Locke, thoughts and opinion.

Last night I watched Locke, and wow, was I happy with that decision.

I enjoyed the film so much that I did my usual search around the internet to find out some more information on the film, see where the discussion went for a lot of people. To my surprise there were a lot of forum posts about how people hated the film. I usually make a point of glossing over the arguments of people who would cite a film as being bad because, 'it's shit', and just stick to people who can make legitimate points. On this occasion though I was dumbfounded as to how anyone could fault this movie so much. Sure, maybe you don't rate it that high if it's not your cup of tea, but to me it's one of those films that transcends most, if not all, criticisms. It's a one man show, and that one man is fantastic.

The majority of cries against this movie seem to come from people who deplored the production, that 99% of the film takes place within the lead character's BMW. I did a bit more reading on these types of films, and what I learned was that films like this, 'Buried' (with Ryan Reynolds) and to a lesser extent, the incredible, 'Sleuth', are called "Chamber Plays". They are stage shows that take place with extremely minimalist stage sets and production values, and rely solely on the performance of the actors and actresses, usually in a cast of less than four. It's a style that puts dialogue before physicality.

A lot of people seemed to shun Locke because of it's simplicity. Someone on IMDB voiced his displeasure with the move, saying, "Tom Hardy was as good as he could have been for playing a character... talking on the phone... in a car... for the entire duration of the movie."

It took me a bit to consider what the negativity against this style was, but it became a bit clearer over time. Another man pointed out that if he was going to paying $11 for a cinema ticket he wanted significantly more action for his money. It's a fair, albeit narrow minded, point. If anything, for me it signified how alienated the casual movie goer is towards pictures like this. Cost of production to some people seems to translate into ticket price. Locke was filmed on a very small budget, an estimated £2 million, and utilised stylish camera shots to keep the pace of the film strong. In total though the film only took 8 nights to shoot, with the actors essentially performing the entire movie from start to finish in a single take, with Hardy driving, and the other characters communicating to him via the car phone. I love finding out things like that, and if anything that makes me want to pay more money to that film. To me, that style, that purer acting method, demands so much more talent and skill from the cast, and that equates to a good film for me nine out of ten times.

For me, I loved the movie, but then I love simplicity and movies that try something different. There were a couple of plot holes I became aware of after reading the discussion people were having, but to hold onto them seemed to miss the point. Cinema is fantasy, regardless of it's subject or style, or it's claim to be 'realistic'. That fantasy means that it's not rooted in the reality of our world, and for the sake of a story sometimes those convenient coincidences need to occur. What stuck in my mind for Locke specifically was that, for the hour and twenty minutes it ran, I was watching the character development, the rise and decline, of the title character. The small details didn't matter, the film was about understanding the mentality of this character and reacting with him when the next issue came at him. It's not a true story, so to be bogged down in the specifics of certain aspects of the film seems to be clutching at straws against an otherwise near-flawless production.

Oliver Lewis Watts on Flickr.

New portrait. Really happy with how this one came out. Nothing extravagant set-up wise, just think I captured a nice moment within the studio. See what you think - John

New edits from old shots.

I'm a big fan of Flickr, and I regularly post my latest shots there. Why? Because it's simple to view, my images are presented in great quality and I can keep track of the traffic my photos receive. Occasionally I put semi-blog posts in my flickr image descriptions and forget to update my actual blog page. As I've mentioned before though I'll write thousands of words on a subject provided I have the motivation to do so, and recently I haven't had it. That's not to say interesting things have been going on, but I post what I do across Facebook, Twitter and Flickr pretty much organically, so it seems like unnecessary work to forcibly put up a written account of what I've been doing on another website. It makes sense to keep an up to date journal of sorts, but it also doesn't take much investigation to discover what I've been doing. In essence, my presence on Tumblr is purely to provide stories I want to share that are too long to post on Facebook or Twitter.

My original plan was to put up my PEP160 Research report...thing, which is all about magazine layouts, (wooo!) but I wrote it out on Word, which I exported as a .pdf and uploading a .pdf is a massive hassle so I sacked that off. Instead I wanna plug some work I've been doing recently. Completely non-Uni related, but it's my work and my blog so let's do this. Leeeeeeroo-This is another issue with writing across several online formats, the fact that I find I'm repeating myself and rewriting a lot of what has already been said. The truth is probably that not many people beyond me even read this stuff, but even so, if I think I'm repeating myself then I also think people are picking up on this which would cause them to be annoyed. Or something like that.

So this new work I've been doing, well it's not really new work, well it is, but it isn't. It's me going through folders on my hard drive, looking at old photoshoots and seeing if there's images I haven't edited before that I feel I could breath some new life into. One thing I hate is re-editing images I've already worked on. I recently uploaded an image after spending hours on photoshop with it and posted with it 'any suggestions people have, let me know', from that I had like 4 people tell me different things that were wrong with the picture. Now instead of being normal and seeing these faults, taking the image down and re-working on it, I instead left it and looked at it as a 'bad image'. It's not that I didn't appreciate the feedback, I mean it's always a bit annoying when people show you faults with your work because you've spent time working on something and invested some of yourself in that work, but hey, it's a part of this industry and it's a part of growing as an artist, so although it's not my fondest thing to encounter I do appreciate that going through it will make me a better photographer/editor in the end. The other thing is that when I asked people what they thought of the image I wasn't really in the mindset of taking it down to change it and re-upload it. What I wanted to know was what was wrong with the image, but then move on from it. I'd sooner be in a position where I could look at the image and see it's faults than spend hours and hours obsessing on how to make it perfect. Because really, if you're gonna ask once for people to critique your work then you need to ask them to do so every time you re-upload it. In the end it's your decision on when a piece of work is 'done', even if it's not perfect in your own eyes.

So editing old photos is a big pass time of mine, despite how lame that might sound, I just find it interesting to go back in time to these old shoots, think about who I was as a photographer at that time and then inject who I am now into the images. Recently I went through three photoshoots that have taken place over the last 2-3 years and found some shots from each I liked and then edited. One thing I've found particularly interesting throughout this process is that I don't have a mountain of past photoshoots to dig through. I look through these folders a lot and yet every time I look through the images a few months down the line I find something new I didn't see before. I just think it's interesting to see how my taste and preference in how an image has been framed and shot changes over time. I might look through a photoshoot folder today and find one image and be content that, that's the only shot worth looking at, but then a few months later look at the same folder and find something completely different and in that shot find 'the best shot yet.'

So here's three of my most recent edits, including a shot I've not uploaded to flickr yet. Talk about a blog post with everything. (Note - next time include a Vampire AND an explosion.)

Hope you like 'em.

1. Hollie - Friday, 22nd July 2011

http://www.flickr.com/photos/leofacephotography/8722223436/in/photostream/lightbox/

2. Lauren - Friday, 13 April 2012

http://www.flickr.com/photos/leofacephotography/8726121818/in/photostream/lightbox/

3. (Bonus image) Lydia - Tuesday, 16th August 2011

Touch

Second 5-Picture-Story is done and ready for printing- hoorah.

Had a lot of fun doing this shoot and I think I'm really starting to come into my own style now. I've spent the last 3-4 years learning photography, trying other people's styles whilst trying to create my own, now I feel comfortable saying my style is my own. Of course, it's easy for me to say that and there's always gonna be comparisons between any two pieces of work, but right now I feel like everything is moving along nicely. 

