This photograph by Martin Parr, entitled "Beach Dome," was taken in 1996.

It appears to be a fun beach scene with vibrant colors and happy people, but the more you look at it, the more interesting the picture becomes. The upper edge of the picture shows a ceiling and a fake background which continues the ocean scene. It doesn't appear to be a staged photo, but it's deceptive because it's not a real beach, but the people in the photo have suspended their disbelief and are having a good time at the fake beach.

The subject is easily hundreds of people enjoying a day at an indoor beach. Because the picture was taken in 1996, it's easy to say that it was taken with color film on either a small, medium or large format camera. The picture was taken from a high view and it was focused at an aperture of f/16-f/22. And the shutter speed would have had to be relatively fast because there were people moving and splashing and having a good time at the beach. It doesn't appear to be staged because it seems as though it's a normal past time to go to an indoor beach (especially while in London where it is cloudy a lot of the time). There were a lot of different versions of the picture online because it's widely known and duplicated, so there were different edits and some with high contrast and low contrast, and others were large scale and some were smaller scale. However, the picture was the same throughout. I can imagine that Martin intended to have this picture be highly contrasted because his technique and style shows that he really likes bright and vibrant colors.

This was taken in an "Ocean Dome" which we assume is an indoor waterpark in England. It seems as though all of his work is connected. We are unsure if this photo is included in a larger body of work or a series, but he has lots of pictures of people at beaches (mostly outdoor). We think that this work is unique because we've never seen any other photographs like his in that particular time period. A lot of professional photographers work was done in black and white film, but Martin's work seems to embrace color which is what a lot of people feared then.

The culture climate of England is what makes this photo stand out so much. You can't build an indoor ocean in Florida and expect people to attend because they have that weather all the time. In England, it's obvious that scene has more of an impact on the every day life of the population.