I was recently commissioned as the photographer to cover the presentation event for East Midlands Ambulance Service NHS Trust based in Nottingham. The Trust were proud to receive the award for the World’s First Multi-Control Room Accreditation.

Everyone remarked on the size of the award itself (A1 from my guessing!) and we had to make sure this appeared in all shots. The shoot was on behalf of Stuart Hollis Photography and the full folio can be seen here.

What do you think of this site by the way? I’m really happy with it and it has been quick and painless to produce and update thanks to Tom at TADJU Design. The site’s linked to a CMS so I can update regularly (and we all know that search engines love new content) and linked to Photoshop Lightroom for the gallery images; and has plug-ins to enable me to send newsletters and for users to subscribe.

In recent years I’ve project managed the production of a number of sites including this one, Proventure Consulting and Elevate East Lancashire; Tom has produced many web projects in both agency and freelance capacities. His work can be viewed at his website, here: www.tadju.com.

We’re more than happy to use this experience to produce sites for others (and, in fact, are now working on one for an independent Pensions consultancy). And without the overheads that come along with agencies, trust me, costs are competitive. So, you could leave everything to us from the design and build through copywriting and motion graphics to CMS training. Do get in contact if you’d like to talk more.

I’ve been looking into portable lighting options using my existing Speedlite and was recommended the Lightsphere II system the other day by a very enthusiastic Canon representative during a mentoring session in the Nottingham Calumet store (I took even more notice as it’s not even a Canon product). He explained how an experienced tabloid photographer swore by it and recently managed to get the only great shot amongst the press pack in dreadful light conditions using his Diffuser. It’s a pretty well-known system pioneered by US photographer Gary Fong. They always show you the before and after shots with these products but, being a cynic, I never quite believe the results; so here’s my own test with direct flash, bounce and using the Diffuser. Aside from a tweak of the exposure (and the same applied to all three) these are completely untouched so you can judge for yourselves. For me , there’s no doubting that the Diffuser results in more even light across Katie’s face, more natural skin tones and a more even background.

There are many products out there on the market – the LumiQuest Softbox III for instance – so I’m sure it’s a case of experimentation and finding one that suits you in terms of both portability and end result. In the short term though, I’ll be sticking with my Cloud and Clear Diffusers…

As you can see from my portfolio, I really enjoy landscape photography and have taken off on dedicated trips in the past to Iceland and The Highlands amongst other places (and am due for another one soon when I’ve decided on the location. Any suggestions?). It dawned on me that I haven’t really discovered what’s on offer locally during my time in Leicestershire. I then remembered a stunning rapeseed field I’d passed while cycling towards Northamptonshire, so headed off one afternoon to explore.

You can see a couple of the results in this post and the rest here. I found less than half a dozen poppies amongst the rapeseed and love the vivid contrast of colours. On the driveway to a local farm, they’d planted a row of trees that looked great against the yellow background. Unfortunately, I had to shoot the trees from the road as I couldn’t get high enough to get the rapeseed fields either side of the trees in full. The local farmer told me that he’d got the very shot I wanted whilst standing on his Defender along a rough track, so I now know what to do! I got chatting with the farmer, who was an underwater photography enthusiast, and he’s kindly invited me back to the farm for the harvesting season, which can be quite dramatic with the combine harvesters in action. I’ll let you know how I get on…

For those of you interested in such things, I shoot with a Canon 5D Mark I with a 24-105mm lens and using Lee ND Grad filters for landscape work; and with minimal colour corrections in Photosphop and Lightroom.

I took a trip to London recently for a gallery visit. Why? For inspiration primarily. And, conveniently, it coincided with a friend’s birthday later that evening… The exhibitions mentioned below all come highly recommended.

The Photographers Gallery, 16-18 Ramillies Street W1 7LF

Ever so slightly confused because it’s moved since I was last in London, I started with The Photographer’s Gallery, which is now in a bigger, self-contained site in Ramillies Street, not over two buildings as before. Their featured exhibition until 14th June is the Photographic Object, a selection of artists experimenting with the photographic form. I particularly liked Gerhard Richter’s overpainted photographs, which seemed to give a whole new life to the original prints; and Catherine Yass’ Damaged series, where she mistreats her films in a variety of interesting ways from ‘under shoe’ to ‘in canal for two weeks’. Perhaps I should try this one day…

Diane Arbus Child with Toy Hand Grenade

I then moved on to the Diane Arbus exhibition at the Timothy Taylor Gallery with work from the period 1957 – 1971, many of which had not seen in the UK before. It’s a marvellous study of the weird and wonderful: from Russian midgets and Child With Toy Hand Grenade to a waitress at a nudist colony (with an apron for protection) and the Human Pincushion. All very simple portraits taken in natural environments; and shot in a more innocent time where the subjects were clearly self conscious but proud.

Not restricting myself to just photography, I also visited the Tate Britain for the Turner-Rothko exhibition. I think Rothko works in isolation (there was a great exhibition in Manchester during my college days where whole rooms were dedicated to one or two paintings) but couldn’t see the benefit of a comparison. (Feel free to disagree, art lovers). The Turner exhibition, however, is comprehensive and very impressive, from his small and delicate watercolours, through his classical grand landscapes, to the subtle and abstract seascapes.