How many of us drive around, see something interesting and stop to take a photograph?

In these days of being so busy, it is not always that easy, is it?

I carry my camera around with me most of the time, and after a recent visit to a Peter Lik gallery, I have been invigorated by the landscape around me.

The reality is that we are mostly rushing around towards the next deadline that is simply to close. What is the answer? Leave plenty of time to allow for opportunity or change your mind set so that time is really not all that important.

Now the German landscape in my immediate vicinity is not the most dramatic and certainly not the kind that Peter Lik visits for his landscapes (sounds like excuses I know and perhaps they are).

The reality is that to do landscapes justice, you have to dedicate time and effort, more than most people (myself included perhaps) are willing or simply able to give. It is sad and a little depressing to admit but like most photographers time is our enemy and quite profound as it is one of the primary parameters we work with on a daily basis. We are always either fighting it or trying our best to manipulate it.

Now I am by no means a landscape guru by any stretch of the imagination but sometimes it is fun to get out on your own with a camera and a 4 x 4 and simply look for the opportunities. There is a convention that says decent landscapes should be taken at sunrise or sunset and really most of the time these are the best times as you can get some amazing light but quite often these times can give you a pretty cliche’d image. That is not to say a bad image, but for me they can lose impact if you feel you have seen them before.

We get so bombarded with imagery these days as there are so many cameras clicking away all the time, there ends up being some fantastic stuff out there but sadly often they are hidden among the mundane. A quick look on flickr searching for landscapes and you will see what I mean.

Germany is a stunning country in so many ways and I plan to try to capture more of this, I will of course share with you too.

There are some more examples of my Landscape work on our website http://www.LIMEfotographic.com Please feel free to visit.

Mirage

May 11, 2013

Opinion

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Las Vegas is quite simply a strange place. I can’t work out if it has an identity or if its identity is based on other places. Our hotel overlooks or is overlooked by a New York skyline, a fairy tale castle and hundreds of other guests. The strip has an Eiffel Tower amongst other world famous land marks. The customer service here is very polite, most of the time, but at times can seem fake and scripted. You can feel anonymous here with the sheer numbers but still feel special. This place does feel like one huge amusement park which is the point I guess.

What IS Facebook and Social media all about?

May 7, 2013

Opinion

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In this last week a friend on Facebook……. wait, a friend on Facebook or a friend who is on Facebook? Good question. How many real friends do you have in a lifetime anyway?

Social media confuses me. At first it seemed quite exciting catching up with people whom I had had no contact with since leaving school. What were they doing now? It appeals to our natural voyeuristic appetite, and yet it feels somehow detached, like you are doing nothing wrong, effectively spying on them (even though by putting their information up there for all to see if their choice).

It started by looking through the friends list of a new contact looking for other lost connections and then moves on to looking through photographs of them and their lives.

Have we always had this fascination?

A few years down the line and I find I have been questioning the validity of social media. Of course from a business perspective it works like a dream, I can post and tag my images and all their friends can see them. More work comes my way. Perfection.

But this can only happen if the public as a whole use the site. Numbers on Facebook are dropping in the western world now, but is this because the realisation has hit that time spend on these sites is a waste of time or are there other better sites available now?

I hope not. Most of the crap on Facebook seems to be more and more like a cry for help than anything else. The motivational and relationship status banners that are popping up all the time simply cannot be a healthy process. At the end of it all, who cares? I worry that many people who read these statuses are emotional vampires who get a kick out of the fact you are feeling low. There are so many people that enjoy watching the misery of others, do they not have anything better to do?

I decided long ago to keep personal details as far away from social media as I could. Most of your friends are really unknown, even if you did know them as a kid.

One of the other really big problems with social media is the faux bravery it nurtures. In the safety of your living room, you can spout all the vile poison in your head (we all have some), and yet feel safe from physical reprisals. You can say things to people that you just would not in a face to face encounter and feel safe that there is unlikely to be any consequences. This is a very worrying development for me, but also because mostly people try to believe all they read, in fact I am convinced that people in general are happy to believe what they are told because it is too difficult, sometimes, to question it. OK possibly not the case but…..

