Action Aid campaign shoot

A couple of days ago I did a days shoot for the NGO Action Aid. The campaign is to raise awareness on world poverty and so they are creating a piece of campaign literature using a play on the word poverty. I thought we had two days to shoot this and hired a couple of lights to give the pictures a commercial feel as requested, however due to the dreaded budget cuts we had to try and get 8 shots in several locations in one day. Definitely not ideal and I diplomatically suggested that the shot list was very ambitious but faced with the challenge there was nothing to do but to crack on and do as much as was possible. By the end of the day, having squeezed one last shot as the light faded we had ticked of 6 shots but were very happy with the results which will be designed in a grid so that the tee-shirts read the campaign message. however we unfortunately only were able to use the lights on the first shot of the yoga as dragging them to the park would have taken far too long so I went with a flash and a reflector, shoot and run...

Ox-Tales and Sir Kingsly

This evening I was shooting an auction in aid of Oxfam at the Saatchi gallery and had the surprizing pleasure of photographing Sir Ben Kingsly. I wanted to try and get a portrait of him out of the context of the auction but the best I could muster was a head shot while he introduced the charity event.
Another candid shot of the even that I liked and shot available light was this one. I thought there was something of the John and Yoko going on...

Master of photography

Last week was quite busy for me photographically, on Weds I took the family up to Shoreditch to look at the private view of my MA work. So I guess this makes me a master of photography but of course you never stop learning and after working as a professional for over 12 years and finishing this level of education I still feel there is so much more ahead of me than behind me.
It was a pretty good turn out but we did invite around 1500 people and I guess at it's peek maybe 400-500 were crammed into The Printspace enjoying a Heineken and looking at the fruits of our collective labour. It's funny but because this was the culmination of a two year online Masters the final show was actually the first time I had met some of my fellow students. There was a good atmosphere after a couple of weeks were the pressure of delivering a show at all seemed to test some peoples diplomacy and patience. But we got there in the end and after reconsidering my display I went with a wallpaper square on the wall rather than a column which was the original idea. I think it looked pretty good and I got some very positive feedback from picture editors, photographers and the gallery owner who told me they considered it best in show.
I think the project worked best in a book and perhaps if I exhibit the work again I will add a few more pictures and a few bigger prints.