Fun time at Focus '08

Well I had a great time down at Focus '08 the last couple of days. It really is the place to go if you want to immerse yourself in the photographic industry. Monday morning I spent time on the Annabel Williams CPT stand. Catherine Connor & Jane Breakell are fab and helped Lou and myself a few years ago to get ourselves established in this world of photography. It was great talking to other people who were wanting to start on a similar journey. I hope I didn't put you guys off and inspired you to take your first step into changing your life.

The rest of the time was going round checking out new suppliers and products also saying hello to some of our existing suppliers. When walking round I kept bumping into a lot of fellow photographers. Particularly Andy Sutcliffe and his wife Gill. They are a great couple and have an excellent photography business based in Halifax. We seemed to put the world to right over several cups of tea.



Finally check out this picture below. It's an ice sculpture of a Canon camera on the Lexar stand.

The largest camera seen at the show. Pretty cool! 

Michelle & Matthew pre-wedding shoot

I did a great pre-wedding shoot today at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park (yes, I know I've been there many times before - I'll go there many times again as its such an inspiring location).

Today I met up with Michelle and Matthew. This was the second time we've tried their shoot. The first time was back in November, but the weather was utterly appalling, so we had to postpone. This time the weather was a bit kinder, although a couple of showers meant we had to use some indoor locations.

Anyway, it was great to get to know Michelle and Matthew a bit better - they were fantastic models and really good company. I'm really looking forward to their wedding which is in May.

Here are a few pictures from today.

Interesting Day

Well, my job often throws up a few surprises, but today was, well, different.

I got a call last night from the Great Victoria Hotel in Bradford - I occasionally do jobs for them (I was taking pictures of their newly refurbished penthouse suite last week). Anyway, they had some guests in today and they asked me to pop along and take some pictures of them. It turned out to be the shadow cabinet (that's the Bigwigs in the Conservative party to anyone not familiar with British politics).

I found myself, along with a group of press photographers, being ushered into a meeting room where everything was happening. I have to say it was very surreal snapping away while David Cameron and chums were discussing how they were going to overthrow the Labour party and TAKE OVER THE WORLD MWAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here are a few of the pics I took. Once I got into the shoot it was just lke any of the commercial jobs we do, but it was fun to be there.

Focus on Imaging NEC

Focus on Imaging is one of Europe's biggest imaging shows. It covers everything from capture through to output and beyond. It is the motorshow for photographers. If you like all things techie then it's a great opportunity to play with all the new cameras and gadgets. If you are photographer or thinking of starting out it is a great place to come to see the industry in action. There are seminars by commercial photographers / wedding photographers / fashion photographers.
When Lou and I started out a few years ago this was a great source of inspiration and gave us a opportunity to talk to suppliers like our album supplier Queensberry who come over every year from New Zealand.

This year I am on the Annabel Williams stand E22 for a couple of hours from 11am on Monday 25th. These guys are great and helped give our business the direction it needed when we were new to the industry. If you are interested in starting a business in the world of photography come over and have a chat it would be great to see you.

If you are coming to Focus and want to meet up for a beer and a chat afterwards I'm going to be down there on the Monday and Tuesday just drop me line.

If you want to know more then  click to the FOCUS Website.

Paulette & John's Wedding 15th Feb

We covered Paulette & John's wedding on Friday and "IT WAS THE BEST WEDDING WE"VE EVER DONE!!" (Was that OK, Paulette!!???!!!)

Seriously, it was a super day, right from joining the boys at the snooker hall first thing in the morning up until we left after the first dance at the evening reception. John and Paulette were such a great couple to work with - we really enjoyed being around them and their friends and family on Friday.

They're due to fly off to exotic climes on honeymoon and escape this seriously freezing weather. Have a great time, guys and we'll see you when you get back. Thank you for inviting us to be part of your day. xxx

Valentines Fair Leeds 2008

Well we had a great few days off this week. Spent some quality time with the kids with it being half term. It is the time every year that the large Valentines fair comes to town. The kids took us down for the afternoon this week. Now I'm not put off by the big rides but some of these look like pure torture! I think I will stick to the Bumper Cars.

Yesterday we did our second wedding of the year with Paulette and John. These guys are fab and had such a blast! Tomorrow I will post in more detail about the day.

