As Ive mentioned in several posts before that last year I picked up my Life In A Somerset Landscape Project once again after a short break.
Using the power of social media I made some incredible connections of people to photograph to the point of being a little overwhelmed.
Legion of the Stag, Somerset Medieval Fighting Group
A few days ago I completed another shoot for my project Life In A Somerset Landscape.
I had been told about a Medieval Fighting Group based in Ilminster Somerset that specialised in 12-14th century fighting re-enactments.
This sounded a perfect fit for the project and so I made a call to a chap called who ran the group called James to have a chat.
Small And Sweet, Crest Cyder Farm Somerset
Chris And Carole Brown run a small family Cider Farm from their home in North Curry Somerset.
Their daughter Alice contacted me after seeing my request online for people for my project Life In A Somerset Landscape
Steve Trims Show Sheep
Steve Trims Show Sheep..yeah try saying it after a couple of glasses of Scrumpy!
Liz Steve Rowe’s wife messaged me to see if Steve’s slightly unusual passion might be of interest to my Life In A Somerset Landscape Project and of course I was intrigued to find out more and we agreed to arrange something.
I’ve captured people in the Willow industry before for my Life In A Somerset Landscape project.
Chris doesn’t work for a company he is an independent artist working from home for a small selection of close clients.
Storytelling In Somerset
In early August I posted out on social media that I was looking for people to capture lifestyle portraits of for my project Life In A Somerset Landscape.
The response was impressive and I found myself having a difficult time responding to everyone that reached out but Im glad to say I did out of simple courtesy.
In August shortly after my social media appeal, I captured Melanie Deegan but since then It’s been a slow burner arranging shoots in between what has been a very busy summer with assignments.
Inspiration to create images comes in many forms at least for me. While retouching some work the other week I decided to randomly listen to something completely different from my normal playlists on Spotify and put on some Bluegrass music. One track, in particular, hit a chord (pardon the pun) which as you may expect from the Bluegrass genre contained the Banjo.
Inspired by some very old musty prints and tales from my Mum and Dad about living and working through WW2 I set out to shoot some images that represented that era.
Through some research I managed to find a guy called Manny who had collection of WW2 memorbillia (and that’s a huge understatement !) who was also located not far from me.
I also thought Manny would be a great addition to my Life In A Somerset Landscape Project so I gave him a call.
As expected Manny was very passionate about the era and travelled to many of the re-enactments both here and abroad during the summer months.
During our telephone chat he mentioned the authentic 750cc 1943 Harley Davidson he had and a U.S infantryman’s uniform as worn in the D-Day invasion.
At that point the image came together at least in my head
We decided that we create a story where a U.S Army Despatch Rider from headquarters company is delivering messages to and from various units.
The setting would be a forest in northern France and so my next job was to find the location and arrange the logistics of getting Manny and his bike there.
A week later the pre production was finalised and the shoot day arranged.
Manny was a dream to work with bringing authentic maps,rifles,etc giving us plenty of options for many variations I may want to try.
As my work is about quiet moments I worked around the narrative of the rider taking a rest from riding on his dangerous assignment.
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.