Sunday 30 June 2013

Sleep, Blog .. Open Studio...









When a man is too busy to blog, he's too busy for life said .. erm, nobody .. but anyway, let's crack on and write, even though I have a trillion things to prepare for tomorrow's Studio opening! It's just that I keep remembering things I'll need to take over there in order to work properly! I've just designed a bit of the new literature I'll need around the place .. price lists, receipts etc., and I've topped up my bubble-blowing machine. Hey, I've even put new batteries in my squeaky frogs and giraffes! (Toys to attract kids' attention, since you ask!) As well as all that, I've designed this new montage for my website, and have even organised July's Twelve for '13 installment, which launches tomorrow! Ooh, this is so exciting! Good job I got up at 4 am....

#culchethportraitstudio

Saturday 29 June 2013

It never rains, but it pours..






















Full steam ahead today to get the studio ready for the 'paying public' on Monday, but I've just got to tell you about a PR job I shot yesterday afternoon. It wasn't one of the .. erm, more successful jobs I've ever done. The point of the event was plain. It was a cheque presentation to a charity! Simples! But, as so often happens, the company wanted to milk the fact that they had a professional photographer on site by producing a list of 'other' shots they wanted doing at the same time. The staff, the offices, the exterior .. you know, the stuff that's a half day shoot in itself but they want you to knock off in the hour that you are with them. So, to the cheque presentation first. Well, that was 'supposed' to be done with a representative from the charity and a character in a cartoon suit. The guy from the charity had brought the comedy suit .. but no-one to wear it! Great! And the staff shot? Three of the six members were off sick! And the exterior shot? It was hammering down and nobody would go outside. Even a shot of the inside brought its own little frisson of panic. A member of the public we asked to pose in a picture had just come from taking care of two kids with chickenpox! Oh, and I managed to bang my mouth with my camera whilst I was putting it round my neck and had to do all the shots with a bleeding lip! Apart from that, it was a doddle. Oh, for the studio life ..

Thursday 27 June 2013

Smoke & Mirrors ..






















More SEO 'bs' yesterday, with two epsiodes concerning Google to tell you about. Firstly, I was contacted by yet another of those magical 'We can get you up the rankings' companies, whose first line to me was - and I quote - "I was going through the leading sites in your sector when I came across you, and wondered if you’d like a Complimentary Website Review." Hang on! I come up in the 'leading sites'? Isn't that 'Job Done' then? So why do I need my site reviewing if it's, by their own admission, already doing its job?  And, as if to prove it, I was phoned straight afterwards by a company who'd Googled photographers in Warrington, and who've now booked me for a PR job on Friday! Eat yer heart out, complimentary website reviewers!

I was on a PR job the other day - you may have seen the link to some of the pix on Facebook - which was actually in the car park of the company, as it was a motor-cycle training event. In a corner of the car-park was the 'smokers' hut' - the pong-palace where people came out for their fag-breaks. Man, I could not believe the amount of young people coming out for a smoke. It was depressing! Speaking as someone who doesn't have a single friend that smokes, it comes as an ever-more shocking site to see people gathering in huddles to suck shit into their lungs. The message is not getting across, is it?




Wednesday 26 June 2013

Me! It's me...


















Now here's a Wedding gallery with a difference, and it's thanks (I think..) to Eddie, the father of Steve Williams, whose Wedding I shot at Nunsmere Hall a few weeks back. Steve just sent me this set of his images. Eddie seems to have spent the whole day documenting the hard-work, artistry, patience and skill that is the lot of a brilliant Wedding photographer like what I am! (Not to mention the 3-camera juggle, the off-camera flash, the 'Look, no hands' approach to climbing ladders - the Health & Safety people love me for that! - and the championship-winning face-gurning! My God, I've got it all. Click on the montage for a close-up!...) Anyway, many thanks, guys! Love 'em!...


Speaking of Wedding Photography, a lady popped her head around the door of the studio yesterday and asked if I'd ever worked for the Eccles Journal. I said I had, but it was a long time ago. She nodded, looked at me and said "You took my Wedding photographs in 1976!"



