Venice Beach Patrol 1992

The last few days I’ve been busy in my archives digging through my travel photography portfolio. and also old car work.
These were shot predominately when I was retained to shoot cover cars for Top Marques magazine in circa 2007.

Within the keyword search popped up this image from my travel and photography trip in the states way back in 1992.
The photography location is Venice Beach in Los Angeles where I finished my 3-month photo trip before flying home.

Unfortunately, the lab back here in the UK actually cocked up the processing leaving many rolls with major colour and tonal issues and pretty much unusable.

Thankfully decades after capturing the image and with my knowledge of image retouching many frames are now repairable.

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Somerset Photographer Capturing Summer On The Moor

Somerset Photographer Capturing Summer On The Moor

Sometimes I have an idea and before I know it I’ve captured all the images required and I’m sat in front of the computer bringing it to life.
Others, however, can sometimes sit around in my head for months or at best sketched out in Photoshop, this image is a little of both those.
As a Somerset Photographer over the years, I have been capturing people and animals for a personal project “Life In A Somerset Landscape“.
It had been a while since I had added to the work and I really wanted to capture Burrow Hill which is a situated close to Hambridge in South Somerset for part of the project.
I remember seeing Burrow Hill for the first time one summer’s day, a quaint small hill with a single tree on top complete with an idyllic rustic swing attached to one of its branches.
It felt slightly surreal like I had stepped into a Jack & Jill Ladybird book!

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Lifestyle Photography Shoot, A Black Sheet And A Shaded Barn, Capturing Jock The Diver

Lifestyle Photography Shoot, A Black Sheet And A Shaded Barn, Capturing Jock The Diver

Inspiration for creating lifestyle images can appear when you are least expecting it.
A year or so ago I was snapping pictures, my kids, while they were exploring rock pools on a small Cornish beach.
I was pretty engrossed with capturing the best shots I could on my iPhone while not dropping it into the water again (yes I destroyed the last one this way) when suddenly a dark dressed figure appeared between the rocks heading for the water.

The guy was all geared up in a wetsuit but not for surfing for diving complete with tanks and spearfish and I remember thinking what a great image this could make amongst the towering rocks.
A year or so on we revisited the area and I decided to return to the beach to capture it and create the image that had inspired me.

Capturing the background was pretty uneventful and my hopes that there might be an amazing coincidence and the diver might turn up faded along with the beautiful light.
No matter, part of the fun creating composite images is tracking down people to photograph so I hit the web and contacted several local Diving clubs and shops seeking a suitable willing model.

I eventually got chatting to Mike “Jock” Stewart who teaches people to dive not far from my studio base. After chatting for a while he explained to me I may not want to use him as he was 66 years old and retired !… I explained even without having met him that he would probably be perfect.

Yes, I could have hired the kit and got a young attractive model but as a lifestyle photographer of many years, I want to shoot a mixture of work besides how much more interesting to have someone passionate about their sport with years of experience and many tales to tell.
A time was arranged to shoot the next day and I set off to get a few things needed like a bag of sand to help add the small details needed to complete the composite.
Like with all composite images there are several things that need careful thought before shooting like perspective, the colour of the surroundings, focus and of course matching the quality and direction of light.

At this point, I should show you an impressive shot of the interior of our beautiful old Hamstone Barn stuffed with lighting and grips..but in reality, a black sheet from Asda and the open shade of a disused farm barn was all that was needed to blend and match the lighting to the background scene.
Not all that impressive I agree but I knew this would give the best result, after all why try and recreate daylight in the studio when with a little manipulation you can have the real thing.

 

 

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The shoot went like clockwork and Jock was a pleasure to work with and quite happy to have water, oil and sand thrown over him!
The 3 completed images came together seamlessly in post-production partly due to some careful pre-planning and plenty of image retouching knowledge.

 

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