Restyle Me
The new issue of Live 24-Seven magazine is out this week, featuring a shoot I did with Rachele who won a full makeover including shopping spree, nails, make-up and hair. She didn’t want anything too over-the-top as she works in A&E at the hospital and wants to be able to get ready quickly in the mornings. She still had quite a transformation though and was so easy to photograph.
Here’s the spread from the magazine. The only image that’s not mine is her “before” shot which she sent in for the competition…
This is my favourite..
This Bank Holiday weekend was great fun despite a severe case of miserable weather. Saturday’s wedding with Matt & Sarah was a really nice easy-going day and they were lucky enough to have the only good weather of the weekend. Highbury Hall in Mosely, Birmingham is a dramatic and grand venue and the couple were up for escaping to get some great images of them on their own. (PHOTOS HERE SOON)
The rest of the weekend was a wash-out due to the weather so we used the time to chill out, catch up on some TV (”Dexter” mainly) and try to teach Elliott how to walk. He’s getting good too! He also tried a little pizza for the first time and seemed to enjoy the experience…
Weddings Rock!
Tuesday evenings aren’t meant to be this manic! In the past 6 hours I have met Steve & Debbie at Weston Park (home of the V Festival and the site of their upcoming wedding), photographed a fancy French restaurant for Live 24-Seven magazine, shot 3 bands including the Futureheads at the Barfly and finally DJ’d a set of 90s alternative music. Talk about multi-tasking! Add to that working as roadie for the bands (well I lifted an amp to their car) and I’d say it’s been a pretty full evening. Most of it was fun…
The gig tonight was pretty good actually. Futureheads don’t normally play such intimate venues and, with their new material sounding better than anything they’ve done before, I’m looking forward to the new album. They were supported by a band who make a photographer’s work somewhat more enjoyable thanks to half the band being extremely easy on the eye. Gundogs also have some great songs to back it up and I wouldn’t be surprised if they went to the next level fairly soon. There’s a review of the gig on Birmingham Live! where you can also find some photos of the Envy & Other Sins gig I shot on Friday night.
Saturday was Charlotte & Steve’s wedding at Homme House in Herefordshire and it was a fantastic day and definitely the most rock & roll wedding I’ve covered yet. The groom played a 40 minute set with his band The Batemans which featured songs by Motorhead, Foo Fighters and even System Of A Down. The bride looked stunning in a gorgeous dress and I came home with loads of great pictures for the couple. Charlotte even brought a present for Elliott. She runs a company called Traces Of Rock which sells cool kids’ clothes with a rock edge. Have a look at the website. Here’s Elliott in one of her baby-grows…
After getting back from the wedding at 1am you’d think maybe I’d get a lie in on Sunday morning but oh no! Instead I was over the other side of Birmingham to photograph an event for Aston Martin with probably my favourite cars on the planet. The same model currently driven by a certain Mr James Bond was just one of the cars I got to admire through the lens of my camera. Probably the closest I’ll ever get to one too! The lovely Daniela from Aston Martin looked after us and it wasn’t a bad way to spend a Sunday morning after all.
From there I went to meet Lyndsey and Simon whose wedding we’re covering next month. We did their pre-wed shoot over near Brindley Place in Birmingham which was great fun despite the lack of really great locations. They’re a very laid back, lovely couple and I’m looking forward to the big day in a few weeks time.
When I got home Elliott was wide awake and practicing his newly acquired kissing technique. He’s also started pushing himself up on his arms. I had my camera out anyway so…
It’s always nice when we meet a couple who are looking for a wedding photographer and there’s an instant rapport. It was like that with Alex and Richard on Monday evening and I really hope they book us for their wedding next June. We got on so well I was with them for almost 2 hours chatting about everything from weddings to Peter Kay to Steven Gerrard (the footballer)’s wedding photos. Richard will even be at the Velvet Revolver gig I’m shooting in a couple of weeks.
Evelyne has been busy this week too. She’s been redesigning our company branding, using new colours and trying to improve the look of our stationery. I have to admit she’s done a great job and the new look will help re-launch the business when we finally move into the new studio.
Album of the week for me is the new one from Kathleen Edwards, Asking For Flowers. I’ve been listening to it repeatedly. I’ve yet to see her play live so I’m keeping my ear to the ground for UK dates.
The Jeckyl & Hyde of Photography
Professional Photographer recently called me the “Jekyll & Hyde of photography” due to the variety of work I do; one day photographing cute kids, weddings or corporate events, the next day shooting dirty tattooed rockstars. It’s a tag I’m more than happy to have as I love the mixture of jobs that I find myself undertaking. And this week has seen me living up to that name-tag as much as ever. In the past week I’ve done a job for Jaguar cars, a lifestyle shoot with 6-month old Layla, a makeover for Live 24-Seven mag and an array of great bands. Here are a few of my favourites..
Aiden @ Birmingham Academy
Bring Me The Horizon @ Birmingham Academy
Gallows @ Birmingham Academy
Layla
Machine Head @ Birmingham NEC
Rise Against @ Birmingham Academy
Trivium @ Birmingham NEC
Makeover - Before and After
The Used @ Birmingham Academy
Arch Enemy @ Birmingham NEC
Jaguar Cars
The Hives @ Birmingham Academy
It has to be said that I feel like a lot of gigs I’ve shot recently have had terrible lighting for photography - lots of backlight and dark faces. The Hives changed all that though! All the gigs were great in their own way with Machine Head being a highlight for me.
