Whitby Pirates Festival  

I traveled down to Whitby be with four friends to capture photographs of this event.  This I now understand will be a regular event and what joy it was to meet so many creative people prepared to dress up in wonderful pirate costumes, with creative make-up, weapon’s and everything to make this a dream for photographers.  I have included a few of my favourite images from this shoot.  I chose to use mainly my Nikon 70mm – 200mm lens.  Sadly this was mainly because I inadvertently bought a 24mm – 70mm Tamron lens which does not shoot sharp with my Nikon Z9.  So although it was very frustrating not being able to shoot wide the close images I feel that I still captured the amazing characters so well.  Shooting with an aperture of 2.8mm for individuals and around f8 to f11 for couples and small groupsso far back!  provided sharp focus.  The wide lens setting with SDF also helped to blur out the background that in the main was full of people and backgrounds that were not in a pirate style or theme.

Typically a conversation with three photographer led to the age old discussion about “we only shoot full manual because we are photographers” drives me insane.  If the best photographers in the world recognise and apply Aperture priority mode when appropriate using different apertures to create the required DOF and allowing exposure compensation to be practically applied is beyond me.

I also met a photography teacher and we discussed students.  I randomly mentioned that many male students and experienced photographers will alway choose to upgrade to the latest camera available regardless of the practical need.  Where female students tend to focus more of getting the best from their existing camera.  the teachers addition to this flow of conversation was to suggested men also over complicate photography by selecting different apertures.   Let’s just leave it there.  

Overall a brilliant day and hopefully the images capture the joy of the whole occasion.

short video

using the transcript.

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Long sands beach photoshoot

It seems to have taken for ever for summer to arrive. Now it’s here it seemed like a great idea to get out in the open air and do some creative photography.  My link with the House of KIKI and the wonderful Karen who is willing to loan me dresses without hesitation was so unexpected but also helped us form a business bond which will when I say thank you with a Catwalk and fashion photoshoot will I hope build our connection even further.

Who will I ask to model on the beach?  It had to be Jules Johnson she is a complete natural in front of the camera the first time I photographed her on the Northeast Coast was about 10 years ago and she looks exactly the same.

So two photoshoots about 10 photographs on each shoot Longhand’s Beach Tynemouth England both now complete images below.

My son Joseph holding a quara battery pack and a boom with a Rotalux soft box.  Each photographer with provided with a camera trigger.  We had a changing facility a rail with dresses to help make things really flow. the first was a perfect night with no wind. the soecond was a complex shoot with rain but in th end it was perect with a colourful sky.  The images below were mine but everyone captured something special.   Lighting over the sea firing down with Jules sitting on a rock was my favourite part of this shoot the side light worked beautifully and the reflections in the water were just so effective.

With Jules jumping through the air we had low ambient light the quatra flash power and short duration allowed her to be captured perfectly without getting close to max sync speed hopefully the results speak for themselves.

For more details about my Event photography  please contact me via the website or my facebook page.