I’ve been fortunate to do training with Damien & Julie Lovegrove (link), Chris Hanley (link) and Martin Hill (link). These photographers are the real deal. When you’re photographing a wedding and it starts raining, you absolutely rely on your training! This happened to me not so long ago… Everything I had ever learnt kicked in automatically to make something wonderful.

Graham Law and myself have both been doing Lovegrove workshops over the last 2.5 years and we make a fantastic team. In fact, Graham and I work together with our clients whether it be a street portrait shoot, a pre-wedding shoot or wedding. We get to practice all the skills we learn with our model Hannah and have been doing this for about 18 months. Both of us constantly hear Damien saying, “Let’s make it happen” which spurs us on and we make it happen. My photographs from our practice sessions can be found on this blog; Industrial Portraits (link) and The Lead Mines (link). Both of these examples demonstrate how we take what we learn and apply the skills in a totally different environment.

A while back Graham and I had discussed creating some nice bridal portraits in an in-door location. We decided that we wanted use Mellington Hall in Shropshire (link). Graham arranged to meet the management and discuss the location and what we wanted. This was also an opportunity to scout the location and afterwards Graham and I discussed how we were going to shoot the various scenes. The next trick was getting a wedding dress to shoot with… Graham approached Celtic Brides (a local bridal shop – link) and offered a proposal of what we wanted to do. With all the plans in place, we booked Mellington Hall and worked with Celtic Brides. They lent us 4 dresses for the shoot of which we only had time to photograph 3 of them. We took all our toys, lighting gear, etc… and turned the venue into a full-on photo shoot. It almost felt like we were on a Lovegrove workshop! We accomplished a lot and we got what we set out to achieve. Some nice portfolio images for ourselves and for Celtic Brides.

Hannah our model was fantastic! Every shoot we do with her she is getting more and more professional. On this occasion her mother Sarah helped out with everything which made the shoot go smoothly. My mother helped out with tea and a few other bits and pieces and we all made a great team!

Watching and learning from the masters, Damien Lovegrove, Chris Hanley and Martin Hill, made it possible for us to make it happen and to create our own portfolio of images. Yes… Training matters!

Below is a small selection of the photos from the day…

This is the first dress of 3. I love the symmetry in the frame!

I love the softness of this frame. There was hardly any post-production required for this photograph.

I love how everything works in this frame.

I like Hannah's inquisitive expression.

I deliberately framed this so that the left side could be used for content. I could imagine a fade to white with a message like "thinking about your big day".

Continuing with how these images might be used... I framed this so that content could be placed on the right side. Perhaps a message like "Have you just started thinking about your wedding dress?"

Similar theme with content on the left side.

Then it was the second dress and to make use the stair case.

I love how the frame leads from Hannah all the way to the top of the ceiling.

Time to use another room at the venue and love how Hannah is surrounded by the dress.

You can tell that Hannah loves the dress!

There were so many wonderful compositions to be made here....

At this point the creativity was just flowing!!

I wonder what Hannah was thinking about?

Timeless... Peaceful... Beautiful...

...

...

Back to the stair case...

I love Hannah's energy in this image!

...

It was time to change into the 3rd dress...

...

I loved the mirror and fire place and decided to take a few wide shots with these wonderful dresses.

...

Always exploring for a different camera angle...

...

...

...

...

The last frame in this set photographing wedding dresses.

For the last few minutes of the day, Hannah changed into a cocktail dress.

...

...

...

...

And this was pretty much the last frame of the day.

Photographs are hugely important! At least to me anyway… I am fortunate that my mother took so many pictures of the family when we were kids. We have literally thousands of negatives of our entire history in Africa. About 13 years ago I purchased a professional negative scanner (Nikon Cool Scan III) to digitally capture our life’s journey. This was way before I took photography seriously, but in a sense, it was the beginning of the road I am now on. As I scanned the photographs, it was like watching a replay of our lives in slow motion. I can remember how home sick I felt when I scanned images of the farm that I grew up on as a kid. I could remember the happy days that we spent at Lake McIlwaine in Zimbabwe where I used to go sailing. I remembered what our lives were like during the Rhodesian war. I remembered the happy times spent with the family on our holidays. And I remembered the sadness at the loss of my brother Bradley.

Photographs like these are extremely precious and will never be relived again. Organizing a vast collection of photographs into date order quickly reveals huge gaps of time where there are no photographs at all! There were years where I didn’t have a single photograph of myself. I’ve learnt that you just need to keep taking photographs (all the time). For a lot of people we all know how it goes… you buy a camera, you take lots of pictures until you get bored of it; and then don’t take any more pictures until it’s someone’s birthday. Simply put, you just need to keep taking photos. Every time I take a photograph of a family member, I find myself saying how precious that image will probably become in time.

