Archive for January, 2010
There is nothing quite like a good book.
Posted by Paul in For Website, Weddings on January 15th, 2010
There’s nothing quite like a good book. Particularly if it’s full of your photographs.
Had a great meeting this morning with our album designer (who’s both lovely and a great designer!) to set the layout ideas running for this year’s albums.
I have to admit we’re hugely proud of these weighty tomes – they’re really really beautiful things, all custom-made and finished in some of the most sumptuous leathers and materials available. Everything from mirror finish patents, to exquisite linens and the softest leathers. All skilfully wrapped around state-of-the-art (yup, there is an art to this) prints and bindings, with each page – even though they’re incredibly thick – able to lie completely flat and open to allow those big panoramic images we’re known for.
Gorgeous albums that will, quite simply, bring back irreplaceable memories for a lifetime.
But even with such stunning craftsmanship, our albums wouldn’t be much without beautiful designs inside them. And that’s where our designers come in. That and the small matter of a load of images to play with! We regularly get together to chat through the kinds of designs that we (and our clients) will like and what sorts of photographs we should be shooting to make it possible. That way we know that the photography and albums will continue to develop and evolve so they’re always fresh and exciting!
This particular album is from Debbie & Kit’s wedding last year up in Chilton.
Gorgeous wedding. Stunning couple.
Absolutely fabulous album.
Blimey, I’m beginning to sound like a creative.
Pass the Bolly darling. Mwah, mwah.
Here comes the rain again
Posted by Paul in For Website, Personal on January 12th, 2010
Is it wrong that I feel as miserable as the kids about the incoming demise of our icy wonderland?
Apparently, it’s de rigeur, when one reaches a certain age (which – at least according to our daughter – I apparently have) to be downbeat about this winter playground but I just can’t help myself.
Firstly, I was just as excited as my two children when the snow arrived. Possibly more so. I’m not sure it’s very grown up to be peering out of the curtains at 6am to see if it’s settled. But there I was, my nose pressed excitedly against the frost-encrusted glass hoping that school would be canceled! The whole thing took me right back to my North Wales childhood where, at least in my head, it snowed each and every winter (oh and Curly Wurlies were significantly bigger and you could still buy a quarter of sweets – there really was nothing like the taste of paper bag inextricably attached to your sherbet pips!)
Secondly, it’s a dream come true when it comes to creating beautiful images – be it portraits or landscapes, snow-ridden light is gorgeous to work in. All in all I couldn’t be happier (though it does have to be said that we use a 4×4 for the business so the snow isn’t quite so restricting as it might be for some – grit or no grit!)
Part photographer. Part delinquent.
Anyway, given that it’s due to thaw over the next few days, here are a handful of personal images I captured while ‘off-duty’.
Oh, and in case you’re wondering, it’s not all fun in the snow – we have also been working flat out in it – this is perfect light for portraits and we have quite a few to show you in the coming weeks.
Enjoy 
Oh, and thanks to Jon Hook for grabbing the shot of Sarah and me with Harriet on the sledge. Brilliant!
Claire & Iain’s Crazy Bear Wedding Album
Posted by Paul in For Website, Weddings on January 11th, 2010
We’re at that lovely time of year at the moment where much of our work involves planning the next twelve months and looking back (with a lot of enjoyment it must be said) to some of the sessions and weddings we did last year.
We’ve already talked about Claire and Iain’s wedding at the Crazy Bear but I thought you might be curious as to their finished album. Well, it was every bit as stunning (and as unusual) as their wedding. 12 inches square and finished in the most beautiful calfskin leather (and weighing more than your average Italian car), it is truly unique – just as every wedding album should be!
Cheers
P.
Karen, Dave, Sam & Maia
Posted by Paul in For Website, Lifestyle on January 10th, 2010
Just occasionally, I do have to admit, I’m not entirely sure what I’m going to capture when we set out on a session. I have all these ideas in my head but I just know we’re going to do something different somehow. It makes me nervous. But very creative. And very excited.
