May

Image Retouching The Fine Details, Surveying The Moor

Photo Retouching The Fine Details, Surveying The Moor

I was asked recently to help out a neighbour with some images for a new business venture she was setting up.
The main image needed to be a portrait of her with her dog Barney and I had the perfect location in mind that I had found only a week previously.
As with most shoots containing more than one person composition is key especially here where we have a person and a smallish animal that need equal attention in the frame. To do this I used a very large fallen tree that provided a great prop and worked perfectly for the main image required but also provided another unplanned opportunity when Barney decided to climb onto the very top of the trunk.

I very quickly spotted the potential of the scene unfolding and fired off half a dozen frames before he climbed down and the moment was gone.
I knew right there before previewing any images that I had a strong image that could be developed further in post.
I can’t explain what it is that that makes a potential image appear in front of me (when many people do not see it ) except to say it’s an unconscious thing perhaps developed (pardon the pun) over the 26 + years of looking through a camera.
The final photo retouching composite required a lot of retouching to remove the harness that Barney was wearing and to retain all the very fine details I’m obsessed with keeping and seamlessly blending with the background.
Retaining fine details like these takes a lot of work but knowing the image will stand up to the closest of scrutiny is important.

Next, I decided to scan through my archives to find the perfect background to compliment the image.
The image I decided to use is one of Exmoor that I had shot a couple of years ago but had never used and provided a perfect fit for the mood I wanted to create. The final image titled “Surveying The Moor” together with a close up of Barney is shown below.

Apr

Recovery

It’s been a bit of a tough year both personally and for the area I live and love that is still recovering from the recent floods.
This week I took a break from a hefty amount of marketing to do some walking and take some therapeutic snaps while I was at it.
Pointing my camera without any plans to what I wanted to specifically capture is not something I do a lot of these days so it was a bit like yoga for the creative muscles to just follow my nose.
I decided to head a few miles from the Studio to the edge of the Somerset Levels at Hambridge where just a few months earlier was several feet underwater and the road totally unpassable at least by car.

I’m glad to say I found a drastic change to the area since my last visit and everything appears to be returning to some kind of normality.
That is not to say that the signs of the devastation where not evident in fact I came a cross everything from flattened rotting withy trees to dead Deer (although that was probably due to a car than the flooding).
Although many fields still looked saturated with water and mud a few did have some signs of growth in them along with hedges blooming with Blackthorn

Apr

Cabin Crew, A Team Performance

Some composite images just fight you all the way then there are some that just go together effortlessly like they are meant to be that way like the image here.
The model for this shoot is Kate and I have been shooting her on and off for over a decade and for very good reason she is simply brilliant !
This goes beyond simply being great looking and being able to walk or pose correctly without much direction it’s her professionalism,enthusiasm and simply knowing she will turn up and I need not worry about anything model related.
On personal shoots I will often work alone but on this one Dean my good friend and manager of The Monks Yard where I’m based was on hand to assist me where needed which was a big help at times especially shooting a little video footage and ordering the coffee !

[su_vimeo url=”http://vimeo.com/92036197″ width=”1280″]
Without doubt the post production work was helped enormously by the fact that we had just installed a brand new top of the range mac to replace our very decrepit existing system and it was like a hot knife through butter to use.
So all in all this was a great team effort helped along a little with some up to date computing power and I think it shows in the final image.

Apr

A Late Willow Harvest

This week we finally finished another shoot for my personal project “Life In A Somerset Landscape“.
You may remember early October I went on a recee to PH Coate & Son “Willow & Wetlands Centre” with the plan to return and photograph the wicker harvest.

Apr

Mind Games With Jet The Raven

A few weeks ago I did a couple of posts about photographing the devastating floods from Burrow Mump in Burrowbridge and some capturing beautiful old trees in Dorset.
Both these where shot for a new image I had wanted to create as part of my personal project “Life In A Somerset Landscape” and to represent the severe floods that had hit Somerset this year.
The only element that I had left to find was a Raven or something from that family of birds which I had always wanted to photograph.
I had nearly exhausted all my options for sourcing one locally and not one to compromise easily I decided to place a post of Facebook to see if anyone knew of one..even a stuffed one was becoming an option ! To my surprise one of my oldest friends replied within minutes saying his tattoo artist called Brendan had a tame Rook and I should call him.
After a couple of days I rang Brendan who indeed had Jet a fairly young and fairly tame Raven I could happily pop along to photograph.
Despite photographing several animals for this project already I’m by far a wildlife photographer and knew nothing about Ravens apart than they where a bigger version of a crow !
Brendan explained how incredibly intelligent these birds where (more than dogs) and although my concern about having my eyes pecked out was very unlikely due to their friendly nature I would definitely find Jet to be very inquisitive.
I turned up with a car full of gear (you never know what you will need on location) but I soon realised the avery was too small for any kit apart from hand holding the camera and a speed light for some fill in flash.
The other things that quickly came to my attention was how big and hyperactive Jet was ! This was going to be a tough shoot but that was to become an understatement!
You remember how I said how intelligent these birds where ? well it seems they also like to play games with tubby photographers trying to photograph them.
Each time I raised my camera to my eye he would fly, I could watch him all I wanted in fact he would do this little display to impress me (or take the piss as I saw it) but as soon as I raised the camera past my chin off he’d go off again…the little bastard was playing with me and winning!
Anyway not to be outdone I decided I would just have to set the camera up the best I could and shoot blind holding the camera at chest level.
I could have possible set the camera up and shot via a radio trigger but the concern was Jet would fly onto the tripod and knock the whole lot to the floor and I did not fancy explaining that to the insurance company less than a week after a £700 repair for it rolling down a hill!
With 140 frames shot I managed to capture enough usable frames to choose from which had correct perspective and interesting angle.