So for my 2nd 5PS I had the keyword of 'Touch', and without having to do too much research on my end I had the perfect shoot fall right on my lap. You know that '7 Degrees of Separation' thing? The idea/concept/theory (whatever it is) that says that through association you're never more than 7 connections away from any individual. Well in Jersey it's basically 'A Degree of Separation', if you don't know someone, then someone you know does. It's very handy in this instance because I didn't personally know any of the founding members of Channel Island Wrestling (CIW) but a friend of mine used to work with two of them, so that's an instant in.

Originally I thought I'd just go to one of the events the group was putting on whilst I was over and take live shots there, but then I decided I'd rather shoot images I have more fun doing and opted to take some strobe shots of the guys at a rehearsal/ training session. My aim for the shoot was to get some cool portraits of the guys in their outfits as well as some action shots of them performing some of the more exciting moves.

Had a lot of fun shooting, and I hope the images are something a bit different to what people may be used to seeing. Hope you like 'em!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/leofacephotography/8635785978/in/set-72157633203028277

*Currently I've got 6 shots because I can't decide which shot to drop yet, if you have any suggestions let me know, could really help me out.

Oh, also I've got rid of my mohawk. Why? Cos someone was able to identify me as an art student based purely on my appearance. Some people might view that as good thing and aim for it, but for me that means I basically looked a creative mess, therefore 1) someone creative 2) a student). Going for a more 'professional'/'mature' look now. If you wanna see how I lost my mohawk however go to this link.... 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wefWKp1jHoc

Fragile update

A few weekends back I was in Jersey for Rumble on the Rock, the islands premier MMA event. I was there shooting for a project and wrote a blog post about how the shoot went just below this one, so if you're interested in that behind-the-scenes stuff then check it out!

The project I was shooting was for my 'Five Picture Story' narrative piece. Essentially any five pictures that told a story revolving around an assigned keyword, in this case - 'Fragile'.

The timing of the project brief and the eve of Rumble of the Rock synced up perfectly, so I instantly pursued the shoot, despite how it ended up costing more money than I'd care to mention on this public space. It's really nice to have things just fit when you need them to. A lot of the issues I've had with previous Uni projects is I've not had the motivation to really go after pictures or stories that excite me. It's not to say these stories aren't there, but sometimes it's just really difficult to see them, and as such it can become easy to just phone it in and take some pictures just to present something. Shoots like that really destroy my motivation with photography, because if I don't care about the subject matter then it reflects my work and in turn it changes my attitude. If I'm taking pictures of something I love, or that I have a passion about then it excites me to push myself and do well, if I'm doing a shoot 'just cos' then I adopt this attitude of 'oh well, these pictures aren't gonna mean anything, so why bother'. I know it's a bad attitude to hold, and I don't endorse or recommend it at all, but hey, it happens to all of us I'm sure. The point for me now is to work hard to find the shoots that excite me and make me enjoy photography. You're not gonna enjoy everything you do, but when you're in a work style like mine, where you are essentially free to choose what you work on, to fault anyone but yourself when you shoot something uninspiring is purely on your shoulders.

Anyway, the shoot in Jersey went swell, and I was able to get all the necessary pictures to fit the brief. It was my third time shooting the event, but this time was completely different, so it meant a lot to me to physically see my style and approach to photography change along with my understanding and knowledge of it.

I decided that whilst I'm back home for the holidays I'd get my work printed and ready for April. I've got a real soft spot for the company that I do my printing through, simply because they've made some really awesome pieces of work for myself and some friends in the past. For anyone from Jersey reading this, the place is 'The Framing Workshop' in St. Helier down the road from Accessorise, and I couldn't recommend them more for professional quality printing and framing.  

So 'Fragile' is all done, but I still have another Five Picture Story to shoot whilst I'm home, this time around the word 'Touch'. Going back to what I said before about loving things that just fit and fall into place, for this shoot I'm going to take some images of the CIW (Channel Island Wrestling) guys. What says Touch more than a group of large, hairy men in spandex confined to a small boxing ring grabbing and throwing each other. Nothing, that's what.

Below: My 'Fragile' Five Picture Story all printed and ready for Falmouth.

If you wanna see the images in better detail go to this link and have a peep. 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/leofacephotography/

Rumble on the Rock

The biggest and most ambitious shoot of my young photography career.

  It’s nothing that’ll sound that impressive to anyone that isn’t me sadly, but last weekend was one of those important, larger than other, steps that needed to be taken to push me further into developing my skills and ability as a photographer. It was also another milestone for me that shows I have what it takes to become a true professional.

  The premise was simple, take a single strobe light, a light stand, a softbox, connect them to my camera and run around a sports hall taking pictures of stuff. The problem was tha- oh wait, there wasn’t a problem… This shoot actually went pretty much exactly as I’d planned/ hoped. 

  Yeah!!

  Sorry for sounding over-excited, but this would be one of the few times a photoshoot has gone exactly according to plan and without incident. But I think unless something completely unexpected had reared it’s head then I didn’t leave myself much space for messing up with this shoot. Basically I cared a lot about this shoot, I spent time planning it, I had the shots in my head and I wanted, more than anything, to create some cool images.

  Having shot at Rumble on the Rock twice in the past I was well aware of the layout now and how the evening’s events played out, so getting my bearings didn’t take long and I felt comfortable explaining to my two assistants what we’d be doing. That’s right, I had assistants for this shoot, (things must be going well for me now!) Their presence was a crucial part of the shoot it must be said, and there’s no way I could’ve done it without the help of my friends Harry Sutton and Sam Delanoe, so once again guys, cheers!

  A big part of making this project work was keeping things simple and organized. It was interesting to think about how I was feeling pre, during and post this shoot because I was very much in charge of a team this time, as apposed to shooting by myself, and the organization of my team was something I found really fun. It felt like we were part of the same creation process, and although we were three people we worked together as a unit and this pushed us to create the work of three people verses one.. This shoot, whether it was the fact I’d originally planned to shoot it by myself or that I’d spent days planning it prior to the night, as soon as it came time to get to work I felt comfortable telling people where to go, what to do, how to do it and what we needed to do better next time. For a long time the notion of shooting something as part of a 10-person team confused and scared me. The pros I idolized were doing it and creating these great images, and a part of me felt ‘this is stupid, why can’t I take images like this on my own, I don’t want to rely on other people.’ Thing is, I still feel strongly about relying on other people, mostly to avoid it where possible because what’s important to you isn’t as important to other people. (These are the words of someone who has had people, friends, close friends, bail last minute on things I held to some importance.) But going back to the 10-man image making crew point, it’s not that these types of images aren’t possible to create on your own, it’s that they take so much more effort and the rewards are no more substantial, if anything it lessens them. I could’ve tried to shoot Rumble on my own, but it would’ve meant hauling a strobe light stand and a fat softbox around a crowded arena, leaving it at the perfect angle, running to another point, waiting to shoot (maybe two shots), running back to collect the stand and move to the next point and do it again. In short it’d have been exhausting and demoralizing, the likelihood of someone who’s not there to pose for my shoots situating themselves in the ideal lighting spot long enough for me to take a series of images might as well be 0%. With assistants sharing the duties of the shoot I was free to concentrate on framing my shot, shooting it and planning the next one. This meant I was able to keep things simple for myself and that’s how I like to work. No stress, no mistakes.