Project 366 - Updated

It was a really foggy start to the day so thought I would try and get some soft light images. The one above was taken at the local Ikea on top of their multi-storey car park. I have also worked on the rest of the images that I have taken over the last week - So the 'Project 366' gallery is now bang up to date. It would be great to get some feed back on what peoples favourites are up to this point. Just drop a note in the comments section of this post.

Emma & GJ

I had a lovely day yesterday - the weather was gorgeous and it felt like the first real day of spring. I also had the pleasure of meeting up again with Emma & GJ for their pre-wedding shoot. It was great to get to know them both better. Their wedding is in April - let's hope the weather is as beautiful as it was yesterday!

SUN Awards 2007 Exhibition - Leeds

Last night I got invited to the opening evening for the exhibition of the 'SUN AWARDS 2007' which took place at the Design and Innovation Centre in Leeds.

SUN stands for 'Shot up North' and exists to promote the talents of photographers based from the Midlands all the way up to Scotland. There is an annual judged competition and the winners for 2007 were on show last night. The photography covers several disciplines of Advertising, Design, Fashion and Editorial.

It was great to go and have a beer and a chat with some of the winning photographers. Rufus Crosby was an advertising photographer I had a good chat with and he gave a really interesting insight to the world of advertising photography. I loved the simplicity of

 his two winning images - The Snail and The Coke Can - check them out below.

You see all the winning images at the Shot up North website. Also if you are based in the North and want to enter to 2008 competition. The call for entries is at the beginning of May. The information is on their website

Chinese New Year

Happy Year of the Rat to all our Chinese readers!

We were down at our local Chinese emporium today stocking up on yummy goodies and I took a few shots of the produce - it's so great to see such fantastic and colourful stuff on the shelves, even if I haven't got a clue what most of them are!

Anyway, however you're celebrating, have a great time!

Gong Xi Fa Cai!!  恭喜发财

Photoicon Magazine

There is a new magazine that came out last year. If you are into modern contemporary photography it is definitely worth a look.

PHOTOICON "revists the modern masters pf photography, examines the new techniques and technology - and showcases the artists currently exploring these new directions." So if you are looking for things to help inspire your photographic style then Photoicon is a good place to start.

There is an article in this issue about French photographer Nicolas Guerin. He took the image of Daniel Craig you see on the front cover. I first saw some of his work last year and thought it was amazing. 

Also take a look at their website. It has some excellent articles which are not in the magazine - Stunning galleries of new and old imagery and reviews on camera equipment.

Finally thank you all who have become my 'Friends' over the last couple of days :-)

I have now moved into double figures - and now understand the 'Wall' a little more. Not to sure about the 'Poking' though :lol:

FaceBook

Well I have finally entered the 21st century. Just when I thought I was going to go old and grey - I have set up our Facebook account. Now I'm told by the few friends that I have that this is the future!




As you can see currently I'm Billy No Mates, so please be kind to an out of touch old man and be my friend!! Become my Friend and leave a message on my 'WALL' ( I really don't know what that means but I would like to find out :-) )

SNOW - But only just

Being big kids, and with no weddings today, we were really excited by the prospect of snow, and were glued to the weather forecast all day yesterday.

Well, the snow did come, but not exactly with a vengeance here in Leeds. All we seemed to see on the news were roads in northern England under gorgeous, photogenic drifts. Er, hello??? We're in northern England and we had approximately one inch of the white stuff. It's not quite the same when the kids have to clear half the garden to make one snowball. Still, before it (very rapidly) melted I was able to get a few nice shots - it was hardly a picturesque alpine scene, though. When I were a lad, we got 6 feet every winter etc. etc..........

Yorkshire Wedding Fairs

As I wrote in a previous post, wedding fair season is here!!

This Sunday we're at the Great Victoria Hotel in Bradford. It's a gorgeous and it's recently been completely refurbished, so there are cool, modern interiors set against the stunning grand Victorian architecture. It's a city centre hotel, and appeals to hip and trendy young couples! As photographers we rarely get the chance to photograph weddings in more urban locations, but we can get every bit as good images in a city centre as we can in the countryside.

We've got a few city centre weddings this year which we're really looking forward to so watch this space!

If you're planning on braving the weather and coming along to the wedding fair this weekend please come and say hello - we're very friendly!!



Next weekend we're at the Hazlewood Castle wedding fair. It's another gorgeous venue and one we love working at. It's great to get these wedding fairs in now while its still early on in the year and relatively quiet for us. As soon as spring starts it's pretty much non stop with weddings most weekends. It's a good job we love it so much!