So going back to my friend, then from the beginning. A professional photographer who has decided to turn his back on the social media revolution. Wow, I thought to myself, that is brave (or stupid). Where are his clients going to come from? I thought. How strange to think that, although it does seem like it at times, social media is not everything. There is a life beyond it. My friend (maybe I will start to believe that this is the case), made some other very valid points with regards to the devaluing of the photographic image too. I don’t know though, maybe the digitising of photography has sealed its own coffin. Maybe the image will now be consigned to the disposable and temporary scrap heap. The next amazing image on Facebook is only a couple of status updates away, after all.

Except it is not, you find some of the good image based pages and you will find that many of the fantastic images being displayed are old, some very old. You see with all of this technology, I think we have started to miss the point about photography. Great off camera flash is wonderful for the wedding client or those portraits in the hay field, and it is such a skill (no doubting that), but they are still gimmicky. A great image is still a great image, even if it was taken 100 years ago. Digital means we can (and do) take more photographs, but we have always known that quality is better than quantity any day. So by taking more images what are we missing?

I think that perhaps we are missing the connection, that is what it is all about. A real connection and not a cyber one.

Photographic paranoia or the necessary steps?

April 30, 2013

Opinion

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There is quite a bit in the press in the UK right now about the new copyright law passed by Parliament. The government say that the bill will streamline and clarify the use of imagery where the photographer cannot be identified or contacted. Photographers are worried that the bill will leave them up protected by large corporations who are prepared to use images without paying for them.

Firstly, I think it is important to say that these issues of improper use of copyrighted images has been going on for some time and the internet and digital capture has only made things harder. S is it right to look at ways to simplify or clarify the law? Well I would agree, that yes something needs to be done. Is this bill the way ahead? Well I am sure there will be many photographers with a great many opinions, but there is a real consensus that over all these changes may be damaging.

One of the issues is the rights pertaining to ‘unpublished’ works. This will technically mean that any image or document made before 1989 can be used by anyone wishing to use it, with or without permission. Further to that if a company does publish the document they will then effectively get the copyright (or publishing rights) for 25 years. This could mean they can sell these documents without the consent of the originator. Pretty scary stuff. It seems that a lot of the lobbying for this change has come from places like ‘Google’, who stand to potentially raise a lot of revenue from this.

Another is termed as ‘Orphan works’ and is related to the use of documents (including photographs) where the reasonable steps made to identify the originator fail. The document can then be used without any recompense to the originator. Most professional photographers apply what is called meta data to their images and in basic terms is hidden in the image, the details of the image including who, what, where, when and how the image was made. Who took the image and the contact details of the photographer. This sounds great but most images on facebook simply do not have this info. In some cases the uploading of imagery to certain sites can remove this metadata too so that all the important information is lost.

What is reasonable? Who decides? The work ‘diligent search’ is present but what does that mean in legal terms? It is what I refer to as a cuddly word, it lacks real definition. It will probably take court action from a number of cases to make this clear.

So where does that leave us? The image used in the blog entry is obviously OTT, but will we see more of this kind of approach in an attempt to protect our property, because in simple terms this is the fact. These images represent income for some people, bread and butter, income and as such it would seem that there is just too much opportunity for abusing this bill.

What do you think? I would love to hear from you.

A scatter approach and the continuous search

March 5, 2013

From the Archive, Military work, Opinion, Portraits

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This week I had been asked to put a few words together for a biography on our work Facebook page. Actually not the easiest thing I have done if I am honest! Harder still was the effort (and time) required to go through my back archive to find some images to include. With ten years as a working professional, you inevitably gather a fair collection and even when you concede that half of that time was working with the more secret aspect of the military (and therefore have no imagery to show for it), I was surprised just how difficult this was.