This week saw Elliott getting his first taste of solid food. I think the picture says it all!
Evelyne and I also found time to sort through all our wedding photos and select our faves to put online for our friends & family. We’re really pleased with the pictures and are going to be able to create a great album when we have a bit more spare cash. Here’s another image from the day..
Sadly, one of the guests at our wedding, my Auntie Linda, passed away this weekend. It was a complete shock as she hadn’t been ill and, at the wedding, seemed very much her usual self. We’ll all miss her and I feel particularly sad for my Dad, my nan and Linda’s husband, Maurice and their 3 kids.
Check out the work of fellow Rock Sound photographer, Steve Brown. His work involves massive amounts of Photoshop artistry but the end results are stunning. I’d love to have a go at learning similar techniques some time.
Mid-Week Chaos
A Swedish company contacted me about photographing somebody they have interviewed for a magazine out there. He’s a young, successful businessman and yesterday I met him in Coventry for a very brief portrait shoot. It was all very easy really and a couple of hours later they had the images in Sweden and had emailed back saying “they are just what we’re looking for”. Job done!
Had a chilled evening last night watching “The Secret Millionaire”, which always leaves me inspired and strangely emotional (I know, I’m a wuss), and drinking red wine. Not many nights in this week so we made the most of it.
Today promises to be a much more hectic day as I’m covering a full makeover for Live 24-Seven magazine. It includes a shopping spree, make-up, nails, hair and teeth whitening. Not a very rock & roll job but these things help pay the bills. And I more than make up for the rock & roll element this evening as I’m shooting the Taste Of Chaos gig at the Academy featuring Gallows, Aiden, Rise Against and The Used. I’ve been waiting ages to catch Gallows live so it’ll be interesting to see how they measure up after all the hype.
Here’s a photo I took of my cousin’s little girl..
Return Of The Mac
So, after months of badgering from Mr Tony Hackett, together with constant reminders from my PC that it couldn’t keep up with my workflow, I finally bit the bullet and invested 3 grand in a Mac Pro with 23″ monitor. And I have to say it’s fanbloodytastic! Since installing it a week ago I have not once sat for more than a second or two waiting for something to happen. Images in Lightroom open instantly (as opposed to something like 20 seconds on the PC) and using 2 screens is great too. Having had an Apple laptop for a few years now, the transition has been a particularly smooth one and I can’t see me moving back to PC ever.
Having such a fast workflow now (7GB of RAM helps!) means I’ve managed to catch up on lots of work and even went back to my photos from the V Festival and found I had some great images that I almost forgot about. Here’s just a few..
Damien Rice
Iggy Pop
Lily Allen
Rilo Kiley
Stumbled across a website featuring some of Jerry Ghionis’ work from a Paris wedding. These photos just prove yet again what an artist that man is and I can’t wait to spend 5 days in his company in London next June.
If we were rich I’m sure we would have flown Jerry over for our own wedding.
Speaking of Cornish weddings, all the pictures from Nicky & John’s wedding in Newquay are ready to go and I’m really pleased with the results. I was only the second shooter on this wedding, assisting Karen Newall who was heavily pregnant. She just had a baby boy so congrats to her. Here’s my fave image from that wedding..
As the nights draw in it becomes trickier and trickier capturing weddings in great light so on Monday, Evelyne and I spent the day with Brett and Kristie Harkness who dispensed some great advice on how to deal with winter weddings. In the afternoon we visited the Lowry in Manchester and got to photograph some brides and grooms using flash, video light and any other light we could find. Here are my fave pictures that I got on the day…
It was interesting to visit Brett & Kristie’s studio up in Milnrow too. It’s a converted barn at the end of a quiet street and they’ve done it up brilliantly with tons of great images around the walls. It’s reinforced mine and Evelyne’s desire to have something similar for ourselves and we’re starting to look for potential places in Birmingham. We’re not in any rush so we’ll wait til we find somewhere perfect that we can really make it our own.
Tony and I popped over to the NEC Tuesday to catch the Foo Fighters gig. I was meant to shoot it but was let down by the record company rep at the last minute. It’s partly my own fault as I did leave it til this week to apply for the pass. Must be better organised in future. Anyway, the gig was enjoyable enough but for me there’s something missing from Foo Fighters’ music that would make them truly special. Dave Grohl’s a great frontman but their songs are just a little on the predictable side for me. It would have been good to photograph the gig but a friend of mine is trying to arrange for me to shoot their Nottingham gig next week so we’ll see.
Wednesday was the Ben Sherman party in Birmingham and Fused Mag asked me to cover the event for them. Free drinks always guarantees people turn up to these things and ex-Specials frontman Terry Hall played a DJ set too. He looked thoroughly bored by the whole event. Here’s some pics..
Evelyne and Elliott are off to Montreal on Boxing Day for 2 weeks. So we had to get a passport for a 3 month old. It’s tough getting a suitable photo that will satisfy the authorities these days but Elliott was a star and posed for the camera beautifully.
While we were there we got one of the whole family for my wallet..