This was one of those sessions.
I’ve photographed Karen & Dave and their family before and had been looking forward to the session for weeks. But it was to be a studio session rather than location as the weather had been awful all week. I do love working in the studio – it’s much more technical than location (in as much as you have to control rather than locate the backgrounds and lighting) and it’s hugely rewarding. However, it’s not my ‘home’. Outdoors will always be my natural environment as I think children, in particular, are much more at ease when they can run unrestricted, only needing to stop and be photographed when we find some stunning light.
However, I needn’t have worried.
Sam & Maia stepped into the studio as if it were the most natural environment in the world to them. And the pictures we captured of the whole family are everything I think you’d want from a photo. Some are funny, some are moody, some are formal while others are essentially moments I grabbed as i saw them.
But they all tell a lovely story of this time in Karen & Dave’s family.
And the frame we just delivered is gorgeous!
Priceless.
Shelley, Alex and Olivia
Posted by Paul in For Website, Lifestyle on January 9th, 2010
One of the great joys of this job is that we meet so many lovely people (many of whom stay as friends) and then we get to work with them over the years.
This is true of Shelley and Alex whose wedding we photographed a couple of years ago – a fantastic wedding at Whittlebury Manor near Silverstone – and who have now come back with their baby daughter!
Shelley and Alex have bought a package that we’ve been slowly piecing together over the past year or two: our one-year baby package. This package is designed for new parents (or new parents-to-be) so they can have a series of sessions over a year to capture possibly the most wonderful period in a new life. Wonderful in spite of the nappies, prams, muslin-squares, bottles, no sleep, no money, more nappies and even less sleep of course. Ah, but I reminisce.
Anyway, when myself and Sarah sat down and looked at the photos we had of the first year of each of our kids, we couldn’t believe how much they changed in those first magical 12 months. Quite literally they go from a standing (well, not quite standing) start to chattering, squawking, laughing, puking little money-pits who you instantly love more than anything you’ve ever loved in your life. Bizarre. To be fair, they carry on developing (particularly in the cost-centre department) at a ridiculous rate but that doesn’t change the fact that that first year, once you’ve got over the shock, is pretty spectacular! And it’s absolutely magic!
And it’s the photos from that life-shattering period (as you might imagine, we do have quite a few!) that are some of the most wonderful to look back at. So we created a package to do just that. 12 months. 3 sessions. Tons of pictures. Simple.
And I’m chuffed to bits that some of our clients – particularly clients like Shelley and Alex – are having families and coming to create some more priceless images. Brilliant!
One foggy morning in the woods
Posted by Paul in For Website, Lifestyle on January 8th, 2010
There are only a few irrefutable facts in life. You will eventually get a water meter. You will pay taxes. If you went to a Welsh school, you did do country dancing (in my case, with a lack of enthusiasm that barely kept up with my distinct ineptitude.) And you cannot, no matter what you believe, control the weather.
Rain? No problem.
Harsh sunshine? No problem.
Snow? No problem.
Richter scale gales? No problem.
Fog. Ah yes, that stuff of Stephen King thrillers. Cold. Clammy. Haunting. Fog.
I’ve never really photographed in fog as such – I have taken photographs of fog. But that is not the same thing at all. Photographing group portraits through fog is an entirely different beast.
For a start, it’s finger-numbingly cold. Not that romantic, crystal clear, frost type cold that makes you feel good to be alive. No. This is a wet, penetrating chill that eats its way through your clothing and sucks the feeling from your digits. The type of cold that makes your eyes (and nose!) drip and drizzle uncontrollably. And, in an obvious twist of the unfortunate – certainly if you’re a photographer – you can’t really see too much. True, the flat, wrap-around light it creates makes for the most enigmatic and gentle face portraits imaginable. However, if you cannot see your clients through the gloom then this is not much use.
Still, nothing ventured as they say.
