Master Photography Magazine Feature

Very excited to received my copy of Master Photography Magazine in the post this morning as there was a feature about my photography and recent associate success on pages 32-34. I had a very brief telephone interview with Richard Kilpatrick from RTK Media in between filming the latest apprentice films and he has put together a lovely write up.  Thank you to all the models, makeup artists, designers and hairstylist who made the images possible.

Art + Commerce

I received an email this morning asking whether I would like to contribute to PhotoVogue at Art + Commerce.  How exciting!!!  They represent many of the photographers I most admire, here are some of the photographers they represent:

Founded in the early 1980s, Art + Commerce is among the most respected photographic agencies in the world, representing many of the most successful photographers working today, including Steven Meisel, Tim Walker, Craig McDean, Sølve Sundsbø, Ellen von Unwerth and Nick Knight. 

Associate Panel

Here are the images from my successful associate panel (minus one body art image).  Thank you to the amazing talents of the makeup artists, hairstylists, designers and models, I could not have achieved this without you.  Big thanks to Desi Fontaine my mentor for being an inspiration and believing in me!

Steampunk Shoot

On Friday I had the pleasure of working with the fabulous April Green (the lecturer from NCN) on a personal editorial project which we plan to submit to a magazine so please keep your fingers crossed for us.  Although I have worked with April at the college we have never collaborated before, I had asked whether she would be interested in working on my fellowship panel images and she was more than happy to collaborate on any projects so we started looking for editorial callouts and brainstorming our ideas.

I booked the beautiful and talented dancer Jasmine for the shoot, she is soooo lovely and super to work with.

Our lovely team consisted of:

April - Hair, Makeup and Stylist
Jazz - Model
Chris - Lighting Assistant
Paul - Midlands Railway Museum to oversee the shoot and assist with the props
Myself - Photography
Accessories - Mark Cordory Creations

The shoot took place at the Midlands Railway Museum, special thank you to Paul for looking after us and making us feel very welcome.

I may send a sneak peek soon once we have decided which ones to submit.




 

MPA Website and Magazine

Meant to post this one a couple of weeks ago, but got busy with customer orders and didn't manage to finish it, here it is:

Had a lovely surprise today, the Master Photographers Associate are using one of my Associate panel images for their banner photo!  I am very happy and extremely proud that they are using it!  Also the Master Photographer magazine arrived in the post today and has a list of new Associate and Fellows and my name is there.  Woohoo!!

The Master Photographers Association are a fantastic organisation and my mentor Desi Fontaine is a wonderful mentor, she really gave me the courage and support to submit my panel.

The day of the judging was nerve wracking to say the least, I put my panel of 20 16x20" images on display for the judges and left the room whilst the judges deliberated.  After a while I was invited back into the room,  which was full to the brim with some of the most experienced judges in Europe, Desi Fontaine, my wonderful mentor welcomed me as an associate and congratulated me on my achievement, I was so shocked and shaking so much that I could hardly smile but inside I was beaming!

Special thank you to the following awesome people:

Desi Fontaine for her support and encouragement, without her I would not have had the confidence to go for the qualification.

The MPA for their support and for their amazing mentoring service.

The student makeup artists, hairstylist and designers at NCN, NHTA and SNC for their beautiful work and allowing me to submit them in my panel.

The wonderful models for being gorgeous and awesome!




   

Magazine interview

I received an answer phone message on Friday from a trade photographic magazine (no spoilers just yet) wanting to do a feature about me.  When I picked up the message on Saturday I was soooo happy, in fact I did a little happy dance and my kids looked at me with a bit of a sideways glance then I beamed the largest smile for the rest of the day!

I will of course scan the article in as soon as I have a copy.  How exciting!

Neon Dreams Muse Shoot

The amazing Captin Ron, the awesome Amy B and I teamed up again for the muse homework shoot, this time we decided on a neon theme which was inspired loosely on an editorial feature in Hunger Magazine, the most amazing magazine I have had the pleasure in seeing!  Honestly you should subscribe, it is a biannual self published magazine by Rankin, the next one is due out in October.  Thank you to Mark Cleghorn for introducing me to the magazine.

I was testing a new light which arrived the morning of the shoot so it was interesting and challenging but certainly worth the effort, there were no boundaries and no expectations as it was a test shoot so we were free to experiment.

Photos to follow shortly....

Rankin Inspired Shoot

It has been pretty manic here recently with work and fitting in the apprentice sessions.  I have managed to do some test shoots for the Rankin theme, I am super inspired by his amazing collaborations with Alex Box so I thought that would be a good place to start.  Many of my regular models start or start back at Uni next week so I wanted to squeeze the sessions in before they went away.

I really like the idea of a progressive series of images starting with quite a stark image working up to almost an explosion of colour.

