A selection of pictures that were never used, left to rot on a hard drive and passed over for an alternative viewpoint, maybe they were too arty or  unusual but for one reason  or another they were passed over and another was used in its place.

So here they are, finally allowed their time to shine, some are personal favourites, each one was taken for a publication and was judged to be less worthy than another of my images.

Sea King

In my opinion the best shot of a Sea King helicopter taken at RAF Shawbury

Another image was chosen instead, presumably due to its more recognisable viewpoint and amount of helicopters present in the frame.

Barn Dance

My own favourite preview shot of a barn dance event due to be held at Fordhall Farm.

A similar upright version was chosen over this one because an upright is easier to fit on a page. Despite this the shot that was used lacked some connection when compared to this one.

Art with Alpacas

A picture of a lady who is using her Alpaca fleeces to create felt works of art.

Another shot of the lady feeding an Apple to an Alpaca was used, I assume this is because they wanted an Alpaca in the photo and only wanted one (despite being asked to get lots of different shots).

Miners lunch

One of many shots taken at the International Cheese Awards in Nantwich, and my favourite from the event. This was passed over because Colliers was not a Shropshire company.

Summer Sun

A shot taken to highlight the sunny weather in June of this year.
It was once again passed over for an upright shot one which was nowhere near as good as this one.

Woof?

A shot taken of a rescued dog who was terrified of human contact due to previous abuse, out of all the photos I have taken this one seems to have the greatest emotional impact on people.

I can only assume that an alternative was used because there was a person in that shot despite it being a bit rubbish.

Confinement

This was taken of a guy who was recovering in an oxygen tank after sustaining an injury.

This was passed over for the simple reason that it was just too darn creepy for the paper, I suppose they have a point but I still love it!

These images are really just the tip of the iceberg, ones which I have liked enough to upload to my Flickr profile. There are always unseen pictures, as for every job I take two or three different images and sometimes several more.

Interesting week this one, we had pretty models, big toys and a fair bit of proper news aswell, so all in all a fairly entertaining week with lots going on for a change.

17/10/09

Just a generic Autumn picture, taken at Hawkestone park. I was a little short on pictures this day so I dug out the autumn opportunity a little early.

This shot was preceded by several others which didnt quite work, such as running through the woods, another shot with a shallow depth of field against a gold background, none of them were quite there.

This image was the last pose of the shoot, and by that time the rather nervous model had started to calm and enjoy herself.

I was a little sceptical about using this tree as although it had a lovely carpet of fallen gold and orange leaves it was surrounded by green, not the autum tones I needed. No worries, big gold reflector to the rescue, I positioned this right in front of the model, to the left of the frame and fired a few shots, not bad but her face was lacking a little punch. To achieve this I placed another bare flash set at a low power on the floor, zoomed in on the model and shot again, much better and a good result.

Once back at the office I spent some time perfecting the shot in photoshop warming the tones and making the image sing before finally saving.

19/10/09

Bingo night with the old people in Wem wooooooooo! Really really dull this one, and not much to go on, getting a few props was like getting blood out of a stone. Lighting was fairly easy, a mix of daylight, bounced flash from the left and a little direct flash on the right.

19/10/09

Last job of the day, taken at a rehearsal for a school play it was preceded by a shot of what amounted to little more than a lineup put together by a drama tutor. I often take a really bad pose first if it is thrust upon me first to keep whoever suggested it happy, but mainly as it allows me time to think and come up with the start of an idea for a better shot.

When I shoot groups I will alway look at them like a big squishy building set. I first identify who is important within the group, and place them in a prominent position ( in this case the guy at the top in the centre is the main guy) then build people around adding as many triangles as possible. I will always work in little sections adding a few at a time and hopefully the end result looks good because this approach takes a good long while.

This was one job where I really wanted a third light to light the lower left of the frame. My first light was high to the left lighting the main character, I wanted this as a tight spotlight but I had to keep the beam of light wide to cover the left hand side. My other light was bounced off a silver reflector low and to the right keeping the right hand side bright.  If I had a similar light working  on the left this would be a much better shot, but we  can only work with what we have.

20/10/09

This day was a pain! The first half was taken up with feeling very uncomfortable covering a high profile funeral, hiding as far away as I could and long lensing the event. No sooner did I return to the office thinking that I would have a nice light afternoon than we get a call saying that someone had crashed a car into Market Drayton’s Town Hall, so off we go again.

It turns out that they had not only crashed, but managed to plough straight through the wall hitting two pedestrians in the process. The area was cordoned off when i arrived, but I was able to get a number of shots showing the car, the damage and the crowd of people hoping to inject some drama into their otherwise dull days. This picture came on a return visit a few hours later, just lit using on camera flash bounced off a wall and a wide open angle it shows what a car can do when you mix up the pedals.

23/10/09

Interesting day today, lots of aircraft were stopping off at RAF Shawbury for refueling on their way to Liverpool to mark the 100th anniversary of the fleet air arm. As there would be so much equipment on the ground the base was opened up to a small army of plane spotters who descended to watch take pictures and generally tie the RAF in knots as they ran round after them. As far as I was concerned I needed a posed shot with human interest (which i managed to grab in a 2 minute window before some Merlins took off) a few shots of the enthusiasts and some shots of aircraft taking off, other than that it was playtime getting some nice shots of Helicopters. This shot of a Sea King is one of those results taken lying on the floor using 2 bare flashes to light the underside of the helicopter My only issue here was having to wait for the assembled crowd to move on and leave me alone with the bird.