So here we were in Wendover Woods in Buckinghamshire with the Baldwin family. And it was absolutely worth the risk. I grant you it took the rest of the day for my fingers to come back to life, but the shots we got were gorgeous. Really unusual and atmospheric. And, as the fog ebbed and flowed around the hill tops like some ghostly ocean sloshing around the foot of some magical inland coast, we had moments of inexplicably stunning sunshine which flung warmth and light at us with such force that it took your breath.
And then by way of apology, would close in again leaving us pulling coat zips back up and tightening hoods and scarves.
A true winter shoot that produced beautiful and distinctive images.
Back to 50mm basics
Posted by Paul in Chat, For Website on January 7th, 2010
A really good mate of mine has just given up his (once very expensive) Canon DSLR and lenses in favour of one of the new tranche of high quality compacts with interchangeable lenses – as it happens it’s the hugely impressive Panasonic GF1 with a fixed 20mm lens. As he puts it: “Right size, lens (20mm) and speed for me. A camera I can actually carry.”
Well said.
It struck me yesterday while out in the snow, just how much kit I’m now used to carrying. True, as a pro, we need equipment that is capable of taking 150,000+ images a year, can be dropped (regularly), trodden on (equally regularly), works in the heat (for destination weddings such as Caitriona and Shaun’s), works in the freezer (if this year is anything to go by), is lightning quick and has easily interchangeable high-quality lenses. And all this in a package that is actually enjoyable to use. With gloves on.
Oh, and it needs to be able to create high quality images too.
But – and here’s my point – does this actually make for a ‘better’ picture? Some of the greatest, iconic photographs ever created were captured without the aid of a zoom lens or digital technology (either in the camera or in the lab) and yet we’ve become hooked on all of these bells and whistles – bells and whistles that the marketing people would gleefully have us renew every couple of years.
So today, just for the fun of it, we’re going to stick a very old design fixed-length 50mm lens (a Nikon 50mm 1.8 AF-D for those who are curious – an old but piercingly sharp little bit of glass) that I bought a few months ago onto the front of the camera and see what we get. I know I’m still using a top-end pro camera to actually capture the images, but given I set the thing in manual mode for nearly everything we do anyway (and I want my 50mm lens to actually be a 50mm lens – i.e. I don’t want that annoying cropping-factor you get with my other digital SLRs), life isn’t much different to when I used to have an Olympus OM-something or other 20 years ago.
And that is exactly why my mate has switched over.
And I agree with him entirely.
Though I may not be getting rid of my amazing Nikon’s any time soon 
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow
Posted by Paul in Chat, For Website, Personal on January 7th, 2010
So what is it about snow that brings out the child in everyone?
Since getting up this morning (at some ridiculous hour as the whole family had been excited about the new snow falls since it started last night) we have built a snowman (a grandiose 9ft specimen that was alarmingly phallic), thrown snowballs, tried to get an avalanche to occur off our thatched roof (with some degree of success I might add), been sledging on trays (and on a piece of old plastic and on a Land-Rover inner-tube), drunk mulled wine, driven the 4×4 to places other cars can’t get to (before drinking the mulled wine I should add) and generally behaved more like kids than our kids.
A hot chocolate and an early night with a comic book (OK, I admit it. I’m showing my age. Of course, the kids would rather go to bed with a Nitendo DS) and the transformation would have been complete.
I know it’s dangerous, our heating bill will be huge and we’re all in danger of running out of gas (or milk for that matter – why do people insist on panic buying? One snowy day and the entire South East of England is risking a trip to A&E by bustling it’s way to whatever local shop is in reach to buy as much milk, bread and cat-food as they can carry home) but it’s just so lovely!
Oh, and it’s also a joy to photograph.
Enjoy!
PS. Photo credit to Jon Rowland for the shot of Sarah and I getting to grips (or, more accurately, failing to get to grips) with the large plastic sheet!
The Opening of The James Figg Pub in Thame
Posted by Paul in Commercial, For Website on January 5th, 2010
I do like a good pub. ‘No,’ I hear you say, ‘really?’ with just a modicum of surprise.
