APOY Inspiration

If you're planning to enter our Urban Life round, which launches next week, take these tips from four of last year's top ten photographers

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Rachel Domleo, Bristol
Bus: Canon PowerShot G3X, 220mm, 1/640sec at f/7.1, ISO 125. Background: Canon PowerShot G3X, 122mm, 1/2000sec at f/7.1, ISO 125

Rachel was awarded second spot for her skilled composite shot in last year's category. The judges said: 'Rachel has created an impressive and extremely sensitive composite here, with the bus and the backdrop working in perfect harmony, and combining to make an atmospheric whole. The monochrome conversion is also skilfully achieved.'

Rachel says: 'As with many of my photos, this image was not really planned but evolved in post processing.

'I set off early one January morning as there was a promise of frost and mist in the weather forecast. There is a great viewpoint over the city of Bristol within walking distance so I headed off full of anticipation. The mist did not materialise but there was a lovely haze, so I took a number of shots of the surrounding area. I then noticed buses going down the M32 to the city centre. They were backlit, highlighting the silhouettes of the commuters, who were beautifully abstracted by the condensation. I zoomed in and took a number of images as the buses went past.

'Later in the day I reviewed the images but didn't have one single image that I felt worked really well, so to create a more impactful image I decided to take one streetscape and one of the bus and blend them using Affinity Photo. This created a much stronger narrative and vastly improved the composition, leaving the viewer to wonder what sort of day lay ahead for the strangers on the bus.

'The final image was very monochromatic, so I decided to convert it to black & white. I also removed distracting advertisements from the bus.'

Tommaso Carrara, Paris, France
Leica Q3, 28mm, 1/125sec at f/8, ISO 200