  I’m gonna come out and say it right now though that despite how much I loved this shoot and how happy I am with some of the images, I know I can do better and there is a lot of room for improvement. No one ever gets something right first time, and I for one welcome mistakes. Sure it’s annoying if you’ve cocked up and properly messed up a shot, but if you leave a shoot happy but acknowledging your flaws and understanding what could be changed to create a better image then I take that as a victory as much as leaving a shoot without seeing a problem. Maybe this is just a stance I choose to take because I know that I’m in the adolescence of my photography career and to learn is to make mistakes. This isn’t to say I think it’s good to settle with mediocre images, I always try and make my most recent shoot my best one, but reflecting on a project, picking apart the images to see their flaws makes you better prepared for the next shoot. There’s no such thing as a perfect shot, but there are shots with considerably less flaws than others.

  Could I have got better images? Definitely. Did I get everything I wanted? Nope. Have I left this shoot with an opening to go back and do better next time? Absolutely.

  Rumble on the Rock 2013, you were awesome. Thank you.

Rumble on the Rock #1

Less of story blog today, more of an actual blog-blog.

Shot the first part of my Rumble on the Rock - 'Fragile' Project today. Nothing major, just some shots at the Weigh-ins of the fighters squaring off. Was also using this as a means for testing my lights and my new softbox. Happy to report everything is going well, can't wait for tomorrow night. This is the first shoot I've done where I've got an assistant and a videographer with me. Assistant is for my off-camera lighting so it can be done efficiently as doing it myself would just take too much time and I could potentially miss shots. I'm really trying for a style of lighting that you won't have seen at other live events, although this excites me it has made me consider there are gonna be issues and complications that arise, but hopefully I'll be able to face these potentially issues head on and push past them.

The shoot tomorrow is really big for me, this could be my biggest shoot yet in fact and if the images come out well they could be really important to my professional career, but the main thing I wanna do is just have fun with this and hopefully the images will translate well.

Here's a shot from today of two of tomorrows fighters squaring off. I'm there to shoot tomorrow but I'm also there as a fan of MMA and I'm just excited about seeing some awesome fights.

Next update tomorrow!!

DesignIn

So to follow up on my previous blog post about a video game magazine I made back in 2008, here's a couple screenshots of a quick layout I've made for my design and narrative unit for uni.

Nothing overly complicated, just something quick and easy to read... Or at least that was the intention.

This layout revolves around a quick summary of my encounter with Mark, the homeless man whom I took a series of portraits of, for a project last term. If you wanna know more about that shoot and what went on behind the scenes then it's a few posts below this one, I won't link it to you, if you really wanna read it then you'll have to wade through some of my other content to get to it. Ha ha! Weren't expecting that were you!

Anyway here's some work, let me know what you think. Full pdf available as well should you interest be aroused.

http://www.mediafire.com/view/?objipy41h1awtfi

Yeah, InDesign, yeah!!

Blast from the Past

Haven't updated the blog in a whiles, and with a few people telling me they wanted me to post more stuff I thought I'd look for something to write about. Although, I'm very aware I think those people may just want me to rant about something and generally complain about trivial things, the thing is I do those blogposts in the heat of the moment when something's got me wanting to write. In essence, if something's been nagging or annoying me I'll write to vent, if I don't write anything to that tune then it just means nothing's been going wrong. So, be happy for me that this term things have been going well, and I've mostly got no complaints. That could all change in the blink of an eye though, so if you like hearing me complain about stuff and try and get philosophical then I'm sure this blog will revisit that territory in time.

To fill that shouty void though I thought I'd upload and talk about a piece of work I haven't looked at in years, a project that may be the first creative thing I've ever been proud of. Considering I made this particular body of work in 2009, already 18 years into my life, I dunno what that says about me as a 'creative person' - a bit slow to the party really.

To elaborate slightly I've always enjoyed art and drawing, but I'd never really embarked on a project I had some passion in, (my GCSE art submissions will pay testament to that. Hint - They're really, really bad.) So this piece of 'work' holds a really special place in my life because it was also the first time I discovered I was good at something. Maybe more than good, this was the first time I'd ever been in the top-tier of a class, and it made me feel really good. This was also before I'd discovered photography, although I guess the two were interlinked on some level, maybe not directly but mentally.

This project, I did whilst at Highlands College, was also the first time I'd gone beyond the boundaries of project assessment and continued creating something purely for fun and for myself. Essentially I'd done enough work to get the mark, but I kept adding to it because I was enjoying the creation enormously and I just wanted to keep enjoying it, 'it' being a feeling of enjoyment I seldom got/get from education. I think on a subconscience level, now that I can look back on it, I was also going beyond the necessity of the course for myself because I wanted to prove to people around me that I was good at things I was passionate about. Throughout education up to this point I'd been a coaster, one of those C/B mark students that no one really remembers. I created a few A mark things here and there, but nothing consistant, so it looked like those works were a flash in the pan rather than something to pay attention to, or at least that's how I imagined my teachers viewed me.

Thing is though, I always knew I was better than that, but I could never put the effort in to do well. I'm not shy in saying it, but I'm mega lazy about work I'm not interested in. In a way I think I've always felt that if I'm told to do something and I don't see a direct line to that thing helping me later in life then I discredit it and think it's not worth the effort. It's not a great view to hold, and I'd have loved to have got straight A*'s for my GCSE's and a Distinction on my National Diploma, but that just wasn't happening. I'm not annoyed that I didn't do well in school at all, because that was just who I was and who I am today. If I'd have really applied myself to school work between years 7 and 11 I probably wouldn't have ended up going to do a National Diploma in media, and then wouldn't have discovered photography. Life is essentially a domino effect, and I've always been a fan of just going with it, if it doesn't feel right then it isn't. That's not to say I endorse the idea of not trying, but don't loose sleep over something that isn't going to make or break the rest of your life.

ANYWAY, before I waffle on about my lackluster secondary education, the point is this thing, that I'm keeping secret from you for some reason, was the first notable piece of work I've ever enjoyed and it basically created a path that would lead me to where I am today.

Now, before you look at it, the thing to bare in mind is that although I'm very proud of this piece of work, it's not very good. That's not me being modest, this is just the truth. I made this when I first discovered InDesign, back when I discredited all Photoshopped images purely because Photoshop scared me and I had no idea how to use it, therefore it was easy to justify myself not using it than admire people who did. I'm posting this as nostalgia for myself just as much as I'm posting this for people to have a little look into the short history of how I found photography.

As I say, this piece of work is littered with faults, but at the time I made this I was trying my best, and I really had no standards to compare myself to other than professional products, and since, as I mentioned, I'd been using InDesign for less than 6 months, I did allow myself some leeway between my work and theirs.

So here it is, the moment I've spent an entire blog post building up to - a video game magazine I created called OVERKILL. It's got reviews, rewards and indepth comments and criticisms about the games of 2009! (What's not to like??)

It's also worth mentioning that I got into Sunderland Uni to study magazine journalism based purely on this body of work, and I chose that particular course and institution based off my enjoyment with creating the document. But as I say, on reflection it's nothing special so don't be too critical, it's just a bit of fun.

I've just posted the front cover, but the full .pdf is below if anyone wants to check it out.

Except for the images, all the writing, design and layout were created by me, with heavy influence coming from magazines like OPM and PSM3. 

Full .pdf here - http://www.mediafire.com/view/?vvvt5p655kdmt31

Oh oh, final thing, for some reason when I converted the original InDesign file to .pdf some of the text became mental and nonsensical. To this day I have no idea why it did that, but it doesn't appear too much so just try and ignore it haha

*Update - I just finished reading this from start to finish. I didn't realise how many grammatical errors there were within these pages, or how bad some of the design was. I almost considered taking it down because of these faults, but re-reading through this made me laugh so much I decided to keep it up. PLEASE don't point out the very obvious faults with this!

(Click the title to go to the link)

Shared this link around a lot, so I apologise if you've seen this before and you're sick of me sharing it, but it hasn't been on Tumblr yet so I've gotta share it on here at least once!

I've never been one for showing my work before I've finished it, I just hate seeing that face on people when they see an image that's still on-camera, and they give you that look of 'oh really? is that it...', and you wanna go 'no, no wait, trust me, this'll look much better once it's edited'. But through a combination of wanting to try as many new things photography related as possible, and finding a link to a screencapture software trial (ScreenFlow4) I thought I'd share a quick example of what my editing process is like.

The actual editing on this image took 27minutes, which I consider to be quite a quick edit that I put down to the lighting being good to start with so I didn't need to work that much on exposure correction or colours massively. Just a bit of skin-retouching and cheeky colour manipulation.

I hope to make some more videos as time goes by, maybe a step-by-step guide to a couple of simple lighting set-ups, I guess we'll have to wait and see on that one. Baby steps.

Book Review Two

So for lack of anything overly interesting to talk about in my life I've decided to do two quick photography book reviews. The thing is though, I want people to read this blog and I can't imagine the words 'book' and 'review' become the most mentally stimulating coupling out there. What I'm gonna do really though is tell you my take on each book and how it impacted me, rather than write a blog post akin to an amazon.co.uk review. That said I'll try to keep them short and hopefully enjoyable to read. Also for anyone who takes an interest in either book I'm more than happy to share them, just ask :)

Book 1 - Creative Portrait Photography by Natalie Dybisz

I don't like this book.

It feels instantly wrong to say such things about a book stuffed to bursting with photographic knowledge and amazing images, but it's how I've been left after going through cover-to-cover. The issue, for me, is it suffers from the same pitfall as Altered Images. For anyone not knowing what I mean by that, I mentioned in an earlier blog post how my favourite photography book doesn't inspire me, despite the incredible talent it holds within it's glossy pages. Creative Portrait Photography, much like Altered Images is a book filled with conceptual, photoshop driven images. Completely unique and mesmerising images. The plus to CPP is that the main body of the book focuses on the work of photographer Natalie Dybaisz, and in it she breaks down the various stages of how an image was created, from the idea to the shoot to the post-processing. It's really informative, although definitely not to be considered a step-by-step guide by any means. It's more, 'behind-the-scenes' than anything else, but through that there's information and techniques to be learnt.

The thing is, it's not that I hate this book, or I don't think it's good, but for me it's really not that great. Rather than inspire me to create images it makes me feel very insignificant with my own work. There's that point where you can be humbled by a body of work to reset your stance and try again, aiming for higher or different goals, but for me that's not the case. The work exhibited by Miss Dyabisz is fantastic and covers a wide range of portraiture styles, although it remains completely unique to her own vision. For me that was part of the issue, because looking through the images I began to think of pictures I could make using the same techniques being shown. However every time I came up with an idea mildly interesting it bothered me that I only found it 'mildly interesting'. I almost felt like this book was challenging me to try a style of photography I had no real passion in. I guess you could argue that through adversity and challenge like that you grow as a photographer, but at the same time I feel that work done without enough motivation and desire won't produce good results.

Like Altered Images this is a great book for looking at outstanding images that are the pinacle of the merge between art and photography. Sadly though it's a very specific niche and I can imagine it's not work that'll inspire or be admired by everyone who picks up a camera.

For me the title 'Creative Portrait Photography' is a little bit too broad for what the book is actually about. It's definitely about creative portraiture, but the name and blurb perhaps create connotations of a much wider exhibition of work. The work in this book is incredible, but very specific to the digital artist genre of photography more than the whole genre of portraiture. It's a stupid term but somewhat apt to describe this book, but it's very 'arty', lots of interpretation within the images and maybe a slight air of pretentiousness. Of course it could be argued that, that's the point of the book, but on the surface at least that's not the way I immediately saw it and then decided to buy it.

Book 2 - Photographing Shadow and Light by Joey L

Anyone who knows me or my photography work probably knows by now that I'm somewhat of a Joey L fan. In fact I feel it may go to the extent that some might interpret that I'm infatuated with the man. Hey, he's a good looking guy!... But sadly that's not the reason I keep talking about him, the reason is simply because he might be one of the best portrait photographers working today, and he's only 23.

The thing is with Joey L is that whenever anyone writes about him, his age inevitably comes up. Really your age shouldn't matter, more the amount of time you've been practicing in your craft, but exception is made to the rule when you talk about this guy. Some gigantic clientele name-dropping potential is at hand when you look through his portfolio, made even more impressive by the fact he was hand-picked for these shoots at such a young age. Anyway, I could go on and on about how awesome this guy is*, (*'this guy' I've never actually met who could be just as likely turn out to be 'awesome' as he could be a massive... well you get the picture.)

The point of writing this blog is to speak about the book. So immediately the book is very similar in layout to CPP, in that it shows a crafting process of various images from concept to final print. Joey perhaps goes into a little bit more detail about the images and provides a bit more backstory. The crux of this book is as it's title suggests and thus focuses on the process of taking images using external lighting. It is important to note at this point though that the equipment Joey uses greatly impacts his work, it'd be a lie to say it doesn't. It's not to say that his work wouldn't be great without the gear he uses, but when you're shooting with a PhaseOne medium format camera and Profoto strobes then the quality of your images increases to a level beyond your seemingly 'standard' 5d mkII.

So in this book Joey goes into detail about how he set up the shot, including lighting diagrams showing a model birds-eye view of the set and revealing what kit he used to shoot with. The whole process of understanding Joey's shots comes across as simpler and easier to understanding than Natalie's.  Maybe that comes down to the writing in this book vs the first one, perhaps Natalie's shoots are simply harder to understand than Joey's, maybe it's a bit of both.

Really both books come down to personal taste. Creative Portrait Photography focuses a lot on conceptual, largely edited images from an artists mind, where as Photographing Shadow and Light is more about images crafted to be 90% done in-camera rather than through hours of post-processing. There's also much more of a sense of 'professionalism' in PS&L, in the sense that many of the images featured were shot for a client rather than for a personal project. I guess that may be an outside reason as to why I prefer Joey's book. Given that right now I'm learning how to make photography a profession, a book telling me about how contracts were created between photographer and client is maybe more interesting, or 'fitting' to me than a book that is more about pure artist expression and love of creating images.

The thing is I don't want to make it seem like one book is better than the other, really they're both steller publications, but through personal digestion I've been inspired to shoot because of Joey's book, and slightly put down by Natalie's.

I really urge anyone interested in either of these books to check them out and create your own opinion of them, maybe you'll agree, maybe you'll think I'm talking out of my ass. Who knows! But the opportunity to check out some great photography literature is there if you want it...

Thanks for reading :)

The Pursuit of Progress.