OMG, as we say! 1976? I told you I'd been doing this a while! She's going to pile into her loft and dig 'em out for me. Would love to see how I shot back then ..      
I wonder if I still pulled faces...















Tuesday 25 June 2013

Those days have gone ..














Here's another of the shots that's going up on the walls of my studio this week. Fun, funky, modern .. permitted! It ties in with something I wanted to tell you about. There's a programme on tv tonight about Vivian Maier, the 'Mary Poppins' of photography who worked as a nanny in Chicago whilst quietly taking thousands and thousands of photographs, simply for herself. She lived in a time when - it seems - she had absolutely no problem in going right up to people on the streets and taking their photograph. "Maier .."  it is said, "disarmed kids and their parents with her camera and was welcome in their world." Well, as you'll have seen from my archive, even I lived in a time when it was absolutely accepted that you could take photographs in the street but, since then, I've already had two episodes of having "Paedo!" shouted at me by young children when I've tried to take their photographs in the recent past, and it's pretty terrifying, I can tell you! So, it's the studio life for me! Kids, yes .. but with their parents firmly in tow and giving their full permission for me to shoot. Sad, eh?...

#culchethportraitstudio

Monday 24 June 2013

Heart-warming ..






















That joke, as Morrissey oft reminds us, isn't funny any more! Just look at that bloody temperature! It's the middle of flippin' June, for goodness sake! I'm back in long pants .. with my jumper on .. and I don't like it! However, you didn't come here to hear about the weather, so let's get on with the blog and Ya Boo Sucks to the so-called summer ..

Another full day at the studio today .. Painting! Can't wait 'til I'm at the studio .. Photographing! I had my first 'job' come in on Friday, when a lady brought an old photograph to restore, and there was another enquiry about a family portrait yesterday, courtesy of actually being seen as a photographer with a studio, so I'm absolutely delighted with the start its made! I'm actually in the middle of designing a flyer for the 'grand opening' next Monday. I'm going to bombard Culcheth with leaflets and .. but wait, what's this? Wow! Bring one of those flyers in before the end of July and you'll get a FREE portrait sitting. That's FREE, folks! As big as the zero in today's photograph! Now there's something to warm you up...

#culchethportraitphotography


Friday 21 June 2013

Christmas ..




















Yep, soon be Christmas! Can you believe it's 'the longest day' already? Half the year gone and advent calendars already in the shops! (Ok, that's a fib and you know it!) I can't wait for the second half of this year, though. It's going to be so exciting, what with the new studio and all, and as soon as I've written this blog I'll be off there again for the first full day of redecoration (Ikea is doing very well out of me at the moment!) It's going to be great to invite people in there for a shoot and, along those lines, I had a baby portrait session yesterday - one that, I hope, will go down in history as the last time I go out to the client's house to take portrait photographs. (Unless, of course, you need 28 family members photographing, in which case I'll be over in a jiffy!) I also had another lady come by yesterday and ask if she could bring in an old photograph for me to restore. I hope her pictures from the past are a good sign for the future, and then it'll be like all my Christmasses have come at once!..

#culchethportraitphotography

Thursday 20 June 2013

Future policy ..















Time to renew my car insurance, and my current insurer has quoted me a renewal rate of £339 and very kindly told me that I don't need to do a thing to carry on being insured, as they'll take my money out of my bank account all by their clever little selves and send me a new certificate on the due date. Now nowbody these days just allows an insurance company to roll over its policy - do you? - so, of course, the first thing I did was to get online and get some comparison prices. Cheapest equivalent?  £207 !! I rang my company and told them. "Oh .." they said "Did we say £339? Sorry, we meant £240 !!.." Cheeky little ratbags! Chucking a hundred quid onto my policy and hoping I just didn't notice! Nice! Anyway, couldn't resist showing you this picture from my archive! Drama on the high streets of Birmingham when this learner driver reversed into me in 1979! I think the insurers have paid up!.. 

I'm off to Sandbach today to shoot some baby portraits. This will probably be the last time I shoot an individual's portrait on location. After this they can come to me at my new studio! That's my future policy!..

