Jason Bell Photography

Tim Ferris, next stop New York.

2009-06-01T05:16:00.001-07:00

Former Constitution writer (he of the "Limelite" fame) is heading off to New York. He dropped by on Wednesday for a few shots to take with him. It was a good session, get 'em talking about what they love and they go real natural in front of the camera. All I had to ask Tim was what he was listening to at the moment.... shot after shot after shot after shot.

North West's What To Wear

2009-05-31T03:38:00.000-07:00

Rapidly approaching on June 12th and is being held at Lush in Portrush, tickets are available from the usual outlets and retailers in the Coleraine area. As well the catwalk (yup I'll be up a step ladder again) I did the poster shots (the ones for Dumb Blonde Productions).

The wind, the rain, the Portrush weather just tried to kick our backsides but we were having non of it. Ultimate cheers to Ashling who just didn't let the weather phase her at all and just got on with, every ten shots or so I'd call for the blanket.

Though you can't really see it those clouds are coming in fast and they looking pretty dark. I just called out "last two shots" and as I pressed the shutter for the last shot a single drop of rain hit my eyelid, game over.

I can't wait to see the posters though, always perks the spirit to see your own stuff being used.

Getting Married In Northern Ireland magazine.

2009-05-31T03:32:00.000-07:00

And now for the good news, there's a picture of Don and Natassia in the lastest issue of Getting Married In Northern Ireland magazine, it's out now.

Go have a quick sneaky peak at page 174 when you are in the newsagents next :) and the buy the magazine.

Don & Natassia

2009-05-22T07:12:00.000-07:00

Gimmicks eh! Good marketing more like.

2009-05-17T03:08:00.000-07:00

One of my flickr contacts had put some images up and they were all generated by a website called http://www.photofunia.com/.

Select the setting you want and then select an image of yours you want splattered onto it. It's actually good fun, more than having a good photographic use.

How to turn Portrush weather into summer.

2009-05-15T01:22:00.000-07:00

Portrush, the golden jewel of the North Coast. Known for it's rare sun, rare temperatures, motorbikes and Barry's Amusements. For kids the world over it's a BIG deal to get there.

As ever I keep an eye on the forecast which was cloudly, the odd rain shower but dry. Wrong. Over the Coleraine mountain there was a lot of rain, it was just trying to figure out which way it was going.... Portrush direction from my guessing.

When I arrived most of the crew (see above) were already there. All those people for one model, it was a good laugh as well, which always helps. Once latte's were consumed it was down to work. Now Ashleen was a total star considering that the temperature was not exactly the best, plus she has a small audience in the form of restaurant goers peering out of the window. Not to mention that it was practise lap night for the Northwest 200 so there were motorbikes everywhere apart from where we were.

In the car was my light kit: Sigma flash, Nikon Speedlight, Fuji S5 Pro, monopod, reflectors, two banks of 5ft striplights and a lot of gels, plus a laptop and lot of A clamps, muslins and assorted light shaping stuff. Come prepared! I hardly used any of it. In fact the one that was left on the living room floor at home was possible the one thing I needed.

So, how do you turn Portrush drab light into summer, half cut CTO over the Nikon Speedlight did the trick nicely. And with Ashleen having ginger hair the CTO just lifted everything up nicely, she was totally professional and didn't moan once, in fact I made more of a fuss by making her wear a blanket every five minutes and when I needed to setup the next shot.

I'm not going to put any images up until the posters are done for the catwalk show.

Lush & Dumb Blondes.

2009-05-12T08:23:00.000-07:00

Ooooh you could read that wrong couldn't you? Dumb Blonde Productions is a new fresh faced and enthused client. So we all got together at Lush nightclub in Portrush to talk catwalk and promo materials. Now I personally think I'm a bit beyond the nightclub sort of things, I don't do loud noises very well any more (unless I'm making them via guitars).

Sunday afternoon, now you can imagine what a nightclub will be like the day after the night before.

Shooting wise I enjoyed myself, even though it wasn't a proper shoot just testing out locations, backgrounds and different ideas. It's a lovely building with different bars, locations and backgrounds and I could have walked around for a lot longer but a few of the rooms were locked. Ah well.

These gold cylinder like padded pillars were my favourite as they give a sense of shape. Georgina is the client but she didn't mind being the model for the hour while I tested a load of stuff out.

The problem with nightclubs, light, not the lack of but the amount of. Ontop of this is the varying types of light which kick around all sorts of colour casts. How do you control all that, well you just hang on for dear life and get on with it. During the evening I managed to put the question to Joe McNally who graciously gave me a few minutes of his time while sat in the airport. If anyone knows anything about light it's Joe...

To compensate I rigged up the new popular fashion light, two gangs of two 5ft flurescent tubes, couldn't get 5000K daylight balanced only 3500K ones but fine balancing the white balance is something I enjoy.

I'm really looking forward to the proper shoot now, and it's great to welcome Dumb Blonde Productions as a new client.

Photo Pro Magazine sub with 50% off.

2009-05-08T04:21:00.000-07:00

There are only two manazines that I actually go out and buy when it comes to photography, Photo Pro Magazine and Professional Photography. Photo Pro is doing a 50% subscription deal at the moment, sounds like a good deal to me.

Click here for more details.

Danny Boy Finale - The Paperboys and Ian Smith.

2009-05-04T13:52:00.000-07:00

For any photog there's waiting involved. For some reason with gigs in Limavady it seems to be an awful lot longer. The 8pm kick off turning out to be 8:30pm (I was not alone in making that mistake) and the lights were just below (they looked great for the stage) anything I could shoot within in the realms with. Even with my new shiny Manfrotto monopod it just never quite made the mustard for me.

So while the other photogs and video were more bothered about shooting Ian Smith live, who was excellent, I made friends with the promoter and got ten precious minutes with The Paperboys.

My personal brief is simple: "Take the best shots you can, do your reshoot while you are here.". It just means I have all bases covered. The group shot was easy enough to do, then came the suggestion from me to do some headshots.... they loved the idea and we had a good five minutes left. I left my background up in the hallway of the hotel and then caught Ian Smith on his way out and took three minutes to photograph him.

Thirty seconds to get a grab shot of Peter Jack with a bright red Canada top and I was gone.

My timeplan went something along the lines of:

7.00pm - Leave the house
7.15pm - Arrive at the venue
7.30pm - Talk to festival committee for a bit.
7.35pm - Look like a billy no mates numpty.
8.10pm - People start to file in, some talk to me (I think they feel sorry for the billy no mates with the camera).
8.40pm - Ian Smith goes on stage. Live shots are not up to much, anything with flash kills the feel.
8.45pm - Chat to the promoter, promised band for ten minutes very soon.
9.20pm - All five members of the band are in the hall at the same time, so I whisk them off to a side corridor to do the shoot.
9.30pm - All done with The Paperboys, Ian Smith comes offstage.
9.35pm - Shoot Ian Smith in less than two minutes.
9.40pm - Leave the venue, quick grab shot of the festival chairman with a bright red garment on.
9.45pm - I'm outta here.
10.00pm - Coffee in hand.