Honestly, I'm not overly happy with the results from my 24 hour project. 

For a quick re-cap I was given 24 hours, starting midnight Tuesday 22nd and ending  Wednesday 23rd (funnily enough), to go into Plymouth and produce 6 shots of something that I had researched and essentially found interesting.

I decided to go to St. James' Blackbelt Academy and take some shots of the staff there. Via their website I was able to find out that the training facility they were running was the biggest martial arts gym in Plymouth and easily the best looking gym I'd ever seen. Taking the opportunity to take some more shots focusing on martial arts, (a subject I hope to really dive into with my photography) and also the chance to check out a fantastic facility for personal reference I got my kit together and headed up there, arriving early afternoon.

Now, prior to this shoot I'd taken, what I consider, to be quite a cool image in a similar setting of MMA fighter, Liam McGeary. Essentially I wanted to expand on the old image using new techniques I had learnt, and take a 'superior' image. I guess I was cocky. Thinking my knowledge of flash had increased exponentially since my shoot with Liam I set up my equipment expecting a certain level of quality straight away. I didn't come close to that quality, and that scared me. Honestly, it seems stupid to be 'scared' by the quality of a photo, but for me it was an instant demoraliser and really took my momentum away from me. I was expecting to be able to shoot great images straight away and surpass the technical quality I had achieved in the previous shoot effortlessly.

The trouble, I soon figured out, was that I was shooting with a completely different style of strobe light. For the Liam shoot I was using my Elemental strobes which need a direct power source to work. This contrasted massively to the AA battery powered Nikon SB900 speedlight I was using for this shoot. Instantly the same results were not possible from the same light set up, and after about 30minutes or so of testing out various ways to light a test model I concluded that the same style of shot wasn't going to be possible and I would need to start from square one.

I've been playing around with the Nikon Speedlights for a while now since being at Falmouth. Just really seeing how they work and getting comfortable with them, and by this point I was quite happy with how my lighting for portraits was coming. It's not perfect by any means, but it's at least a sign of progress in something I knew very little about before arriving in Falmouth. Anyway, I decided to leave the action shots for a bit and go back to what I knew was working with the Nikon lights. I got one of the coaches, Andy Wu, to stand infront of my camera whilst I positioned the strobe to his direct right and took some test shots. Much happier with how these shots were coming out I expanded and asked Andy to do some shadow boxing from a fixed position, then some leg kicks. The light was working much better than when I had first started shooting, but there was still something uncomfortable about it, and the images weren't really grabbing me. I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Maybe it was the florescent lighting of the gym, maybe it was the output of the flash or the settings on my camera. Whatever it was, there was something that was out of sync and making the images look somewhat flat and blown-out. (It doesn't help that I didn't realize until after I'd left Plymouth that I'd been shooting in JPEG the whole time. I don't check to make sure my camera is shooting in RAW when I shoot because my 550D is always set up the way I like it, but because I was using a loaned 7D I'd completely forgotten to check this important factor. It's my own fault, just something I've got to learn from, especially since this isn't the first time I've done it!)

I spent a lot of the shoot reviewing my images, and not really liking what I saw. I had really high expectations for this shoot and was hitting no where close to them. I'd come into St. James' Blackbelt Academy with two halves of two shoots in my head. I was half there shooting for my Uni project, which had a specific set of rules and restrictions within it, and also there to outdo my shoot with Liam. This incomplete mindset ultimately didn't allow me to properly think about my shots and I ended up with some shots I really know I can do better than. That's not to discredit the guys from St. James' at all though, as far as subjects to shoot they couldn't have been nicer or more accommodating. It was my own desire to surpass an old shoot with newly acquired knowledge that essentially made me lazy in the face of harder challenges and caused my images to suffer.

My experience with this shoot has been a humbling one. You don't create better images because you think you will, you create better images because you challenge yourself to take more creative, difficult ones. I assumed I was going to take good images mimicking a shoot I'd already done, instead I should've been trying to take more complex images and pushing myself to advance.

Below: A shot I took of coach Andy Wu doing some high-kicks for me. This was one of the only images from today I really liked, and even then I know I can do so much better. This isn't aided by the aforementioned JPEG mess-up that really restricts the level of editing within the highlights I can control.

On my own terms.

First and foremost I just want to say a quick thank you to everyone that's been reading these posts and talking to me about it. I really appreciate it because I know I tend to go off on a ramble, so for people to read through the mass of text when they could be doing something else is really gratifying. So yeah, cheers for reading again if you're a continued reader, or if this is the first post you've read by me I hope you enjoy.

A few days ago I went to an exhibit. The exhibit was on the work of photographer Philip Blenkinsop. It was a really enjoyable evening, a 2 hour Q&A interview presentation that was amusing and insightful. Now I'd be lying if I said I knew who Philip Blenkinsop was until about 2 weeks ago, but that's just the nature of the industry. There's so many photographers in so many circles that you can know hundreds of people in one area and then not hear anything about people in others. It was almost scary to realise this, because Philip is a 3x Visa d'or award winner, which is a really big thing, and I've never heard of him or seen his work before. He's someone at the pinnacle of his profession, but it shows that even then not everyone is going to see your work, even the people who probably should.

Philip was an interesting person for me to be exposed to. He's someone that strictly only shoots on film, develops and prints his own work. He's not about telephoto lenses, he's about getting into the thick of the action. You can tell he has a passion about his craft and is very proud about his ability to shoot where others cannot. The thing is though I'm not like Philip, not at all. I guess this is why I had a hard time trying to join the choir of people declaring the inspiration of Blenkinsop shortly after the exhibit ended. Don't get me wrong, Philip's work is incredible, some of the most striking portraits I've ever seen, but he's not someone I can view or listen to and feel instantly inspired by. I've mentioned him before but Michael Muller might be my favourite photographer working today, I check his website 2-3 times a week just to be inspired by his work. There's something about it that just clicks with me and makes me want to shoot, where as Blenkinsop's work, although impressive, doesn't resonate with me.

It was odd because I was sat in a room full of photography students clearly foaming at the mouth with adulation for this man, yet I wasn't on the same wavelength. There was a moment where Philip made a joke about us, (the digital photography consumers) wanting "more megapixels!!", and it was met with an eruption of laughter from the audience. I got the joke, but I sat in silence, instead taking on board the statement rather than laughing at the punchline. Philip said a lot of things that discredited the talents and abilities of digital photographers, none of it being false. This is why I found the evening with him more interesting than I had expected. He said a lot of things against the digital age, things that I'd have thought would've offended me, but it was all credible and honest. I love digital photography, I think the pros of it eclipse the pros of film, and this belief is all I could think of when I sat and listened to Philip seemingly dismantle everything I held dear about digital photography. Philip is someone who has carved such an impressive career out of his own beliefs in photography that you'd be a fool not to take his word as gospel, but this is what got me thinking about my own experiences within the medium. Really there is no 'right way' to succeed in photography. Essentially if you wanted to you could try and make a career for yourself only using an old school Photosphere camera (http://johnsrolleionlypage.homestead.com/files/Photosphere_9X12.jpg), and there's nothing to say that wouldn't create success for you, it's very unlikely but it's still possible. This again got me thinking, there are no rules to photography. There are guidelines and recommendations, but ours is such an art form that we are free to approach and execute as we please.