Wednesday 19 June 2013

Thumbs up ..















Dee, the bride whose Wedding I shot on Friday, sent me this email yesterday after I'd sent her the link to the photographs in her online web-gallery.

"I've just sped through them as I want to enjoy them with Ian and a glass of wine tonight but being a woman I'm far too nosey and impatient to wait, they look amazing so far thank you so much, I love them all. Thank you for being part of our day, for keeping us both calm in a professional way, for capturing our memories, for your sense of humour and for doing a wonderful job in every way, we really enjoyed you being there .."

Not bad, eh?

Tuesday 18 June 2013

A question of timing ..



















This amused me yesterday! I was searching through my 'box of important stuff', trying to find my MOT certificate (And no, I didn't, now that you ask!) However I did find my diary for 1981, the year I turned 21. On the inside front cover there's this list of figures and abbreviations. Hello, hello, you ask, what was a bright young thing like Martin keeping a record of in 1981? Chicks' phone numbers? Names of great Manchester discos? New punk singles to buy? No, no, no .. sadly, it's the dev times of HP5! Now if you're not into photography this won't mean a thing, but it's a list of the development times and chemicals needed for a black and white Ilford film called HP5 when rated at varying ISOs .. or ASAs as we used to call them! Man! Look at that! If you wanted to shoot at 6400 ASA you had to dev your film for 25 minutes in Microphen! (And probably at about boiling point!!) These days that adjustment would take you .. oooh, a second and a half? And you wouldn't need to make a note of it in your diary! Go chase chicks, you square...

Monday 17 June 2013

That'll do for me...


















Lesley and I spent three hours in Ikea yesterday .. three hours .. buying blinds and 'stuff' for the studio, and I've just dropped it all off there before I head out to a PR shoot in Altrincham. Two lovely old ladies walked past as I was heaving shelves into the unit. "Oooh..." one of them said to me as she read my window poster "It's about time we had a camera shop in Culcheth!" Camera shop? Hmmm! Better read up on changing batteries in compact cameras! But at least the message is getting out there and camera shop? Hey, that's close enough for me!..

#culchethportraitstudio

Sunday 16 June 2013

Sunday reading ..















"And verily.." sayethed the Great God of Wedding Photography "Thou have sufferethed enough, mate! How's about a bit of sunshine?..."

Yes, unbelievably, after Friday's absolute monsoon of a day, I had the 'problem' of too much sunshine at yesterday's Wedding! Halle - bloody - lujah! I ain't never gonna complain about bright sunshine ever again, no sir no way! It was incredible! Saturday at Willington Hall actually started with me photographing the groom's arrival in a total belter of a rain storm (Here we go again, methinks!) but finished with me coming home with sun-burn! Admittedly, the Great God of Wedding Photography still threw in a curve-ball as it was at least Gale Force 42 (And even my ladder blew over in the wind!) but rather that than the hammering rain I had on Friday. Anyway, have a look at the results here and here!

Slight gap in Weddings now .. nothing 'til July but, as we've gone all religious, I can only see that as The GGOWP's way of saying "Crack on with that new studio, me old mucker!" and verily, I will. I've set the opening date as Monday July 1st. The first day of my new mid-year diary and a great day for 'new beginnings'. Praise the Lord!..

Saturday 15 June 2013

Cor, blimey ..
















Yesterday's Wedding had it all .. thunder, lightning, torrential rain, a crash that blocked the motorway to the reception .. and a flood at the venue once we got there! Oh, and a deliriously happy couple who didn't give a hoot about what was going on 'cos it was their Wedding Day! Big cheers to Ian and Dee, who smiled all day and even treated me to a pint of the black stuff once we'd got our shots done! Don't be fooled by that spot of blue sky in the photo, by the way. That was just a scudding gap in the clouds before the monsoon set in again! Looks like more of the same, too, as I head off to Willington Hall this morning for Julie and Sean's Big Day. Fear not! I shall rise to the challenge! Mine's a Guinness..

Friday 14 June 2013

Up the wall ..