Sound advice....

2009-05-03T04:09:00.000-07:00

“If you’re going to take a picture, really try to make it the best picture you’ve ever taken, every time. Always strive for the best you can do.” This level of professionalism requires that you live, breathe and eat photography, and that every step along the way is executed with great attention to—what else—the details. “If you want to be a photographer,” he advises, “Be a photographer ten hours a day instead of spending five hours retouching some half-ass picture you don’t like in the first place.”

Martin Schoeller was talking to Charlie Rose for a piece in Resource Magazine. I'm actually having more fun upping my game at the moment. Doing things how I want to do things and not just with an attitude of "it's only for the paper"....

Photographing Abbatastic - turning a less ordinary venue into a studio.

2009-05-03T02:00:00.000-07:00

Now let's be honest, Limavady Football Club is not the most glitzy venue to a) perform and b) photograph. So I spent the day thinking about how to photograph tribute band Abbatastic. Press photographers don't usually carry a large bunch of gear around with them: camera and flash gun basically (it's on camera to keep things really simple) and a notebook. For some things it's the best way, cheque presentations and the rest. For Abbatastic we have to turn things round a little bit.

So, in the car. My 1.5m x 2m black collapsable background and a few white reflectors. An SB-600 with a bounce card, and a camera - my Fuji S5 Pro.

The job doesn't start at 8pm, it starts at 5.30pm with a quick scan of the internet to see if the band are online. Double whammy blessing is a mobile number so I call the band asking if I can do some specific shots and can they be ready, dressed for as near as 8:15pm as possible. Next is a quick scan of the internet to see what covers Abba have done. A quick look at the "Definitive Collection" cover looks good: can be setup quick and it doable with what we have. More to the point I don't have quick access to a helicopter to do the "Arrival" cover. So my point of reference is defined, all I have to do is introduce myself and do the picture.

Brown Sugar are supporting and I know these guys they are a breeze to photograph, plus you just get festival chairman Peter Jack in the picture (white suit, white wall, perfect) and we're done.

I do the Abbatastic shots in the dressing room (it's actually the Limavady Utd boardroom), background up and young roadie Eamonn is immediately roped to be my assistant and VAL (voice activated lightstand). Now all I have to say to the band is "can we do something like the Definitive Collection" cover and before you know it Bernice has everyone in place. So two minutes to setup, a minute for a test shot and two minutes to arrange everyone.

So the shot for the paper takes no time at all, looks great and (more to the point) will be different to any of the press guys and the coucil photographer. Just takes a little bit of effort and (where possible) a phone call. So with the other ten minutes I photograph the rest of the band.

All you need is 15 minutes and little bit of planning.

It keeps things interesting if you are a press photog, the same type of pics can actually starting to wear you down. It all depends how creative you want to be. Obviously there are times you are never going to get to do all this. I've just decided to up my game, a lot.

Danny Boy Festival time again.

2009-05-01T07:24:00.000-07:00

Well it actually kicked off last night. I've got involved at the eleventh hour due to some information I was given. So I'm off shooting for my client.

Bob Carlos Clarke retrospective.

2009-04-26T13:40:00.000-07:00

Still my favourite photographer hands down. The Guardian have put a nine photo preview of the exhibition that will show at The Little Black Gallery (from 8th May through to the 3rd July). The Little Black Gallery was put together by Ghislain Pascal, Lindsey Carlos Clarke and Tamara Beckwith. There's also a permenant exhibition at Marco Pierre White's restaurant, Luciano's.

The exhibition coincides with the release of Exposure: The Unusual Life and Violent Death of Bob Carlos Clarke by Simon Garfield.

Links:
Bob Carlos Clarke
The Little Black Gallery
Link to Amazon for the book.

One of the best shoots I've ever had.

2009-04-25T05:32:00.000-07:00

The last twelve months seem to have blessed me with some of the best shoots I've done. Yesterday was excellent though everyone's first though for a wedding: "what's the weather like?".

Now the Met office don't always get it right no matter how many "it's supposed to clear up by 1pm" sentences I heard the rain didn't let up all day. From the moment I started shooting at 11am until I stopped at 10pm. Always have a "plan B" is my motto, so we rolled out plan B with immediate effect.

Off camera flash was the order of the day, the formals and bride/groom portraits were all done in the church after the service. Once the larger formals were done I spent 30 minutes with the couple, "can you hold this high please" I asked and a semi bemused Groom held my SB-600 as high as he could. Hey presto, simulated daylight coming through the window of the church, with a bounce card the light spread nicely. Same again but with me shooting from the balcony and Nikon's CLS kicked in no problems at all (I'm sure glad Fuji kept CLS in the S5 Pro).

I'll post some pictures up soon but I want the bride and groom to see everything first.

Wedding Shoot pre flight checks....

2009-04-16T15:03:00.000-07:00

I tend to lock myself in my office with everything I need before a wedding shoot. Then the pre flight checks begin.

Charge every battery you have for cameras.
Fresh batteries in both flashguns.
Fong Lightsphere ALWAYS goes on the Sigma, no exceptions.
Clean all lenses.
Make sure the camera bodies are clean as well.
Revise the list of shots I have to do.
Double check my timing plan. Church to formals to Bride & Groom shots to Reception. Played out in my head many times over.
Shirt ironed and suit ready.
Business cards in pocket.
Check the weather for tomorrow.
Make sure there's enough petrol in the car.

A great way to learn lighting...

2009-03-19T07:05:00.000-07:00

..is to look at what everyone else is up to. Whether that be reading Strobist, trying to get inside the head of Joe McNally etc.

Trade Secret Cards now have a collection of lighting related cards. The picture on one side and the diagram of how it was done on the other. It's an excellent idea.

You can read the Strobist post here.

The incline to 2010 begins here.

2009-03-12T00:27:00.000-07:00

I'm off to join the British Institute of Professional Photographers today, I'm actually quite excited.

From crisis through to resolve

2009-03-07T04:18:00.000-08:00

For the last couple of weeks I hit a real creative rut. Horrible it was too. In hindsight it's good to go through these things. A complete month of downtime with the camera wasn't what I had in mind but it was a great way to do things.

Yesterday was a major turning point when I watch Zack Arias video that he did for Scott Kelby's guest blogger segment. As I've been busy with other things over the last few weeks I haven't really had chance to look at photographic blogs or the like.

If you are in creative industry, Zack's video is a must see.

Hot Shoe Diaries.... finally pre ordered mine.

2009-02-26T13:31:00.001-08:00

I couldn't hold off any longer and Amazon have a very good pre order price.

There's a sample chapter here if you want to have a look. You can even order it here if you like.
The Hot Shoe Diaries: Creative Applications of Small Flashes (Voices That Matter)

The one way to ge the creative juices flow is not to shoot anything.

2009-02-21T03:01:00.000-08:00

Use the time to reflect and review what you have done. I have and the results are quite a shock but you can see a progression over the last three years since I started doing all this seriously.