This was one of those situations that is surreal, I captured this shot before understanding what had happened. At the time there had been a couple of shootings by Iraqi troops and this was taken on a training day. This guy was keen to point his AK-47 at me for the photo and there is a magazine fitted, I never knew if he had live or blank ammunition in it. I was lucky I guess.

I think at times it is good to look behind you, to see and consider what you have done in the past because the reality is the past is what has shaped who you are today. I am a believer in the acceptance we are really only the sum of our experiences, they shape us, they mold our character and personality.

One of the things we like to try and do is get the story in one picture. This was the Hajj pilgrimage, and the first time since the conflict that Basrah international airport had been open for the pilgrims.

As I have stated before, Buddhists believe that life is suffering, and we all endure hardships in life, some more than others granted but it is there. The real test is how we come to deal with these tests, and in this case I mean the emotional response rather than the physical one. How we look at a situation will inevitably affect how we deal with it, but any response will also involve a measured adjustment too. What I mean by this can be illustrated by nature. Two male lions fight to take control. A fight ensues that could easily mean the death of one of them. Both probably begin the fight with the same kind of emotional response and aggression, however pretty soon one will realise they are probably going to lose. How do they respond? Well they have a choice. They can continue or flee, if they continue they could get lucky (if they are thinking rationally) and if they flee they may survive. Is either response wrong? Probably not but they are worlds apart. You could even consider that the weaker one may have entered the fight without really expecting to win but understanding that to fight is expected.

Sometimes it is simply about an aesthetic, during a military music show, this one soldier was lit by a spotlight as he shouted his commands, I just liked the shot for its controlled lighting,

Life in the military has a reputation of being tough and much of the time it is, however humour is also so important. The bi-annual ‘Red nose day” provides opportunity.

The longer you consider the situation you can start to see different motivations or responses. These days as human beings we are not exposed to these kind of choices, but the reality remains.

It’s all about the lighting and finding a way to tell a story. This shot, taken at sunset is a simple story of water being dropped in the middle of a desert for an operation. A tiny bit of flash was needed to bring out the boxes of water, otherwise they would just have been silhouettes.

There are times when you are just in the right place at the right time. This shot was taken as the sun set on New Years Eve 2007. The Lynx was coming in to land fast and I had the time to capture this shot.

Anyway I kind of digressed there. To have the opportunity to look at my past work was good and bad. I remembered some of the experiences and cringed at some of the images. Any creative process is simply that, a process. I see images today vastly differently to what I did ten years ago. But I do that because of the experiences I have been through. My experiences are my own and each of us have had completely different ones. I feel now that the past has improved me and I only hope that it continues to for many years to come because this is the future and it excites me that the best is yet to come…

This is one of those shots that is technically dull but it is the details in observation that make it work.

This shot was taken on a routine patrol outside Basrah, looking for rocket rails. This shot was just a part of a selection used for a bio slideshow of trooper Whittfield that can be seen here; http://vimeo.com/26632974 This shot did also end up used by the Guardian to illustrate a story they did on budgets in the MOD. You can never control the use of your images I suppose.

Bring on that warm fuzzy feeling.

I loved this shot for what it stood for rather than the breathtaking quality (ha ha), this was a common sentiment from the Iraqi troops, they were generally proud of their involvements.

This shot does need some explaining. This is a drill (not real), the injured soldier is made up to give soldiers the realistic chance of dealing with an horrific injury, one they may expect to come to deal with. All I really remember now is the sickening smell of the fake blood, it smelled of overpowering make up.

Thank you for listening.

So then, why the title? Having just read it back it seems a bit of a tangent and perhaps it is. I was actually referring to this blog. I have been struggling with how to follow my last entry. What on earth do you follow an article on Belsen? Then I looked further back. This blog is personal, that is a fact, I am sharing my experiences and as an Army photographer I can deal with the full range of things. The horror of Belsen one minute, to soldiers skiing the next. They are not connected but as I experience them they are all important to me. I want to approach each situation with professionalism. I only hope this comes across.