Jameela Elfaki modelled for the shoot, as ever she looked completely amazing!  The makeup was creatively provided by the superbly talented Anna Eason.

Photos to follow shortly....

Associate Panel Success

I have been very busy preparing for my associate panel submission for the Master Photographer's Association.  I am supremely pleased to announce that I passed, I am now an Associate!  I will post the images shortly.  So excited and thrilled that they passed me.  Fellowship is my next journey, I am starting to plan it already!

Model Shoot

I have a session tomorrow with the beautiful Ami Virden, an agency signed model, we have worked together on a couple of shoots this year and I am super excited about the shoot. She wants to update her book with some edgy fashion images, beauty images and some lingerie images.  The super talented makeup artist Amy Biddulph will be providing her amazing skills for the day and I have been doing lots of homework to get an idea of the type of images we are looking at creating.

Creative Dance Shoot - Sneak Peek

Here are a few images from the creative dance shoot with the amazingly talented Emily and Akeim of Northern School of Contemporary Dance and the super creative Anna of MUAnna.  We had an awesome day, it was hugely enjoyable.  The first two shots were taken using my trusty quadra lights and the third image was taken using available light.

Creative Dance Shoot

Had an fantastic session today with the highly talented makeup artist Anna of MUAnna and awesome dancers Emily and Akeim from Northern School of Contemporary Dance. The shoot took place on location in Birmingham under the arches of a railway line in Digbeth.  For the first part of the session I used my trusty Elinchrom Quadras balanced with the natural daylight under the arches, Akeim did his finest impression of spiderman climbing up the wall, will post a sneak peek soon. Then we decided to do some natural light shots at a fast shutter speed to capture some movement shots, the railway bridge arches provided a fantastic quality of light it was like having two lovely large window of diffused light so I was more than happy to try. As you will know from earlier posts I am not confident with natural light but I am happy to take on the challenge and improve my skills in this area.  Will post some edited photos from the session soon.

Rankin Hunger Magazine

Managed to find a use but near perfect copy of Hunger Magazine Summer 2012, Rankin's awesome and amazing bi-annual magazine.  So much to love in this magazine, what a talent Rankin is. Mark at PT4U has set Rankin as the photographic icon to inspire our next homework shoot so I am finding as many Rankin fashion images as I can for inspiration.

Green Screen with Perfect Mask 5 Webinar

Last night after returning from London I joined the Masking and Selection PT4U/OnOne Software webinar.  It was awesome, so helpful for replacing backgrounds.  One of our apprentice challenges is a green screen project so it was particularly useful for this ongoing project.  To all you PT4U members I would definitely recommend watching the video when it goes live.

Please like my Facebook page

Hi all,

I would really appreciate if you would like my Facebook page and spread the word to anyone you know who may be interested.

Thanks in advance.

D x

Visit Two - On location

Had a fab visit this week with the PT4U team in Stockport.

Day 1

We were based at Hallam Mill Photographic Studio, a fabulous daylight studio with so much space and  a wonderful range of eclectic props.  We started the day going through our homework which was videoed by the team.  Then Duncan Cooper from Calumet demonstrated the brand new Leaf Credo 60  Back on the Mamiya Medium Format Camera.  The camera is amazing and surprisingly simple to use.  I was blown away by the fast shutter speed with lighting, ordinarily I can set my Canon to a maximum of 250th of a second before the rear curtain banding is noticeable within the image.  As the Mamiya is a leaf shutter it does not have this problem at all.  I shot a couple of images at 200th of a second with a window behind the model then Mark suggested I increase it to 800th of a second and WOW the sky really popped, amazing!!  I can see that the medium format would be perfect for my dance work and the fashion and beauty work I take for the colleges and universities.  I am officially in LOVE!!

After the demonstration we began shooting with the beautiful Portia, she has an amazing look and is super talented with her makeup and styling too.  She was really easy to work with as she moves and poses so well.  We concentrated on natural light which in a sense was great as we had identified it during the first visit as a weak point for me in particular.  My commissions for my business are based on flash photography so I have done very little with natural light other than a few seminars with Kevin Wilson.  I found this particularly difficult and restrictive as I have not fully grasped natural light and reflectors as yet.

Towards the end of the day we went outside the mill to take some daylight and flash images.  Mark showed us a neat trick with the camera setting it to 320th second and turning the camera upside down to create a natural vignette which should be featured on one of the films, the images he showed us on the back of the camera were awesome!

