Sep 212011
 

Last couple of weeks have been a strange time consisting of a variety of jobs and the holiday that almost wasn’t. It started quietly enough with images shot on spec of Peter Andre dropping into WH Smiths Meadowhall to sign copies of his two new children’s books “The Happy Birthday Party” and “A New Day at School”. That was followed by a shoot for Atteys Solicitors who had a good news story involving Cupcakes and “The Sweet Taste of Success” then finally a short job on Friday of a Lottery winner from Rotherham who had bought himself a very nice motorbike with some of his winnings.

Then after that with nothing more on the diary the plan was for a weeks caravan holiday at Cleethorpes close to the beach, quiet, relaxed, don’t care about weather, plenty of dog walking and traditional Fish n Chips. Well that was the plan until the phone rang, and rang, and…… well you get the picture (excuse the pun).

The first job was on Saturday shooting the Walkers Hot Crisps tour handing out free hot crisps to members of the public in Sheffield with the help of Celebrity Master Chef 2010 and Holby City/Spooks star Lisa Faulkner. The results included some very nice portraits of Lisa.

The Second Job was Tuesday for St Dunstan’s a charity founded in 1915 to

help blind ex-service men and women lead independent and fulfilling lives.”

Three visually impaired ex-service men had stopped in at Sheffield St Dunstan’s centre on Fullwood road during their epic 372 mile Centre2Centre March the guys are stopping off at all of charities Centres. The last centre will be St Dunstan’s new £12 million rehabilitation and training centre in Llandudno. I hope they make it in time, as part of their challenge is carry the ‘key’ with them to the new Llandudno facility and open the building when they get there. Having met Billy Charlie and Chris I have no doubt that they will especially after the showed me some of the technology they have with them to keep them en route, a driver a car networked smart phones & tablet, mobile internet and Google maps. This was a job well worth travelling back from Cleethorpes to do.

The third Job, its a little miss leading to refer to it as that, was a couple of shifts for the Rotherham Advertiser meaning we had to leave early so I could work Friday and Saturday but that’s just the nature of being a freelance professional News and PR (public relations) photographer

Despite having to cut the holiday short, at both ends, we still managed to enjoy ourselves. I even found time to take some holiday pictures what do you think?

May 092011
 

Public Relations Photography

Something that seems to have become an endangered  species in Public Relations Photography is booking two jobs in a day. According to my diary it was going to be a fairly straightforward day with one booking. The brief  shoot “behind the scenes” images of the 888.com sponsored Premier League Darts at Sheffield Motorpoint Arena for Sky Preview Magazine, a publication aimed at licensees who use Sky sporting broadcasts to help bring in customers.

Public Relations Phone Call

The day before the Darts my phone rings and a second clients needs a Public Relations job shooting the same day as Skys. At this point Murphy’s law will generally kick in dictating that either

  1. The two jobs are at the same time and on the same day.
  2. The two jobs are the same day, aren’t at the same time  but they do overlap
  3. The two jobs are the same day, don’t overlap but the distance between locations makes photographing them both impossible.

It looked like number three would be the problem. The second Public Relations job was in Cleethorpes on the east coast. A client needed  the interior layout of Halletts Lifestyle convenience store and some of their staff photographing. The store had just won a national award as Blakemore Wholesale/ Lifestyle Retailer of the Year 2010/11. The job was urgent, a plus for me as it meant the client was happy with a morning shoot and booking number two had just become booking number one.  I had, for once, given Murphy the slip and had two jobs on the diary.

By 09:45 I had driven the 75 miles to Cleethorpes and was already working. By 15:05 I had made it back to the office edited, processed, captioned and distributed the digital images to the client. With just enough time to produce an invoice and grab something to eat I was off to the Premier League Darts.

One of the countless things I love about being a full time professional Press & Public Relations Photographer is the variety. Going from shooting  the aisles of traditional a seaside corner shop, to the showmanship and razzmatazz of  televised Premier League Darts is nothing if not varied.

The Double Page Spread in the Sky Preview Magazine

 

If you want to see more examples of my Public Relations Photography visit my home page