The worst of human nature

February 24, 2013

Opinion

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Life is not all smiles, in fact if you believe Buddhists, life is suffering. I think we all have periods of our lives when we can relate to that.

We experience bad things, this is only natural, although who can say that they experience pain (physical or psychological). This week I decided to go back to a place I went to as a child and never really understood, Belsen, one of the Nazi concentration camps of WWII.

Now to put this in context, I used to live near to Belsen as a child growing up in a forces environment, but as a child you should not understand these things (sadly this is not the case for all children). Going back to the new museum (since I was a child), I was initially shocked by the museum, it felt cold, impersonal, forbidding. As I spent time in there, the more I understood it.

My wife’s Grandfather served in the Royal Engineers during the Second World War and was one of the first to enter Belsen. As a keen amateur photographer who had his own kit, he was requested to take some photographs of what he saw, such was the dis belief of what they did see, there must have been a real fear that the outside world would simply not believe it. Sadly he suffered the effects of what he witnessed for the rest of his life. Many of the photographs and negatives were destroyed on the advice of a psychiatrist in the 60’s or 70’s. A few did survive and were given to the Imperial War Museum together with the camera they were taken on.

On reflection as you see the exhibits, the photos, the artifacts later discovered, it becomes clear. How can you soften this place, no matter how uncomfortable you make the museum, it CAN never be as dreadful as it was for these inmates.

I will always remember the story told to me by my Grandfather in law, on entering the camp there was a young girl, sat near the abandoned gates, malnourished and to weak to even stand. By the time he walked past her again a couple of hours later, she was dead.

Part of the exhibition (that does not feel like the right way to describe it), the memorial, is a video exhibit filmed by the AFPU (Army Film & Photography Unit), the fore runners of our existing trade of RLC photographers. The video is harrowing to see, as it shows the reality that made me a little uneasy, watching the dead being dragged around in ceremoniously by a limb only to be dumped in huge ditches. I am realistic enough to understand that due to the sheer scale of the problem, it had to be dealt with so quickly as the stench of death must have been almost too much to bear.

Sadly it would be at least a little bit comforting to know that as a result of these atrocities, similar events would be avoided, but alas, this has been proven not to be the case.
Even more disturbing I think is the groups that deny that these events have been fabricated, they never happened. I don’t understand that even with the weight of evidence in still and video imagery, there can be any doubt, but it makes me wonder what motivates this denial, or the continued refusal to accept the worst in human behavior. Whist that continues, should we continue to accept these situations? How do we, as a species stop it?

What’s it all about? and what IS the magic of photography?

February 20, 2013

Opinion, Portraits, Wedding

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Wow, heavy, or is it?

Today we were informed by WordPress that we have now reached our second anniversary, where does the time go?

How do you begin to approach questions like ‘What’s it all about’? Well I suppose every single one of us would give a different answer and more than that, your answer would differ almost daily…

The question always reminds me of a Michael Caine line used in a song by Carter USM and it always makes me smile, not for any other reason than the acceptance that we all pose the question to ourselves at one time or another. It’s only natural.

So what is this blog all about? Well I am under no illusion that this gets seen by millions of people, tens of people is something…. This is a tool of my trade, a business tool an opportunity to shout about what we are doing, what our plans and ambitions are, so show some examples of our work, to interest you (well you can’t have it all I suppose), but ultimately a way of connecting. There is no malice, just what is intended to be an honest approach. The trouble with the written word is context. The skill in writing is just that, but often over looked is the skill in reading. Most of us don’t really understand punctuation, me included. Where should that colon come in, why does the apostrophe go there and how does the comma in a certain place change the meaning of the sentence? Yes it is fair to say, I am not the best at writing, but I try. We all communicate with each other, and talking is the best way because quite simply, the voice naturally has the natural inflexions that enhance the words themselves and make the meaning come to life. to give it context, to make it easier to understand. I think it is far easier to misunderstand the written word than not and possibly the other way around for the spoken word. That is not to say, the spoken word is never misunderstood because we all know it is.

