Occasionally, I come across a venue where I feel I may have a bit of a challenge with regards as to where I may do the portrait session. The Samlesbury Hotel is one of those. There is a large car park, which basically surrounds the hotel. There is a field, which I’ve used before, but it wasn’t going to work this time, as this was a November wedding, and it was dark.
Mark, who owns the Emmott Arms, asked for a full range of images. This was to include food photography, and also interior and exterior images. He also wanted to include some staff imagery, although rather than headshots, he wanted lifestyle images that would reflect the character of the establishment.
After I’d had a run of silver cars, I was rather grateful for a black Ferrari 308GT Spider to turn up in Preston, and in rather nice nick too. The brief was for exterior and detail imagery, and the weather was rather good. I really do enjoy my automotive, or car photography.
Product photography doesn’t always need to be on white. On white images are required by a number of e-commerce platforms, such as Amazon, and unfortunately, many clients assume it’s the norm.
I enjoy all aspects of my work, but there are two genres I think are my favourite subjects to shoot. Vehicles and food. With automotive photography, I really enjoy the challenges of large vehicles such as lorries and buses or coaches etc. But I actually enjoy photographing any vehicle, from a truck, right down to a motorcycle, and anything in between.
I’ve contemplated medium format for a good few years now. I disliked it in my film days, because it was just far too cumbersome. I possibly didn’t persevere for long enough, but should you really have to adapt yourself to become accustomed to a tool of the trade? I much prefer when a tool can adapt to my particular style of shooting, and meet my needs without unnecessary drama.
Quite often, when presented with a dish to be photographed, I want to isolate a specific part of the food, rather than present the whole thing. This could be derived from the main ingredient, or the most photogenic item amongst the whole platter.
This series of images were requested for a PR company that specialised in PR for companies dealing with interiors. The brief was rather vague, other than to get a variation of images, including details. The guidance would come from the builder and owner.
This was a rather nice shoot, and a bit of a reunion. Hannah is a violinist and tutor, and needed some imagery for her website which promotes her sessional work. I say a reunion, because I had photographed Hannah and her boyfriend a good few years ago, when they were members of Montego Bay.
Fashion photography can be a funny old thing. You meet with the client and they have a good grasp of what they want. They want the detail to show, and the quality to stand out. Great, that means they aren’t going to go for that full on flat lit look, so often seen on their competitors websites. Something to look forward to.
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