Shaven by children enjoyed by all

My long locks have been getting on my nerves for the last few days and I have felt like going to the hairdressers but I just haven't had time. So inbetween customer appointments I hunted out some clippers that had only recently been used for trimming the dogs moustache and the hair around his anus! And before you ask, this is necessary so the sausages that come out of his tiny hole don't get tangled up in his fur! Something I have also considered doing on myself.
Anyway, I asked my daughter and her friends who are all around 11 years old if they would mind shaving my head for me. After tearing themselves away from bebo or whatever it is, it wasn't long before my head was completely shaved!
I now find I can move my head much faster and am much more nimble! This can only be a good thing as sometimes I do need to move fast to capture that perfect shot!

It all Changes

Its funny how everything changes as you get older! At school although I was never bullied, I still knew which lads not to get in the way of.Back then I used comedy to get out of most scrapes!
Anyway the reason I mention this is that while I was doing a wedding on Saturday I noticed a familiar face.It was the hardest guy from my school and I was amazed he actually recognised me. Not only did he know who I was, but he was very polite to me and even asked me if I wanted a drink! Later he also asked me if I would take a photo of him and his wife! This is someone who would have ripped my head clean off when I was at school and I'm sure was probably a lot more popular than than me with the girls, but as time has gone by he now looks much older than me and has lost the freshness of youth! I on the other hand have obviously been drinking from the fountain of youth, as the ladys now flock to me like I am some kind of superstar! This may be a slight exageration but there is a truth behind it! I'm not arrogant I'm just confident in my photography, myself as a person and my fantasticly firm buttocks!

And now I return

Well I'm back and the picture above is pretty much how I have looked for the last few weeks!

For anyone who didnt watch the season Finale of Lost last night it was pretty good!

Another one of those "What on earth" moments at the end. I wont spoil it for anyone that hasnt caught up yet but it was a bit of a shock as to who was in the coffin!

Very good though!

Anyway I'm currently looking for a decent compact (digital) for a personal project! I have wanted a Ricoh GR Digital for some time now as its the only digital compact I know where the noise looks like film grain. A lot of the digital crowd hate it because it doesnt try to hide the noise at the higher iso's. I really hate the way other digital camera's try and hide it by smudgy smearyness. The GR Digital embraces it and it looks good! Maybe not so much in colour but in black and white it looks fantastic for what I want!

The GRD 2 unfortunately is not quite as grainy so it will be the Grd that I will be getting!

I'll post some results on here when I have the little beast!!!

Madness

Apologies for no recent posts!I have been very busy with some personal projects as well as a lot of weddings. I will be back posting very shortly!

Be true to yourself!

My good freind Marcus Doyle was in the area and came to see me last night. It always amazes me how he can just stroll in like a traveling nomad, and even after months of never seeing eachother its as if he has just came from next door with a muffin basket and get the latest gossip.(That's a camp way of saying its as if he never left.)
The kids adore him and can be a right pain in the bum to him I'm sure. Beth,who is my 10 year old is fascinated by his bald head for some reason and can't stop touching it. Funny thing is, she is very shy with most people but she always looks forward to a suprise visit from the traveling Doyle. I have said this before but I just love the way he is uncompromising with his landscape work. He does them his way and that's it! Its hard for a wedding photographer to do things without compromise as the client gets so much choice. The only wedding photographer I know of that does it his way and that's it is Jeff Ascough. He doesn't give the bride and groom a choice of photo's for their album. Instead he chooses and they just receive the final product as he wanted it to be. After all its his art and why should he change it? Doyley once told me of a time he was asked to change something about one of his prints. Basicly they were asking him if he would print it a certain way rather than how he had. Of course the answer was a massive no! I'm sure you will agree its very cheeky to ask for an artist to change something about their art. Do you do this in a different size may be acceptable but that's about it. Although even then, the artist may have always meant the picture to be a certain size and would not wish to compromise on this.I think all photographers should be true to themselves and their art should not be dictated by anyone else.

The art of black and white printing

I have mentioned my best friend Marcus Doyle previously but I have not mentioned his skill of printing! Marcus is not just a fantastic photographer but has an amazing skill as a printer. In fact it was Marcus that made me jump on in leaps and bounds as a black and white printer. I could see his skill was far greater than mine as a printer so I asked him to teach me his secrets. He did more than that! He actually wrote me a personalised book showing me the best ways to get superb results. The book had examples, prints he had done and was written in a way that he must have known I would understand. The book was funny as well and had me laughing out loud. How you can make a book on printing that is funny is something I'm sure very few have done.I will dig it out and scan a page from it to show you when I get a chance. I know marcus will admit he never gives much away to do with his skills and tecniques and it was a real honour to get such an in depth step by step guide to his way of printing. I mention this as I know as I have not printed anything in about 5 years I will be very rusty at it. So its time to blow the dust from his big black book and refresh my memory. Sorry I have posted no piccys but my computer is still away at the moment.

Its a Personal Thing

After weeks of thought, I have started preparing for my personal project.I have also decided to do it entirely with film. I have spent so long emulating film on my digital work I figured why am I doing this if digital is up to the standards I want. Its not a matter of quality or how large I can enlarge photo's, but a matter of the look and feel of film as well as the quality of a final fibre based print. I simply just love the film I used to use. On a lot of my older photo's grain is very visible and a lot of my 35mm images are quite high in contrast. Some of my digital images still are quite high contrast but I have to be so much more careful with the digital stuff that I don't go over the boundaries of what the medium can do. I used to love a lot of Ellen Von Unwerth's work. Not all of it by any means, but I still do like some of her images. The thing I don't like a lot about photographers like her, is that they are normally technically completely inadequate. They shoot a load of images and can compose and focus a shot, but somebody else brings it to life for them. The skill of the developer and printer is sometimes much more than the photographer. The other thing is that they always shoot pretty people! No offense to any of my clients but I'm sure its easier to make Kate Moss look good than somebody that isn't a top model! So it begs the question, is it the photographer I like or the photography. Well with Ellen Von Unwerth it is certainly the photography. What I mean by this is that I love the finished photo that was a combination of not just her work but the models, make up artists, stylists, and maybe most importantly in her case, the printer. The beauty of my personal project is I will make sure I do all of the work, except the makeup and hair though! My models will be real people also and hopfully this will compliment my wedding work.