I guess it makes sense then that unless you are certain the writer of some text is excellent and you have confidence that you read well, you should never take what you read too literally. Easier said than done! I know…. The more I write the more I understand just how artistic writing can be.

This leads me onto the next question, what IS the magic of photography? Well apart from being a tag line for this blog, photography for many has always had that allure of magic. If you go back to thee old film days (many of us view with a nostalgic tear), the actual process of creating an image onto a piece of glass or gelatin is nothing short of ingenious. Using the right chemicals at the correct temperature for the exact amount of time to develop the latent image is nothing less than astonishing. To see an image form on a blank piece of paper in the darkroom will always amaze me, it feels like magic. Of course I know it is not, it is chemistry but I will never fully understand the process so no matter how much I research it, I like the feeling I get that I am witnessing a little miracle.

Photography has changed in many ways in recent years and like any development, change is never all good, but usually it is also never all bad either. It is true the chemistry has gone, but the technological change is as dramatic and breath taking as the original process. How modern digital cameras capture what they do, well there simply has to be an element of magic in there somewhere.

Again though, this is not all there is, the magic goes beyond that. Surely the magic is in the emotion that a still image can portray? The capture of a genuine smile, the love displayed in a wedding photograph, the drained exhaustion of a brand new mother holding their baby, the satisfaction of having received your scroll from University, the list goes on and on. The capture of these things remind us of those moments and allow us to relive them, to remember. This is the real magic of photography, a simple two dimensional print or image can be so much more than that. In fact in cases where families have lost all their belongings in a fire often say that the hardest to come to terms with is the loss of their photos. Makes you think….

I made a photograph……… Snap, snap, snapping away.

October 22, 2012

Development, Opinion

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Snap, snap, snap, this photography lark is easy….. Isn’t it?

Any of you who have read some of my older posts will no doubt at times have noticed that I am a little critical of Photography as a form of art. As a photographer myself this is not meant in a detrimental way, more a quizzical way.

To describe an image as arty usually means it has a below a quality threshold but illustrates an effort to provoke some kind of thought process.

Now I am quite opinionated about art where it seems a skill of verbal diarrhea makes certain arty types go weak at the knees. I am however coming around to certain aspects of art in photography. Why?

Well I do think that far too many photographers are overly critical about their abilities, I know I am far too harsh at times. Does photography come naturally, we’ll for some it does and others it most certainly does not. Because it comes naturally to some does that mean it is any less impressive.

Where there is a problem, I think, is when photographers concentrate on an aesthetic composite over a narrative. After ten years, this is something I only now think I am getting to grips with, although some of that is my acceptance that each year that passes, my photography changes, the focus, my understanding of what I want to capture and how, seems to change constantly.

So what does this mean?

Well it means that as a photographer I am always adapting, moving, processing, getting better? Well, that will always be a matter of opinion. One thing I do know is that the more experienced I get, the clearer I see a photographic opportunity, the more I am able to preempt a situation and try to posting myself accordingly to get as many of the relevant elements I can into the frame.

The ultimate mission is to capture everything relevant to the narrative in a single shot. Not an easy thing to do, but always an objective.

You always want a picture editor to choose your image to support the article, and more often than not, one image is key (although with the Internet, there is an unlimited space). In print, one photograph is best, although not always possible.

So, as a conclusion, the images I take now are not simply a case of the fraction of a second it actually takes to capture the scene, but it becomes a culmination of a whole pile of ingredients. Like a chef, two people can make the same dish with the same ingredients and come up with completely different end products. This is the same with photography, two photographers at the same event with full freedom of movement will still come away with different images. The images I take now have taken far in excess of ten years to produce, which brings me to my final point, and one that for some time I never really understood. When I say I made a photograph, I now know I mean it. I construct an image from the surroundings, my position, my composition, my use of the photographic elements of shutter speed, aperture, ISO, the use of the lighting, or adding my own light. A photograph can really be so much more than just a snap, a brief moment captured as a still.

