Behind the scenes video

So it looks like I completely neglected to mention that, along with assisting and shooting some behind-the-secenes stills for the Ali Johnson/Lisa Caldognetto beauty shoot, I also shot some video!

 

So, when I wasn't being a human light stand or shooting some stills I ran around with the 60D and shot some footage of the goings-on. Although I very much enjoy shooting video I really do dread editing it. This is one of only a handful of attempts I have made at a 'finished' video product but I did take things a step or two further this time.

I got to grips a bit more with using the titles in Premier Pro as well as adding pans/zooms to still images within the video. Though I think by far the best thing I learnt was how to adjust the colours. I shot a few bits on auto-whitebalance which did a massive orange fail all over it, something I didn't think about until afterwards (fixing that on a still RAW file isn't a problem!). It's by no means perfect but the whole thing looks better than the untouched footage did and I managed to make the WAY too orange footage a bit more acceptable looking.

Learning; it's good you guys.

Assisting friends

Last friday I had an opportunity to help out with a beauty shoot, not my usual thing so it was very interesting to see how it all works. I was assisting my friend and photographer Ali Johnson (AJ Imagery) as she shot the work of make-up artist Lisa Caldognetto with hair by Emma Louise and Ella Johnson as our lovely model.

I regularly forget that Ali only graduated this year, I know I've grown a lot in the three years I've been out of uni so I can only imagine how good she's going to be in that time.

This lot were shot on the 60D with the 17-40mm and the 85mm 1.8....

And these were from lovely, lovely Bessa...

               

A Balloon Ride

For his 50th birthday, my dad was given tickets for a hot air balloon ride. It took a year for the weather to cooperate but it finally happened a couple of days ago and it was well worth the wait, it was perfect.

I went along with Phoebe in another car and we did a sort of laid-back version of a storm chase, driving after them to try meet them at the landing site.

I didn't want to post too many on my website so this day was worthy of a blog to tell the story of the day.

All shot on the Canon 60D with either the 85mm f/1.8 or the 17-40mm f/4.

Some changes

I recently switched to tumblr from using this place to host my website. I like this as a blogging platform but not so much as a site, it LOOKS too much like a blog despite my best efforts changing HTML and creating pages.

I was just going to leave this here as-is, but I think I'm continue to blog here because it's comfortable. It's all the internet so it should probably be the same here or on tumblr but I feel more willing to share thoughts and words here than I do over there.

So, on the subject of thoughts and feelings and also happenings, I think it's time for some sort of update...

On Monday I finished studying for my CELTA. I have completed all my assignments and teaching practice and now just have to wait for my certificate to arrive and, in the meantime, I have a letter from the college stating I have completed the course to a satisfactory standard. This means I can now start applying for teaching jobs here in the UK and save up for my travels. This is remarkable timing, since I didn't plan for this but, I also paid of the last of my debt today. So I have no credit cards and no overdraft left to worry about, everything I earn is mine beyond rent and my phone bill. Saving can start right now. Exciting, daunting, slightly scary.

My plans are becoming a little more real. Progress.

Cambridge and other things...

Got the roll that was still in Bessa developed today. I need to start leaving it longer between shooting and developing (as I did with this one) because it makes it so much nicer to get the photos back.

Cambridge Bike Polo

This one's going to be a bit of a picture spam. I edited it down but some how I can't cut any more.