I'm having a lot of fun looking for suitable work to go on the walls of my new studio. This lovely shot was one of the first I thought of, caught at the end of a portrait session as the little lady grew tired. (Oh, I work my models hard!) Add to that a couple of nice Wedding photos, a funky 'happy family' and a cool 'teenager with attitude' shot and I think that'll do it! I'm also sourcing furniture and fittings for the room, with a 'warm but workmanlike' theme being favoured at the moment. Having said that, it's time now to put my plans down and put my Wedding head on. I have two Weddings this weekend, starting today at Mere Court Hotel, near Knutsford. I won't mention the weather...

My PIL tickets arrived yesterday. The band are playing The Ritz at the end of the month, but I'm getting so paranoid about the missing the gig (See Monday's Blog!) I think I'll just camp out at the venue the night before! I have it in mind to try to get John Lydon's autograph, too. He's definitely one of those people that 'changed history' and I'd love to add him alongside Morrissey, Ali, George Best and Margaret Thatcher. Actually, I'd better not mention to him that Maggie's already in the book. He'd go up the wall, wouldn't he?..

Thursday 13 June 2013

It's a sign ..















Oooh, it's the big day! Today I sign on the dotted line and take possession of the unit that will very soon be my new studio! How exciting! And the signs are good that it'll be a success, too. I've already had .. wait for it .. three Wedding enquiries, two baby photo session requests, a business portrait enquiry and have spoken to a lady who wants me to renovate some old photographs of her grandparents! Brilliant! The very fact that people know about a photographer setting up in the village is already generating business, and it just proves what I've known for quite a while, obvious though it sounds .. I need premises! I can have all the sample Wedding albums in the world, all the acrylic frames, all the canvas prints .. but they're useless unless someone can see them! Well, from July they'll be able to! Just got to sort out the unit first! Now let's see: Strip the wallpaper, fill the holes, paint the walls, fix the blinds and backdrops, make a sign...


#culchethphotographystudio

Wednesday 12 June 2013

StudioFiveFour .. finally!


















If you've been following my blog you'll know I've had a bit of a nail-biting time lately, waiting for a decision that could mean a lot to my business. Well, yesterday that decision was made and so now - finally - I can announce some fantastic news! I am opening a NEW STUDIO!!! I'm so excited! I found out over three months ago that a space was becoming available in the shopping centre in Culcheth, but I've had to wait until yesterday to find out if I'd be able to get it! Oh, darlings, the tension! Well, I did get it, so full speed ahead now to get it kitted out and up and running. I'm going to offer everything from passport photos to retouching, family portraits to Wedding consultation .. all within the confines of my OWN STUDIO!! Man, it sounds good to be able to say that! So, watch this space, as they say, but don't rush to be my first 'sitting'! That privilege has already gone to Suzanne and Paresh, a bride and groom of mine from two years ago. Their little son is coming in to be my first 'model' .. I won't make him hold the camera!


#culchethphotographystudio

Tuesday 11 June 2013

What's the idea? ..
















Rain! Oh, joy! At last...
I never thought I'd be writing those words but yes, it's good to see a little aitch-two-oh falling on the poor old garden this morning after quite a prolonged stretch (for us!) of dry weather. I can almost hear my lupins cheering! I'd been thinking lately about shooting some more Florescence flower photography - colour transparency film on 645, since you ask - but to be quite honest I'm not sure there's a market for it anymore, and therefore any reason to incur the expense of all that film and processing. (My current collection of pictures is stored with a specific 'plant photography' image library in London, but I haven't made a penny from them in over two years as the stock photo market is absolutely saturated with images from people who are happy to make 50p from a sale!) Well, take the pictures for yourself, I hear you say! Hmmm, no can do! Ever since I turned professional I've always needed a reason - an end product - for my photography - be it publication in a newspaper, use in a book, Wedding photography or whatever, so to take the shots 'as a hobby' just doesn't do it for me any more. I've always taken photographs to be seen by others. Well, that's the whole idea, isn't it?..

PS: Speaking of being seen, this shot is from my Twelve for '13 project, a selection of which are now on show at Smiths Restaurant in Eccles!

Monday 10 June 2013

You snooze, you lose..














