My Bio - Less scripty and more fun....

Thought I'd revamp my Bio, converting it into a more visual and fun format as some bio's can be rather boring and time consuming to read through....

All part of my new responsive web-site that will be live early in the New Year!

Cow Gum and Magic Markers

If you are of a certain age and you frequented graphic design studios before Apple Macs made their appearance, then I'm sure you will remember the pungent smell of Cow Gum and the colourful arrays of Magic Markers, scalpels in abundance, yellow lighter fuel canisters and sheets of Letraset.

Cow gum was a solvent based latex glue packaged up in it's distinctive red and white tin. It was great for sticking your artwork together as it didn't cause paper to wrinkle like water based glues would, it also had the disadvantage that it would end up where you didn't want it to! Graphic designers across the globe had great fun rolling the glue into balls and chucking it across the office whilst involuntary (or voluntary) getting high on the fumes at the same time.

I can still remember the smell I experienced when entering agencies' premises, its the type of smell you never forget..

Often next to the Cow Gum was a very expensive set of Magic Markers, either arranged in neat order, or as I usually saw, strewn across the desk and surrounding area. To complement Cow Gum the markers had their own unique 'volatile' smell and squeaky noise when used, they came in chubby bottles with fat felt tips. I miss those great scamps that were created using these markers, there was greater scope for interpretation of the brief and a really good showcase for the artistic talents of the graphic designer. I also think that the thought process works far better for creating ideas with sketching pen to paper, rather than recycling images on a computer. These great illustrations are virtually extinct now, which is a shame. I still find myself sketching out ideas in front of clients (using pencils and a large layout pad), not only to show what I'm thinking of, but to also explore possibilities before the shoot commences.

Don't forget those Pantone Colour Specifier swatches either. Sheets of lots of little coloured squares that can be torn off along the perforations. No design studio should have be without.

As for Letraset (dry transfer lettering), well that is something I never really liked at all, tedious to apply and generally annoying to use, and you can still buy it!

Village Butcher Retiring

Our fab village butcher is retiring after 35 years of supplying high quality meat to the village of Redbourn, I'm sure him and his shop will be missed by all.

There is no other butcher in the village, so if there are any budding butchers out there who like the idea of taking over the shop then why not give Barry a ring 01582 792279. He will close up shop in the beginning of November.
http://www.redbourn.org.uk/Redbourn/HallW

Plums

Plums

Plums are so good at this time of year.... Here's a photo I took today, four flashes at f11 btw..

Japanese Crackers

Japanese Crackers with Wasabi

Thought I'd show you a photograph I took of Japanese Crackers. Not only did they photograph well but tasted great too!

The Fire Pit

A short video I made of a fire pit in the depths of the Canadian countryside. This looks best in high definition but I hope you enjoy this low res version.

Make yourself comfy, watch the flames and listen to the night sounds!

Holiday Photos

I've just returned from a couple of weeks visiting my cousins in Canada, and have added a few photos from my trip to the blog. 

Pool

CN Tower Toronto Canada

Downtown Toronto

Red Trousers Niagra Falls

Niagra falls Canada

Niagra falls Canada

"Dream Home"

Red Hat

Niagra Bikers Canada

A sign that sells itself

Diptych Photograph

You may not have heard the term Diptych, but my latest photography idea was to create one.


According to Wiki a Diptych is: "a photograph that uses two different or identical images side by side to form one single artistic statement. The two images can literally be in contact with each other, or separated by a border or frame".

So there you go, here's my Diptych below.

I've rummaged around and found some old photographic bulbs in the studio.

Photographic bulbs

I have been sorting through my collection of photographic bulbs and thought that they would look good photographed together. The biggest bulb there is a 2000W Tungsten which I occasionally use in my large Mole Richardson lamp.

If anyone would like a print, let me know and I'll sort one out for you. The 160mb image will easily print big btw....

Light and Dark Chocolate with Hazelnuts & Pistachios

Chocolate with Hazelnuts & Pistachios

This was a large slab of dark & milk chocolate from Hotel Chocolat. Three lights, and old metal tray and a brown satin backcloth made up the set. Leftover chocolate happily disposed of orally :-))

Cognac splash in Glass

Splashing Cognac in glass

Not only do I like the splash but I also like the folded paper background and the way the light is hitting it. High speed flash....http://www.dj-photo.com/gallery/still-life-and-product-photography

Remy Martin Cognac - not a straight photo by a long way

Remy Martin Cognac

This photo of a bottle of Cognac was not one simple shot, each element was colour balanced and photographed separately; the light on each side of the bottle, the base, label, inner glow, and rim lighting. A lens calibration was also done in CaptureOne Pro as there was some front tilt on the lens to keep things in focus. There were about seven different images that were combined in Photoshop to achieve the result that I wanted.

