Odette, walls and lights

A videographer friend of mine wanted to film me doing a shoot with a musician for his portfolio, so we decided to approach the fantastic Odette who has graced this blog a few times before.

We all met up one Sunday afternoon in a local business park-not the most glamorous location on first viewing, but when you learn how to use a location suddenly the most mundane wall or stairs can become interesting with the right angle and some lighting.....

Our first image is a wooden wall that houses the bins for all the local businesses, I had great slanted beams that drew your attention to Odette, especially when I used a grid on a portable flash aimed at her face witch left the light to fall off  from the centre.

Second image down is a staircase that is just behind the wooden wall in the first image, I changed the lighting to a flash with an umbrella box to camera right pointing down to Odette who was sitting on the steps, I used the lead in lines of the hand rail to guide your eye into the image.

Third image down is a metal wall that is to the right of the stairs, I liked the juxtaposition of the smooth wall and the grasses with Odette slightly to the right of the image.

Fourth image is the same location but with Odette over to the edge of the frame so it could be used as a flyer as it has some empty space for text to go over if required.

Fifth image is in the studio against a white background, it's a simple portrait of Odette with her guitar, lit with an umbrella box directly in front of her and angled down to get some shadows under the chin.
Many thanks to Odette for the shoot as it was a cold November day and she dressed for summer for the images!

Charlotte Campbell

I had a chance of photographing the lovely Charlotte Campbell last week-she was on as support for Paul Carella and his band at the Kingston College Theatre.
She has a great voice and a charming personality and really interacted with the audience, she is currently recording her album, certainly someone to look out for....read more about her here

Ian Todd

Below is Ian Todd, captured here mid song at Jagz open mike, he sings some great melancholy blues songs and has a fantastic image.
To hear more brilliant artists performing for free! nip down to Jagz on Tuesday evening, grab a beer and relax, come and say hello to me-i'm the one at the front with the camera....

Instruments at peace....

Occasionally during breaks in filming or photographing in the studio, i like to look at the instruments laying about.
I saw the cymbals on this drum kit catching the reflections from our video lights, so with a long lens to compress the image i took a few shots and turned them to black and white.

In this image, one of the guitarist had laid his guitar down on an amp to go to listen to the latest take, i liked the composition of the two crossed guitars against the black backdrop so i took a couple of images.....

Paul Carella

Paul Carella and his band came down to Charborough Studios recently to shoot a video with us.
They recorded a brilliant new song called 'Electric to Touch' and the team was there to film it
They are a great bunch of blokes-all very talented and professional, i took some behind the scenes images as you can see below...

A few weeks later Paul had his EP Launch at The Kingston Theatre, the Charborough team went along for a night out..... Paul was supported by the lovely Charlotte Campbell and the the fantastic Caddy Cooper