Happy Holiday 2009

Snowscape

Tracks in the snow

Down came the snow. Nearly three inches of the stuff during the night, so i awoke to a bright white carpet covering the ground. Who knows, we may even get a white Christmas here in the UK. The bookies seem to think so but it's anyones guess at the moment.

This photo was taken on my iPhone, but i was out and about taking some more images for my winter landscape project. You can view a short video that i took while i was out working HERE. The sense of being alone in the snowscape was overwhelming. It was wonderfully peaceful. I just love those moments of traquility when out shooting.

Taking Liberties

Photography by Nick Turpin

I've gone from being slightly irritated to being angry. It's taken most of this year for the anger to grow but  i'm finally getting to the point where i think ' What the hell is going on'?!?! What am i talking about? Photography in the UK and the ability for a person to be able to take photographs in a public place. Part of what many social observers, journalists and politicians call a free society. Something that may be under threat.

In the last few weeks, a number of photographers, film makers and journalists have run into police officers who have used terrorism legislation in a very sloppy fashion to stop, search and even arrest people. What makes things worse is the situation seems to be getting worse rather than better. Even after police officers are told by their top brass that photography in a public place is not a crime, photographers are being stopped on the grounds of national security. Whatever happened to the friendly copper just inquiring nicely:-

"Excuse me sir, can you tell me what you are doing'?
"Yes officer,  i'm taking some photographs for a project/portfolio/work/myself. "
"Oh very good sir. Thank you for your time."

Ask nicely and  you'll usually get a nice reply. Maybe that reads a bit too much like a script from Dixon of Dock Green, but it is based on my own dealings with police officers as a photographer. A post by Phil Coomes on the BBC Viewfinder website works along this very point too using a 1938 news article. There is no need to use anti terrorism stop and search powers to find out what's going on! I passionately believe that good policing is all about maintaining a good relationship with the public. Their help is often vital for helping solve crime. During the 7/7 bomb attacks in London, the police actually asked the public for any possible images/video of the bombers that may have been taken on mobile phones or video cameras. Now certain individuals in the police seem to believe that photography is only a tool for terrorism. The police should be working with photographers, using them constructively as an extra pair of eyes. Photographers are observers on life and if anyone can spot unusual behavior, or something that doesn't quite look right,  it's the humble photographer. Times that by about a factor of three if you are talking about a veteran street photographer.Those types of snappers miss nothing!

The Magnum photographer Martin Parr recently commented that he thought street photography could be banned in the U.K within the next five years. I personally think that a ban would be unworkable, especially in an age where virtually every mobile phone has a camera built into it. The British public would not tolerate a ban either. Nevertheless, the right to take photographs in public places needs to be fought for vigourously especially when the authorities start taking liberties with our liberty.

Ones to Watch

Over the past year, i've come to admire more and more, the multimedia photography and video work that resides on many U.S news websites. I just wish that the British news organisations would take more of an interest in the format because i truly believe that this will be the way many news stories will be told in future.

Two videos have really caught my eye recently. Both are both superb examples of documentary film making 21st century style. Short, but powerful, these video presentations use the short runtimes to the max and tell their stories quickly but with style. The video above is called 'From Himalayas to Helmand,' a video by Anup Kaphle that looks at the Gurkha soldiers fighting for the British in Afghanistan. It's a brilliant piece of work, telling a fascinating story that are often largely ignored by mainstream media organisations.

The second multimedia website was developed by the Los Angeles Times for a story about  former L.A gang members trying to help young people trapped in a life of drugs, violence, poverty and crime in Alabama. The 13 minute video is superb, as is the photography section. It's the future of modern photojournalism folks.

First Frost

Ice on a car window

Mother nature is such a great artist. As i was walking past the car yesterday, i noticed the wonderful ice patterns left on the windscreen (windshield to any U.S readers) by the first heavy frost. Frozen water left on a window doesn't sound that great does it, but i think you'll agree that the textures, patterns and lines contained in this photograph are just so beautiful, intricate and amazing.

AudioBoo Number One

As if posting photographs and a bit of text wasn't enough, I've just started AudioBooing. Yes the iPhone finally arrived and i did my first AudioBoo recording today. Apart from the fact i need to get used to hearing my own voice, it went OK... i think.

