Christmas

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas! I'm just going to stick up a few pointless photos of my Christmas for you to look at. My Christmas was nice, if a bit short-lived, I've gone back to Blockbuster for the holidays & as a result, only had Christmas Eve & Christmas Day off, which was no fun, especially as the Boxing Day rush does not extend off the highstreet into Blockie, where we have the same sale on as we did before Christmas & haven't even bothered to cut the price of the Christmas selection boxes...







Christmas isn't Christmas without some exciting socks from my aunt. She may well have out done herself this year.



My Dad got me a backdrop, which my brother & I set up & tried out in the dining room, however, even with the table blocking the entrance to the kitchen, there wasn't enough space...the lights were pretty much on top of him & the camera was inches away from his face. This posed several problems - it was boiling, I couldn't light the backdrop to conceal the creases & well, I couldn't really light it properly at all. Still, I like this candid shot:



We're having to send the backdrop back as one of the stands was cracked when we got it out of the box. After that I will concentrate on getting the creases out & finding somewhere practical to set it up. I'm hoping my room at university is big enough to actually fashion some half-decent set-up. But, even though I've been living there for the last three months I can't envision how big the room is. Fingers crossed.

In other news, I had a beauty shoot last week & now that I have a new mouse (I cannot stand using my Macbook's trackpad) courtesy of my brother, I shall endeavour to get them up. I might also do some university work this week. As I have a five thousand word essay on vampires that I've yet to start...not to mention the Economics...

Chelsey

I had a shoot with an absolutely stunning model on Tuesday, Chelsey. Unfortunately, it wasn't really meant to be. We ended up bumping into a lost dog & spent over an hour trailing around Hampstead with said dog in tow waiting for the dog warden to come collect him. In actual fact, he was adorable (if a bit stinky) & I wanted to take him home. Though, a third floor Camden council flat with five students is hardly a good home for a dog. It was microchipped though, so he's back with his owners now.

The dog in question:



We ended up doing a brief & freezing shoot in Hampstead Heath, here are a few of the shots:

FlairNow

Latest FlairNow is out, featuring my Cleopatra photos.

& some shots from that shoot:

Queensway shoot & Flairnow

A while ago I had another shoot with Yinsey, this time with another model; Charlene & make-up artist Sarah. They were an absolutely fantastic team!

Having spent a considerable amount of time locked up in Costa getting ready, we were confronted with a grey & rainy Queensway as our location for our shoot. However, we found a little back street, with some shelter for the rainier moments & I have to say, I'm very pleased with the results & had a great time. Even if it was absolutely freezing. Our final stop was Charlene's bathroom, as the light was diminishing too much for our final look. Not exactly ideal lighting for such fantastic make-up, however, with some photoshopping (courtesy of my lovely models) the shots turned out really well. Then Yinsey & I had to do some serious running to get back home before the last trains.

The team:


Yinsey, Sarah & Charlene

& some of the final products:







More on Flickr



Also some of my shots from the Cleopatra shoot are being used in the promotional images for the next issue of FlairNow.

Cleopatra & Katzi

It's all gone a bit quiet on the photography front for a while, but, hopefully I'm back on track now. Last week I had a Cleopatra shoot with some lovely models & make-up artists in Queensway for a magazine submission. A few behind the scenes shots for you:







The final images won't be revealed until it's out.



In other news, the Katzi website is now up, which features some of the pictures from the bridal jewellery shoot back in May.

Katzi Jewellery

I've been pretty busy with [avoiding revision for] exams lately, however, last week I did two photoshoots for Katzi bridal jewellery, with an absolutely fantastic team. The first of which was at Kenwood House, with a traditional English Rose feel & the second was in & around London (complete with sixteen seater red mini bus which we somehow managed to completely fill with wedding dresses, make-up & snacks) with an edgier feel.

Anyway, here are some "behind the scenes" shots because I always find those intriguing...



Emma having her hair retouched at Kenwood House.



Setting up Annika's second location of the day.



The whole city shoot team (bar Fran & Annika, who were the models earlier in the day).



Amber's wrap-time joy.

Here's a sneaky glimpse of the finished item, from the earlier, more traditional shoot:




I'm aiming to get a lot of shoots organised for the summer once my exams finish on 13th. I'm also looking into taking evening classes in Photography in order to gain some sort of qualification & supplement my somewhat limited technical abilities. Hopefully I can do that over the summer, to fill the ridiculous amounts of time I'll have, if not, then I'll start when I get back to London for the new term in September.