Yup.
Call me old fashioned but there are few places I find quite so convivial. So comforting. So British. There is nothing quite like finding yourself on a lazy afternoon with a well-pulled pint and a roaring fire listening to the background chatter of one of this nation’s greatest legacies. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you: The Pub.
That being said. I do lament the smoking ban in pubs and bars.
Now don’t get me wrong here, I have never smoked and, not withstanding a suitably apocalyptic midlife crisis, I probably never will. But the smouldering presence of tobacco smoke in a public house or bar always seemed somehow, natural.
I know, I know, I love not going home smelling of everyone else’s smoke and not having to wash my jacket every time. I love not having a sore throat. And I love being able to actually taste my beer.
But, and here’s the thing, I’m a photographer.
And I miss the light.
I used to get so excited about that familiar smokey, hazy, drifting light. Some of my favourite images have been captured so simply with nothing more than a basic camera, a good quality 50mm lens (the staple of all 35mm photography until the new digital formats emerged), some window light and a creamy pint of Guinness. And just a smidgen of tobacco smoke. Sigh.
Still, I digress slightly in that I meant to write about one particular pub I photographed recently: The James Figg pub. The pub (previously the Abingdon Arms) has been in the middle of Thame ever since I’ve lived here but was old and tired (not in a good way) and so it was with some excitement that I was asked by Peach Pubs, who also own The Thatch, amongst others, to create some images of their newest pub for its website and to cover the inaugural night.
And I was right to be excited. What they’ve done is pretty much perfect: a good English pub serving great beer and great food (of the pie’n'chips variety at least).
And I’ve been back since for a quick half and it is still fantastic. The service is truly friendly and hospitable and the place was seemingly full – both of people and of atmosphere.
But, sadly, still no smoke.
Ah, well it’s almost certainly for the better. I just need to find new ways of recreating that wonderful light!
Krystina, Ryan & Jacqueline (with Max & Jet) at Little Marlow
Posted by Paul in For Website, Lifestyle on January 3rd, 2010
Well, a very happy new year (and new decade) to everyone! As I write this I’m sitting in a particularly early (and consequently deserted) Saturday morning train clattering lazily through a frost-bitten Chiltern landscape into London for the first shoot of 2010 – very excited to be starting the year at a run and the weather is simply gorgeous!
My new year’s resolution this year (actually, just one of my new year’s resolutions. If I’m being honest, of course, there are numerous including the obligatory lose weight, spend more time with my family/friends, sleep more, talk less but hey, who’s counting?) is to get on top of our blog. I should make it clear at this point that I love writing the blog. It’s like talking. But without the requirement that anyone stop and listen. It’s just that it takes time and time seems to be one commodity I never have enough of.
That is, unless, I happen to be sitting on a train whipping past the frozen pastures and woodland of this glorious landscape that we’re blessed with around here in Buckingamshire. Quintessentially English and breathtakingly beautiful. Maybe not as awe-inspiring as my native North Wales, but we really do take this gently curvaceous scenery far too much for granted. And, on a crystal morning like this, it’s tear-jerkingly pretty.
As it was just before Christmas (nice link huh? D’yer see what I did there?) when I set out to photograph Krystina, Ryan and Jacqueline – and two unbelievably well-trained gun-dogs: Max and Jet – on their family farmland above Marlow.
I’m not normally known for photographing animals but we’d been asked to create some images for Christmas presents – and I do like a challenge. And thank goodness or I would have missed some truly unique images.
The weather had been truly awful all week but, for this particular afternoon, the muddy grey December veil lifted briefly to expose that wondrous raking winter sunshine that you only get on a few days of the year. Couple that with three siblings who were fantastic company (no, seriously, we just laughed for two hours!) and two dogs that were the epitome of health and contentment (and, alarmingly, better behaved than my own kids) and we were on for one of those sessions!
Utterly stunning!
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