Portrait Promo' Video 2009

I've been meaning to put a couple more videos together for some time time now; mainly an 'About Me/Mini Bio' for the About Me page on my main website and with Christmas only 130 days away, a Portrait Promotion.

So after a little bit of filming last Thursday and a good few hours editing, this weekend I posted up the Portrait Promotion Video onto Facebook & Twitter to get some feedback (good, bad and indifferent) just to see how it would be received and so far it seems to be going down well (phew). Anyway, I thought I'd post it here too for those of you who aren't Facebook / Twitter users and extend the request for feedback.

So, if you've got 2 minutes and 16 seconds, please take a look and let me know what you think; in fact take a look anyway, if not just for the 'recovery' at the end ... you'll see what I mean.

Right, must dash ... lots more coming so keep checking back.

Enjoy ;o)

* Thanks to my buddy Vince Callaghan for filming some of the footage (@VinceCallaghan on Twitter)



* Press the HQ button to watch a higher quality version or visit my Vimeo Page here.

Latest News / Update

Hi All,
Well there's definitely an 'air of excitement' here at the moment and I've got lots to tell you about with regards to what's going on now and what's in the pipeline, so I'll try and keep it brief and being a typical Virgo I'll do it in list form...here goes:

1. September 20th ... I'm running my very first workshop covering lighting and editing. I'll give more details over the next week or so, but this is something I'm really excited about cos it's 'different' ... I'll say no more for now ;o)

2. Podcast ... Very soon we'll be launching our brand new video Podcast on iTunes called 'Insight - From concept to print'. This will be a regular downloadable series where you'll get to see behind the scenes of one of my photo shoots and also the editing involved; again, more details soon.

3. This Thursday we start recording some more video for the website. The first video we'll be working on is an 'About Me' video or Mini Bio' and I hope to have this ready for viewing in about a week from now.

4. I now have a dedicated YouTube Channel which you can visit & subscribe to by clicking here.

5. I'm putting together a Facebook Business / Fan Page so all of you who are currently 'Facebook Friends' I'll be sending out a message soon so you can take a look. If we're not yet connected through Facebook, then please follow this link and add me in so as not to miss any upcoming events etc ...

6. ... and finally (for now atleast) I'm going to be be adding a custom Twitter background to my Twitter Homepage which I intend to have up in a few days too. Follow me on Twitter by clicking here.

So all that as well as Photo Shoots there's much to do and so little time ... all I need now is to ask Santa for a 36 hour day and we'll be sorted.

Take care out there and I'll see you 'online'

More later ...

iPhone Photos - 'Before' & 'After'

A while back I wrote a post about my 'iPhone Photo of the Day' project; my only regret was that I couldn't show you the 'before' and 'after' photos (because I'd deleted them) so I thought I'd take a few moments just to show you a few.


As each day passes it seems that another editing application is released for the iPhone and despite the fact that the editing is 'Global' (it affects the entire picture as opposed to specific areas), some of the results can be really quite dramatic. At last count I had just over 2 pages of camera applications on my phone and I would say that each of them would get used at some point depending on the look I'm going for; and I'll always use a number of them at once to 'mix' them together.


Now, the camera on iPhone is no NIkon D3 nor are the editing 'apps' a mini version of Photoshop CS4, but they're good .... real good and if nothing else they're great fun to use. So there really is no excuse to not take 'that' photo nowadays; I just wonder what we're going to have available to us in the future.

Here are some other images without their 'Before' & 'After' shots. To see my growing iPhone Gallery you can use this link or just go to the Portfolio Section of my main site.

More later ;o)

My Gorgeous Little Nephew

I can't believe it's now 2 years since my Gorgeous Little Nephew Rowan came into my life; time really has flown by. I was always told as a kid that the older you get, the faster time seems to pass; something at a young age I couldn't quite comprehend. Well now I'm a 30 something, geez does it seem true.


It's when I see Rowan that I get reminded just how incredibly important photography is; capturing special moments forever that in reality are gone in the blink of an eye. I'm sure by now Rowan thinks that his Uncle Glyn's face has the word 'Nikon' stamped across it, or his hand has an Apple symbol tattoo cos virtually every time I see him I have to take a photo ... be it with my Nikon D3 or my iPhone. I keep an 'album' on my iPhone with photos from the day after Rowan was born to present day and I'll regularly look through them to pick me up if I'm having a low moment, as we all do from time to time, or I'll look at them just because ...


Being 'Uncle Glyn' is just the best feeling in the world and I'll forever be thankful to my Sister Sian, & Brother in Law Andrew, for not only making me an Uncle but asking me to be Rowan's God Parent too.

I guess if there was any message I'm trying to get out to you from this blog entry it would be 'snap away'. Keep taking photos and if need be, become the pest in the family that always has the camera out because in years to come everyone will be glad you did ... guaranteed!

Green Family Photo Shoot

Thought I'd post a few images up from a recent photo shoot with the 'Green' Family. All in all there were 9 members of the family present who were great fun to spend time with.


We started off taking a few variations of a main group photo and then moved onto doing portraits of couples and individuals making sure not to forget the star of the show, their dog George.


