Jan
04

Final & First Promotional Mailers

2013 was a busy year not only for assignments but for the real work of marketing (getting the work to shoot).
Having been in the business for 26 years (or something close to that) I have promoted myself with some very clever & creative mailers over the years.
These ranged from branded boxes containing mini postcards of our work to beautifully printed and designed pop up cards.
These days however I stick to the less creative but more effective (in my opinion) A5 postcard for my main marketing.
These are targeted to creatives and agencies whom I would like to work with and are a good fit to my style of work and followed up with a Book drop off where possible.
This little lot are the final batch of my current mailer to head out and the first mailing of the new year and then it’s to the printer with the first new card of 2014… just hope the price of stamps do not go up !

Dec
28

Casting Into The Dawn

The Christmas break has meant I have had time to look over some of the many personal images I have shot over the last few months but not had time to process. This one title “Casting Into The Dawn” was captured at dawn on the cliffs close to Albufeira on Portugal’s Algarve coastline.

Casting Into The Dawn, Portugal

Dec
18

House On Nieuwe Maas

While in Holland a couple of weeks ago I had a small amount of time to explore Rotterdam. My initial plan was to jump on a boat and visit some windmills that were situated not too far from the city center but unfortunately, this meant I’d be cutting things a little fine to get back to catch my flight home.
A little disappointed I decided instead to catch a water bus down the Nieuwe Maas river for an hour or so and capture a few images for my composite archive and enjoy the views.
The weather was a little grey and misty but in my opinion, there is never bad weather or light for image making it just depends on what you want for the shoot in mind.
During one of the many stops, the water bus made I noticed this house on the banks of the river that for some reason I was strangely drawn to.
Maybe it was because I watch too many horror films but with the damp December weather providing an appropriate backdrop it looked slightly eerie sat isolated on the edge of the river.

Dec
11

December Dawn On The Nieuwe Maas

The last few weeks have been pretty busy with a rather diverse mix of assignments both here and abroad.
Rather than wind down and take an early Christmas we are currently preparing to complete some shoots for one of our ongoing personal projects (See The Cider Orchards & Withy Centre Posts).
Personal work is and always has been a very important part of my photography. For me it’s an extension of my commercial work except I have complete creative freedom to cut loose,experiment and generally create whatever inspires me at the time.
A couple of things that do get me excited to go out and shoot are exploring new places and it’s people. Fortunately last week after completing an assignment in Rotterdam I had a few hours the following day to explore the city and I and set myself the challenge to come home with a few shots to sum up this very interesting and modern city.
The image here was captured at dawn and combines several iconic elements of Rotterdam including the huge Nieuwe Maas river, the beautiful Erasmusbrug Bridge and lighting up the horizon the very modern De Rotterdam building.

Dec
06

Protexin, Stop Motion Company Video

For several months this year we worked on a large project for a company called Protexin.
Protexin manufacture and distribute worldwide Probiotcs for human & animals consumption and where looking for a new way of showcasing to their international customers their impressive state of the art production line, staff and premises.
As we had been keen to work with them for quite a while we set up a meeting and proposed shooting a video using thousands of still frames (and some motion) to showcase their company in a contemporary and engaging way.
After shooting using the technique at one of the many exhibition that they attend  (see Protexin A Engaging Video Solution ) they decided to expand the project even further to produce the finished video below.
After a fair amount of pre production and planning not to mention many many hours of processing, colour grading, a pinch of after effects and plenty of video editing the project was finally finished.
Protexin where extremely happy with the finished product and we have since worked on several other albeit smaller Photographic projects with them.

Nov
26

The Headland Path

Another recent image captured in the beautiful light of the Algarve Portugal.
This one titled “The Headland Path” was captured on the cliffs close to the coastal town of Albufeira.
I have always lived on or very close to the beach and to be honest it used to concern me that the coast appeared in so many of my images.
Over the years however I have come to understand my work/vision in much more detail and what drives it and I know you can’t force or control creativity you simply just have to follow what inspires you.

 

Nov
24

Perigoso Path, Portugal

It seems a distant blur since my week in Portugal probably partly due to being very busy completing a couple of commissions since returning home.
Now these jobs have been completed I finally had time to start going through a few of the images from my trip and managed to complete this one titled “Perigoso Path” (Dangerous Path).
The light in Portugal was stunning and produced some of the most colorful sunsets I’ve experienced for a very long time which of course I captured for my composite archives to be used at a later date if needed.
The cliffs in the image here where captured at dawn which is often my preferred time to shoot as it usually means less people around to spoil the view !
The coastline here provided me with several interesting locations to capture over the week and I plan to add a couple more of the images to the blog as when time permits.

Nov
08

Capturing Deer On Location

After a very enjoyable week in Portugal it was straight back into it this past week with two assignments planned.
I can’t reveal too many fine details at this point but one of the jobs is a follow up to a very successful adverting campaign we shot & retouched last year.
This shoot involves capturing some rather cute (some of them at least) Deer on location and we happened to find the perfect place just a 20 minute drive from our studio base at The Monks Yard.
Despite being rather unpredictable beasts the shoot went extremely well and I completed all the images needed with any drama.A few days later I had completed the capturing of all the elements needed and we are now currently working in post to assemble the two ads for the agency.Here are a few snaps of the location and some very brief video footage.
I’m hoping to reveal the final images here within the next few weeks and can’t wait…



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Oct
11

Wicker Coffins & Wetlands Centre

Today was the end of a very full week of shooting in London, Devon & Somerset.
We also had to produce estimates for a couple of fantastic briefs that we hope we will be shooting next month which we are pretty excited about.
So all in all a very enjoyable week and to top it off today we spent a fantastic morning looking around yet another location we are planning to shoot for our personal project “Life In A Somerset Landscape”
The location was PH Coate & Son “Willow & Wetlands Centre” here in deepest Somerset.The Coate family have grown willow here since the 1800’s and today produce products from environmentally friendly Wicker Coffins to Christmas Hampers for the famous Fortnum & Mason in London.
So just like Cider making the Willow growing indusrty just had to be included in our project and we plan to return in November when the Willow Harvest is under way.

iPhone 5

Oct
11

Capturing The Cider Orchard

This week the weather finally looked perfect and we got to shoot the old Cider Orchard I mentioned in a previous post.
I arrived on my own at the orchard just after sunrise and spent nearly two hours in the beautiful autumn light capturing all the images I would need ready for the composite.
I should explain again that the plan was to capture the orchard now while full of Apples and then photograph the guys from Richies Cider when things quieten down for them after the harvest.
The shoot was pretty simple and most the time was spent trying to create nice clean compositions as there was just so many trees full of fruit close to each other that it was a little too much !
We now have to create our backdrop from the images captured and arrange to return to Richies Cider Farm in a few weeks to capture the images of the guys to complete our vision for the final image.