Day 2

Mark let us know the previous day that we would be shooting four vintage period dresses and the outcome of the shoot would potentially be featured in Photo Professional Magazine. We were introduced to the beautiful and serene model Cassie Jade McDowell, she is fabulous to work with as she looks so innocent with a real english rose quality but is a self confessed rule breaker.  I started the first shoot with Cassie in a beautiful black lace vintage dress.  The shoot took place in a cluttered corridor, I really struggled with the natural light and the limitations of the location and got a severe roasting from Mark as I was pretty hopeless.  I took onboard all the comments that he had made and tried much harder when shooting the next dresses. By the time we got to the last dress we were at out time limit so I had to rush the shoot.  Next time it may be better to work out the time divide it between us and allow changeover time etc.  This is how I have to work with the college students and it works really effectively so we don't run over time.

Having reviewed the images I took they are pretty bad, I am certainly not proud of any of the images but I do have the capacity to learn and I do have a plan.  We are in the process of purchasing a beautiful old but tired mill, so before we start sand blasting and partitioning I am going to work on natural lighting techniques until I master it.

Mark set Rankin as the iconic photographer for our homework which I am really excited about, Rankin is awesome and his work is stunning.

I am grateful to the PT4U team for this amazing opportunity and although I currently feel out of my depth with the natural light photography it will certainly be a great skill to have when I do eventually master it.

Exciting News - Vogue Italia Approval

I finally got round to submitting some images to Vogue Italia now that the colleges and schools have finished for the holidays and I have a bit of time to catch up on admin.

To my delight I have had a couple of images approved, yeah!!!

The first image was taken on one of the level 3 makeup artistry courses on location at the Pitcher and Piano in Nottingham.  I love the period makeup and the gripped hairstyle it is absolutely awesome, and what an amazing model. Full model and makeup artist credits to be updated as soon as I confirm the author's work with the college, it is a very large class and a very long 14 hour session so I don't want to credit the wrong makeup artist by mistake.

The second image was taken on another level 3 makeup artistry course on location at a vintage bus depot in Nottingham.  The makeup artist was the wonderfully talented Natalie Stevenson, it was such a pleasure to photograph her session, she had a fabulous story for the session.  We were lucky to stumble across the dusty old car in one of the rooms at the depot, they kindly let us photograph using the vehicle as a prop. I will post more of the images from this session once I have submitted my associate panel in August, I have been advised by my amazing mentor Desi Fontaine to keep them under wraps until then.

Secret Assignment for PT4U Fashion Apprentice Training

Keep looking at the blog over the next few weeks as the secret assignment will be announced shortly.  It has certainly tested my photoshop and editing skills but it is a really exciting project! Here is a clue hint of what is to come with the truly amazing model and self stylist Ryo Love.

Muse Shoot - Gold Session One

I had organised a shoot with Rhona MacDonald, also known as Captin Ron (yes, that is Captin not Captain).  She is an amazingly versatile model, she is heavily involved in role play and acting so any shoot we organise she really gets into the role and brings so much to the shoot.  We had been taking for sometime about doing a gold makeup shoot, Ron had originally sent me an image as inspiration which I had kept in my inspiration folder. We worked from the initial idea and together came up with two distinct looks.   The marvellous Amy Biddulph kindly agreed to do the makeup for the day, she specialises in sfx makeup and was really keen to collaborate, again she was one of the students that has recently qualified on the level 3 beauty course at one of the colleges that I photograph, she is awesome!

Here is a montage of my favourite images from the session:

Moving forward, it would be great to develop this idea further using different makeup effects and more of a variety of lighting techniques, I have started putting together a mood board showing lighting, makeup ideas, jewellery styles, nail art etc.

Lara Jade Inspired Shoot

Mark and the team at PT4U set Tom and I the task of shooting in the style of Lara Jade.  I really wanted to try to attempt some outdoor shots using natural light but the rubbish weather we have had so far this summer has made it difficult to take the shots outdoor, the project will still go ahead later in the year as we have a sensational team of designers, hairstylists, models, makeup artists all keen to collaborate, we just need the weather now!

I decided to use one of my shoots for clothing designer Callecia Brown with the gorgeous amazing model Jameela Elfaki of Industry People as the Lara Jade inspired shoot, the designer was happy for me to experiment with lighting so towards the end of the session I tried a few different lighting styles which can be seen below.  The super talented Sarah Feist provided her awesome makeup skills for the session, she is a recently qualified makeup artists from one of the courses I photograph, big thank you Sarah for the superb makeup.

I shot the session with the intention of converting the images to black and white in post production but I prefer the images in colour as they really show the clothing off well.

Self Portrait

Mark and the team at PT4U set Tom and I the task of taking a self portrait for to bring along to each visit.  I am not at all keen on having photos taken, I am MUCH happier behind the camera but the task has been set so I couldn't really refuse as much I wanted too.

I wanted the self portrait images to say something about me and show an element of my character and my passions in life.