The light streaks were created in Photoshop, using the Path tool, layer effects and custom brushes. This technique has no shortage of options, it is possible to end up with so many various styles which can suit just about any subject!

Photography set up for the bottle shot

Camera: Linhof M679 CS
Digital Back: Phase One IQ180 (80million pixels)
Lens: Schneider Apo-Digitar 120mm Macro


More shots like this coming soon!

Parrot head Tulip

Parrot head Tulip

The Blue Snooker Ball

More snooker balls.....

The Blue Snooker Ball

Homage to the Pink Ball

Homage to the Pink Ball of Snooker

A play on colour and texture....

Pink ball on Fur

Razor Clams

Nice to finish the day with a photo of some really tasty Razor Clams bought earlier from Borough Market London.
www.dj-photo.com

Sorting out pages for my folio

Food photographs for the folio

Busy today sorting out food photographs for my folio. Meetings next week.

Time of year for Rhubarb!

Young Rhubarb Leaf

I have a really great patch of Rhubarb at home, every year the emerging leaves look fabulous, they are so perfect and have a crushed tissue paper look.

Photography Masters Cup Honors me!

My photo of a cross-section of Lemon Meringue Pie has won again, this time in the 6th International Photography masters Cup Awards. It was selected as a Nominee and can be seen online here.

"It is an incredible achievement to be selected among the best from the 8,521 entries we received this year," said Basil O'Brien, the awards Creative Director.

The awards international Jury included captains of the industry from Phillips de Pury & Company in New York; Kunst Licht Gallery, Shanghai; XPO Gallery, Paris; Tasveer Galleries, India; BFN, Netherlands; to BBH in London who honored Color Masters with 239 coveted title awards in 18 categories.

INTERNATIONAL COLOR AWARDS, PHOTOGRAPHY MASTERS CUP is the leading international award honoring excellence in colour photography. This celebrated event shines a spotlight on the best professional and amateur photographers worldwide and honors the finest images with the highest achievements in color photography.

Lemon Meringue Pie

Great Cartoons by Tom Fishburne

I love theses cartoons!
Here's a few to digest:

 You can see more on his web-site:
http://tomfishburne.com

Village of Footdee Aberdeen

Footdee is a old fishing village situated by the river Dee in Aberdeen, Scotland. The quirky collection of small houses and huts makes for a few interesting photographs. Here's some I took.

Footdee Aberdeen

Footdee Aberdeen

Footdee Aberdeen - Ornate tap

Footdee Aberdeen

Footdee Aberdeen

More Food Photography

I've recently been doing some food test shots and here are the results, one shot of a Pear covered in caramel and a photo of some dried chillis in a sort of abstract way.

Both photographs were taken using a 120mm Rodenstock macro Digitar lens on my Linhof. The Pear was a two part comp, one of the pear and one of the drip.

Pear with caramel

The chillis were shot separately on a cyan background and then stripped in again to make the final composition. The hue of the cyan was slightly altered in Capture One using the colour editor tool. They were back lit with a spotlight.

Abstract photo of dried chilli

Blue Dragon Food Shoot

Blue Dragon, the well known brand for Oriental sauces visited the studio to have four cooked dishes using their new sauces photographed.

There was also a photograph of a wok accompanied by a substantial array of raw vegetables, the image was to be reproduced very big on the side of a marquee so attention to detail was vital, also the image file size had to be very big too! Lighting was relatively straightforward using just two lights; one light through a trace (for the hot food shots) and a Fresnel spot, all shot on a PhaseOne IQ180 (80MP) digital back mounted on a Linhof M679, digital Rodenstock HR and Macro lenses used.

Home Economist's tools

The shoot was attended by the client, the agency account handler and creative director, and two Home Economists. All went very smoothly considering the threat of snow and disruption on the roads the night before.

Lunch was supplied by a local caterers, the coffee sponge cake went down particularly well!

Here's what the agency client said :

"Just a note to say thank you so much for today – it was good fun, super productive and the end results are, I think you agree, superb."

Creative director and Home Economists setting up first shot