Philip showed me, through his work and passion, that film photography is the only way to take pictures. He showed me that this direction had worked exceedingly well for him. He didn't however show me that repeating the same steps would yield fortune. I think people can misunderstand the relationship between inspiration and admiration, sometimes it seems that people can become so overwhelmed by someone's work or message that they don't really take the time to fight with what they said and get a proper understanding of it for themselves. I believe there is something to learn from every person you meet, but that the message is sometimes not always as clear as it may seem.

For example, for me, Philip didn't inspire me to go shoot anything specific, he didn't inspire me to shoot in a certain way or with a certain method. He did however inspire me, or at least show me, that to succeed is to simply shoot for yourself. "Never sellout" was a belief he briefly spoke on, and for me it was the highlight of the evening. Essentially, (because I don't want to misquote him) he said that once you've sold out, that's it. There's no going back, no renewal, you've done it and you have to live with it. No one else, just you. If you have a belief, stick to it, be true to yourself and see it out. Your beliefs are what make you, you. To be rid off them is to dehumanise yourself and admit defeat in the face of trial. I connected with this point more than others; since starting Falmouth Uni I've struggled so much with understanding who I am as a photographer, how I should be working and how I should be evolving.

If I blindly excepted everything I hear about photography and succeeding within it then I wouldn't be here writing this blog post, I'd be off in a foreign country shooting a story about human injustice on a specific film camera with a specific lens. But I'm not, I'm at University teaching myself about off-camera flash techniques, developing my skills whilst learning new ones. The point is that there's a reason we all got into this in the first place, and that reason should never be forgotten. One of the main reasons I got into photography in the first place was because I loved looking at HD wallpapers on my computer and wanting to take pictures like them myself. I LOVE glossy photos, I just do. I love high quality and detail. It's Life+, the bits you can't see with your own eyes. Let's be honest, who doesn't love watching anything the BBC puts out with Attenborough. We all watch it and think "F**k this is HD! I can SEE what that elephant is thinking through the detail in his eye"

This is why I don't like film. I hate noise in my images, I just think it distracts from the original image. Yeah it can look cool on certain images, but by that right it's more of a filter than anything else. It's a fault with the technology at the heart of it.

Those are my beliefs on certain areas of photography that I feel passionate about.  They're not someone else's, they're not always shared, they're not right, they're not wrong. They're mine. These are my beliefs that I won't sellout on because someone else's beliefs conflict with them. Because of how well Philip has done with his work and career, if this was any other profession we were in then he could say bluntly that what I'm doing is wrong, and here's what I NEED to do to succeed. But the point is he can't because there's so many ways to succeed and fail in this industry that no single person has the answer or blue-print on how to do it.

Philip Blenkinsop is the most interesting photographer I've come into personal contact with yet, and for none of the reasons I would've expected. More than anyone else he has shown me, without showing me, that your beliefs are what get you somewhere in this industry. My passion lies in shooting glossy, interesting portraits. That coupled with a burning desire to end up shooting the big names of the world I'll mature into is what drives me. That's my goal and that's where I will end up if I can have it my way. There isn't a right or wrong way for me to succeed, it'll happen based purely on my ability to work hard for what I want and be patient. If good things come to those who wait, then better things to come to those who work whilst waiting.

Below: My photoshoot with Mark (check out my last post 'The pros of con' to read more about him), pushed me to try something completely new. This was the first time I'd taken off camera lighting outside, on the streets. I've always wanted to do so and this was my chance to do it. I was terrified that things wouldn't work. Terrified that the images would suck, or that I would embarrass myself not being able to use the equipment. But I worked hard prior to this shoot to learn how the Nikon speedlights worked and how the light wrapped itself around a model so that when it came to shooting I was comfortable.

With the messages from Blenkinsop still fresh in my head, I shot with a purpose. This style of photography is what I'd been aspiring to master since I first started taking photos, and now was my time to finally start pushing towards creating professional quality images and establishing myself as a legitimate photographer.

The Pros of Con

"I wouldn't want to take you up to the Campus anyway"

"I have an offshore bank account"

"I guess things could always be worse..."

These are three statements I made to a homeless man today.

On reflection, my impulse meeting with Mark and his dog Tide wasn't as bad as my choice of words when speaking to him would make it seem.

Today I found myself in Falmouth wondering around without anywhere to really be. I had some bank stuff to sort out, but aside from that I was on my own time and available for whatever.

Twice I past Mark as he tried to sell me The Big Issue. I smiled politely and shook my head as we crossed paths, and he smiled back. Maybe it was because I was expecting a look of disappointment or disdain towards me, but when he smiled and wished me well on my way it really stuck with me. I got about 15 metres up the road after the second time I walked past him when I stopped and thought to myself. I had plenty of change in my wallet, with no plans or need to save it. Change, in essence is there for you to part ways with without worrying. It's not big money, at least not always. I also thought about Mark's companion with him on the street, a scruffy looking but endearing dog called Tide.

I love dogs.

Dogs have this connection with humans that I find amazing. Even if it is purely a bi-product of the relationship humans and dogs have had for centuries, I find there to be no simpler joy on this world than to see 'a man and his dog' enjoying each other's company. Perhaps it was because of this relationship between the two that I felt myself wanting to help out more than if it was just a man on the street corner, sat on some crushed boxes. I almost want to look into that with more detail. Did the image of the homeless man and his dog make me want to give him money? Did the dog act like a 'selling point'. I suppose unless you're someone who regularly gives money to charities with no want for gain, when you give money to a cause like this it's because of an X-factor. For me, perhaps it was Mark's dog more than the fact he was man needing money.

So I turned around and started walking back to Mark. He smiled as I approached, and joked in a way that made it seem like he knew I was going to come back. I spent a few minutes talking to Mark, who cheerfully engaged the conversation by asking how I was. As it turns out I was fine, although some issues with Natwest meant I couldn't pay in my student loan. When I explained this to Mark though I felt a wave of embarrassment pass over me. I've just given £1.50 to a homeless man and his dog and I'm telling him about my issues with paying in money to my offshore banking account. I felt like a tit, but he smiled through it, even going so far as to joke about it to Tide, "Woah Ti, check this guy out, he's loaded!" - to which Tide looked up from where he was sleeping as if big news had just come his way. I laughed with him and he told me he was just having me on, then I proceeded to say "ah well, it could always be worse". That would be me trying to insinuate that a delay in paying in money to the bank isn't anything worth getting worried about, but I fear it may have come across as "ah well, it could always be worse, I could be homeless...". Again I froze for a split second, thinking in my head, 'Why would you say that?? The hell is wrong with you?!'

Mark asked me what I was studying, so I told him 'Photography', to which he told me that he'd encountered photography students before. Turns out a few in the past had asked to use him as a subject and wanted to take him up to Campus and into the studio, to which Mark declined. I didn't press him for too much detail as to why, but what he told me next pretty much summed it up. He said, "If you want to take my picture, that's fine, I'm more than happy to help. But take the photo here, on the street, here with the shit on the wall." It was clear that if Mark was going to have his photo taken then he wanted it to be legitimate. If you want a photograph of this homeless man, take it in his home. I told Mark that this encounter with him almost seemed like fate. I spoke to him about how my projects in Jersey had completely failed and I had a deadline approaching. I asked him if he'd mind playing model again to a photography student and let me take his portrait. With a smile he obliged and told me that he was happy to let me shoot him but wouldn't go to Campus. I shook my head and said that I wouldn't want to take him to Campus. A misinterpretation of that statement may have made it look like I wouldn't want to be seen with a homeless person, but what I meant, (which I clarified quickly after) was that I wouldn't want to take shoot him in the studio because that wouldn't be capturing the essence of who he was. Therefore, I would bring the studio to him.  