The are lots of ways of subscribing or hearing my podcasts. A series of links to subscribe to the podcasts, download the mp3 or listen to a streamed version can be found on the AudioBoo section of the website located HERE.

A Quiet Moment

Making a phonecall - Fakenham Market, Norfolk, UK

The bad weather did produce a good outcome this week. I finally got around to processing part of the backlog of film. By coincidence, a post on a photoblog i read this week commented about how some photographers use the gap between shooting the images and processing the film, to lose all emotional attachment to the photographs they've taken. It's an interesting theory, but it doesn't really ring true for me. Photography is emotion, surely?

Photographers invest their time and money into producing what they hope will be great photographs. It's an investment that you hope will prove beneficial visually. Sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn't. Regardless of the time delay between shooting and processing, i find the moment of a newly developed film emerging from the developing tank an exciting one. I vividly remember developing my first roll of film twenty years ago. Pure magic.

Back Home

Of all the photographs i've seen connected to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, this one REALLY hits a nerve. Heartbreaking is all you can really say. The photograph shows Victoria Chant crying as the coffin of her father, soldier Darren Chant, is carried from a chapel after his funeral in London. Mr. Chant was killed in Afghanistan on November 3rd.

I don't think i could have taken this, it would seem too intrusive for me, but these types of photos should be taken. The photograph is by Toby Melville of Reuters and reinforces my believe that the most powerful photographs from the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are not taken on the dusty battlefields, but back where the impact of the loss is felt most. Home.

Winter Trekker II

The old railway line - near Fryton, North Yorkshire, UK

Here is the first image from the first test roll of film shot for the winter landscape project mentioned in the winter trekker post a week or so ago. I'm rather pleased with the results. The whole look of the photograph is what i'm after, to see the countryside outside of the usual images of a green and pleasant landscape.

Currently, i'm looking for more shoot locations. The area where i live features a lot of old railway tracks and public walkways that make accessing the fields and hedgerows so much easier.  Another photo display idea i'm thinking about uses an interactive map display with the photographs located in the area where they were shot, like the panoramio system used on Google Earth.

More winter landscape photographs coming soon.

Red Piano Man

Street entertainer plays ABBA near Bettys Café Tea Rooms in York, UK

Street photography has always been a passion of mine. As i mentioned earlier this year, i've started using my mobile phone camera more and more to capture scenes on the street. The size of the phone camera offers certain advantages to using a proper digital or film camera. You don't attract attention for a start, and you attain the look of just another tourist photographing the colourful life of York. People just walk on by.

This photograph has given me another idea for a photography project in 2010. It's going to focus on the varied street entertainers of the city who work throughout the year. York, with it's old walls and history, never really stops being a tourist destination, so the buskers, musicians and performers just carry on working whatever the weather. I'll be posting more 'street' photographs of York, the performers, markets and streets during the run up to Christmas.

Inspiration and Influence

The end of another week and it's been a frustrating one. I put in an order for my iPhone which you would have thought would be a simple process these days. Nope. It's ended with me having to wait a potential ten days for the money to be refunded. Ten workings days!!!! I am NOT a happy camper. Still, never mind eh!

I've been reading a rather fascinating series of posts which ask the reader to think about where they got their early influences from and how they developed. The answers can be very revealing. The photoblog author, Gordon McGregor, gets a lot of his early influences from paintings, a common area of influence for many photographers including greats like Henri Cartier-Bresson. Painting has never really influenced my work that much though. Photography and the cinema are where the vast majority of my visual influences stem from. My landscape work is influenced heavily by the stylish 1940's black and white films, a good example of which would be David Lean's classic Oliver Twist made in 1948.

This great series of posts really does make you think about your influences and inspirations. Is it paintings or something else that inspire and influence your photography?

The blog posts can be found here 1, 2, 3, 4

Winter Trekker

Out in the late Autumn sunshine

Yesterday, i went out to shoot the first initial test rolls of b&w film for the winter landscape project. Technically it isn't quite winter yet in Britain, but nevertheless i decided to start on the project that will continue through until late February/early March 2010.

The afternoon light was just about perfect by the time i'd arrived at my first location. It didn't last long though, barely thirty minutes, before the fragile warm sunlight slipped quickly away and the night came rushing in. The land is saturated with water after huge amounts of autumn rain. The massive deep puddles on the paths and tracks look fabulous adding a bit of foreground detail. They do make moving around potentially a very muddy experience though.