Since I’ve started on my photography journey, I’ve often come across folk who have little or no regard for the value of a photograph. There’s nothing wrong with this… each to their own… but a part of me does wonder if it will come back to bite them as time goes by.

Very sadly my father passed away in May of this year. As I reflect on the impact he’s had in my life, I’m glad I have so many photographs of the times we shared as I grew up. I’m glad that I became a photographer. I’m glad I have precious photographs which I will remember him by. Few people have achieved as much in their lifetime as my father did. He became a pilot, revolutionized commercial fishing in Southern Africa; and started a business on 60 Rhodesian Dollars and grew the business to the point that every milk bottle sold in Zimbabwe was milked with his milking machines. My father’s achievements in life are many — he did everything in life he wanted to. An achievement in its own right. But most of all, he was a loving father.

As I write this blog post, it reminds of a post that Joe McNally posted some time ago. Taking a picture of a feeling (link) and his feedback response (link).

I’m so glad that I became a photographer… I get the privilege to capture memories of loved ones…

Below are a few photographs of our family’s history.

This is a picture of my Grand Father at their home in 1931. My Grand Father and his two brothers were early pioneers in Southern Rhodesia. They arrived in 1901 from the Boer War, originally from London. They were part of the team to build the infrastructure of Rhodesia. The home shown in the picture was my mothers first home.

This is my Grand Father's car travelling with the family.

This is my mother when she was 18 years old when she was staying with her Grand Mother.

My Father at 23 years old when he immegrated to Rhodesia.

My Father next to his aeroplane getting ready for a trip to Mozambique to spend a weekend on Paradise Island.

The family travelling to Durban, South Africa for a holiday next to the sea. In the picture is my brother standing next to the car and there's me sitting in the back peering out the window.

Visiting my sister near the Zambian border at the Umfolozi river near Mushimbi Pools.

Me with my brother and sister. It was common during the war to carry a gun wherever you went.

My brother often travelled on company business to various farms. He attached the gun to the truck as a means to protect himself from terroist attack during the war.

The family was invited to visit the local chief and he gave us a chicken to take home for dinner. That's me sitting next to the chief...

A fly over the Lake Kariba dam wall. My father was in charge of the fishing fleet for what was the largest man made lake at that time.

My father inspecting a new milking machine installation that was manufactured by his business..

This is a photograph of me at 9 years old soon after my brother Bradley had died.

Me with my father at Lake Kariba.

Me a few years later aged 17 years old. Visiting Worlds View at Inyanga with a betamax video camera.

My father helping me test out a new lighting technique early during my photography study.

My father again helping me out by posing for a photograph.

This was one of my father's favourite photographs of himself which I took one Sunday lunch time.

Both my parents helping me out by posing for a photograph.

My favourite photograph of my father. This shows what he was like. He liked cooking in the kitchen and always wore his apron. The books behind him are also very fitting as he was always very studious.

If you’d like us (Graham Law and myself) to photograph your wedding, get in touch…

Enjoy the photos below…

The shoot started with Julie in the local town park.

Julie and Will in the same location.

Moved over about 30 meters to another location for this frame.

I directed Will and Julie to create this wonderful image.

Same location but a figure in the landscape type image.

A moment of closeness.

Same location...

Time for some drama! Yeah!!

A quick visit into town for a few frames. This was the first location.

Used a wall that was right next to the previous location.

Love is in the air...

Across the road was a lovely telephone box for us to use.

A private moment...

A change of location...

I love making these kinds of shots...

A simple but effective portrait.

A wider frame of where we were shooting in the previous frames.

I absolutely love this image!

A change of location again... out in the fields...

It started to rain... but we weren't phased at all

Finally arrived at our last location.

The last frame of the day...

About a year ago I purchased a Canon 5D mk II camera. When this camera came onto the market, it caused a flurry of excitement. As a stills camera, it has a Full Frame sensor (35mm x 24mm) and is a whopping 21 Mega Pixels. It works well in low light and it looks like a normal sized DSLR camera. As well as being a great still camera, Canon introduced HD Video recording too! The camera’s small form factor (compared to industry standard video cameras) and it’s large sensor size excited film makers throughout the entire industry. The cinematic look created by such a small device was a new affordable way to get great results. Film makers all over the world grappled to work around the limitations and make this new breed of hybrid camera work. The most prominent of these film makers was Vincent Laforet and he made a short film that rocked the entire industry titled Reverie (link). Shortly after… a new breed of film makers jumped on to the wave. The take up of the 5D mk II camera within the film industry surprised Canon. Apparently, Canon hadn’t expected the video feature to take a life of its own in the way that it did. Some even comment that Canon made the video functionality too good! One of the new breed of film makers that jumped on the wave very early was Philip Bloom. He left the broadcasting industry and started afresh using the new Canon hybrid camera. He is now one of the most prominent names in the industry, has a huge following and has companies like Kessler Crane make products to his specifications. Canon has done something amazing! It’s almost single handily created a new industry in the film making world with the 5D mk II camera. The camera is now regularly used in filming the popular TV show ‘House’ and it was also used on a few scenes in Iron Man 2.