I managed to go to a gig on Friday night .. and miss the band I'd gone to see! Farewell, Meat Puppets, I hear you were great! Alright, I'm being a bit hard on myself here because, knowing that the band we wanted to see were the support, me and my pals did get to the gig by eight thirty pm but, by then, the lads'd already played and packed up and we were left to put ourselves through the boredom of three Mudhoney tracks before we called it a day ourselves and went off to drown our sorrows! Aaaagh!!! How annoying! How frustrating! How bloody crazy that a gig at what we still think of as Manchester Uni Students' Union had already put the support band on .. by 8.30!!! I mean, it was Friday night for flip's sake! You'd think the dear students were up for partying 'til at least 11 o'clock! Cripes, I went to see Gary Glitter once (Shhh...!) and even he didn't come on 'til half one in the morning! Sob sob, boo hoo .. I've sulked all weekend and had the mickey taken out of me something rotten! But, as all us good old punks say .. "I don't care!" .... (But I do, and isn't it bonkers that ... oh, shut up Martin!...)

Ahem... and in other news this Monday .. another two Wedding weekend coming up this weekend, and I'm back at two of my favourite venues once again. I'll be at Mere Court on Friday, and good old Willington Hall on Saturday. Now if there's one thing I do freak out about it's being late for a Wedding so, if you'll excuse me .. I'm off to Mere Court. I should definitely be there by Friday...

Friday 7 June 2013

Are you crazy?..













Blog? On a hot day like this? Are you crazy, who's going to read it? Everyone'll be outside, catching the rays at long, long last! Actually, the thought of people sunbathing put me in mind of this photograph, which I took at Barton Air Show in the late 70s. It's a sight you see often and, as I gear up to hit yet another air-show this July, I just can't help wondering why! Why go all the way to an air-show and .. sleep? I mean, these things aren't cheap, and you can always sleep .. well, at night .. so why miss all the aircraft you'd been looking forward to seeing all year? The funnier thing about this photograph, which you might not be able to see in this low-res version, is that the sunbather's wife is actually asleep .. in the car! She didn't even make it outside! Hurrah for crazy people! They make great subject matter for us photographers ..

Thursday 6 June 2013

Growing old! It's an age thing ..













My youngest sister became a grandma on Monday, in the same week as the latest issue of the British Journal of Photography leads with an article on 'Ageing and Creative Decline!' Feeling old? Me? Noooo .. I'll go on for ages, me .. but I'll tell you one question that's constantly at the back of my mind in this modern, digital age. When will my cameras pack up? The thing is that, unlike the 'old days', when you took your cameras to be repaired if they started playing up, I just know that there's a built-in 'End' date for my current gear! One hundred thousand actuations - or whatever it is - and then that's them done! Scrap heap! Bin! Back to the camera shop ..  and I must be getting close! I mean, all those Weddings! Cripes, I've had one of my cameras an absolute age now. Damn near four years! How the hell is is still working? And more to the point - assuming I can afford it, anyway - what do I buy as a replacement? Nikon have already stopped producing the model I use so I'd be unnecessarily upgrading to a camera I don't - and never will - need! I wish photography was like life! One body, and stick with it!..

Wednesday 5 June 2013

Stuck in the middle ..

  
You're kidding? No, it's true folks and I'm sorry, but you're going to have to start using the inside lane on the motorway again! Oh, I know it goes against all your macho 4x4 bullshit - the slow lane is for losers, and all that - and I know you feel safest doing 60 in the middle lane, white knuckles aglow whilst all that nasty traffic has to go all the way around you - and I know it saves you all that pointless indicating and using both hands to drive when you're in the middle of a terribly important phone-call - but PULL OVER you tit, and let's get back to three-lane motorways again!! Ah, that's better! Yep, I'm delighted to hear of the government's new ruling over fines for middle-lane hoggers. Imagine a whole third of our motorways being brought back into use! I just hope this legislation's a little more succesful than their laws about mobile-phone use in a car! Today's photo from my archive, by the way, is the old M63 junction at Eccles. Just look at all that space!..

