It's good to see your work in the press and I had that privilege last week when an editorial shoot I did for Core Marketing made the Birmingham Post. They have a nice area in the office which had the company sign and the staff were relaxed and easy to work with too.
Shame there isn't a credit, but great to see your work in the media.
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I was looking to do something a bit different to my usual work on my recent Christmas trip to Canada. Whilst googling ideas I came across the creatively named, "painting with light". I have been aware of this technique for some time, but never really had cause to use it. So I thought I would give it a go as already had a good subject in mind. The subject was an rusty old 70's car that had been dumped in the woods down the road from the in-laws house. So I waited till the darkness fell and attacked it, unfortunately I did not have my full kit on me (damn those airlines and their weight limits). So I was most importantly without my tripod, amongst other things. However in true make do and mend spirit, I fashioned a stand out of a gardening bench and some sticks to even out the rough ground. The technique used to create the image itself is very straight forward. The shutter is left open whilst you wander round subject adding light where you think it will work. For the two images added here I used around six flash bursts in a 30 second exposure. And the great thing is you are not caught in the image as whilst you wander around the scene, as long as you keep the flash pointing away from you.
I was quite impressed with the results, especially for a first go. It's clear that the technique will take a lot more practice to get my ideal shots, but I'm fairly happy with the results, it almost has the look of a studio shot. The great thing about this technique is that no single image looks the same, human error allows a difference in each image no matter how hard you try stick to the same formula. I'm planning to do more of this now I'm home, as I enjoyed it. I may even try some human subjects….as long as they can stay still! A couple of weeks ago I had a shoot for FourFourTwo magazine, it was a feature on Dan Ashworth, who is the FA's head of elite development. Luckily the guys at the magazine had a pretty specific idea of what they wanted. We ended up only having around ten minutes with the main man. It sounded like a tall order. But fair play Dan Ashworth, he was friendly, easy going and did everything asked of him given the very short time frame. It's always a tricky job when you have so little time, there's no chance to have a brief icebreaker chat with the subject, no time to work on the lighting with the subject in place, etc, etc. The key was getting set up quickly before Dan arrived and having an educated guess at how it would look when we got going. Luckily I managed to get things fairly close to how I wanted them lighting wise although a bit of time to improve it would have been great. At least getting the kit sorted gave me a bit of time to work on the positioning and body language when he arrived. Most of the shot's needed to include the three lions on the floor of the sports hall we were shooting in. This meant needing to find enough elevation to get a good angle on the logo. Luckily the press photographers best friend came in handy- the stepladder, my advice is always carry one you may not need it for months, but when you do it's worth it's weight in gold (well almost). Luckily it was one of those shoots where thing's just seem to come together. There is always the concern that you've missed something or not got it just how you want it as you don't really check the back of the camera to see the results as time is so tight.
Sure there is room for improvement, but given the constraints, I'm pleased with how the picture's look on the finished page. We are all basking in sunshine and it feel's great. So here's something to make you appreciate the nice weather we are having.
Winter 2013/14 was the wettest since records began. Many parts of the country were hit badly, especially in the south, as we all know. Here in the Midlands, Worcester suffered it was hit badly with the Severn reaching record levels. It's amazing that Worcester continued to function on a relatively normal basis, despite the huge amounts of water passing through it. Lot's of people put a huge effort in to keep the city running. And now we have some and above average temperatures, so here a few pics (starting with my rowing on the racecourse pic that featured in the nationals), from the winter to help you appreciate what we've got right now. Enjoy! After checking the nationals the morning there was a disappointing lack of Shrovetide football (infact there was a disappointing lack of Shrovetide anything). So here is a dose of some hardcore Shrovetide football from Atherstone, Warwickshire. I would usually head to Ashbourne as I'm from the Derby area, but Atherstone is on my doorstep and in recent years although it's a great day, Ashbourne become really popular. So I felt it was time for a change. And what a change. The great thing about Atherstone is the accessibility to the "front line" so to speak. As you will see from the pictures, if your brave enough you can get right in the mix. Usually I come home with a ding or two on my camera and a feeling of disappointment at not being able to get close enough to the action even on a long lens. Not this time, I got mega close, close enough for a wide angle and not a mark on my gear. Actually it seemed the closer I got the to the action, the less I got roughed up. The only casualty I saw was a guy with a camera who was not paying any attention in front of the ball and got a whack in the face. A proper wake up call. And fair play to the competitors they even took the time out to let the little kids have a kick of the ball. So all in all pretty good fun and I hope you enjoyed them. Next year will be a tough decision between Ashbourne and Atherstone.
Last Friday was like any other day. Got up and checked the news, when I got to the Mailonline I could not believe what I saw.
The Aurora Borealis had been seen that night across large sections of the U.K http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2569881/Aurora-Borealis-Norfolk-Skies-East-Anglia-turn-red-green-stunning-display-Aurora-Borealis.html Needless to say I was totally oblivious to this due to a busy week. Which is frustrating as I have pretty keen to see them…...So keen I went to Iceland in December 2012 and came back empty handed due to adverse weather conditions. Although I did have the joy of sitting next to a woman at the airport on the way home, showing off her camera phone pics of an aurora she spotted in the taxi to the airport . I was envious to say the least. That said we had a great time and Iceland is an amazing place, highly recommended. Fast forward to early January and the press was full of news of an aurora being visible across the U.K. Great news, I got my kit ready, found a great location and headed to the countryside. Several hours later I returned home to contemplate another Aurora failure (and a full body defrost). So the aurora has managed to avoid me yet again. Fair play to those that were out there and got good shots, it looked a great display and it got some great coverage in the papers. So the next step? Well I would like to catch them here but with chances few and far between, it's DEFCON 1 now, time to head to Tromso inside the Arctic Circle in the next year or so. Watch this space, I will get them……..Eventually!!!!!!! |
Matt Stewart PhotosI've been a photographer for quite a long time now. So hopefully I have something to say about it. Archives
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