traumatic challenges the author
Ruth features in her book everyday
creativity says creativity is not
something that only belongs to artists
we all have it and we can express it in
the way we react to our daily challenges
in fact connecting with our everyday
creativity can make us more productive
improve our quality of life and even our
health also the emerging field of
positive psychology recommends
harnessing creativity as a way of
leaving more happy and productive lives
this is what I feel I do with
photography I can’t change the fact that
I’m losing my sight but I can’t change
how I react to it and I believe everyone
is capable of the same in their personal
situation
so through photography I wish to connect
to the birthplace of hope in every
person’s life taking part in pluggin amp
was a lifeline for me I was going
through a very difficult time I started
having more problems with my night
vision even in familiar routes like
coming back from work and in daylight I
started walking into everything to make
matters worse I also started having
problems
reading small print so I knew it was
time to take action to consider using
our why cane and look into assistive
technology and I’m not going to lie to
you it was very difficult to the point
of being sign off from work for a while
and I even thought I was not going to be
able to carry on doing photography but I
did not give up I forced myself to go
out to the park and take photos to
listen to my little dory voice and try
different ways of framing and editing
images with the determination to take my
work out to keep more exposure to my
photography and this year I had my first
breakthrough in April my work was part
of a shot in the dark a documentary
about flying photography featuring my
work alone and the work of two other
photographers based in the Midlands a
shot in the dark is openly available on
YouTube and not only that I had the
opportunity to also exhibit my work
alongside the work of the other two
photographers in the launch of the film
in Manchester and I’m now really
focusing on working on my passion for
small details through nature and
architectural photography so these are a
tenerife I’m Frank Ferguson to finish I
would like to share a few things that
I’ve learned through coming out of the
closet has visually-impaired first of
all I’m registered legally blind I have
to use a cane I have difficulty reading
small print but I can still see
confusing well according to the RNIB 93%
of people register blind and partially
sighted in the UK have got some vision
it’s just not as good as normal vision
but we can perfectly leave our lives
with the use of a few adaptations in
fact what a few of us are very witty
problems or solvers
every time I’ve met somebody else living
with sight loss have learned something
new there are tricks for navigating
venues for avoiding knocking things over
on the table for thirteen steps you name
it there’s a solution for it and that’s
every day creativity in fact you might
not believe it but I’m used to having
monkey vision I mean I can’t remember
what it’s like to see normally and this
surprises most people around me for
example when I told one of my specialist
Dominique I am oh I am an amateur
photographer
he was so baffled he invited me to do a
talk at the staff meeting and he was
great because they shared how it enables
me to enable them to understand what
it’s like to live with sight loss and I
feel this must be a practice more spread
in the Health Service because from a
personal experience losing your sight
can be a scary thing and retinol units
must be more humane big places where
people is treated with
technically regardless of their side
condition I also share an article I
wrote about photography with the people
doing a white country I was doing YK
training with and later on it made it to
workshop vision magazine which support
around 500 people living with silos in
work sure when I started doing
photography
I thought I was the only one if not one
of the few visual in Faragher firs but
as I later found out there’s many of us
out there and like to finish by sharing
some of their work with you Tanveer
Naomi Bush from the UK Hattie Cole from
and Julie Carbonell from my home country
of Venezuela just like them just like me
you too can turn anything around be
creative look at things differently you have nothing to lose thank you