The problem I find with press/editorial work is that it's very very easy to get stuck in a basic groove of flash on camera, get the shot, get the names and get out. Towards the end of my freelance time at the Constitution I would hang around a little longer to get something different.

Rosemary Wright was a good example of this. The job didn't take more than 10 minutes but I came out with two very different shots. There was the "play it safe for the paper" shot and then the more creative one. Which one did the editor pick.... yup the one that looked different.

So I haven't taken a picture in two weeks now and I'm starting to get very itchy fingers.

The January that never was.....

2009-02-06T09:27:00.000-08:00

Too many things happened.... so no photography that month.

Back on track. The good news is that Maranna McCloskey's album is due out this month. Northern Ireland newspaper, "Local Women", ran a small bit on Maranna. The shots of her from October 2007 (it was a cold afternoon shoot) still run and still get comments.

Ah well, here's another one from the shoot.

Carrying the Lee Filter sample packs around.

2009-01-09T01:58:00.000-08:00

The wonders of Strobist hail that the Roscoe Gel Packs and the Lee Filters Designer pack are oft required in the wonders of doing things with a flashgun.

The Lee Filter Designer pack comes a block of gels with a pin through them to keep them all together. Strobists have devised ways to keep them in some logical order. Last night, I figured out mine.

Enter stage left, the Asda business card holder. All £1.24 of it. There's 25 pages in them which hold four business cards per page. So you can hold three filters per business card pocket and fit the whole gel pack in.

Here's mine:

The onstage/offstage rule.

2009-01-06T02:15:00.000-08:00

Following on from what I was talking about in my last post. The onstage/offstage rule is really deemed to anyone who operates on stage... so actors, musicians, poets, writers and all that lot.

When Rock The Valley were doing gigs in Limavady the Halloween Ball was always a good night for images. The Kiss tribute band, Hotter Than Hell, did the whole nine yards in terms of make up, platforms and the attitube, but remember it's an act. In fact they were nicest bunch of blokes you could ever meet.

I waited a long while for them to do the photo, and I wasn't leaving until I had it, their manager/press person came over to me and said, "they are ready for you now". When I walked in it was all nice accents, shakes of hands, how you doing, you're not from Limavady are you (I have an English accent in Northern Ireland, it's the first question I get). "Right lads, can you give me Kiss attitude?", no sooner I said it they were in character. Ten frames later and I had what I needed. The funny thing was that someones mobile went off and he answered it, "yes darling, I'm just in the middle of having my photo taken for the paper.... okay... yes.... love you, no you first... no...... okay....byeeeeee". As soon as he put his phone in his pocket he stuck his tongue out and gave me Gene Simmons.

Mirenda Rosenberg

2008-12-21T03:18:00.000-08:00

One of the best shoots of 2008, I'm glad it happened on many levels. Mainly that it re-affirmed that it's photography that I love doing. Economic downturns and the rest can be put to one side and I can shoot some pictures.

Mirenda and her band scoured the social networks and looked through about 30 portfolios of photographers... they liked the way I worked and the questions I asked. Within a week were doing the shoot.

One of the most important things to note with singers and musicians in general. They are different characters offstage compared to onstage. The first set of images just didn't work mainly due to the amount of light that I had available. The second set, at the bar, just clicked straight away as Mirenda and I started talking about music. "Do you have a completely different, act/character, on stage as opposed to offstage? You do, can you the onstage character now?". The shoot changed 100% and the list of moves and poses just got bigger and bigger.

Nothing's final in the music game but the mock up of the CD cover I did looks promising. One diffused SB-800 at waist level hence the "Scooby Doo" shadow in the background. The hand gestures were very important, having the hands doing something improves any photo no end.

Office move and Platon audio.

2008-12-08T10:45:00.000-08:00

I decided to move the office a few weeks ago but just haven't really had the time to do it. So I've been doing it bit by bit. The photo was taken once I got the office how I wanted it, not pictured is the bomb site of the old office where there's ten tonnes of paperwork I need to go through.

As it stands, it won't look like in a weeks time.

To celebrate actually getting stuff moved I listened to Platon's talk which is on Vincent Laforet's blog. It's excellent, very very very good. You can listen to it too by clicking here (you'll need Quicktime installed).

The most high pressured scariest gig of all my time as a photog....

2008-12-05T04:56:00.000-08:00

And it was an absolute hooooooot to do.

Yup, you guessed it. Photographing my daughters nativity play rehearsal for the local school.

This gig is made all the more scary when you daughter's mates are pointing and saying to my little one, "isn't that your daddy?". The cheshire cat's grin was smaller.

So, the best part of 80 kids: shepheards, three kings, snowflakes, sheep, cows, angels, percussionists, Rangifer tarandus :) ,one clumsy angel and a baby Jesus.

I don't think I've laughed so much in ages.

Take 18 Firemen....

2008-12-02T02:02:00.000-08:00

Limavady Fire Brigade, they do a brilliant job, end of story. Getting all 18 of them in the same room at the same time takes some organisation.

Only one day in October could we get all of them to sync for a ten minute time frame for a photo. I had a bunch of ideas but with drills and the rest of it, it just never happened.

Watching them stop the traffic in Limavady just to turn two tenders around for a photo, well that was fun.

Lighting wise it wasn't easy, there was a dozen misses and only a few hits. The strip lights causing most of my nightmares (you can see their reflections in the windscreens of the tenders, I would have needed to hang some serious amount of black cloth to kick those out*). If anything more light, much more light, would have done the trick. But we have what we have, and what we do with it is what counts.

So, Fuji S5 with an SB800 running bare.

*Note to self: get thirty foot by ten foot of black cloth.

They joys of manipulation.

2008-11-24T14:13:00.000-08:00

When I got back into photography seriously I took one look at Photoshop and started doing mad stuff with it.

Ooooh look we can replace the darkroom. Well not quite, but not far off.

Over time I moved away from the computer stuff and worked hard on getting it right in the camera. Obviously there are times when you just can't do that.

I took a photo of a subway, in the late night, just for something to do. Then I had the idea of using a catwalk image and coming up with some urban catwalk theme.

Photoshop shines! I forgot how much fun it was.

SB-800 R&D with Creative Lighting System

2008-11-15T02:12:00.000-08:00

Saturday morning was a bit of an R&D morning. As I still have Ali's SB-800 and a fresh set of AA's I thought I'd rig up a portrait session to work on some light positions.

The background is my 1.5m x 2m foldy-upy thing (it's more like wrestling a wireframe but once you get the technique it's okay), a piece of white card to the "model's" left (camera right) and an SB-800 as a remote flash on 1/64th power (controlled from the camera) camera left pointing 45 degrees. Fire test shots weren't too bad. The S5 was on 80th second @ f4.

Not a bad start but it's a bit dark.

Better. I kept with the flash at 1/32nd power and put a muslin square in front to act as a diffuser. You'll notice the the hair is reflecting back a little, I want to reduce that... so bring on the muslin squares (once used on infant duties a few years ago but duely washed since, it now stays in my case of bits: snoots, clamps, Fong Lightsphere, Lee Filters, notebook and puke cloth).