Funny old week, this! I had a Shoot 'n Tutor workshop postponed on Sunday as the chap had to stay home for a workman, and yesterday I had a child portrait shoot put on hold due to the kid having a cold. Now, because my contact is busy, I've got to wait another week to do a recce on a pr shoot I've been booked for involving 200 people and a cherry-picker! I'm also still waiting to hear a decision on some Big News for my business! I just can't get going this week. I'm just so just stuck in the middle..

# middlelane

© Martin O'Neill 2013

Tuesday 4 June 2013

Bloomin' heck! ..



















It's such a joy to be up and at 'em on these warm, sunlit mornings and I always try to make the most of the garden at this time of day. I really love photographing flowers and plants, although I don't actually shoot in the style of Florescence anymore as those shots were on medium-format transparency film with a formal studio set-up approach. Nowadays I'm just happy to get down on my hands and knees and get stuck into the flower beds with the old X10. The challenge to come up with a new angle is as exciting as ever, though - in fact, probably more so now that everyone is taking digital photographs - so it does keep me on my toes, which is pretty amazing seeing as I'm already on my hands and knees! I know I get into some funny positions when I'm taking photographs, but I had a new one the other day when a young lady I was photographing suddenly burst into laughter. "What's so funny?.." I asked. "Your 'photography face' .." she giggled "You pull such funny faces when you're taking photographs!"












 Bloomin' heck!...

Monday 3 June 2013

Music, food ..



















A great week for music this week with the new Queens of the Stone Age album coming out today, and The Meat Puppets playing in Manchester on Friday night. All that, and the discovery of a cracking band that .. erm, split up thirty years ago! (I'm blushing, I promise!) How the hell did I miss Bad Brains? It's so weird! I mean, I love American hard-core music, and they are so just that, but somehow I've never come across them! Anyway, I'm making up for it now as I've not stopped playing them for the last 48 hours! And what do you mean, you've never heard of The Meat Puppets?

I launched the June installment of Twelve for '13 on Saturday, and was delighted to see that the shots had already been viewed 41 times by 8am this morning. Don't forget that you can see another part of my archive - the exhibition called 'Photography - it's food and drink to me' at Smiths restaurant in Eccles. All the shots have something to do with .. well, food and drink - and, as you can see, I have very cleverly combined eating and music in today's blog shot, a picture from a summer fair in about 1979.

Speaking of Smiths, I posted a print of Morrissey to a girl in New York, and she emailed me this weekend to say she loved the print and was "so proud to own it". Now that is music to my ears...

Sunday 2 June 2013

Rendered Relaxed ..



















Saved by the plasterer! I was due to give a Shoot 'n Tutor workshop this morning, but I've been given an unexpected day off thanks to a spot of rendering that needs doing at my 'student's' house! His need to wait in for a plasterer equals my opportunity to spend the day in our garden. Good job, too, 'cos it's so on the verge of exploding into colour, with lupins, clematis, poppies and roses about to burst open all over it! So, no blog, no work .. and a lovely magnolia from my Florescence collection for you all to enjoy today! Catch you on Monday!..

Saturday 1 June 2013

I'd just like to point out ..













There ya go - one of my favourite shots from the June installment of Twelve for '13! This, and another 79 shots have just been added to Flickr, and you can check 'em all out from here! Incredible to think that I'm now half-way through the project and all I can say is - I hope you're enjoying it! June's collection takes us from hot-dog stands to Honey monsters, Placemate 7 to Eccles Job Centre, kids on choppers to snogging at 'grab-a-granny' night! Blimey, talk about diverse! If you don't know, Placemate 7 was a disco in Manchester, and my pal and I used to go there every Tuesday night - it was free to get in before 10pm! Trouble is, it was empty before 10pm, and we'd have to stand there bored rigid sipping our over-priced bitter shandies until a bit of 'talent' came in. I remember one time my mate started chatting up a French au-pair. He actually apologised as he thought I'd be interested, but she was definitely not my type, so I left him to it. Within a week she'd ditched her job and moved into his Chorlton bed-sit which, many weeks later, she managed to set on fire and melt all his LPs. Ah, oui, je ne regrette rien...