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God..The Best Lighting Cameraman ?

Back in my early years of photography I remember reading a magazine interview with Advertising Photographer Duncan Sim.

When quizzed about how he created one of his images of an American Diner shot against an incredible sunset he simply said “I think God is the best lighting cameraman”

Now I’m sure this was a tongue in cheek answer and no doubt the post production company helped both God & Sim somewhat along the way also but that statement has stuck in my mind ever since and more importantly I have found it to be very true.

Whether subconsciously  that statement moulded my way of approaching lighting or it was the lack of lighting available to me in my early years I’m unsure but these days (depending on the job and effect required) I always look to use natural light whenever possible then supplement this with flash or other light sources as required.

He may have been toying with the magazine a little but I think Sim was spot on especially when I see lighting like that in the image of my daughter below. This was shot in Cornwall while camping a few days ago with no reflector,no flash just my experience / knowledge and God given great light.

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Clarks Shoes ATL Sandals

 

Boats At Beer

Here are a couple of snaps I captured over the weekend while visiting Beer in Devon with friends.

Despite the very bright and quite harsh summer light the location looked too good to not shoot.

As I mentioned last week in a previous post there is never any bad light it just depends what you want to capture.

Raging Beauty

I’m mildly obsessed with shooting skies as I believe they can often make or break many of the images I create.

So when thunderstorms are forecast you can be sure my camera is not too far from my side much to the despair of my family who get pretty fed up with me constantly pulling over in the car to shoot them !

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“July” Snapshot Of An English Summers Day

I was asked to do some teaching the other day which I rarely do much of these days and I was explaining how important it is to learn the fundamentals of photography.

I also very quickly added that once you have learnt them that really anything goes ..if something works for the intention of the image you are creating then it works end of the story.

This kind of applies to this image as I rarely would ever create any serious imagery in the middle of the day especially in the height of summer.

The sunlight (if we have any) is harsh, contrast and for the most part pretty uninteresting and if shooting landscapes everything tends to be a little too green with little colour contrast between anything.

Having said that I’ve always maintained there is no bad light it just depends on what you are trying to achieve in the image.

I had the idea of creating a cow image for a while and for me they remind me of Summer with yes you guessed its green fields and deep Mediterranean blue skies.

Apart from having to be careful with the vast contrast inherent in the scene it all went together well with an appropriate Somerset landmark of Burrow Hill in the distance.

 

Cow-in-field-somerset

Knorr Garde d’Or

Towards the end of last year we where commissioned to shoot a job in Rotterdam for Bristol Agency Flourish

The brief was to photograph a chef at a hotel on the outskits of Rotterdam for a campaign for Unilever’s Knorr’s Garde d’Or range of products for adverts around Europe.

Time on set was rather tight but I’m pleased to say everything went very smoothly and hats off to Flourish for a very well organised production allowing us to simply concentrate on capturing the best image possible.

 

 

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4 Hours In Amsterdam, Inspired To Capture

The majority of the work I create these days tends to be pre-planned to a brief or an idea I’m inspired to create usually from several images composited in post.
Now and again though it’s great to just grab the camera and just explore and capture whatever I come across.
This often occurs when travelling to new places and I find inspiration is in overdrive to go and creative images that represent the place I’m experiencing.
While in Holland last week I had a few hours before flying home to go and explore Amsterdam.
There are in my opinion a couple of possible downfalls to arriving at either a well-known location or having limited time somewhere.

Floral Basket

If I’m visiting somewhere like Venice or Rome avoiding the well known often copied postcard locations and coming up with something fresh and in my own style is always one of my main objectives.
If time is limited at a location like in the shots here of Amsterdam then I’ll often find great locations only to feel that there would be an even better shot if only I could be there longer to wait for the light or weather to change, I suppose it’s a case of always wanting that little bit more perfection.
Over the years I have had to accept you are there at that moment and creating something unique from what you have in front of you and the other option is to simply just walk on by.

Here are a couple of images that I captured during my brief time in Amsterdam, the one below is a composite from two separate images captured a short distance from each other and composited together to create the final image.

 

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Summer In Amsterdam

iPhone Wanderings In Holland

Like many other photographers as well as shooting with more Professional equipment I love the challenge of shooting with my iPhone.

This week after shooting a job in Rotterdam on Monday  I had a few hours the following day before flying home to explore Rotterdam & Amsterdam.

Here are a few snaps from my wanderings with some more of the serious stuff to follow.

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Rotterdam-buildings

South Wales To Central London

One of the great things about doing advertising work is you never know what’s going to come in with the next phone call or email.
Last Friday this week looked like being a fairly quiet and relaxed one but it proved far from it.
On Tuesday we found ourselves heading across the bridge to Cardiff for a couple of meetings regarding a potentially very large commission we had put a proposal in for the just the previous week.
Thursday we found ourselves on the road again this time heading for Central London at fairly short notice for a nice little shoot.
Now I love shooting in London but driving through the centre is not for the faint hearted especially when your idea of heavy traffic normally consists of 2 0r 3 horses or a tractor and trailer blocking the narrow country lanes.!
Glad to say I transformed into city driving survival mode and breezed (kind of) in and out without any problems.
As I said love working in London but it’s kind of nice to get home away from the crazy roads !
Have a great Whitsun everyone..

 

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Joyful Memories At The Beach

I’ve lived by the coast pretty much all my life and as a result it has featured in much of my work over the years and still inspires me to create new work.
This beach scene was captured during a visit to the Algarve in Portugal last October with the model being captured last week at the beach in the south west.

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