Sonoco

Here’s the latest shoot I did on Friday night. Esha, a good friend of mine from Uni is the lead singer of a band called Sonoco. The full band…according to their MySpace page is Ayesha ’street brawler’ Allen, Matt ’slap in the face’ Brown, Max ‘Dom Perignon’ Richardson & Harry ‘the puppet master’ Thuillier. They play a sort of House, Trip-Hop, Soul, Jazzy, Funk Fusion. I photographed them before a gig at the Roof Gardens in Kensington, and out of all the posed musician/band shots I’ve done, I reckon they were the most relaxed and happy to be photographed; very easy to shoot. They’re playing with Lemon Jelly (yes THE Lemon Jelly) on 26th March at Valmont in London. So if you’re not busy, get down there.

My new job on board the Africa Mercy

I say job; it is unpaid, and in fact I have to pay for my board and lodgings, as well as my transport there and back.

On May 15th until September 5th this year I’m off to Togo to work for the Mercy Ships on their flagship Africa Mercy. The Mercy Ships essentially harbour for several months in countries in western Africa providing free operations to individuals who would never otherwise get the chance receive the complex healthcare they require. I got the position as their PR photographer, so will be photographing whatever I’m instructed by their Media director all day long… portraits of individuals that have an interesting story to doctors performing eye operations.

I found this video on their website and it explains in 5 minutes just exactly what they are about.

I’m a Photographer not a Terrorist…

Many of you will have probably seen this on the news last Saturday.  It leads on rather nicely from a previous post about the rights of the photographer on the street. The protest attracted about 1500-2000 people to Trafalgar Square to protest: I’m a Photographer not aTerrorist. Police ARE allowed to stop anyone under sections (I think – haven’t looked it up…) 44 and 67 of the terrorism act. They are NOT allowed to delete anyones photos. Anyway the point is over the past few years, with increasing numbers of photographers on the street and increasing fears of terrorism since 9/11 and 7/7 police have simply been stopping people with a camera because they might be photographing something as a part of terrorism reconnaisance. I myself have been stoppped photographing a sunset behind waterloo station. It’s embarassing and in most cases, if common sense were used, totally unecessary. Anyway, if you want to find out more visit I’m a Photographer not a Terrorist.

Meanwhile, here’s a small selection of the photos I took at the protest. There’s plenty more at the facebook group so I tried to put up ones that I hadn’t seen similar too.

I’m not entirely sure who this guy above is, but he seemed to be organising a lot of it. It’s possible he’s a well-known press photographer, or maybe just a loud one, but it seemed to be he that organised a large group photo – which inevitably everyone wanted to take, and turned out more to be a photo battle between two sides.

A couple of portraits…

You may have seen Anthony Strong, one of the guys in these portraits in one of my blogs before. He’s a brilliant jazz pianist/singer/crooner, and well worth looking up if you like that sort of thing. The other photo is of his girlfriend Amy, who was kindly posing while I set up the shots…

A frozen Barnes pond

I haven’t put up a blog for a while mainly because I’ve moved to Kew in London, started a new/old job for 4 1/2 months (more on that later) and my laptop’s still buggered. So there are my excuses.

Anyway, have been nevertheless busy taking photos and have several things to put up. First is  several photos of Barnes pond when it was frozen over a couple of weeks ago.

Christmas at home

We suffered a load of snow this year, which led to the usual Dad-panic and talk of delaying Christmas day by a couple of days. It all went ahead as planned (though Royal Mail still haven’t delivered my presents!) and I managed to get a couple of nice shots of the snow. As well as a couple of photos of my Mum and Dad.

The above photo is the view from just outside the living room.

This is the Wye Valley taken on the way up the hill. My parents house is at the very bottom, at this time shrouded in the mist that sat at the bottom of the valley. I’ve seen this sight a couple of times recently but never managed to find an ideal spot to take the photo from…the search continues.

I reckon the light was just right to take this winter portrait of my Mum wrapped up warm. At the time we were just heading up the road to clear the ice a bit so my Dad could drive safely down the hill.

And here’s my Dad conked out on the same afternoon. He’d been unable to get out of Coleford, a small town several miles away and had to sleep on the floor of a friend’s the night before. Clearly he needed to catch up on sleep a bit.

Christmas shopping

Here’s a few more street shots taken in Camden, Oxford St, and Hammersmith in the week up to Christmas. Last lot for 2009. I’m moving to London in the New Year so will be building up a nice portfolio over the first few months.

Street Photography Laws

Ok, now I’m no expert at this, but I do read the British Journal of Photography each week (which I’d highly recommend to budding photographers) and they are always publicising stuff about photography rights, especially with regard to photographing on the street. They have been campaiging against police abusing the terrorism act over the past 2 years, which has been a problem stretching back way before this last weeks ‘news’ in the papers – finally they’ve cottoned on to the problem that’s been plaguing their own photographers for ages.

I found this on a website about photography and the law: ”If you’re on a public right of way – such as a public pavement, footpath or public highway – you’re free to take photographs for personal and commercial use so long as you’re not causing an obstruction to other users or falling foul of anti-Terrorism laws or even the Official Secrets Act (frankly, this one is unlikely).”

It goes on to say there’s a few exceptions, such as no professional photography in Trafalgar Square. And I think there’s been a recent law that means you have to pay to photograph in the Underground – I assume by seeking permission from Transport for London, for commercial stuff I think it’s around £5000 a day so big budget shoots only!

This recent article in the British Journal of Photography states what the Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson said yesterday on how police officers shouldn’t be stopping photographers in the Capital unless they have a very very good reason to believe they’re abusing the law.

It’s really important that people understand how important photography is in documenting current events, lifestyle, fashion etc. candidly without needing to chase up a model release form after you take one of a thousand street shots of different individuals that day. Think back to England during WWII, or the fall of the Berlin Wall, or those iconic shots of Times Square in New York from the first half of the 20th century. Great photographers like Henri Cartier-Bresson, Elliott Erwitt, Bruce Gilden or Martin Parr wouldn’t be able to make a living and provide us with those all important photos of what everyday life has been like in parts of the world where it no longer and will never exist again.

You may not recognize at the moment how important street photography by professionals and amateurs alike is at the moment, but when you look back at them in 40 or 50 years, you will.

Oxford Street

Well, here’s a few more – there were a load of others I wanted to put up, but don’t want to overdo it. I’m going to try and get to Oxford street this Saturday before Christmas and see how many stressed out last minute shoppers I can capture. Bit of mix here - a drunk behind some road works trying to open his whiskey bottle, bored people on the tube, a man peeping through a window, and for pretty much the first time in my life street fashions starting to grab my eye… anyway, comments more than welcome as usual.

The Uxbridge Road

Following up from the same style of shots I did in Monmouth, I found myself in West Ealing recently, and walking from there to Ealing Broadway took a load of street shots down the Uxbridge Road. These are a few of them. I’m not sure I would have liked these a year ago. Maybe it’s that for much of this year I’ve either been abroad in Nepal and Nigeria or down in my house in the middle of the Wye Valley away from business, but when I look at these photographs of people on the streets I wonder about their backgrounds; if they’re rich or poor, hard working or lazy, religious or agnostic, friendly or unfriendly, sad or happy; I wonder what they’re thinking about, if they’re just engrossed in their usual daily routine, if they are worried about the future, the current recession, or what to get their loved one for Christmas.

In January I move back to London after three years and I’m looking forward to continuing my ‘Walk in London’ project, this time including more shots like this.