The first self portrait was makeup and vintage inspired, I work for a number of makeup colleges and absolutely love the work, it gives me such a buzz, the students have amazing ideas and produce beautiful work.  I asked Josie Clarke one of the lecturers to come and do my makeup for the session, she is very experienced in airbrushing and made an amazing job of the makeup.  Josie stayed for the session and helped with styling and pose direction, big thank you to Josie for all her help.

The second self portrait I wanted to show my love for dance and movement, I am not the greatest dancer but I LOVE to watch and photograph dancers, it is one of my greatest passions in photography. I used a light floaty material to portray the fluid and graceful movement of dancers. This was by far the most difficult shoot I have encountered so far,  I hadn't fully appreciated how difficult self portraits are to take and even more so with other variables such as moving fabric.  The majority of the images were unusable, fabric in mid air all clumped together, ridiculous facial expressions as I concentrated too hard on the fabric, rubbish posing etc. It was certainly a challenge but I have learnt a lot from it.

Day One Fashion Apprentice Training at PT4U - The Interview Morning

Tom Keenan and I travelled from the hotel to PT4U studio on Monday morning, after carrying out an Austin Powers' style many point turn on a very narrow road with rather a steep drop we reached PT4U.  Debbie was there to greet us and took us on a tour of the facilities, well equipped in an understatement it is every photographer's dream!  It is amazing, so much space and in such a beautiful setting, a decommissioned old chapel, it is truly beautiful, they have retained a lot of the original features so it has so much character too.  Debbie introduced us to all of the team, they were all so welcoming and friendly to both of us.

The first part of the day was extremely nerve-racking, the prospect of being interviewed on camera was very daunting for me, I am sooooo much happier being behind the camera these days.

Tom went first thankfully and seemed to be amazingly relaxed, or certainly appeared so outwardly, the interview was really interesting and great to watch, you should check out his video when they go live. Tom is a really lovely guy, very creative and talented.

It was then my turn, I was super nervous and I am sure it will show in my body language when the video goes live.   Mark was extremely good at interviewing and really helped me to relax, well as much as I could with my heart beating in my throat!

As my mind went totally blank during the interview here is a bit about myself:

I am married with two gorgeous girls (of course I am biased that is a mother's prerogative).  We live in Derbyshire and I have a studio a couple of miles from where we live.  I specialise in makeup, hair and fashion photography, I work closely with the local colleges and universities taking pictures for the student's portfolios and designer's lookbooks. 


I have worked with photographers since the 90s, my husband encouraged me to start out in business so Gecko Studios Photography came into being in 2002 as a part time business and I left my safe job at the Council to go full time in 2008, I have always loved photography it just never dawned on me that I could make it a business, so I really need to thank Jeremy for his support and encouragement.  I feel blessed that I am able to do something that I truly love for a living!


I graduated with a Bachelor of Laws (Honours) last year which I studied with the Open University, starting the same year as I started in business, it was a great journey and I am so pleased that I gained my degree but if I am true to myself, my heart is most certainly with the photography.

Here are a few photographers and publications that I LOVE:

Horst P Horst

Helmut Newton

Mert and Marcus

Al Rodriquez

Annie Leibovitz

Zemotion

Herb Ritts

Howard Schatz

Lara Jade

Michael David Adams

Solve Sundsbo

Richard Avedon

Tim Walker

Stephen Meisel

Ellen Von Unwerth

David La Chappelle

Patrick Demarchelier

I adore Vogue, Elle and Harper's Bazaar as the photos are always so amazing!  

I also love cinematic and graphic novel style imagery, taking influence from films such as The Third Man, Amelie and director such as Tim Burton and Terry Gilliam. 

After the separate interviews Tom and I were interviewed together with Mark, we talked what inspires us. We chatted about our mutual respect for Lara Jade, Mark set us a challenge to carry out during the period before our next visit, we have to take a series of 12 photographs in the style of Lara Jade to display and critique during our next visit. For me this is very much out of my comfort zone as the majority of my work is carried out using studio flash both indoor or outdoor, the thought of using natural light is a tad scary to me.

The Adele photograph for Vogue US that Mark, Tom and I were discussing can be found on Vogue's website at http://www.vogue.com/magazine/article/adele-one-and-only/#/magazine-gallery/adele-one-and-only/9  I love Mert and Marcus, their work is absolutely stunning!  The photo that we discussed is so beautiful - the lighting, composition, set, clothing, styling and the makeup, it is a dream of a shot.

After the interviews we had lunch and met our stunning model Ryo who was modelling for us for the afternoon session.  I will post the afternoon in the next post, we have some great behind the scenes photos taken by Paul Cornish.

This is my first post for everything related to my fashion apprentice training with the awesome Mark Cleghorn and the Phototraining4U team.

I will keep you updated with my progress over the next year and what I get up to between the visits.