Quality wise a much better result, if I were truely not bothered I'd take the CF card and bring the image up in Photoshop/Lightroom and dial another stop of light in there. Personally I like o get things right in camera to reduce post production.

As I was expecting the muslin ate about a stop of light, no problems, just dial in some more flash power from the camera. To compensate I dialled the flash to 1/16th power and put the diffuser up again (via a knitting needle and two plastic A clamps).

To get a starting point this took all of five minutes to sort out. Now I can concentrate on the session of while the model didn't utter a word all day.....

Opportunities come and go, don't miss them!

2008-11-12T09:54:00.000-08:00

I don't carry my camera around with me enough at the moment. And when driving I'm usually saying to myself, "I could have got that one", "Oh that looks cool" or "Look at the colours!.....".

These times very rarely repeat themselves, be prepared and these images will come to you, have a camera with you and you'll be able to record them for all to see.

Once in a moment shots never come back. I was in a press conference with His Holiness the Dalai Lama last year, he was a keynote speaker at the Children In Crossfire conference in Londonderry. All us press photogs were crammed at the front, the odd flash would go off and it never once phased him or his flow where the answers were concerned. At the end His Holiness stood up, posed for the press. Everyone wanted to touch him, shake his hand.

Then there was this little lad. He had a present, the photogs were all piling out of the building to get to the front door where an amassed throng had gathered. The young chap presented it to His Holiness, who duely opened it to see the contents, gave the lad a huge hug and then span him around to find the first photographer.... Which happened to be me, His Holiness didn't say a word just raised his eyebrows at me directly, which is the international call sign for, "can you take this photograph please". I rattled off a couple of frames and then they left.

The moment that presented itself, a split second that was giving to me, they don't happen often. You need to know your camera well (Nikon D50 at the time, AP, at f5.6 and let the flash and the Fong Lightsphere do the work).

The sign of the times

2008-11-08T02:14:00.000-08:00

It looks like freelance photographers are finding it tough. My bookings for local press basically fell through the floor during October. The reason was quite simple, advertising revenue is well down on this time last year and in order to cut back the papers are literally culling any lose expenditure.

The staff photogs are now basically expected to reschedule any events that come up on their days off. If you have a cheque presentation and it's on the photographer's day off then you'll be expected to rearrange it. Not so easy when you have the Mayor/dignatory/celebrity turning up, but some things can't be avioded.

Talking to other freelance professionals (and not just in photography) the same thing is happening all over the place. Freelancers are being squeezed out. It's time to find those niche markets where staffers can't tread.

Handy portrait background when you don't really have one...

2008-10-20T10:10:00.001-07:00

...especially if you are doing a portrait shoot in an office.

Had the camera, flashes, bounce cards and the rest but I didn't have my sheet to hand. No matter. I found the perfect background, pure white and untouched. A flipchart holder, perfect it was and as the client didn't use the white dry marker board it was unmarked.

The portrait didn't need anything doing to it just a touch of curves to take the ever-so-slight-but-I'm-a-pedant-pink cast on the skin.

Job done.

The Writers Group

2008-10-18T02:26:00.001-07:00

During the NWLLA shoot last week I popped in to photograph the writing group. Time wasn't on my side so I kept it short. The group shot didn't take long to put together but I had another idea in my head as well.

A couple of more flashes and I could have done things differently. As my portable backdrop system (or a large sheet as it's more commonly known) was already in use there was little I could do to the background. Lightroom toned the whole thing down so it's not so noticable.

Jude Nabney and the Magic Party

2008-10-18T02:14:00.000-07:00

Should be the name of a band...

For those of you who have seen my website the model from the fashion section is Jude Nabney, she's been called Northern Ireland's version of Agyness and very good on the catwalk. I photographed her at Belfast Fashion Week in March this year and turned out some of the best pictures in my portfolio.

On BBC2 last night, in Northern Ireland, was a programme call "The Magic Party" where someone is given a party with a DJ and magician. First in the series and the recipient of the party was Jude. Intermingled with shots of the same catwalk I was photographing.

I ended up on "NI Wags" a few months back through no fault of my own, just a snapshot of me photographing the catwalk at the 2007 Foyleside Fashion Show. It was a bad edit at that as I didn't photograph that section that they were showing, I was edited in! Everyone in the area thought I had the life of lucky man. I had to tell them different.

The programme was okay, not my cup of coffee, but I do have to say that the magician on it, Dynamo, was brilliant.

NWLLA - The community commercial shoot.

2008-10-15T05:18:00.000-07:00

8:45am - I arrive at Northwest Lifelong Learning Association. Home to good training (I did all my bookkeeping stuff there), good coffee and excellent people. They've become firm friends over the years. Today though, it's a lot of photography in a short space of time.

Head shots of each trainer.
A full group shot
A group shot of technical staff
A group shot of office staff
A group shot of volunteers

All this in an hour.

NWLLA is always a buzz of activity and getting the right person at the right place at the right time is difficult, nigh on impossible.

So, one training room has a sheet as a background. I kept the flash on camera with a bounce card and basically got the trainers to line up. Once a group was available I'd take them out to the front and get the group shot done.

A quick head and a notebook. Post production in lightroom to blow out the background on the portraits and the job's done. The actual shooting time was less than 45 minutes.

Jason Bell Photography Youtube Channel

2008-10-11T03:06:00.000-07:00

Oh I finally caved in.....

http://uk.youtube.com/user/jasonbellphotography

I experimented with putting a small slideshow together of the Foyle Fashion Week images and narrowing down from 400+ final images to 23 for a slideshow was hard work. My only gripe now is the quality of the images coming out, something about video resolution when I upload the video I think.

Happy enough for a first attempt but if anyone has a clues on making those video images SHARP then I'd love to hear from you.

The Lawyers of Limavady

2008-10-11T02:51:00.000-07:00

My final photocall of Friday night was with the gathering of the Limavady legal community, it was a retirement dinner and it was a dickie bow do.

So 19 lawyers, one large table in a smallish room. Oh you have to laugh. One of the hotel staff passed and I went up to him, "is there anyway we can move this table?". He just looked and laughed, "I'm afraid not". That was the end of that. I did a quick check in the viewfinder, it looked okay with the table cloth in so I went for it.

Arranging two groups of nine, putting the retiree in the middle, wasn't such a bad move on my part. And considering that I had less than five minutes to get the shot done, I was happy with it. The table cloth ended up being a useful reflector from the underside just lifting the shadows out of all those chins.

Thank goodness for tables cloths.

The eye test

2008-10-08T12:45:00.000-07:00

I had my 18 month eye test today, not too sure what to expect but I was getting some odd results from one of my cameras and I didn't know if it was me or not. So I thought I better get it checked out.

Instead of my right focusing eye getting worse from over use, it's actually getting better and the new lens is not as strong. Surprised me for sure. I'm definately happy about it.