We chatted for a little bit more before a handshake and a goodbye sent us on our separate ways.

Relieved that I had finally sorted out a subject for my project I began to think about what that actually meant. Had I justified taking advantage of this man's situation because I'd given him a quid fifty? Because really, that's what I'm doing isn't it? It's not intended that way, but this man, because of the way he looks and lives has made me want to take his portrait. I'm using someone else's misfortune for personal gain. I'm not going to get money or fame from these images, but I am trying to better myself via his misfortune. His misfortune being the "hook" of these images. The more I write this the less I like how it sounds. The issue is that it's true, even if it's in not meant to be perceived the way it could be. Mark is an interesting character to talk to and look at, the camera will love him, so as a photographer why shouldn't I take advantage and try and get some decent shots of him? I've asked his permission and wouldn't shoot without it, but he gets nothing out of this. He's fine with me shooting him, but I dunno if I'm fine with me requesting it. I've only shot people in a negative situation once, when I went to Romania to deliver relief aid.

I was in an old people's home in the middle of nowhere. These people were poor. Really poor. 3rd world poor. I had my camera but found it impossible to shot. The faces of the people there would've produced some stunning images I'm sure, but I was so frightened by the notion of it. Here I was, some random white kid with nice clothes and a big camera looking to take images of people worse off than me so I could get more hits on my website. It made me sick to think of it that way, I had nothing to give back to these people, I was just taking from them. It wasn't meant maliciously, I guess my pictures could be used to show how bad these people were and create a reaction in some people to help out, but realistically that wasn't likely to happen. It was self gain.

I find myself in that same mindset with Mark. He's a person, but right now I'm viewing him as a project. I can see the images in my head and want to share them with everyone. But if that happens and people like the photos I'll get credit as a good photographer, Mark doesn't get credit for being homeless.

Below: One of only about six images I took of the villagers in Romania.

My holiday without photography.

This'll be my first post in about a month. Not great considering I'm supposed to update this blog daily, but oh well, does that still count when I'm not within the constraints of term time? It probably does, so whoops, sorry, but oh well. This blog is about my own personal expression, the release of my brain-thoughts to this pixelated paper. I write when I feel like writing, and whilst I was in Jersey I didn't have the urge to write once. I had no desire to remind myself that I was at University. Part of that meant distancing myself from photography as well. This wasn't some grand scheme to forget the past 3 months for some specific reason, I just wanted to take a break from everything that Falmouth was. After 3 months of indulgence I just wanted to move away and focus on other things, perhaps more important things.

Maybe it's different for me because I have to travel across an ocean to get home, but when I leave the UK to go to Jersey I feel just as much like I'm going on holiday as I do migrating back to where meals don't feature the words 'ASDA Smart Price'. I think it's interesting that I don't feel like I'm on holiday when I'm in the UK, it's probably due to the amount of time I spend in either place, but also it seems that I associate Jersey with fun and relaxation, and the UK with work and deadlines.

I previously stated that my intention was to distance myself from photography when I was in Jersey, and that was a fine mission statement, but not so great when put into effect as I had at least two photoshoots to do for Uni. Photoshoots that specifically needed me to be in Jersey to accomplish. So looking down on my holiday time from above I saw that I had 3 weeks to do two photoshoots and potentially finish an already half written essay. I decided, as was my right, to leave all of my work to last week. Although not assessable by a governing body, I had 'work' to do that greatly outweighed that of my £27,000 Uni course. The 'work' was of a personal nature and is by no means something I wish to divulge with you, much to your dismay. Just know that it was something I spent a lot of my time in Falmouth loosing sleep over, but ultimately worked out for the best. So feel happy for me in that respect, and criticise me that because of that decision I couldn't do one of my projects.

I had a single portrait project to execute in Jersey. One project, two photoshoots. The brief was simple - two separate studies, one of a man, one of a woman. Two sets of four specific shots - Observed, formal, environmental and detail. Two of the shots for each set needed to be flash lit. Easy enough. I'd chosen my two subjects and had confirmation from both that they were ok with being shot. So with that information in my head I didn't feel any sense of haste when I touched down in Jersey, I would take as much time as I wanted for myself and shoot when the time presented itself.

As it happens that may have not been the best idea, as two weeks into my holiday time one of my studies cancelled on me and that shoot got scrapped. So there went a pretty cool shoot I had planned and a rather decent story with it, but oh well, these things happen. I didn't panic, I just had a think and looked for other potential people to shoot with. As it happens the same day the shoot got scrapped I found out that a friend of mine was back in Jersey for the New Year and they would make a great back-up subject to shoot. So there we go, crisis over, dates set, I still had just over a week till I needed to be up at 6am to go the airport.

So the final days loomed overhead and I prepared to do the first bit of Uni work since I'd been home. It was Wednesday and I was going to be up at the GBCI MMA academy to shoot. I'd arranged with the subject to shoot him after the evening training session so that we could have the room to ourselves and wouldn't have to potentially finish the shoot early just as another class arrived to use the space. 

The evening session ended, and the subject wasn't there. Bugger. Although, I had arranged to shoot at 7:30, and it was only 20 past, so maybe he would turn up in a little bit. "I'll wait", I thought. He didn't turn up.

I got home and went online. It wasn't a huge loss after all, I spoke to him that evening, he apologised for not showing up but said he could shoot tomorrow. Perfect. I don't know if any other photographers get this, but hours before a shoot I think of how it'll go in my head and I come up with ideas for shots I really like. It's not really until I get the excitement and butterflies going that I'm able to think of several shot ideas to use. So really, by putting off the shoot till the following day I had these new shot ideas in my head I could refine, and then also potentially have a few more appear again before the shoot.

I didn't shoot anything on Thursday.

Unavoidable this time, illness plagued my model and he was unable to weather it. Absolutely no hard feelings at this point, this stuff happens, it's the very nature of this job, there's no sense in getting angry or upset about stuff you have no control over.

Again I spoke to him once I got home and again we arranged to shoot the next day. My final day in Jersey. With his word that he'd be there this time, I was once again excited about the shoot.

So 3rd time optimistic I went into the academy Friday evening with my studio and began to set up. Two things went wrong with this shoot. Two things that would've made getting angry at the first two attempts at doing this shoot pointless. Firstly the infrared transmitter between my camera and my lights decided that between me leaving Jersey in September and coming back in December it'd died. So my lights were now useless. Already this shoot is redundant for my course because I can't shoot with the artificial light required. But sod it, I've come this far, I'm going to shoot something! With half a roll of film already shot in my camera I decided to at least finish that off. At least, that's what I had hoped to do.

I took one shot and my Canon 300 went the way of my transmitter and inexplicably died. Stating via the digital display that it was due to the batteries being flat, it was soon discovered that this was a cold faced lie since when I tried brand new batteries, fresh out of the pack, I was faced with the same cry for help.

Without the camera and the lights the shoot was dead. There's a point where you try your best to salvage a sinking ship, but there's also a point where you walk away and learn from a failure. Again, these things happen, better to roll with the punches than get knocked down by them.