Must admit, this was the first time I've used sandbags on a shoot to weigh kit down so it doesn't get nicked by a little dog, rather than stopping it from falling over; small dog, BIG character for sure :o)

Enjoy ;o)

Guildford, UK Photo Walk - Winner

Well I've finally made my mind up and decided on the winner for the Guildford, UK Photo Walk; not an easy task by any means but after looking through the photos that had been submitted many (& I mean many) times the Winner is:

flyjules 1976 (Julia Reichel) with 'Bikes' (See attached photo)

Congratulations to Julia who not only wins a copy of Scott Kelby's brand new book, 'The Digital Photography Book - Volume 3' but also gets entered into the Worldwide Competition and the chance to win thousands of pounds worth of photographic equipment (I shan't list it here for fear of getting a repetitive strain injury from typing as there is so much).

Good luck Jules!
More later ;o)

21st Birthday Portrait Shoot

This past weekend has been a 'photography fest' with photo shoots on both Saturday & Sunday. Saturday's shoot was with Katy Russo who's brother Angelo had paid for her to have a portrait shoot as part of her 21st Birthday Present. I met Katy & her boyfriend, Tom in Costa Coffee Beaconsfield at around 3.30pm where we had a coffee and a chat before heading off to some pre-planned locations that I'd scouted out earlier.



We initially spent some time in New Beaconsfield, shooting in a stairwell so as to keep out of the bright sunlight and took natural light shots and also made use of a California Sunbounce Reflector (Zebra/White) which I'm now hooked on.



I'm guessing that after just short of an hour of shooting in the stairwell, we then made our way off to Winchmore Hill to a corn field, so as to get some images incorporating the beautiful blue sky and clouds. This called for my Alien Bees Lighting rig as the sun was still quite bright so using it I was able to balance out the environment and control the light falling on Katy (& Tom) separately.



We finished off spending some time under a motorway bridge to get some 'urban' style shots and made use of both natural light and a single Nikon SB800 Speedlight fired into a Lastolite Ezybox for a few shots.



BIG 'thanks' to both Katy & Tom for being such good sports and great fun to work with; it really was a pleasure.

More later ;o)

Inspired by the weather ...

The photograph attached to this blog entry wasn't for anything in particular (client or portfolio) it was just something I was motivated to take I guess by all the 'great' weather we've been having lately. Now, don't get me wrong I'm not going through a 'dark' phase, quite the opposite infact, it was more a case of 'if you can't beat them, join them ' so get out and make a photograph and get something positive out of the bad weather. Mind you, I've got shoots booked this weekend and you can bet it'll be bright sun and I'll be wishing it was cloudy ... are we ever happy? :o)


Anyway, the guy in the long coat is my Buddy Vince, who's always willing to lend a hand and only accepts coffee as payment. Thanks Vince for standing there and putting up with all the strange glances from the dog walkers; still, no pain, no gain.

More later ;o)

Happy, Happy, Happy!!!

After a great weekend of photography the new week kicked off to a good start too. This morning, as is normal practice for me I read through the blogs and sites that I subscribe to, only to see that the video of our Photo Walk made it onto Scott Kelby's Photoshop Insider Website.


Scott & his team are responsible for putting together the Worldwide Photo Walk - an incredible event which at the final count had over 32,000 photographers participating around the world, so for our video to make it onto his site feels pretty darned good I can tell you :o)

Right, must get on ... lots do to but I'll be back later with stories/shots from upcoming model and family shoots this week.

Enjoy ;o)

History in the making ...

Saturday 18th July 2009 will surely go down in history; a day when 30,000+ photographers in cities around the world took part in a Worldwide Photo Walk. This worldwide photo walk was the brain child of best selling author, Adobe Photoshop Guru and Photographer Scott Kelby and is the second of it's kind. Last year was a huge success but this year saw numbers of photographers becoming involved, far more than anyone ever expected.



The idea of the photo walk was to get a group of no more than 50 people together in a City, anywhere in the world and go on a photo opportunity 'hunting' exercise for 2 hours. Having been contacted by Scott several months previous, I had the opportunity to organise and lead a UK based leg of this record breaking event. The city I chose to do the walk in was Guildford, Surrey so at 1pm a group of keen photographers all met in Starbucks for the obligatory caffeine hit and then made our way off around a pre-determined route taking us through cobbled High Streets, to Castle Grounds and then ending off near a lock on a canal.


It really was a great day having the opportunity to mix with people from all backgrounds but with one common interest...photography. Walking round it was really intriguing to see what members of the group were photographing; things that others just hadn't considered or seen but then that is what's so intriguing about photography and how we all 'see' things differently.

At the end of the walk we 'debriefed' and took a quick look at what photographs had been taken whilst sampling some of the local ale. All that remains now is for me to pick the winning photograph from what was taken by everyone, and whoever took it wins a prize and the opportunity to win many thousands of pounds worth of photography gear as the overall, wordwide winner.

Kudos to Scott & his team for planning such an enormous event that was clearly enjoyed by everyone involved; many new friendships have certainly been made.