Building books and the tangible truth

October 22, 2012

Afghanistan, Military work, Opinion, Portraits

6 Comments

If there is one aspect of digital photography and the internet that I don’t like it is simply the lack of necessity to print your images.

There is nothing quite like a decent print, and trust me it is never simply a case of hitting the print button. So in the last six months or so I have been responsible for producing 4 photographic books, and all I can say is wow. Although the books have been limited run or one offs, the sense of achievement you get after all the work of putting them together and handling it is second to none.

I now have the printed book bug.

A reflective image is so different from a back lit image, that seeing your images feels like seeing it again for the first time.

There are some amazing companies out there that can produce these books and some of the software you can use to complete the books are very straight forward. All I would say is don’t feel the need to over complicate the layout.

Photo books should ideally, in my humble opinion, be about an image at a time, although that is not always possible. There is certainly a skill in putting a book together and I feel myself getting better each time. There is a lot of work, in particular when you are trying to include other contributors.

Another important effort is to do your best to create a narrative, to make the images inter connect and flow from one to the other and at times, even if you have a cracking image that misses the narrative, do not shoehorn it into the book just out of hand. If you need to add another section to the book to fit it in, then try but be your own worst critic.

The end result is worth it though.

Have courage in your convictions

June 23, 2012

Opinion

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Most people in our society will at some point in their life need (no, not need but want) a photographer, be it for their wedding, to photograph their new baby, their portrait, their pet. Their business products, the list goes on and on.

What do people look for?

Do you search for a photographer who captures something different or has a certain look you like? A cheap photographer? A friend who has a camera? Or nothing at all?

Where does the cost of a photographer come into it? Should it enter the equation at all?

The photography industry is incredibly competitive at the moment and the industry can be very easy for anyone to access with the super high quality of even some of the budget cameras. I wonder if this is a positive development, but regardless, this is where our industry is right now. The client has never had so much choice.

What does that choice mean?

I think this depends on what your view of a photograph is. Do you see a photograph as just a still image that simply records and reminds you of a memory? Is a photograph a piece of art? Can a single image really be that important? Take a while to think about some famous images you can remember. It may be a war photograph from Vietnam or a celebrity portrait, but the chances are it will be a stunning image for one reason of another.

A photograph is history. Although it is taken at the time the image is immediately assigned historic status. I shows us what was.

When you are looking for a photographer, what is your main consideration? I think there are two main perspectives. Will I love the images or can I afford them?

Take a wedding for example. This is for many people the most monumental day in their lives (although not for all). I think it is fair to say that most couples will look for a look they like from their wedding photographer. There is usually a budget but their first consideration in many cases is the look. I have been asked if I can replicate someone else’s look for a wedding before………Mmmmm!

Each and every photographer is different, of course there are styles and fashions that you can find over and over, but you have to look at the image, see what has been captured, is there emotion, a certain use of light, a character in there or is it simple a flat image processed to a style?

Photographers are observers, we look for things, we search for a representation. Some are better than others, that’s just the way fo the world I am afraid. As a photographer we should always be striving for the next image, that killer image that may not be the most asthetic but one that has that bit of magic. Sometimes that is not obvious but invariably there will be something.

To look at a photographers images, look into them, try to identify what they were looking at. You can do this for any photographer and ask the question, why? I guarantee you at times you won’t be able to answer the question but you will still see something that you like.
My work may remind you of someone elses work but for sure that’s all it is. Photographers are individuals, our work is unique, we all see things differently and if you hire us you are buying into that vision and experience. All photographers draw inspiration from the world around us.

As a client you should never look at a photographers work and then wonder if you can get a cheaper alternative by going elsewhere. Another photographer cannot just step into anothers head. So if you need a photographer, look around, look for somthing that you like, an edge, a look, a style or a vision and hire them.

If budget is an issue then look for an alternative, but don’t expect the same, you are only setting yourself for disappointment.