So two photoshoots failed to produce anything. That on it's own would've been annoying, but luckily for me I had another frustration to look forward to.

Last Summer I fell off some rocks. I promptly landed on my camera and broke it. I had it sent away to get fixed, but it's never been the same. The focusing is sluggish and often unable to deliver the clarity it used to, and this holiday season I discovered that it's now prone to a comatose state if it's left in a temperature similar to that of warranting wearing of a pair of gloves outside.

So again to recap, shoots fell through, equipment broke and I didn't get my work done. Fitting that so much would go wrong for me with photography during a period of time I wanted nothing more than to get away from the thing.

I've entered 2013 with quite a negative view to photography. Recently I felt like complaining so much when things went wrong, and telling people so it seemed like it was the worst thing that's ever happened to anyone. Then I realised that I'm complaining about taking pictures. My "work", no matter how tedious or difficult it becomes is still the thing I love doing most in the world. Just a bit of perspective can be enough to remind you how good your life is, even when it's not going your way.

Below: The first 3 months of Falmouth have almost made me forget about the simple joy I got with photography. Pictures I take now seem to need a purpose, an audience an emotion. It was nice to go home, forget about Uni and take pictures that weren't about 'photography' but about having fun.

This image is titled - "Dur"

Two and a half years.

Haven't posted anything in a while which is why I find myself at 14 minutes past midnight Wednesday morning putting digital pen to digital paper.

The last few weeks leading up to the Christmas holidays have been a bit hectic, despite the contrasting placid atmosphere of Falmouth which is missing a majority of it's students. Opting to stay an extra week at Uni to catch up on work I found myself thinking a lot more about the education I was involved in. Without the distraction of general uni hijinks and merriment I was in a room, for a lot of the time, working solidly on my projects.

It was at one point when I was researching something that I realised the last 3 months of my life have been the most involved I've been in photography... ever. I took a few moments to really think about that and consider what impact it had, had on my life and view on photography. Up until I started Uni I was primarily self-taught (excluding online tutorials and side bits like that) and therefore 'learnt' at my own pace. My "research" was me looking at photographs and photographers I was genuinely interested in learning about. It was more organic, and I guess, fun.

That's not to say Uni isn't fun, it's been brilliant thus far. It's not all been great though, mostly due to my inescapable desire to criticise and challenge anything I don't see the point of, a trait I'm sure will gain me more critics than followers in photography and life. But Uni's been what I expected, if not better. 

Anyway this post isn't about how Uni's going it's about something else. What I've been feeling lately is that thing certain people speak of when trying to turn a passion into a career. Becoming over-indulgent in something, especially when it involves business, has the potential to take away the fun and joy from it. I basically came across this when I realised that thing I was looking forward to most about coming back to Jersey was that I wouldn't be surrounded by photography.

I could take a break from it. 

I thought to myself about whether education was making me loose my love for photography, and that the non-organic, stipulated approach to 'learning' was hindering my creativity and drive to do better. 

Everyone's different, everyone has their own path to carve and follow, no two lives are ever the same. I'd attribute that last sentence to me having spent a lot of time researching and reading up on the origins of certain photographers. Quite dishearteningly a lot, like, A LOT, of the professionals I aspire to be on the same level as didn't bother with a photography-based education. They were people that got out there and did something. They shot. Met people. Got published. Met more people. Shot. Etc etc. The thing is though it's all relative, and it just so happens that higher level education wasn't something that was needed in these people's lives to get them to where they are now. It's not to say that if you don't go to Uni you will become an established professional able to create a comfortable life from your skills. But it's also not to say that once you finish a photography degree you'll be earning ALL the money and shooting for Nike a week later.  

Something I'm glad life thus far has given me is scope.

I've got a few friends who've done photography degrees at University level, and others who have gone straight into the industry with nothing more than an understanding and a big camera. I've seen both sides of spectrum when it comes to professionals and aspiring professionals. Since Falmouth though I've had the opportunity to really investigate and understand these types of people.

I knew someone who came out of a good University with a respectable 2:1 and within a year was working in a completely non-photography related career because they realised making a living through photography wasn't as easy as saying, 'here's my degree, give me some money'. I feel bad for that person, I guess if they're happy that's all that matters, but essentially 3 years of their life didn't go towards getting them the career they wanted. That's not to say that when you go to University you're setting yourself up for the job you want for the rest of your life, but for a lot of people it is. I know it is for me. The thing I've seen with people is that they think the degree you get from University elevates you above other people trying to get a job you also want. It doesn't. At all. 

To be fair though, why wouldn't you think that way? You've spent 3 years and no doubt a ridiculous amount of money to become better than the people who aren't at University, (Unless I'm missing the point of a University education, in which case maybe I should take the money I'd spend on tuition for the next 2 and a half years and travel the world with my camera instead...) 

This post isn't me telling people how to do well after leaving University, because that'd be ridiculous. I've already dropped out of one degree, I'm hardly the best person to seek advice. But I've seen and observed a lot of people who have left Uni though, some have succeeded, some have failed, and it's their experiences that give me the knowledge to shape my own future as I want. 

The main point is that there's no clear cut way to becoming a professional photographer. If you've got an idea of what kind of photography you want to get into after University then don't wait until your 3 years is up to make a call to someone about a job, or pursue a personal project on it. Start right now, ask to shadow people, do smaller jobs in the area you like, hell, just get involved and shoot. University is awesome, but it's not going to give you a job, it's up to you to acquire the skills, knowledge and work you need to get you where you want to be.

lit-by-fire

Lit-by-fire was a completely off the cuff project that started when I was out shooting some fire breathing/ fire poi shots for a music video I was making.

The project came into existence when I was reviewing an image I'd just taken and loved how the fire created this incredible light on the fire breather's skin. So I decided to focus on portraits for a few shots and see what I could do. I had two fire breathers with me when shooting and basically arranged one as my model and the other as if he was a strobe light. I got him to breath fire to a specific place that would light the model correctly.

This had very limited succession. But this wasn't demoralizing at all, it was simply learning and figuring out how to use new 'equipment'

What I really loved about shooting this way was that I was creating something unique to my own work style. A lot of my work is based off inspiration I've gathered from other photographers, but this shoot was purely me combining my love of portraits with my adoration of fire and using my own knowledge of photography and lighting to achieve what I wanted.

To start with I was taking shooting at the peak of the fire plumage when the fire breather did his thing, but then I decided that (although very badass) it wasn't particularly time effective. Also one in 5 shots was coming out 'ok'. So instead I got an assistant to move a stationary fire (this stick - http://www.flickr.com/photos/leofacephotography/7767596046/in/set-72157628428906397) around the model to light them more consistently. As far as comparisons to the studio go this was the difference between me firing strobes off without checking the light levels verses using a modeling light.

Recently I found a few images from a shoot I did earlier in the year where I'd done this style of lighting again. The first 'lit-by-fire' focused on portraits of fire performer Andrew Fleming, but the second shoot was fashion orientated with the lovely Leanne Hall. Part of the fun of working on these types of image is making it seem like the lighting hasn't been created with fire, which may seem strange, maybe even against the point of doing it, but I think it gives the image a little bit more depth and a story behind it. Kind of a 'guess how this was done' thing.

Below 'lit-by-fire 3'. Model - Leanne Hall