Current reading: Richard Branson - Business Stripped Bare

2008-10-08T12:37:00.000-07:00

My daughter was desperate to get something for my birthday. The Doug Wimbish CD's had arrived from my parents, my sis sent the guitar clock so all in all I was already happy.

Little one and my beloved had been plotting which involves whispering and giggling. At 3:30am (see that, AM, the morning) Little one was so excited she woke up and wanted to give me my first present, a pair of Sharpie pens, with the extra fine nibs that I haven't been able to find. The other present (which came at a more manageable 7:30am) was the new book by Richard Branson. I've got three books by Branson and they are all brilliant.

A good day.

You've seen one side of the catwalk, now see the other.

2008-09-29T09:30:00.000-07:00

Robin Karnstaedt was photographing with Converse Communications who organised Foyle Fashion Week. The life of the photographer is oft lonely when waiting around and trying to get light balances right. So Robin and I traded. In order for him to test out his new flash bounce card he took some photographs of me. No problem.

Later he took one of me at my office (the hotel's stepladder).

And then I noticed what he was doing.....

No doubt they'll find their way on to Facebook, Bebo and the like.

Foyle Fashion Week - Thursday

2008-09-26T08:45:00.000-07:00

A much better evening catwalk. A break in the middle just broke the evening up nicely and gave the audience a bit of time to run to the bar and back again. Perfect.

The catwalks were much more fluid tonight, a couple of them really shone. Highlights in terms of collections were the finalists of the Fashion Academy and Jarayd F's new season of stuff. The Fashion Academy designs were brilliant, my fave still being the paper creation that took the poor lass SIX MONTHS to make and took me 1/125th of second to photograph.

The aftershow party at the Red Rooms was good, I did feel a little old but nothing to worry about. People who want their photo taken jump in front of the camera and when they get bored you can usually get the feel that the end of the night is nigh.

Foyle Fashion Week - Wednesday

2008-09-25T09:07:00.001-07:00

Ahoy there, perched from my high step ladder.....

When are press guys going to realise that using flash ain't gonna cut? :)

I had an enjoyable time during the first catwalk last night. But with no break it was a long night aloft the steps (kindly blagged from the hotel by Rosemary Wright, make up artist and step blagger).

With no break I ended up using both the S5 and D50 so there wasn't any downtime. Tonight I've asked for a ten minute break to give my feet time to recover.

The event was well received and I'm hoping it will become a regular thing. Converse did a good job on putting all this together.

Well done guys!

So, the preparation: camera's, clients and the rest.

2008-09-23T12:47:00.000-07:00

Okay, here's the basic run down before any large catwalk shoot I do.

The Camera

I take two cameras, the main camera is my Fuji S5 Pro and the backup is a Nikon D50. Everything is zeroed-out and ready to go (memory cards formatted, White Balance set to cloudy (but more on that in a minute) ISO set to ISO100 for the S5 and ISO200 for the D50 and the mode is put to AP (Aperture Priority).

Make sure:

Memory cards are formatted

Lenses are clean

White Balance is usable (we don't want 300 pics in lovely blue cast, do we!)

Batteries are fully charged and bring the fully charge spares (if you have them)

Catwalks vary from place to place. Some have no platform, some do. Lighting varies immensely as well and I try to make a few phone calls and get some information a few weeks before the show happens. With Foyle Fashion Week for example we met in the location and ran through setups, where the runway was and access etc. Whatever the weather, no flash on catwalk please. Get the fastest lens you can afford. I carry a 50mm f1.8 prime lens religiously in my bag. I borrowed a 50mm 1.4 for the very first catwalk I did, the press guys thought I was mad until they saw the pics. No platform, have steps from the local DIY store.

The Client

Got a pass? All depends on the event. Some events just love photographers kicking about. I'm booked as the client's sole photographer so I get free dibs where I'm going to stand (the press will have work around me). On this one it's head on at the end of the runway and at eye level with the models who are walking down it. The best catwalk shots have protocal behind them. Personally I don't like the looking up the nostril of the model shot, I know I've done it myself a few times but I didn't have the choice or the reputation at the time (no one had seen my stuff or heard of me). Now it's a little different.

Keeping FFW as an example, I caught noise of the fashion week in June. I was on the phone the next day, already sorting out press photos for the local paper and booking myself in with the directors of the company putting it together.

I attended the launch party (I don't really do parties that well, not good with the noise anymore, rather be in reading a book with a cuppa). Did loads of shots there, did some others as well. Put a gallery of stuff up. Next thing the phone is ringing the next morning asking to meet and quote.

Sometimes it's not that easy. The quotes get passed back and forth and things have to be reshaped but as long as we get a win-win then I'm happy.

On the day

Be early. The first Belfast Fashion Week I did was all over the place. The car wasn't acting right, I got lost, the police followed me, I needed to park, I needed the toilet, I went to the front instead of the stage door and I looked like a nutter when I arrived backstage clutching to myself.

Be as early as you can. Bring water, don't assume that the client will pay for everything. I'm not pally pally with the models either, they are doing their job and I am doing mine. I didn't get into catwalk photography to look at models. During BFW I didn't speak to anyone apart from the organiser, Cathy Martin (and that was for literally 30 seconds to say hello), and a few other photogs during the break.

Most of all, enjoy yourself, it will show in the pictures.

Eglinton is now the centre of the universe (or Jason Smyth comes home)

2008-09-20T10:58:00.000-07:00

The usually quiet village of Eglinton in Northern Ireland is currently a buzz with paralympic double gold medalist Jason Smyth returning home. I have now gained the press photographers knack of walking backwards between a marching band and a big four x four vehicle, whilst not being run over by a throng of kids, atheletes and adults.

I carried two cameras with me, my old Nikon D50 with a 55-200mm telezoom and the S5 with my 18-55mm. Now there's only so many ways you can photograph a nice bloke on the back of a truck. All cameras point skyward.

For me the better shots came at the end, then I went for the small details. The kids were desperate to touch the medal (I was wondering what it felt like myself but didn't want to try).

On camera flash modifications and their effects.

2008-09-19T01:49:00.002-07:00

It was one of those late nights where I walked into the office to do one thing and ended up doing three other things as well.

On camera flash is pretty bad for most things but as a press shooter you usually have very little choice but to slap the thing on the camera and fire away. I then bought a Lightsphere and that helped a whole lot, the other photogs would poke fun at me but no matter my pictured looked better.

Wanting to get a real good grip on the whole light thing I purchased a copy of "Light: Science and Magic" from Amazon, a wonderful book. The last chapter was going on about bounce cards, so I thought I'd give that a try.

So I created an experiment with the help of the above (belongs to my daughter and the hairdressing head/shoulders has no name). It did provide though a good gauge on how bounce flash, bounce card and the Lightsphere would produce images.

You can see the full set of images here.

Irish Dancing with attitude

2008-09-19T01:49:00.001-07:00

No shoot is ever the same. Recently I've taken to doing some daft stuff at the end of shoot and it's usually those shots that the publications go, "hey wait a minute, let's use that one".