Your choice of photographer may, in the end, cost a little more than you wanted to pay but in years to come, those photographs could have more value to you because you will know in yourself that you did not compromise.

Did I mention that I shoot weddings and portraits…………………………………………………………………………..? 😉

Pets win Prizes!

May 5, 2012

Development, From the Archive, Opinion, Portraits

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We at LIMEfotographic have arranged a special open day at our studio on Eichholtstrasse, in Bunde, near Herford in Germany on Sunday 13th May 2012.

You love your pets, of course you do! Have you ever considered getting a professional pet portrait done? Well here is your chance, and you can be in with the chance to WIN a canvas frame print of your special pet.

We are opening our studio for a special pet day, so between 10am and 4pm on the 13th May, bring your pets to the studio behind the Naafi in Bunde (near Herford). We will photograph your beloved pet.

HOW THIS WORKS. This is a promotion day, we will photograph your pet in our studio for a maximum of 15 minutes per pet. Once the images are processed they will be posted on our Facebook page for voting. You can invite who ever you can to vote for your pet and quite simply by the closing date, announced when the images are posted, the image with the most likes, will win a stunning canvas print worth €250.

There is no obligation to purchase anything, but of course you may decide that you would like to book a family shoot or some simple portraits…………

Just pop by on the day, and don’t forget to bring your favorite pet with you.

Promotion and give away’s

May 2, 2012

Development, From the Archive, Opinion, Portraits, Wedding

2 Comments

The technical side of photography is not a problem for me. I know that may sound big-headed, it’s not meant to be. My photographic training was, let’s say, comprehensive. A seven month full-time course that in wider circles is well-respected, certainly gives you a grounding. I look back at some of the work from back then and cringe at it, but I also accept it for what it is and am still striving.

A personal first from ten years ago, the use of many layers, taking days to do and really pushing the computers boundaries.

Having been presented with the subject ‘shopping’, it made sense to mimic some of the visual inspiration of the time. Not great work now but it was a step.

When I graduated from the school, I felt a little bit like when I had just passed my driving test. I knew how to take a photograph but that was just the mechanics, I now had to develop that knowledge into a style, to give my images some character. This I think is where the real challenge of photography is.

I really enjoy shooting weddings, they are challenging and never easy, so you need your wits about you.

So ten years on, my photography has developed into its current manifestation and I now think I am a marketable commodity. This is where my next hurdle lays. All my training does not prepare me for self promotion. Some of you who have been reading my blog or follow my Facebook page may be surprised to hear that, or maybe not. I have in recent months been looking into the different ways to market yourself and mostly it is now down to the internet.

In the studio, you need to work hard to get the shots you want, you can never just turn up to a shoot.

Sometimes it is a shame that many elements used in the shot are hidden.

Inspiration is important to any photographer, we draw our inspiration from other image makers all the time.

Being in Germany does kind of limit my available market somewhat but this gives me the opportunities to try out marketing plans to get an idea about what works or doesn’t. Mostly though I just want to stay busy, producing new work. I have in the past organised a very successful studio open day where I allowed visitors to come in off the street into the studio, sample a micro shoot, see the product and as a result took bookings for bigger shoots. My next project is similar, but based on the pets theme. This one will be slightly different as it will be a kind of competition where people who have their pet photographed will then see their image on our Facebook page. This is where they vote (by liking) their pets image and they then invite their family, friends, anyone who knows them to also like their image. The winner will receive a canvas print of the winning image. Votes can also be included by the general public, so there will be a need to really push the Facebook page.

Sometimes you just have to jump in with both feet, a studio full of animals is a daunting thought.

The idea excites me, I am intrigued as to how the project will work out. This does need loads of work to work, but it is just another step in the journey of building a client base and a reputation that is in this industry all important.

I don’t find self promotion easy, I find that at times I feel clumsy and awkward with it, I am always too critical of my own work, but I accept that in these times I have to get beyond that and just go for it.