So… as well as having a superb stills camera, in my hands I also have an amazing video camera too!! The temptation to introduce myself to the film making world is too great! In many ways I see it as an option to extend my creativity and offer potential clients a new kind of post-event experience. I love seeing the excitement of people’s faces when they see a wonderful image of themselves and loved ones. The prospect of seeing a bride and groom seeing a cinematic film of their wedding will be something to treasure forever. Another film maker that shows hows its done on DSLR cameras and is one of the new breed of film makers is ‘stillmotion’ from Canada. Here’s a recent wedding film they put together (link). And then you have film makers like Kevin Shahinian who make a wedding film that goes way beyond your typical experience (link)!

Over the last several months I’ve been doing a lot of research into the film world and started doing a lot of self-study to get myself onto the film ladder. In many ways, in a similar fashion to how I got to grips with photography. My first task was to try and get an overview of the industry, especially the DSLR film industry. This meant following film makers on twitter and generally chasing search terms in Google. Having appreciated the importance of photography training, I searched for a ‘Damien Lovegrove’ type person in the DSLR film world. I wanted that person to be based in the UK (because of access) and this turned out to be Philip Bloom. I got his training DVD specifically aimed at the Canon 5D mk II camera (link). This was a fantastic introduction. You get to hear about the essential gear and some of the technicalities of filming with a DSLR camera. Next up is the book, ‘From Still to Motion’ (link). This is simply brilliant! It is written by many authors and contains a DVD with 6 hours of additional footage. It also contains the RAW footage discussed in the book and even includes the Final Cut Pro project files. Then I purchased Drew Gardner’s 2-disk DVD set (link) which contains more detail on actually filming a short film. These 3 items have been essential for me and getting to grips with using a DLSR camera.

Working with DSLRs like the Canon 5D mk II require some essential gear to really get started. It is unrealistic to just use the camera ‘as is’ for video or film making. The camera’s form factor makes it difficult to hold steady and it does not have autofocus. The steady aspect can be easily achieved using a tripod which most photographers will already own. However, they are unlikely to own a video head which is a minimum requirement. Anyway, let’s take an overview of what’s required (as far as I can ascertain):

Tripod and Video Head
I’m using my current tripod which is probably not ideal for video use. However, it appears to be okay for the time being. I have purchased the Manfrotto 501HDV video head (link).

Hand holding the camera
As mentioned already, you cannot easily hand hold the camera because of its form factor. At a minimum you need something like a Zacuto Z-Finder Pro 3x (link). This is an eye piece that fits onto the back of the camera’s LCD display. It allows you to assess focus more easily and adds an additional point of contact to your body. At this point there are 3 points of contact with the camera. Your left & right hand and your eye. Ideally you need 4 points of contact, so something like a Zacuto Target Shooter (link) is required. With this setup, you can hand hold the camera steady enough. An optional component is a monopod which will help keep the camera still when you’ve stopped to take some film.

Audio
This is a whole new ball game for photographers. The built-in microphone is useless. You need something like a Rode Video Mic (link) which is a directional microphone. Then you might consider an external audio recorder such as the Zoom H4N (link). And additionally you might want body packs so you can get omni and uni-directional microphones close your subject. Something like the Sennheiser EW G3  radio microphone (link). This stillmotion video covers the ins and outs of audio (link).

Advanced gear
There’s a bunch of advanced gear that you can use for different types of shots. You can use a GlideCam (link, example 1, example 2) for smooth filming whilst moving with a subject. There are cranes which allow dramatic movements of the camera. Companies such as Kessler Crane make a variety of cranes and jibs (link). You can use a dolly track to add a subtle moving quality to the film piece (link). And the list goes on…

Software
The video editing software used by professionals is mostly Apple’s Final Cut Pro (link) or Adobe’s Premier Pro (link).

Making films goes way beyond simply being able to film the scenes with a video capable camera. You also need story telling skills and a creative mind. To help me on my film making journey, I’ve just booked a place for an intense 3-day masterclass with 3 film makers in Majorca later this summer. I’ll be training with Philip Bloom (link), Nino Leitner (link) and Sebastian Wiegärtner (link). I’m very excited about this opportunity to walk amongst giants!

And to finish this post off, here’s an amazing short piece by Tom Lowe which will blow your mind (link)!