Irish Dancing has some protocols when it comes to photographs, I call it the "pointy toe theory" because when anyone is in Irish Dancing attire and has their photo taken the pose is practically automatic.

The Allen School of Dancing win awards left, right and centre and they are a good bunch to photograph. Once I'd got the main stuff out of the way I heard a under breath comment of, "wish we could do one posey". I just looked at the lass and said "yeah, let's do a big posey group shot".

Easy, totally relaxed and I was loosing light rapidly (as you can tell from the light falloff from the flash).

Chic Fashion Show

2008-09-19T01:49:00.000-07:00

This was arranged weeks ago and my brain was positive it was on a Thursday, so when I look in the diary and I see Tuesday.... plans go to pot for everyone involved. I saw this catwalk as a good run through for two Foyle Fashion Week catwalks I'm doing next week.

The Chic Chairty Fashion show is held in store, over two floors, so the five models have to plan some form of route downstairs then upstairs without bumping into each other. Best position for me was on my knees for a full 90 minutes.

The odd thing I found is it became a homely touchy feely type of do. The audience want to know more and the oddities also fly out (one audient was more bothered about the ring the model was wearing that any of the outfits).

It also gave rise to some great under the breath comments, "it looks like she's wearing marigolds!", as the model walked down with mustard leather gloves on.

So it's not strictly a catwalk, more a soiree of customers willing to give to charity and have a look at the autumn/winter collections. A great evening.

Football Photography

2008-09-11T05:19:00.000-07:00

"Go shoot the football and the odd picture of the manager....", came the shout from the desk (well not so much a shout, more a polite request).

After the usual dealing with the sponsor shots (and cheque presentations) it was out on to the pitch. Obviously when a photographer enters the pitch the rain is to start on cue. It did and then continued for the next 25 minutes. I was drenched, the camera was wet but fine.

I got some good shots, but actually enjoyed photographing the managers hollering at their teams much more. Much much more :)

Rosemary Wright - Make Up Artist

2008-08-28T08:10:00.000-07:00

It's always interesting to see what perceptions the subject has when it comes to a photograph. I was booked to get an image of Rosemary Wright for the paper. I was after a visual hook, Rosemary has a nice portrait image that she gives to PR companies but I was looking for that extra something.

The first pic was more a portrait than anything else, a little play it safe in case my editor didn't like what I had in mind. In fact I gave the editor the choice to choose between the two photos. She instantly went for the mirror shot as it was interesting and not a normal portrait.

The second shot was with the mirror, we tried without the brushes first and it didn't look right. Second attempt was much better. The above is the uncropped version, the final version made the paper.

So, how am I going to approach the story telling group tonight......

Don & Natassia Engagement Shoot

2008-08-24T02:42:00.000-07:00

I did a great engagement shoot on Thursday night for Don and Natassia. It was relax, informal and we got a great set of pictures. I was concerned about the weather more than anything, driving over the mountain and the rain poured. Once I arrived at the location it was wonderful, the sun was out and the light was good. Just as we declared the shoot as finished the rain was on again.

Looking back at the archive: Maranna McCloskey

2008-08-16T04:23:00.000-07:00

Well I just let Lightroom 2 import everything on my hard drive. In Northern Ireland I've photographed a lot of musicians, local ones, visiting ones, festivals and gigs where no one has turned up.

In October 2007 I did a session for singer, Maranna McCloskey. I first met Maranna when she supported Altan at the Danny Boy Festival in 2007. Later on in the year I got a call to do a promo shoot. Now it wasn't the best of October days (it was cold basically and the sky was just a monotone off white colour). We ploughed on non the less and ended up with a good selection of work. Meetings were arranged and proofs deliberated over. Maranna went away happy.

There's always been the niggling thing in the back of my head that the images would have looked better in black and white, but as they were promo purposes they were better off in colour for the client. This afternoon I was tinkering in Lightroom and came up with something a little to a Bob Carlos Clarke-esque tone to it. My little nod to the photographic genious that he was.

The location for these was Downhill Castle in Co. Londonderry. The stone is quite light and when you blast it with white light again it starts to wash out.

Client perception is the name of the game here and these images won't have cut the mustard in terms of a traditional Irish singer. On the other hand, as a set of portraits I love them in the B+W.

Rain, rain, rain, ooooh a bit of sun, rain and really bad rain.

2008-08-16T01:57:00.000-07:00

Northern Ireland has been prone to a sprinkle of the wet stuff. This last week though has been more monsoon that summer shower. It's affected the pictures quite badly, events called off and people not really in the mood to go out.

Spare a thought for 12 folk from Limavady Tesco's who are being bussed 19 miles up to the Lisnagelvin Tesco's and then WALKING back to Limavady. It's all for Marie Curie Cancer Care so it's not all bad, but I'm glad I'm not walking with them. No offence.

(Just as well Stendhal backed off for 2008 as it would have been a mud bath, or perhaps that was the whole plan....)

So you wanna be a model?

2008-08-16T01:54:00.001-07:00

There are two pages of tips on how to look good in photos in Septembers British Vogue. Some handy things in that article.

The Castlerock Beach stitch up....

2008-08-10T01:24:00.000-07:00

When a client requests a picture of Castlerock beach, in the middle of summer you'd think you'd be in with a fighting chance of getting something.

Monday: rain, Tuesday: rain, Wednesday: really bad rain, Thursday: rain, Friday: a window of opportunity.

So off we trott to the location, which is basically free reign to me. As long as it's Castlerock beach. At 6pm and the sun is still way up high and bleaching out colour like no one's business. Plus the other issue with Castlerock beach is that there is no real landmark, nothing to give a sense of location. It could be any beach in Northern Ireland.

So I decided to do a panoramic shot instead, start from the sea and work my way around. It's the one time in Photoshop when the photomerge tool performed perfectly. Only a small retouch on an overlapped cliff and a cloud movement.

I can't show you the picture yet :)

Onwards to the shops for supplies and then onwards to White Rocks. I was hoping that by 8:30pm it would be pretty deserted. No way.

Oh the manual white balance on the Fuji S5 means that you can push to 10,000K giving all these wonderful warm tones in the sunset that you'd need a miriacle for normally. You have an idea in your head and the S5 gives you all the options to do it, the days of near fighting with the light and the Nikon D50 are clearly over.

I'm off to do another Castlerock shot from the other end of the beach this time. The weather forecast for the next few days is rain :)

Stendhal Cancelled

2008-08-07T01:43:00.001-07:00

So we went from having a festival....

To not having a festival...

In the blink of an eye. Stendhal Festival officially got cancelled yesterday. A real blow to Tim, Ross and John, more to the point a big blow to the Limavady area as it would have been a great festival.

There's a bunch of reasons why this could have possibly happened which I'm not going to disect here. From a photog point of view this does re-enforce the point of "do your reshoot now". When the call came in to do the pic I thought it wise to photograph both outcomes while I was there. It meant sacrificing a poster but hey, that night was the council meeting where everything hung in the balance. At the time no one knew which way it was going to go.