A change of perspective and the search for a new presentation.

May 1, 2012

Development, Opinion

7 Comments

A change is as good as a rest, so they say. I am leaving video behind at least for the time being and as I look to get back with my beloved stills camera, I have been trying to work in ways I do not normally.

Out came the 60mm Macro lens and on a perfect morning in England with dew sitting on the foliage I experimented. I have shot macro before but it is not really something that a do much of, neither is the nature shot.

I was lucky also to find a couple of bugs (this now seems to be what my kids now call them), crawling around.

I have also been looking at ways to present images better than just straight edges. A part of me is reluctant as I do feel that in many ways these presentation methods are employed too often to make mediocre images seem better than they are. This also goes for some of the post production so many photographers seem to be using now.

The search was down to looking for ways I could present some of my Afghan work in a book or for an exhibition. So I looked for a few choices and have so far settled on the ‘Photoframe’ software that integrates with my Adobe software so well. I am using it on a trial basis and at this stage I think it’s important to make visual mistakes, so there are a couple of frames that I don’t think work, or I don’t like.

I hope you like the images.

Is the photographic industry dead or dying?

March 5, 2012

Opinion

2 Comments

I am a professional photographer, that simply means I get paid to take photographs. This is my livelihood and not just a fun pass time (I know how lucky I am to enjoy what I do for a living). I am aware of the things that are said and done on the internet and the speed with which this industry is changing.

As anyone in this industry its hard to be truly objective about its development as anything I will say could be seen as sour grapes. On a positive note, digital photography has made photography accessible to anyone, which is a good thing, right? This means that the numbers of people with a ‘decent’ camera, clicking away has gone exponential. Even IPhone’s are regarded as excellent at gathering the image. You even have Pro’s shooting weddings with one!

Now I am not a photography snob (at least I don’t think I am), photography is not about your kit or equipment, its all about seeing the potential of an image before you take it and using your skill to capture it, however I do worry about perception with the public (clients) and more and more with people within the industry. Weddings are now being shot by Pro’s with the iphone 4, which is great for iphone and I am sure that a skilled operator does it justice. The problem is that every man and his dog has an iphone though and the perception ‘could’ be that anyone can now do a professional job with one. Not true. There will however be an issue with costs as you can get one of these cameras free on a contract and other photographers have over ten thousand pounds worth of kit, both pitching for the same wedding, there will be a massive range of costs, so where will this lead. Not having an iphone (for now), I really don’t know just how adept they are, my understanding is that you get app’s to re-work the images. This to me is like using a filter in Photoshop to give your images a ‘look’. In essence you use a filter to make ‘ordinary’ images stand out. This is only my opinion.

Where does that leave the industry? Well only time will tell, but one thing that gives me a degree of hope is that more and more clients are beginning to seek references from a photographer prior to booking, could this be down to the client now understanding that its the person that makes the image and not the camera? Is this knowledge borne from the experience of having a ‘good’ camera and wondering why they can not get the quality of image they expected by pointing it and shooting? Could this finally be the bubble of an over saturated market about to burst and the beginning of the rediscovery and homage to the skill of the photographer?

This is not intended to be an elitist subject, because these developments have brought some very talented people into an industry that was largely inaccessible before, but a statement about how an unregulated industry is seen by many as being in the dying twitches. Could we be seeing the dawn of a new era? Discuss.

—The mastery of life, work and Photography

The eye sees what it sees, the camera sees what you ask it to and the rest needs to be discovered.

Archive

Opinion

Seeing opportunity and getting of your fat @rse!

Mirage

Photographic paranoia or the necessary steps?

A scatter approach and the continuous search

The worst of human nature

What’s it all about? and what IS the magic of photography?

I made a photograph……… Snap, snap, snapping away.

Building books and the tangible truth

Have courage in your convictions

Pets win Prizes!

Promotion and give away’s

A change of perspective and the search for a new presentation.

Is the photographic industry dead or dying?

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