Not a 100% true, but over a year we followed Garin College students to take the photos for the latest Prospectus.
Whether it was school sports, outdoor education, dance and drama presentations, classroom activities, hostel life… we were there to capture the moment.
Check out the Garin College website and download a copy of the Prospectus.
We have had many requests for all kind of video productions over the past months so we have decided to add it to our services.
The video below was produced for HARCOURTS Real Estate. The owner of the house had moved to Christchurch and the house in the Marlborough Sounds was empty. To make the video more attractive we persuaded the owner to appear in front of the camera to talk about the place and its features to give it a ‘personal’ touch. A different approach to the usual Real Estate Video.
The video is now linked to a listing with HARCOURTS Picton website and has attracted within the first month more than 60 views from Europe, Asia, Australia and New Zealand.
UPDATE: After a total of 250 views, the house is now SOLD.
The brief for taking images of the Opawa Wine bottle range was a bit unusual.
“ We want to present the bottles on flat round river stones from the Opawa River and bathed in Moonlight because the half moon is on the logo / label ” !
Hmm… shooting outdoor on location won’t work. Too many uncontrollable elements to consider. And how to create a moonlight beam to bath the bottles in ?!
So I took an image of the river with moon reflection, built a bed of flat round river stones for the bottles in the studio and created a bluish moon-glow lighting for the background and around the bottles and a neutral light beam from above to make them pop out. All components blended in Photoshop and a bit of magic to make the moonlight beam visible and here we have what the client requested.
Client’s comment: ” Thanks for this – I love it ! ”
Last weekend our three teens attended a photo shoot at Hair @ Monaco with photographer Tabby Toxic. See her photos here.
The twins got their amazing dresses from Trouble & Fox, a quirky little store located at Shop 6, Bank Lane, Nelson (near the Saturday markets).
Between the “official” sessions, we pulled the kids out for some fun-fashion-shots. How do you like the images below ? Our first try on fashion photography…
It was one of those days, where everything fitted. Not too hot, not too cold, no wind and plenty of sunshine for a great day shooting out in the Marlborough Sounds.
Jessie Creedmore, Director of The Marketing Department had contacted me with a request for high quality advertising photographs for The Helmsman, a company who offers luxury cruises in the Marlborough Sounds, departing from Havelock. Philip Crothall and his team cruise up to 25 guests in style and comfort on the Nirvana, a 18.5 metre Maritimo luxury vessel.
Philip wanted some photos to show the size and opulence of the Nirvana and the splendid service his team provides. So we set out in the morning with the Nirvana and another slightly smaller vessel for me to shoot from. Two couples joined us as photo models and Jeanette prepared and served plenty of delicious food and wine to survive a busy 13 hours photo job.
Kelly Bryant, the captain of the Nirvana decided to show us some action by riding with high speed through the waves our boat created. I mean, pushing a multi million dollar luxury cruiser through the sea spray is not what you see every day.
Working without an assistant I was totally exhausted at the end of the day, but this photo session finally resulted in the images Philip wanted for his business.
Check out The Helmsman web-site for more info and photos and have a look at the interior Virtual Tour we produced too.
Over two days I photographed ITO students on their activities in a designed Outward Bound scholarship programme. The programme is geared specifically towards young apprentices and puts 26 like-minded trades people together in the Outward Bound camp in the Marlborough Sounds, to find their outer limits, both physically and mentally.
Stuart, an Outward Bound instructor and my guide and minder for the next days, I met on Wednesday morning at 8 a.m. on a foggy and wet day. We started the hiking trip 8.30 on sea level and reached Mount Cullen’s summit (1055m) 3 hours later, where we caught up with one of the two ITO watches who had spent the night in the bush.
After a hearty lunch between the moss covered trees …
… backpacks got shouldered and shoelaces were tightened …
… we started the descent where I took photos in a non-interfering way as requested by the instructors. Although a few times I was close to yell out “go that way” because it looked better over there.
Running downhill over rocks and roots with a back-pack and the camera in one hand to capture the boys from all angles …
… was a bit of a suicide mission as I landed pretty hard on my back several times.
Sometimes the boys were lost…
… but good equipment …
… and a team who had just learnt how to use it …
… and we found the way down and finally reached the truck at 5:30 p.m.
It was a long and exhausting day and my shoulders, back and knees were really sore!
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The following day started at 8 a.m. with ITO student group shots. Despite the rain the guys were in a good mood…
… because they had no idea what would follow.
It is not everybody’s piece of cake to be suspended from the side of a mountain with a metal clip and a length of rope.
Stuart made sure that I was properly secured when I climbed along the highest point of the wet rock-face to capture the action from above. The slippery rock left an uneasy feeling…
After a quick lunch break we drove out to the river to capture the other ITO watch on a two day’s kayak trip.
Getting ready and listening to instructions…
… a safety briefing and no fear …
… and off into the wild waters …
… but not everyone can walk on water.
It didn’t take long and these highly motivated apprentices had mastered the tricky rapids.
Stuart was fantastic. Without his help and knowledge of how to get to the best spots, many images weren’t possible. We heaved a huge canoe uphill and downhill and over boulder banks to get to the best spot. He waited patiently in the rain for me to finish shooting. A big kudos to him. As Stuart said, I participated in a miniature Outward Bound course over the past two days.
Overall, I experienced some fairly tough conditions. My camera and equipment got soaked a few times, my body aches and the bruises are colourful. 
The brief for the job was simple. A dozen shots of the new chief winemaker Patrick Materman at the winery between 9 and 10 a.m.
Hold on, a dozen portraits in 1 hour ? We are talking business portraits here and not snap-shots !?
That is 5 minutes per portrait and includes moving from location to location !?
Well…
Anyway, it turned out that we had not even one hour for the shoot because Patrick was busy with another event. But in the end we were able to produce enough images to make the client happy.
The day was grey and miserable with dark clouds over Blenheim but the client insisted on some architecture photos of the entry to the winery.
A bit of Photoshop magic did the trick and resulted in quite a dramatic image. Dark clouds all around and just a bit of blue sky behind the tower. Is that a sign from above…?
On 17 May I had a meeting with David James of David James Tree Services. David told me that he needs some commercial images of his core business for the new website and print advertising. Deadline was the 2 June to get the new website life on 3 June.
2 1/2 weeks – no problem, I said. I am available for you from next Thursday. But if you believe it or not, from that day on, we had only terrible weather. Conditions you don’t want for advertising images. Just rain and grey days…
In the end, I had a 1/2 day of halfway decent blue sky and a streak of sunlight now and then. Not easy conditions but check out David James’s new website (especially the slide-show) to see for yourself what we where able to produce.
Working from the bucket truck.