I'm keeping the gear simple; just a BenboTrekker tripod, a Bronica ETRS camera and a lightmeter. Now it's just a matter of waiting for cold December to arrive so that i can move onto the next stage of shooting.

The Dark Lens

 The Dark Lens- Photograph by Cedric Delsaux

The Dark Lens is a photographic project that really caught my attention this week. Photographer Cedric Delsaux has taken the characters and the cool spaceships from Star Wars, and placed them into a modern urban environment. What is really fascinating is how easily the two blend together to create a new Star Wars world.

The idea is quite clever. After all, as children we were all able to create exciting places from our everyday surroundings. A tree house could become a secret base and a simple stick could be a laser gun. All that Cedric Delsaux has done is to take that creative imagination a step futher, and create that world through the use of a camera. What a fabulous looking Star Wars world it is too.

The collection of images does not have a direct weblink address, but you can find the gallery by going to the photographer's website at http://www.cedricdelsaux.com/ and clicking on the work menu link where The Dark Lens is listed. It's well worth a look.

Recruit, Soldier, Son and Friend

June 23, 2007: Ian checks his stance and the position of his hand as the platoon learns how to salute properly. Photograph by Craig F Walker

Craig F Walker's photographs of American soldier Ian Fisher reminded me of the old LIFE magazine photo stories of years ago. The images certainly have that feel about them. The time, effort and detail that has been invested into the multimedia story by the Denver Post is outstanding, and something that the rather slow British media should take on board. I would certainly count this detailed photo essay by Craig F Walker as one of the best done so far in this current conflict.

Craig F Walker follows every detail of Fisher's new army life, making an intimate portrait of the young man undergoing the process of becoming a soldier. We get to see Ian Fisher leaving high school, joining up, going through basic training, deployment to Iraq and continuing right through to his return from his first tour. The journey is not an easy one. Opening up your life to a photographer like that, while undergoing stressful life changing events, makes this young soldier even more remarkable. How many people would allow themselves to be put through that?

The superb collection of photographs, video, stories and other extras about this photo story can be found HERE.

Black Film

Vanishing Point II, 2009

At first glance, this photograph would seem to date from around the 1940's period but it was, in fact, taken this year as part of a excellent project called Noir.

Noir was the idea of Brittany Jones and Mitchell Rouse who have taken the stylish and atmospheric cinematic style Film Noir and shot a series of images along a similar theme. The resulting photographs are fantastic. A website gallery of the photos can be found HERE.

Selected images from the Noir Series work are on exhibition at the 400 South Main Gallery in Los Angeles and will be open for the Downtown Art Walk on November 12th.

Noir was found via a post on the excellent photoblog Lenscratch. If you like keeping up to date with exciting new photography, then i'd recommend taking a look at the blog.

High Standard

The 50mm standard lens - loved and loathed in equal measure

The poor old 50mm standard lens. It's never really got the sort of praise that it deserves. For many photographers, it's just the lens that comes with the camera, although these days it's more likely that a camera will ship with a zoom. That's a shame because i think the 50mm lens is one of the best lenses that a photographer can own. I'd even go as far as saying that it's an essential piece of kit. The first lens i purchased ,when changing from the Pentax to Nikon camera system ten years ago, was the Nikon 50mm. The superb Pentax 50mm lenses i used throughout my college/university years were invaluable on a number of occasions when the light was low.

Last week, as you may know, i was in Whitby shooting some promo photos for a film. As the film is a vampire movie, it couldn't be shot in daylight for obvious reasons. Daylight and vampires are a bit of a no-no. Street lighting and some rather well placed statue illumination lights were all we could work with, but the shutter speeds naturally came crashing down. Early on i realised that my zooms weren't going to be fast enough aperture wise to let enough light in. Even at f2.8, the shutter speeds still remained too low. In the end, i delved deep into the bag and came out with my trusty 50mm. It was the perfect choice for getting the shots; fast, light and sharp.

Ah Richard, you may be saying, surely with significant improvements to modern digital sensor technology, a fast 50mm is no longer needed. Well, true, but I'd still want to use the fastest lens i had to get the shot. If you can go from 1/25th to 1/50th just by using a one f/stop faster lens, you'd use it ...wouldn't you? Plus, the standard lens, regardless of make, is one of the cheapest to buy. The Nikon f1.4D can be found for an affordable price and that's what I'm after next to go alongside the f1.8D. Zooms are great, i love em, but sometimes you need that extra bit of help when the light starts to get low... a small, compact and fast 50mm type of help.