Once the shoot was in the bag I sent both images across.... who knew what would happen. The outcome was good, the festival was to happen. Only with a week to go the decision was made to cancel.

Shame. No work is lost as it all counts for 2009.

Fuji S5 Pro

2008-08-05T05:25:00.001-07:00

I took delivery of my new camera on Friday. My Nikon has done me great service over the last 2 1/2 years but I've been looking at the S5 since February.

After talking to at least 20 photographers about the D200/S5 debate I went for the S5. I'm glad I did, it's a lovely camera. The first major test will be the Stendhal Festival just outside Limavady.

That was the week that was....

2008-07-31T16:22:00.000-07:00

A quiet week, though I have to add, quite thankful for it. Lots of catching up to do, press passes to get hold. Stendhal Festival seems to be gathering pace, hopefully ticket sales are going well.

Still no response regarding CountryFest so I'm considering that one gone.

This months Professional Photographer is the best I've seen in ages. I was starting to get a little despondant with the publications. A round table discussion about Bob Carlos Clarke was well worth the wait. I was a little dissappointed that they didn't use some new images though, it seems to be the same set of pictures that gets featured in every magazine. Regardless, it was still excellent.

Wedding Photography by Jason Bell

2008-07-29T08:00:00.001-07:00

It has to be the single most popular question that I am asked, "do you do weddings?".

Well the simple answer is yes.

Red Sails Festival - Portstewart

2008-07-27T01:03:00.000-07:00

The final day of the Red Sails Festival in Portstewart was busy, really busy. I didn't actually arrive there until 7pm.

George Jones and Clubsound were onstage when I arrived. Crowd shots were easy to do as the auditorium curves round in front of the stage, so it's quite easy to get a live stage shot with a good selection of audience in the image as well. I wanted a shot of the band post gig, had a quick chat with George to arrange it, we walked over to the town hall and within thirty seconds had my shot.

I walked up and down Portstewart with just a 50mm 1.8 lens on the camera. I tend to have a selection on me but decided to leave the bag and work with one lens. The promonade is split on two levels, the road and the sea. So it's quite easy to get good candids.

After a chicken burger, numerous coffee's and the piercing screams of a child or two the fireworks kicked off at 10.30pm. I have to admit I wasn't too bothered about photographing fireworks as I've done stacks of times before, this display was good but finding a way to capture anything to possibly sell afterwards is a fun one to sort out. I'm there though and happy.

From 10.50pm to 11.30pm was just solid traffic out of Portstewart

Foyle Fashion Week Launch Party (Part II)

2008-07-17T18:18:00.000-07:00

Sugar in Derry has the most varied set of light sources known to man. All very well in a disco setting but nigh on useless when it's fashion.

So every shooter resorts to the last resort, on camera flash. No matter where you point it, it's harsh white light. I got all the shots I needed from the social point of view but to get flatting catwalky type shots... hmm a little harder to do.

A good nights work, and the photoshop mods I made to the web layouts are working a treat.

Foyle Fashion Week Launch Night

2008-07-17T06:15:00.000-07:00

A frantic day of marketing and running around today. Looking forward to tonights launch do, not that I'm the party type.

All the same I trust the event will go well. Proof galleries are going up tonight for publications to see.

It's all happening this week.

2008-07-13T03:46:00.000-07:00

A light weekend, I tend not to do too much on the 12th of July. There are others who are far more interested in getting into the thick of flutes and lambegs. Sadly, I am not one of them.

This week coming brings up a whole bag of problems. The fashionistas will piling down to the Foyle Fashion Week launch, then the Shackleton Charity Festival runs Friday, Saturday and Sunday. In the middle of those things there are two charity gigs on at the same time. Add to that that there's a strike which will bring Derry City Airport to a standstill. It could actually be quite a good news week.

Purchasing newspaper prints.

2008-07-11T12:18:00.000-07:00

I get a lot requests about obtaining prints from pictures that appeared in the newspaper. You can purchase these online. Each week I will put up the available pictures on my website.

This week's Constitution pictures are available now.

Stendhal gets its licence.

2008-07-10T16:45:00.001-07:00

The organisers of the Stendhal Festival got their entertainment licence tonight.

For the eagle eyed among you, this appeared front page of the Coleraine Chronicle this week. I actually covered both bases and got the "not so happy" image with Ross tearing up the poster.

So I wasted a poster....

Outside the meeting tonight, no plackards! Though I did get one, "no photos please", from one resident. This time I actually took a step back and granted her request. Normally on a public highway the request would usually get ignored.

A nice ending to the story but I don't feel it's the complete ending.

Shackleton Charity Festival sneaky peak.

2008-07-09T14:14:00.001-07:00

This evening was spent down at Shackleton photographing the press launch and demos. It was noisy, then it started to pour it down. Ah but it was fun.

More pics will be up on the Shackleton Charity Festival website tomorrow.

Linedancers, ladies golf, a minibus ride, three rock bands and an iron.

2008-07-09T14:02:00.000-07:00

Just a normal week then. I don't have a natural dislike to line dancing, it's just not my bag but the linedancers I had to photograph were just a joy.

One golf tournament award presentation later on. A quick sleep and the next day I was tootled around Limavady in a minibus for elderly shoppers. By Friday night it was a couple of July 4th celebrations (more line dancers) and a table quiz.

Come deadline day and the phone call arrives from PJ, "I need a photograph of an iron."

Who am I to let this man down? I was later told it was all in context. I haven't seen the copy yet but I will in the morning. The actual shot was very quick and easy, one of those cheapy light tents off ebay and a couple of homebase work lights (the 150w Tungsten jobs, very hot and will melt most items within a two foot radius). The iron was sitting in a cupboard (we are a two iron household) and the black tile kicked the iron back a bit so it wasn't floating on air.

Now I've told you all this there's now a good chance PJ will now take photographs of his own iron for publication use :)

The busy weekend....

2008-07-07T14:08:00.000-07:00

Driving around in a ping-pong sort of way on Friday night. All the job times didn't work in my favour so it was a seven mile drive, followed by a fifteen mile drive, followed by another fifteen mile drive back and then finally back home.

Sunday night rocked at there were three Steve Martin films on TV. Time to kick back and leave it at that.

Monday I spent the morning on a minibus with the elderly, the Mayor of Limavady and a couple of project coordinators. Then a new addition to the Eyes/Window/Soul thing.

The doctor, the solicitor and the photographer (Part 2)

2008-07-02T13:21:00.000-07:00

Okay, so Peter Jack's opinion piece went to press today, due to space they cropped the main picture so the final cut didn't really show what was going on. I suppose you had to be there.....

So here's the pic in it's whole glory.

Northern Constitution finally makes it online.

2008-07-02T05:06:00.000-07:00

Perhaps all my wittering finally paid off, or it was something they've been planning for years and just not let on. The Northern Newspaper Group have put their titles online at http://www.ulsternet.co.uk/

Well done, I've just not see any of my pics on there yet :)

And to celebrate the face even more, two of my pics made front page of the Coleraine Chronicle. Happy days.

The doctor, the solicitor and the photographer....

