ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the nocturnal edges of the Thames Gateway as experienced through the production of a short film titled Ghosts & Empties. The film was started as a by-product of a longer work entitled Zone of Change. All the footage was shot during daylight hours, but the long nature of filming days, often 14–16 hours, meant that I would often be finishing at sunset in the summer and driving back after dark. Driving through the Gateway at those times allowed me to experience another phase of its cycle and usage. I became increasingly interested in the area’s night-time economy and in the shift between day and night usage models. The use of a high-definition camera allowed me to record this landscape in a way that was closer to how I was experiencing it, and opened new possibilities to explore the sensory experience of the nocturnal. Through depicting the nocturnal edgelands, I explore their position as sites of ‘Otherness’, activities that separate them from the heteronormal. Night envelops and obliterates our ability to see; instead, we rely on our other senses.