Vampire Night

Photographing a Vampire in Whitby

I love a challenge and you can't get any more challenging than a night photo shoot. Not that being a film maker is an easy life. The most obvious fact that you can't fail to miss when involved in a movie as closely i have been this week, is that the project development work for a film is far more complicated than in the photography business. So many external factors can come into play to make movie making a rough experience. It's amazing that so many films get made at all.

The light was virtually non existent for this shot. All we had to work with were street lights and illumination lights around a statue. We used the latter to shoot the photograph above. I lay down on the ground while Heather knelt with her face near the light. The shutter speed was a surprising 1/50th sec enabling me to shoot a fast sequence capturing Heather's vampire movements.

There is still a whole lot of work to do on 'Christian'. Financing, casting and promotion are just some of the issues that will need to be dealt with in the coming months. The filming is due to commence in Whitby in the spring of 2010. For more news and to see a rather good promo video of the film go over to http://www.christianmovie.co.uk/

Wonderful Whitby

Boy fishing at Whitby, Yorkshire, UK - 1992

It's been one of those weeks. Still there is plenty to look forward to in the coming weeks starting with a rather interesting project in Whitby. I'll be working as the photographer on a film set. It's just the early stages of production with the film not due for release until the summer 2010, but it's still very exciting to be part of it nonetheless.

Whitby is probably the most photogenic town in Britain. The place has an amazing atmosphere helped by it's fascinating whaling and fishing history combined with links to Bram Stoker's Dracula story. It's no coincidence then that the film I'll be shooting photographs for is a vampire movie.

Whitby has become a very popular tourist destination due to it's charm, however, it does have a distinct Gothic darkness to it added by the windswept churchyard and ruined abbey; something that no doubt inspired Bram Stoker when he visited Whitby in 1890.

I'll be posting my thoughts, and a few Whitby photographs, on twitter starting on Monday.

Taking a View

Sunrise over the Old Man of Storr, Isle of Skye, Scotland - Photograph by Emmanuel Coupe

Landscape photography is a popular subject matter for photographers, but taking a truly beautiful photograph of a landscape is a specialist art that only a few truly possess. It takes time, patience and a lot of endurance to find the right photographs, in the right location, at the right time.

The beautiful photograph above by Emmanuel Coupe won the 2009 Take a view, the Landscape Photographer of the Year Award, a competition started by Charlie Waite, one of today’s most respected landscape photographers. It has to be said that the quality of the photographic entries for this year really is superb.

A collection of the 2009 competition photographs can be found HERE

Shadow People

The stunning photograph above is by Finnish photographer Juha Arvid Helminen, just one of a number of photographs along a similar theme. The style and visual construction of these photographs is just superb. There is something that makes the photographs deeply uncomfortable to view, and not just in a claustrophobic way because the models are completely covered.

The great thing about Juha's photographs is we can't be quite sure what's going on. Is it an execution or just a goodbye before heading off to war? Quite possibly it could be either, it's down to the viewer to interpret what they will from the photographs. A selection of Juha's wonderful photographs can be viewed HERE.

Private Investigations

Fish and chips dinner in Norwich - late June 2009

While walking through Norwich market this summer, i spotted this gentleman tucking into his fish and chips dinner. What struck me first were his clothes. Take away the walking stick and shopping bag, he could easily be a undercover detective out on a case. He definitely has a rather stylish Mickey Spillane detective look about him. I wonder if he was 'packing heat'. I imagine the only heat he'd be packing would be a nice hot flask of tea.

Scotswood Road

Pine Street 1960 - Photograph by Jimmy Forsyth

During the 1950's and 1960's, amateur photographer Jimmy Forsyth captured on film the working class community located in the Scotswood Road area of Newcastle Upon Tyne. In all, over 3000 negatives exist within the archive for the Scotswood Road area, taken in the years prior to a major change in UK housing policy that would go on to destroy much of the long established community life throughout Britain's towns and cities.

