I can’t believe how much time I can spend agonizing (yes, agonizing! ) over titles for blog posts. Most of the time they are there, just like that *clicks fingers*. At other times I mull over them, tweet about them, walk away and leave it and hope that inspiration will just appear. It can be quite a time consuming activity! I’m sure I’m not the only blogger to suffer from delayed-blog-title-itus.
So, without ado, let’s get on with today’s photo blog!
At quite short notice I got a call from a theatre company who were taking their play on the road and needed an image for their poster. The play was about a solitary librarian who gets embroiled in an abusive relationship. She finds solace in books, and uses the stories to block out what is happening to her.
The director of the play knew exactly what he wanted; from the look on the models face, to the position she was in. When he made the booking he mentioned that the model would be naked and wanted a female photographer to help make her feel more at ease.
When I arrived at the location (a function room of a hotel) the make up artist was doing her finishing touches, and painting black hand prints all over the model.
As you can see from the image below. The model opted to keep some of her underwear on. “Can you get rid of this in photo shop?” the director asked. “Yes, no problem”, I replied. I generally use photo shop on my images, mainly to just brighten them up a bit or to adjust the colour balance, sometimes cloning out the odd spot.
When I got home to review the images I had to admit to myself…this required me to pull all my photo shop skills into play! The knickers, the knickers…….oh, those bliddy knickers! (Perhaps that should have been the blog title?)
Painstakingly, pixel by pixel, I removed every single trace of those knickers.
Thought I would put together this little gif to show you the before and after.
And one of the final images.
I’m gearing up for a busy week with the 4am Project. I’m still putting the final touches to the 4am walk in Birmingham. Sadly I have received quite a few “no’s” from various venues which is very disappointing. However, one way or another there WILL be a 4am photo walk in Birmingham & I hope you can join in. Watch this space/twitter for details. Big Cat are doing the PR for the project and I’m delighted to be working with them, they have some great ideas! The press release is about to go out any minute now. I’ve also managed to secure some prizes for 4am participants this April! However, I need some more! If you wish to donate a prize, them please get in touch and we can have a chat.
New York! New York! I’ve decided that a month isn’t long enough – 6 weeks should be about right. I still haven’t actually booked anything mind! I am building up my ideas; I want to take the 4am Project there, I want to let my camera free in one of the greatest cities in the world, and I want to get into making videos whilst there as well. With the awesomeness of the internet (I love you internet) I’m slowly making some friends over there. My Mother, however, has other ideas completely though, and has my trip all planned out; I’ll meet a man in NYC and he will propose to me at the top of the Empire State Building (no less). Um, yeah Mum. Don’t get your hopes up there! Bless her. I need a title for my (at the moment, imaginary) NYC trip. Any ideas?
After a photo shoot yesterday, I got to wondering how other photographers plan their shoots, and I thought I’d tell you about one of the ways I plan mine.
I don’t use a studio. There are a few reasons behind my choice. Financially, I don’t want the overheads. If needs must, I can hire a studio, but I haven’t had call to do that. Creatively, I much prefer location shoots and the variety they bring.
Take yesterday’s photo shoot. The brief was for some portrait photographs of Adrian Shooter, chairman of Chiltern Railways. I had to take photographs of Adrian in different environments; in an office, at Snow Hill Station (we were meeting at Moor Street Station), on the train and on the platform and I had an hour to do this. No problem!
As is usual with my photography shoots, I was walking into pretty much an unknown environment. What would the office be like? How about the lighting? Would the station and the train be busy? How about Adrian, is he happy to be photographed (no worries there, he was lovely)?
I started drafting out some plans with plain old pen and paper, which you can see below. Don’t laugh! Admittedly they are very rudimentary, but they make sense to me! I try and think about possible lighting situations and what settings I will use on my camera, although often that changes when I turn up at the location. I make a plan of my ideas. When I’m in the middle of shooting, it can be easy to get carried away and it helps to pull out my piece of paper and have a glance.
Although my drawings are very basic, upon closer inspection there is quite a lot of detail. The arrows coming out of the stick figures head? The direction of eye line. How to position arms? Check. Angles? Check.
As you can see, there are quite a few sketches and notes ( if you can read my scribbles) in relation to the train journey. But, ah, the best laid plans!!
I had about 30 minutes with Adrian, who had to dash to catch his train. Chiltern trains stop every half an hour at Moor Street. Travelling to Snow hill would be no good (as Adrian pointed out) as the train would be packed with commuters at that hour, plus it was under a tunnel so in relation to capturing a scene of Adrian sitting at a table – it would just be black in the background. Ideally we would have travelled to Solihull and back.
Okay, 30 minutes it was then! Let’s get cracking. Here are a selection of photos. Oh, and for all but the first photo of Adrian, I was standing on a chair!
Adrian dashed for his train and so I had another 30 minutes or so left. A lovely lady from Chiltern asked if I would be able to take some shots of Moor Street itself, so I happily obliged.
How do you plan your shoots? I would love to hear! (I’m sure your drawings are MUCH better than mine )
Don’t forget to put the 4th April in your diary & tell your friends. Not long to go until the 4am Project’s 1st Birthday!
After seeing my portrait photographs of Karen, Amy got in touch and we arranged to have a city shoot last Sunday. Amy’s best friend, also called Amy (wearing the yellow coat) came along to see how the photo shoot worked, but of course I couldn’t leave her out, and made sure I got some great shots of the friends together too.
I love using streets and parks as a back drop for photographs. I love the variety they offer. Amy and her friend came from Worcester, so they saw parts of the city that they hadn’t been to before. It was a photo shoot combined with a tour!
Amy is a dancer, so I took some fun shots of her dancing moves!
We found a nice little park. Who can resist a leaf throwing fight?! Amy won
If you are starting to think about Christmas gift ideas for your friends and family, treat them (or yourself!) to a photo shoot. It’s something a little bit different, and a lot of fun!
) over titles for blog posts. Most of the time they are there, just like that *clicks fingers*. At other times I mull over them, tweet about them, walk away and leave it and hope that inspiration will just appear. It can be quite a time consuming activity! I’m sure I’m not the only blogger to suffer from delayed-blog-title-itus.
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