The image is titled “A Perch Above The Flood”

Feb

It Don’t Rain It Pours !

After some careful planning I today decided to venture out towards the heart of the severe flooding on the Somerset Levels.
I headed to a spot I’ve visited many times called Burrow Mump at Burrow Bridge where the floods hit very hard.
I wanted to capture some images for a new image I have an idea for and also document the severity of this major and devastating flood.
I arrived on the only road that is currently open, parked up and navigated the muddy field at the base of the hill.
The climb up was a bit precarious and I did not look forward to the journey back down which I was sure would be predominately on my ass !
The view from the top of Burrow Mump is always impressive and although the flooding had receded a fair bit in places it was still an incredible sight especially as the storm clouds gathered yet again ovehead.
After several shots of the incredible light over the flooded fields I decided to move position to try another angle, as I bent to grab my bag the tripod complete with camera toppled down the hill smashing the £1700 lens that was attached !.
It’s been a difficult few weeks as I have previously mentioned and maybe due to this I just looked at the heap of electronics on the damp hillside packed my bag and headed home.
As my mum would have said “It Don’t Rain It Pours” she also used to say things often happened in threes but I’m hoping this time that is not the case !

Feb

A Brown Case Of Memories

Last week was the most difficult in my life with the sad passing of my mother.
As I have dealt with the things that need to be arranged I found myself needing an image of my mum that I knew we had from her wedding day from 1949.

I finally found the image I was seeking in a small and very old brown case which also contained a treasure chest of images dating back to 1917.
I decided while I had time I’d copy the aging prints most of which where in amazing condition despite their age. The images ranged from the usual family snaps of Mum,Dad,Grandad,Grandma and various other siblings to some more unusual from my dads naval days.
My Dad served on the aircraft carrier HMS Indomitable during WW2 in the Mediterranean and the Pacific and spent time on R&R in Sydney.
One in particular shown here is my Dad in his uniform with a blonde lady which we believe was a girl he met and got engaged to while in Sydney.
He returned to England with intentions of returning to marry her but then met my mum.

On top of this we also discovered letters he wrote home to his mother and newspaper clippings of him which really adds to the whole story of that time in his life.
This got me thinking firstly how lucky we (myself, brother & sister) are to have this family archive of images and letters. Secondly just how important image captions are as only a few of the prints had any kind of dates or descriptions scribbled on the rear of them.
It’s a shame that the majority of children growing up will never have a dusty box or case full of prints in Grandma & Grandads loft to open up and explore as most people these days simply do not produce prints but share their images just digitally.
Maybe we all should have a box and place prints into it periodically for our children & grandchildren to enjoy when we are no longer around .

In Loving Memory

Feb

Storm Front West Bay Dorset

Another image from a recent trip to the Dorset coast of West Bay.

Feb

Into The Onshore

Most of my Saturday’s are made up of Football. The morning are spent with my sons games followed by (when at home) watching Yeovil Town F.C.
Occasionally however we get a football free Saturday and this weekend was one of them so we grabbed the kids and took a trip to the market at Bridport.
With Bridport being so close to West Bay & with the weather forecast predicting yet another storm approaching later in the day I decided to take my camera in the hope I could capture some interesting skies for my composite archive.
I was not disappointed the coast was being battered by high winds that was creating some amazing cloud formations and I managed to capture several images this one being one of my favorites titled “Into The Onshore”

Jan

Rubus “The Beast In My Lap!” Ad Campaign Kings Bruton School

Following on from last years very successful campaign which won Silver in The Graphis Advertising Awards I received a call back in September from Ice House Design with another exciting brief for Kings Bruton School.

After a couple of meetings and an interesting recce of Kings very old (it was founded in 1519 !) & historic school the briefs where finalised.
The required image was pretty straight forward involving capturing Kings Bruton’s sports field and Church with the beautiful hills behind with the inclusion of the famous Dovecote on it’s hill.The Dovecote does not sit quite in than spot but with a little creative license I moved it into position a mere mile or so. The main element for the image and most difficult to potentially capture was to be a Stag.I always prefer to shoot my own images when creating composites but even I thought a stock shot may have to be sourced for this one. Fortunately after some research on good old Google and conversations with several people my good mate and manager at The Monks Yard where our studio is based provided me with a contact just a few miles away.
Mike Gage runs South West Deer And Rescue and was more than happy to help me out and I arranged to pop down to take a look around.Mike showed me the park and it’s gorgeous views across the Somerset countryside and the many species of Deer he had. He finished off by introducing me to Rubus and very large Stag with an amazing set of antlers..perfect !.

Being October it was rutting season and Mike warned me Rubus was pretty hormonal and I was not to get out the back of his pickup truck. Unfortunately it did not stop Rubus coming over and sticking his rather huge head of pointy bits almost into my lap trying to grab food from the floor of the truck…! It became obvious pretty quickly I definitely have to wait for the randy Rubus to calm down from the rutting season before coming back to get my images.
After a few weeks I had gathered all the background material and I returned to see Mike and to capture Rubus.This time he was a fair bit calmer and I could with caution leave the safety of the pickup to get the angles I needed.The shoot went well without too many scares and I got all the material I needed within 30 minutes or so. The post production took a little longer however about 71 and a half hours longer to be precise but then the devil’s in the details and the final image had plenty.
Below is one of several adverts that are now running together with another version that did not showing more of the sports field with rugby posts and flags.

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