Back when I first started in the world of press photography I was working for a lovely little weekly paper the Coventry Observer. The paper was really a training ground for me and allowed me to get my feet wet in all sorts of different situations and events.

One of the highlights of working in Coventry was the local team Coventry City FC. It is a fairly large team in Uk football, but one that suffered a few poor seasons while I was there.

Taking pictures at an average sport job is a fairly simple affair, you generally turn up, mention who you are (if there is a gate) and stand somewhere along the side of the pitch and hope it’s not too cold.

Taking pictures of Coventry City was a different matter altogether. First issue is where to park as parking generally costs a small fortune. One option was the local retail park, which was perfect for those days where I had shopping to do, or I was only attending for one half of the game due to other jobs on the day. The other options was to park miles away and walk in or pay for the parking. After a while I got to know the owner of a local pub who gave me parking almost a stones throw from the ground in return for a few shots from the game.

Once arriving at the ground you then travel to the main entrance to the Ricoh Arena (conveniently located as far as possible from you) to pick up your pass from the media reception, and then travel back round to the other side of the ground to get inside the ground proper. This is sometimes more tricky than others, as on occasion I was forced to arrive for only the second half, and by this time there was no one manning the gates forcing me to hammer away in the hope that people will hear.

Once you are inside the ground, you are on the floor faced with the pitch in front of you and thousands of fans taking their seats around you. You move into a maze of passages below the stands where you find the photographer’s room (not an easy task first time). The photographer’s room is a tiny little box of a room where you find a bib, programme, team sheet and several other photographers from local and national newspapers agencies and me who hasnt got a clue what is going on.

This is the work involved in getting onto the pitch, once their life gets much easier. You find a spot along the touch-line you are happy with, where the team you are shooting will be attacking, set up a little camp stool (no chairs for photographers and no standing either) and settle in for the game.

As far as taking the shots go, im no expert but it involves predicting the plays, keeping focus as best you can and a little bit of luck that events go your way. I was always a little short on kit at these games, as most photographers carried at least two camera bodies, one with a really long lens, another for close in action and possibly a third on a remote behind the goal. I had one body with an 80-200mm lens attached meaning that I could shoot about a quarter of the pitch, as a result I was often seen on Sky Sports looking a little bored when the action was out of my range.

The following shots were taken at an away game visiting Manchester United at Old Trafford. This was a very different experience, not just because the ground was so much larger seating over 76,000 people but also in the media rooms. The photographers room for example was not just a cupboard but a large room with internet access, power points, plus free food and drink. Also we had benches on the pitch! nothing fancy just a piece of wood with photographer printed on, but this was luxury. The final score? Coventry won 2-0!

There are lots more photos form my time at the Coventry Observer and more sport here Images of news.

Seems like ages ago now as I have been off for a week doing very little. This was a week filled with animals and rural charm, lots of quite light jobs with no real pressure. If only all weeks were like this.

26/09/09

Football first, and its Market Drayton Town v Gainsborough a game which Gainsborough (Yellow) dominated dispite a solid effort from Market Drayton. This was taken during the second half after a really dull first half where I shot very few frames.

29/09/09

These guys were spraying the lawn at Market Drayton cricket club as a freebee for the club, which of course makes it news! they were nice and co-operative and allowed me to move their vans and pretty much do whatever I liked.

It was lit with two lights. The first, lighting the guy infront was bounced off a gold reflector below him and to the left. The second threw a little light on the guy behind, this was just a bare head on the floor. To be honest I was looking for something a little more punchy, though I was pleased with the overall outcome.

30/09/09

This lady is starting a series of courses aimed at making felt from the fleece’s of her herd of Alpacas. I shot enough for a 7-8 piece spread here (what I was asked for) and was pleased with my results, although in the end the paper in their wisdom decided to use 1 shot, and not one of the best at that, but it had an Alpaca in it so people go ahhhhhhhhhhhhh.

This one was lit with two lights, 1 bare flash high and to the right of camera to light the scene,and 1 bare flash left of camera zoomed in on the face to lift shadows. I did try bouncing the high light off the ceiling but this didn’t produce brilliant results (probably because the ceiling is transparent).

01/10/09

Its Fordhall farms art thingy, I don’t think I ever found out all the details for this one but it involved children coming to the farm and painting/drawing. Very easy to shoot, as Fordhall farm is fast becoming one of my favourite North Shropshire photographic locations as it always provides a decent shot.

This particular shot relies on the foreground art materials, (the look this is what its all about bit) leading you through to the lady who is supposed to be drawing a picture. Nice simple composition which works time and time again.

I used one flash to help light this positioned to the right of the frame to help fill in some tricky backlighting.

02/10/09

Whitchurch was holding its annual Blackberry fair the day after this was took, and I was sent out to conjure something up out of thin air as they had not even arrived with the equipment for the day. Having said that it was somewhat tricky to get this set up for a same day deadline, especially as I had radio Shropshire breathing down my neck almost as soon as I had gathered some props wanting to do a live interview.

Lovely!  It was a case of quickly compose the shot, yes we do want the two year old in as he is the only thing im happy about so far, bugger hes crying, “look who’s that” (showing child the screen often works when silly noises and funny dances fail) snap snap refocus snap annnnnnnd………..done!!