2008-07-01T04:57:00.000-07:00

Just a normal Monday then. So this solicitor phones up the paper, "I need a picture of a doctor, in a white coat, holding a stethescope". The request then comes to me, the easy route out would to declare defeat and just nab a pic of flickr, but I'm not like that. I already know that the solicitor in question is not sane, I just need to find a GP who's just as loopy.

First call is to my GP. He's up for the idea but busy. So the next call is to the health centre to see if any doctors have a sense of humour. One does. The bail out plan was to hire the white coat and scope and get the solicitor to examine himself on his office desk.

Three men in a room and the GP is so up for this gig that he starts getting out all sorts of heck knows what. The next thing I know is the defibrillator is out and switched on, the electronic voice starts commanding people who are not listening... "check airways.....". Well no one was listening apart from the solicitor who was now starting to look a little freaked. He was still happy that all this sillyness was happening around him.

"Give me a blank look...., no more blank than that.... blanker! Put the stethescope on his forehead doctor...". Shot is in the bag, then another close up shot with the GP making insanity gestures with his hands.

Who said press editorial work isn't fun?

"What is that thing on top of your camera?"

2008-06-26T08:12:00.000-07:00

It's the single most asked question I get. For starters I don't keep my sandwiches in it.

I stumbled on the Fong Lightsphere a year or so ago. At the time it was expensive but to honest it was worth every penny. I got some severe stick from the press guys until they saw the shots. I've never been a great fan of direct flash but when you have less than five minutes to get the shot then you just get on with it.

Over the last few months I've got peeved with the amount of light it was chucking out, yeah it's diffused and yeah it's everywhere.... but for the music stuff I've resorted to a home made snoot out of black card.

Don't get me wrong, for 97% of all my flash shots the Lightsphere is on the camera.

Want an example? Just look below.....

The best shots happen by accident...

2008-06-24T14:16:00.000-07:00

How long did this shot take to put together? About three minutes. Totally unrehearsed, no-booking-required-portrait. My good mate Ali Moore was in need of background material, all I had was a large sheet which I had not unwrapped since buying in the charity shop.

When I rolled it out it was four foot wide and twenty foot long.... no good to anyone but we gave it shot anyway. Ali held up a pole and I "A" clamped the material to the background. Quickly asked Laura to stand in front of said human standed background and there you are.

I find that the pre processing stuff in RAW is much better than hanging on what Photoshop will do to it. I've pretty much moved over to Lightroom for most things now, just PS for the odd clean up healing brush type malarky.

The office move

2008-06-24T13:13:00.000-07:00

Been a long time coming, perhaps it's fresh starts with the website. I'm moving my office from one room to another. Computer first, that took all of twenty minutes, clear the debris from my desk took another hour then I could move the table.

It's going to take another two days to get through the remaining pictures, paperwork, invoices, CD's and a stack of magazines including Professional Photographer, Digital Photo Pro, umpteen bridal magazines, Vogue, North West Woman... it all mounts up.

I also found my flash gun stand that I've been hunting for the last two years. Happy Days!

New website launch.

2008-06-22T13:31:00.000-07:00

It was a long time coming but I finally put some time aside to redo the website. So, nice sleek navigation to each portfolio, easy to find information. The client list has been updated, I forgot how many people I've worked with. It took a little time to wrangle with the iPodesque coverflow thing. Finally big thanks to TDR Networks who looked after me with new hosting and lightening email support when I needed it.

Constitution - 18th June 2008

2008-06-19T02:44:00.000-07:00

So not a bad catch all in all. Two pages of Limavady Jazz and Blues live pics and Anita Flavin for two, shame they were black and white as they were really strong images. (And for anyone wondering I did not shoot Anita low as there was a shed in the background).

Tomorrow is back to the photographic land of school awards and cheque presentations.

Limavady Jazz & Blues Festival 2008

2008-06-15T11:23:00.000-07:00

Good to see the festival doing well this year, last year wasn't that bluesy or jazz for my tastes (with the exception of Kent Duchane who was just plain amazing).

Two acts from Yorkshire which was nice as I got to hear what was going on. The King Bz turned out into some long lost reunion since our first meeting in 2006. Paddy McGuire gave me the low down and that Gary Barrett himself said to say hello to me. Bless.

Friday night was subdued, in and out in an hour. It would have been shorter but the firework display at the Radisson Roe Park Hotel meant I couldn't get parked. Samantha Payne had just taken a break and then went back on.

Saturday night was just heaving all night. It took me twenty minutes to get from one end of Frank Owens Marquee to the other only to realise that I could have walked up the outside and through the "stage door". I got some great shots of Rab McCullough Blues Band so the trek (and three thousand hellos) was worth it.

On events like this you always see the usual gang of photographers. David Larmour, festival photographer Andy Cameron and Norman Thorpe were all out. Twenty four pics later for the paper and my job was done. That didn't stop me getting in Andy's path a few times.... (see below)

Fathers Day Listening

2008-06-15T03:41:00.000-07:00

Three little surprises for me this morning. Even though the stack of Level 42 I have
(for which I'm pretty well known for liking) there's a version of "Return of the Handsome Rugged Man" on the CD which is one of my fave instrumentals. Whooohoo double CD of Peter Gabriel too.

Now what can we do with these shoes?

2008-06-13T17:02:00.000-07:00

A very quick shoot with shoe designer Anita Flavin. She was speaking at the Women In Enterprise evening in Coleraine, my editor was there and wanted to know more. My first meeting with Anita was at Belfast Fashion Week. I pelted it from Limavady to Belfast, got lost, got followed by the police (the English plates, oh they love the English plates), I couldn't find a parking space, I was desperate for the toilet and the catwalk was starting in two minutes. Plenty of time.

There's a good few different ideas in the shoot, can't post them all up just yet but there's a nice one to get you started.

The eyes are the window to the soul?

2008-06-13T16:55:00.000-07:00

I kick started a little personal project while I was at the gallery. The Limavady Jazz & Blues Art Exhibition seems to be doing well, in terms of interest. In between times I've been wanting to do portraits with their eyes closed. It doesn't work with everyone. Getting people not to look into the camera but close their eyes takes a little doing, but once they get into it they go in to a world of their own, that's when the good pictures finally start to happen. So the initial idea of the exhibition is there, I'd love to know what they were thinking so I can write a long random list down.

The shots were both natural light, the gallery was acting as one big studio lovely, white and diffused. Panel boards were basically reflecting light all over the place.

Both Joni and Stevie got into it real quick, the white wall helped a lot. Now once I've got 100 of these then I'll exhibit. Only 98 to go.

Shackleton Charity Festival launch.

2008-05-22T13:32:00.000-07:00

Finally the night arrived of the press launch for the Shackleton Charity Festival. A weekend of motorsport in Ballykelly on the 18th,19th and 20th of July. The festival committee, sponsors and charities were all out, as was the Mayor and Lady Mayor of Limavady.

The first shot was of everyone, and I mean everyone, but between four photographers we got the whole thing together and everyone smiled at the same time.