We’ve been on the bubbly this month, celebrating a win at the Creative East Awards 2008 for ‘Best Commercial Photography’. The industry’s been a tough place over recent years so it’s nice to get the recognition, especially as we’ve all worked very hard as a team. So big thanks to the team! The winning image of a girl holding an energy-efficient light bulb was produced for Getty Images for a series of environmental shots entitled Future Generations. You can see it in January’s blog entry. Our good news also made it into the local press, the EDP Business, where the photo was printed too. With the award, we also got a four-page spread in Professional Photographer so look out for it in the May edition.

The judges were photographer Tom Mackie, photographer Andy Earl, and Ian Farrell, editor of Professional Photographer. Tom Mackie is one of the world’s leading landscape photographers and I recommend a look at his website that speaks for itself:
Andy Earl is known for producing over 120 album covers for bands such as Pink Floyd, Rolling Stones and Robbie Williams.
Ian Farrell edits Professional Photographer magazine but is also a photographer in his own right.

Apart from that, a large proportion of this month has also been taken up with stock shoots. I’ve been working on a business brief and tend to try my hardest to avoid the obvious when shooting for Getty for two reasons; the first obvious reason being that it could effect sales but secondly as new concepts create new challenges.

The image included in this blog entry is a shot of a businessman taking a plunge in the sea to relieve his frustrations with his life. In taking the shot, there were several elements, which were likely to cause problems. It was freezing cold – about 3c, and very windy which meant there were huge waves so we all had to be on our guard at all times. Both these elements meant that the time in the sea was going to be limited which kept us on our toes! To keep the camera dry I used a Kata waterproof camera cover which are brilliant in these conditions.

I used an assistant who filled the part as a model dressed in an old suit of mine, which was unlikely to see the day of light again. As for lighting, I used a second assistant with an Elinchrom ranger strapped to his back and the flash head was hanging off the end of a boom arm and a small soft box to soften the light. The Elinchrom rangers are excellent for this as the power packs are waterproof, they give out 1200 watts of light and they recycle in about a second so you can work fast. You can source them from The Flash Centre, UK distributors for Elinchrom.


Tom Mackie:
Andy Earl:
Ian Farrell:
Professional Photographer:
Kata:
The Flash Centre: