My News Archives - Page 10 of 13 - Tim Gander, Photographer, Bristol

October 13, 2015October 13, 2015 by Tim Gander

It Isn’t All About The Gear – only a little bit

Canon 5D original or MKI camera body with a 40mm f/2.8 pancake lens attached.

It’s fair to say, I was never your typical “gear head” photographer. Back in the days of film I learned to respect whatever kit I had and got the most out of it, even if it wasn’t top-of-the-range.

My first professional kit consisted of a Nikon FE2 and a Kiron 28-70mm f/2.8 lens, which I bought secondhand and even that needed a repair before I could use it. I don’t think Kiron exist any more. Nikon? well I think they’re still around, but I use Canon…

To me, my cameras and lenses have always been just kit for the job. I don’t rush out and buy the latest equipment whenever a new camera comes out. There always has to be a good reason to do so, especially since the digital camera market “came of age” and digital SLR cameras got to a stage where there wasn’t really a bad one to be had, just different levels of ruggedness or fancier features at different price points.

Ok, I do get a little excited when I buy a new camera body, but mainly it has to prove itself to me and earn my trust and respect over the course of several assignments.

I’d say the Canon 5D MKIII body which I’ve had for well over a year has done that. I had the MKII before it and never liked it. It had too many short-comings for me to warm to it. I usually felt I was getting the shots in spite of the camera, not because of it. Perversely, the 10-year-old 5D original body is a classic and I still own one. I use it in spite of its age because in some circumstances it’s really helpful to use two cameras at once, and it’s always essential to have a backup camera should the main one fail.

In fact I used the MKI body alongside the MKIII on a job last week and it performed exactly as I required. And when I delivered the images, the client didn’t say, “We hate these, they were taken on a 10-year-old camera!” In fact they loved the pictures and will get lots of use from them.

The fact is, a camera built in the days of yore can, in certain circumstances, work better than some of the really high-resolution camera bodies available today. I think the MKIII has more than double the resolution of the MKI, and sometimes this can cause problems. It all comes down to knowing how a particular camera will perform with a particular lens under specific circumstances; something I’m not sure all photographers take note of.

For my assignment this afternoon I’ll probably stick to the MKIII because I know it’ll give me the best results for the circumstances I’m working in. Horses for courses, cameras for… um… well, you get the picture.

September 15, 2015 by Tim Gander

Fun Experience in Frome

This week is mainly a thank you to Frome visitors Imogen and Ben who became accidental models when I was out and about last week with work experience photography student Becky Collis.

It was a quiet Monday afternoon when we took a stroll up Catherine Hill seeking a photographic opportunity for Becky to get to grips with. I spotted this stylish couple, classic film cameras in-hand, walking up the hill and approached them to ask if they would pose for us for a few minutes.

They were gracious enough to agree and patient enough to let Becky and I take turns at posing and photographing them. I decided we should apply newspaper rules to the task, so the photo had to have a news feel to it, would require captions and a speedy turnaround at the end.

The photos below show Becky in action, followed by her portrait of Imogen and Ben, then her action shot of me followed by my version. Just click to see them larger and to cycle through the set.

07/09/2015 Student Imogen Beard, aged 19, of Trowbridge, Wiltshire, will soon be starting her fine art degree at Chelsea College of Art, London while her boyfriend Benjamin Lincoln (18) of Bradford on Avon is about to start his BA in Music Technology at Falmouth University. Keen photographers, they enjoy taking pictures in Frome in their spare time.

Photo © Becky Collis

Becky caught some nice light outside Kushi clothing store, who also kindly allowed us use of their bench, while I opted to bring them away from the window front. The light wasn’t as pretty, but I got the separation I wanted from the background. My preference would have been to use portable lighting to lift the daylight, but this was also an exercise in minimal equipment (precisely because I didn’t have portable lighting with me).

Within about 40 minutes we’d returned to the office, processed and captioned our images and delivered them to online galleries in the same way as we would have delivered them to clients. Job done and a nice little exercise.

So thank you Imogen and Ben (good luck with your studies!) and thank you Kushi for the loan of your bench. It was the perfect bench test!

in My News 0 comments

September 1, 2015 by Tim Gander

Welcome Break

Welcome back after my holiday hiatus.

One of the wonderful things about doing what I do is that whenever I go on holiday, I always have a professional photographer with me. Not everyone is so fortunate and there is even a growing trend to hire a photographer to take your holiday snaps for you.

Don’t worry though, I’m only going to talk briefly about my Summer* holiday and show you just a couple of the photos I took during my week off. The point being, as much as this blog is for showcasing what I do for my clients (and hopefully for you if you become one of them), it’s sometimes good to share what I do outside of my paid work so you get to see how I think when I’m not tied to a photographic brief.

My trip this year involved a week’s camping in South Devon; Slapton, to be precise, and to be even more pedantic, during a week-long weather warning from the Met Office. Yes, it rained quite a lot and got so windy that my windbreak broke.

In spite of all that, I had a wonderful time relaxing with my lovely partner. Long walks (we clocked up in the region of 25 miles in the first 3 days) and some of the most incredible seafood I’ve ever eaten.

And when I’m on holiday, yet still carrying a camera, what do I look for in a photograph? Well I do occasionally find myself taking some of the same clichéd photos that any tourist takes, but mostly I look for something unusual to sum up an experience in a less obvious way than simply lifting my camera and recording what’s in front of me.

It’s always a balance between enjoying the holiday and its moments and using the camera to record them. I certainly resist taking photos until I see something I really want to capture, and rarely trouble myself with anything that thousands of people will already have captured ad-nauseam.

Hence the two images here. Both are simple and both lack any real context. Looking at them, you wouldn’t necessarily know where they were taken, but for me they form the kernel of much bigger memories. I hope though that in spite of that, you can see some beauty in them that doesn’t rely on you knowing the context in which they were taken, so they stand on their own as pictures worth looking at.

Enough artyfarty nonsense, here they are.

Three yachts in the far distance on flat, grey water with a moody, grey sky above. Taken from near Start Bay, South Devon.

Looking up from the base of a bamboo copse at Coleton Fishacre House, South Devon.

*I heard a lovely quote the other day, I’m only sorry I don’t know who originally came up with it, but it goes “I love the English Summer. It’s my favourite day of the year.”

in My News / Personal Work 0 comments

August 11, 2015 by Tim Gander

In Summery [sic]

If you’re currently on holiday, sitting in a caravan on a rain-soaked and windswept holiday park in the UK, I feel your pain.

I used to take photos for holiday park brochures, mainly of the static caravan variety, and it was always a task made unpredictable by the English weather.

A man with a walking stick walks his golden labrador dog on the beach in the mist at Cresswell, Northumberland, UK

Foggy Cresswell, Northumberland 2004

The photo featured here was taken after I’d been held up on a park in Northumberland by poor weather which persisted for two or three days. It got to the point where, having done every conceivable interior photo, I literally couldn’t shoot anything outdoors that would have made the park and its surroundings look like a great Summer destination as the mist, or sea fret as it’s locally known, had set in and wasn’t going to shift.

Eventually I had to abandon the shoot and drive home, which back then meant a six-hour drive to Portsmouth.

There is no moral or sage advice attached to this tale of inconvenience, except to say that it being August and holiday time, I shall be suspending blog posts until September 1st.

I hope that whatever you plan to do this Summer, wherever you go, you get the weather you want and return refreshed and ready to face Christmas merchandise in the shops and an Indian Summer which will no doubt be in full flow once you’re back at your desk.

Bye for now!

in My News 0 comments

August 4, 2015August 4, 2015 by Tim Gander

This Hamster Needs Feeding

Perhaps one of the toughest aspects of making a profession out of photography is that of maintaining inspiration. I love what I do, and I love working with businesses to create the images they need for their projects. Sometimes it can seem a little formulaic and routine, such as when I’m shooting 30 executive headshots in a board room, but even then I enjoy meeting all the different people, having a chat and laugh with them, relaxing them into their photo session while simultaneously ensuring the results are top notch. I never tire of this.

Other times I get to work on projects with which I can get more creative – just look back through my recent posts and case studies to get a flavour of the kinds of jobs I’m talking about, but inspiration for everything I do has to come from somewhere and I’ve become increasingly aware that over the last few years I’ve been neglecting to feed my creative soul.

Back when I worked on newspapers I would take inspiration from colleagues and competitors. I would see their work every day, and it would spur me on. Now that I tend to work in isolation, this source is a little dry.

My personal projects help feed into, inform and inspire me for my paid assignments, but even these require some kind of external input or I’ll find myself running like a hamster in a wheel, feet going like crazy, but not actually getting anywhere new in a creative sense.

I’ve started to address this issue. I’ve realised that while I do spend time looking at images online, following favoured Instagram accounts and the twitter feeds of some really incredible photographers, I also need to see printed photography, which forces you to sit and consider rather than just flicking to the next image as one tends to do online. Plus it’s an edited source, rather than the constant rush of throwaway pics in which the good stuff tends to get buried.

Front cover of Huck magazine, taken on an angle against a multi-coloured striped rug.

huck magazine special edition

UNION #1 out now

So when I saw that Huck magazine (whose twitter feed I follow and enjoy) were bringing out a special edition, I bought it. Packed with inspirational people in all kinds of fields, all photographed differently by a wide variety of photographers, as much as anything it was the pleasure of seeing photographs in print again (and sniffing the printed page… you know what I mean) which has helped wake my creative soul again.

Likewise when I saw that an old photographer friend of mine, James Cheadle, was working on a new magazine, I had to get my hands on a copy.

Like Huck, James’ magazine, Union, is a stylish, high-quality publication beautifully printed (mmmm smell the print!). Where the Huck Special Edition profiles different creative people and entrepreneurs, Union consists of fascinating photojournalistic articles about gangs, drugs, tribes, religions, bikers… the list goes on. It’s a hell of an undertaking and I really hope it thrives because there seem to be so few outlets for this style of photojournalism in mainstream newspapers and magazines.

So now to the next step. I have to take the inspiration I get from the likes of Huck and Union and start applying it to my own work again and stop being the hamster in the wheel. I’m taking the time to get off the wheel, and fill my cheeks with yummy inspiration.

in Industry Comment / My News / Reviews 0 comments

June 10, 2015June 10, 2015 by Tim Gander

Fancy a Challenge?

Last week was huge fun as I was booked to cover the IRTE Skills Challenge 2015 for the Society of Operations Engineers. The event, hosted by S&B Automotive Academy in Bristol spanned four days and involved teams of bus and coach technicians tackling challenges from diagnosing electrical faults in a wiring loom to repairing a metal box section in the bodyshop.

It was full-on and all-go as I set about making sure I had a good selection of photos of each of the 50+ competitors over the course of the event, as well as group photos, detail shots and general views.

The pictures will be used on the SOE website, on social media and in press releases and you can see an edited selection of the pictures here.

This was my first year covering the event which has been running for 5 years now, but hopefully I’ll be invited back next year. I was really impressed with how helpful everyone was, especially the candidates who were under pressure of time and having to concentrate while I worked around them.

It was a fascinating challenge to see how to get the best angles and light the subjects in the most effective way. Welding shots are always fun as they have to be done through a welding mask (or risk permanent eye damage!), but here’s one of my favourite images showing competitor Tim Laws Chapman of FirstGroup grinding a tidy finish to his welded section in the body shop.

Tim Laws Chapman of Arriva grinds a metal section he's just welded. He's wearing eye and ear protection as well as gloves as sparks fly.

in Case Studies / My News 0 comments

May 12, 2015May 12, 2015 by Tim Gander

Tweaked Fees

Those of you familiar with my pricing structure will be aware that it’s based around the gallery delivery service, whereby I upload photos to the client’s gallery and the client gets to download what they need, when they need it. They can request access for their colleagues or designers – anyone who requires access can have it, but the gallery always remains secure to the client.

This service has been running incredibly well, but it occurred to me that the most basic package, Gallery Essential, was basically a waste of space on my website. Nobody used it because it was designed back when the economy was going in reverse. The idea was a business could get photos taken and held in the gallery for a very basic fee and then they would just buy individual images as and when they needed them and budget allowed.

Screen grab of Tim Gander's photography fee structure.

A new structure to help more clients

However, it became clear to me that most businesses want at least a basic set of images back from a shoot for immediate use and were always willing to upgrade to either Gallery 30 (now renamed Gallery Standard) or more commonly to Gallery Unlimited, which is by far the most popular package.

The other issue this presented was that it left me no obvious place on my website in which to inform potential clients that a package was available for shoots lasting just an hour or two. I hope I’ve fixed this now by replacing Gallery Essential with Gallery Starter, which gives a client up to two hours on-site for £250 and with unlimited image downloads.

The reason I don’t limit the number of image downloads on this most basic fee is because a typical two-hour shoot will be booked for covering a small to medium PR event or a short portrait session. The numbers of images taken by the end of this kind of shoot shouldn’t result in an unreasonable amount of post-shoot editing time, which is built into all my fees.

I still have limits on the Gallery Standard package because in half-day and full-day shoots the image numbers climb rapidly, and really these larger packages are aimed at different requirements.

In addition to the new Gallery Starter I’ve increased the number of image downloads included in Gallery Standard, and yet most clients will still want the sheer simplicity of Gallery Unlimited. It’ll be interesting to see how these changes work, but if you have any (sensible) suggestions, I’ll be happy to consider them. You know where to find me!

in My News / Uncategorized 0 comments

April 21, 2015 by Tim Gander

News of Frome Views

Earlier this year I left the Alamy stock image library in order to preserve my professional integrity (I won’t bore you with details here), since which time I’ve been giving some thought about my future relationship with stock photography in general.

I’ve never been a great fan of stock photography partly because I always prefer to work on commission, where a client knows what they want and therefore I know I’m taking pictures which have a definite purpose. Stock photos mostly exist for no reason at all and will never be published; the idea of taking photos which just languish on a server somewhere seems sad to me.

Additionally, because stock photography is a numbers game, a photographer has to dedicate themselves pretty much full time to taking stock photos in order to make a living from it. The lack of motivation I have for doing nothing but stock shots all day combined with the exclusion of all commissioned work would kill the joy I have for my job.

Having said all that, I have decided there is room in my professional life to spend time taking pictures which interest me and which might also have a stock image value. I don’t have to offer them through an agency and I can set my own prices, but there is an additional benefit which you don’t get with a stock library, namely that by hosting the photos on my own gallery, I create content which is indexed by Google. It creates another small piece in the search engine optimisation jigsaw.

Even if I never sell a photo, the photos I host will have the benefit of helping to attract search result enquiries. I can adjust, chop and change what I offer, which will also signal to Google that I’m an active, creative photographer based in Somerset. They also show potential clients another side to what I do and might offer inspiration for their next project. All of this can only happen by keeping the images closely tied to my own website. When they’re held remotely by a stock library, the link between the image and the creator is weakened.

The images here are just a small taster, and though the collection itself is very small at the moment it will grow and you can see the full set here.

An Independents for Frome board in the shape of a speech bubble is erected on a wooden baton in a resident's garden.

An "I'm For Frome" board displayed in a garden in Frome

Looking at The Cheese and Grain building across the Market Car Park in Frome, Somerset

The Cheese and Grain in Frome town centre

A view from the South side of the Cheese and Grain car park with the old foundry buckets, blossom trees, pedestrians, cyclists and cars and the Button Bridge in the distance.

Cheese and Grain car park, Frome, Somerset

Looking towards High Street from Market Cross car park in Frome Town Centre, Somerset.

A view of Frome town centre in Somerset

A view of Frome's Bath Street taken from Cork Street showing the shop buildings, road, traffic and pedestrians

Bath Street, Frome, Somerset

Cheese-maker cuts a round of cheese at Frome Super Market

December: Frome Christmas Super Market, including delicious cheeses from Somerset

in Industry Comment / My News 0 comments

April 14, 2015April 27, 2015 by Tim Gander

All Dressed Up…

Not all my work involves taking portraits of business people in offices, though it’s fair to say a lot of what I do is exactly that.

Just before Easter I started on a project with BBSRC, one of the UK’s research councils, to produce a set of images of their facilities for use in their new website, on social media and in printed reports – in fact all their corporate communications. They’re moving away from using generic stock wherever possible and towards featuring their own research scientists and facilities to better communicate what they do.

This first stage of the project required some forethought and planning, because I was going to visit research units where biosecurity is a consideration. In other words, I couldn’t just walk in from the outside, with my camera, and start snapping away.

It wasn’t a full “hazmat” situation, but I was required to take a shower and change into supplied underwear, scrubs, disposable boiler suit, gloves, hair cover and face mask before going in, and although my camera gear was unlikely to cause a problem, I opted to use it for the most part inside a waterproof housing. Not least because at a future date, I’m going to have to use the housing in a facility requiring even greater biosecurity than at this one, so it was a good opportunity to try using the camera in the housing while wearing a face mask and gloves.

Thankfully I didn’t have to spend the entire day shooting like this because an underwater camera housing is rather like a penguin; graceful under water, unbelievably clumsy on dry land. It was great practice and I learned a few things about what I could and could not do when working this way, but it didn’t half make my hands ache as I tried to work the lens and controls through the PVC camera housing. I also discovered that with the face mask, my view into the viewfinder would steam up every time I breathed out. I did a lot of breathing control during this session!

To respect the client’s licensing, I won’t be sharing the photos I took for them here, but as the project progresses I hope I can show you some behind-the-scenes and outtakes along the way.

in My News 4 comments

February 17, 2015May 11, 2015 by Tim Gander

Tunes On, Pop-Up and Drop In

I tried something a bit different yesterday, some might even call it radical, but let’s not get carried away.

Some background first; My office is based in a shared work hub in Frome in lovely Somerset. Here I can do my editing and admin and because the building hosts several other businesses, I have contact with a range of people working in everything from the charity sector to web developers, app developers, event stylists and many more. There’s even an oil rig support business here, which I suppose is handy for the North Sea.

A portrait photography setup with lights, backdrop and camera on a tripod.

My go-anywhere portrait studio is perfect
for business headshots.

Over the past year or so many new businesses have taken up office space at the work hub as it’s expanded, and I realised there might be an opportunity to help them with a simple, social media portrait session.

Normally if I go to a single business to spend time taking corporate portraits I’ll charge a minimum of £250+vat, and more often than not it turns into a half-day at between £450 and £600, but this would be prohibitive for many of the micro businesses based in the hub. So how about setting up a pop-up studio in the communal space and offering a quick portrait session to anyone who wanted to come along and just charge for the images they download?

Obviously I had to keep the deal simple and decided to offer a no-sitting-fee session with downloads starting at just £30 including VAT for a small file suitable for LinkedIn, Twitter and the like, with a rising scale of fees according to the size of file downloaded.

The day went pretty well, especially since it was a first time for this event. I came in for 08:30 am to set up my studio, organised some tunes to add a relaxing ambience to the space and made test shots before the first arrival.

Black and white business portrait of David Evans of Ghost Ltd

The portraits are designed to be simple and clear so they’ll work right down to avatar sizes.

I had a steady trickle of people (I wouldn’t say I was killed in the rush) and I got the impression that even some of those less keen to be photographed actually quite enjoyed the experience.

I delivered the images in personal galleries to each of the sitters just two hours ago and the portraits have already started to sell!

What was even more encouraging was the number of people who expressed an interest in getting more

photography organised in future for things like website refreshes, so there was a promotional side-effect to my cunning plan too.

It’s possible I’ll turn this into an annual or even six-monthly event because I’m sure as word gets around, more people will want to sign up. In the coming days I’m going to make contact with other hubs in the area to see if they would like to host something similar. This little idea could grow.

in Case Studies / My News 4 comments

« Previous