Injured in an wartime industrial accident, Jimmy took up photography to record the changes taking place in that community. After 1945, post war housing in the UK was finally recognised as being in a poor state, and vast areas of housing throughout the country were designated for demolition. New modern housing estates would be designed and implemented by town planners to create a modern living environment fit for 20th century living. Later Jimmy Forsyth would recall the grand housing plans:-

"The planners actually believed that they could build communities, but instead the community was scattered to the four winds, people were sent to far-flung estates, and a community was lost forever."

Jimmy continued to photograph the people of the Scotswood Road until his house was demolished during the late 1950's. During the 1970's, Jimmy Forsyth's work became a focus of interest and in 1979 a major exhibition of his work was shown at the Side Gallery in Newcastle. Jimmy continued to take his photographs, including one of my sister who lived near him for a number of years, until poor health forced him to stop. He died in July 2009 at the age of 95 leaving behind a visual legacy of around 40,000 images.

A fabulous collection of Jimmy Forsyth photos can be found HERE

Mad Mutterings

A feather amongst the barley - July 2009

Coughs, sneezes and muttering fill the air around me at the moment. I've caught a bad dose of flu which has put an end to a few ideas this weekend. Whoever 'infected' me will definitely be off my Christmas card list this year! I shouldn't complain really as i don't often suffer from colds, flu etc, and it does give me a break from running for a week or so. Even so....

The photograph featured above was taken while waiting for a Tiger Moth plane to turn up. I'm still waiting for the plane to arrive, but the barley field and the golden light were just magical that evening so not all was lost. I've always had the philosophical attitude that images that are created successfully were meant to be, those photographs that don't make it.... were not. Accidents, incidents and mistakes are part of the learning process, so you must take from them what you can, rather than becoming too angry and regretful about images that will never be.

The most memorable mistake i ever made was adding too much washing up liquid while washing some newly developed film, way back in the late 1980's when i was rookie film processor. Washing up liquid works well as a washing agent, which helps remove the risk of water drying marks as the film dries. You only need one drop in 600ml of water to do the business - i added a great splodge and saw my lovely new pristine b&w negatives start to crazy pave in front of my eyes. Within seconds they were all cracked up and unusable. I muttered like a mad Muttley for about an hour or so, and then chalked it down to experience.

Faded Photo

Soldiers from Hull on parade, taken just before the First World War

Of all the jobs i have to do as a pro photographer, the one that continues to fascinate me are the old photograph collections that I'm often given to repair or copy. Over the last few years, more and more people have started to look into their family tree, no doubt encouraged by easy access to records on the Internet and popular TV programmes like the BBC's 'Who do you think you are'.

Last week, an especially lovely collection of old Victorian and Edwardian photographs, including the photograph above, came in from a client searching his family tree. The image quality of these old photographs was remarkable. Many were nearing or over 100 years old, and yet the faces still looked fresh and full of character. Several of the photographs were designed to be sent as postcards. A final message home before they encountered the horrors of the trenches.

One of the saddest photographs i dealt with featured a nervous looking young sailor, obviously not keen on having his photograph taken in the studio, who lasted just a matter of weeks at the front before being killed. Written on the postcard back was a message to his sister saying that he was fine and everything was OK. Handling a photograph like that is a privilege. It's great to think that with a little work in Photoshop, photographs, like that of the doomed sailor, will survive well into the 21st century.

LIFE Online

LIFE magazine has always had a special place in the history of photojournalism. During it's long history, the magazine employed some of the best photographers in the world, and as such, the photography was always one of the magazine's big strengths. Until now, finding issues of this classic magazine was difficult, but fortunately Google have recently scanned over 1800 issues of the magazine, dating from 1936 to 1972, and placed them all online to view.

Even seventy three years on from the very first issues, LIFE offers a superb reading experience. I have to admit that the 1930's and 1940's are my favourite eras of history, so that's where i started my viewing. The magazines from this period manage to pack in a good mix of human interest stories, fashion, world news, movie news and celebrity gossip. The adverts are also hugely entertaining. Keep an eye out for the surprisingly suggestive Chesterfield cigarette ads that feature regularly during the World War II years.

Google have done a great job here. The quality of the scans are excellent, capturing all the page detail of the originals. Flicking through the pages really does feel like travelling back in time, so much so that you can get quite caught up in the period. The superb LIFE magazine archive is well worth a visit if you're a photographer, budding historian or just crazy about old magazines.

The website can be found HERE