Copywrong!..

Do you like any of my photographs? I'm so glad to hear to it! Then, by all means, help yourself! Copy them, take them, use them as you please because I'm afraid, if the Government gets its way, that's what you'd soon be able to do without thought of paying me a penny for the privilege. Their 'Orphan Works' act, which has just been passed, will mean that any photograph on the internet might be fair game for free useage as long as a 'diligent search' for the Copyright owner has taken place. Diligent search? You mean, you looked for metadata but it had all been removed? Ah, that's ok, carry on! And all this in the name of making 'the UK's enterprise culture one of the best places to do business' ...! Well, I'm sorry, but my business is selling photographs, so thank you, gorgeous government, for just removing my ability to earn a living! But don't think this just applies to professionals. If you put any image online there's a chance it might suddenly appear .. well, anywhere! .. and used by anyone for whatever purpose they like! I've watermarked my internet images for quite a while now but, you can rest assured, the ©opyright logo will be a lot bolder on them from now on...

Hive of activity..

There's a buzz around Brussels today as the powers that be try to get a ban on the insecticides that are thought to be knocking off our bees! After that we just have to educate all the idiots that freak out as soon as one of the little fellas comes near them. Stop flapping! You won't get stung! A bee is not a human! It won't attack you just out of its own selfish interests! Not like the ministers and chemical companies that would have us continue using neonicotinoids just because it makes them billions of dollars! No proof it's those chemicals? Hey, no proof it isn't either, so let's get 'em halted until we know for sure what's causing the decline. Can you imagine a world where Lesley's little grand-daughters didn't know what was a'buzzin' round the lupins in my photo...?

New shoots ..

Months of hard work come together tomorrow when I hold the first of my 'Presently..' plant sales in Culcheth Village centre. I've been growing plants to accompany my Florescence flower photography range and will offer everything from tulips to anenomes and passion flowers - with a free photographic greetings cards with every purchase. The idea is that people can buy a small plant and give it as a gift with the card. The photograph on the card shows what the little plant will - presently - grow into! It's a little subtle addition to the photographic services I offer, and here's hoping it's the start of a growth industry..

Speaking of diversifying, did you see the programme about the photographer Norman Parkinson? What a character he was, changing his name from Ron Smith and eventually 'inventing' his own brand of sausage because he couldn't get a decent banger in his adopted home of Tobago. Mind you, I'll bet every photographer I know can tell you about a character they've come across in this wonderful busines of ours. I'll always remember Derek Eastwood, the first ever freelance photographer at the Manchester Evening News (I was the second!) He was the Weegee of Oldham, constantly tuned in to police and emergency service radio frequencies and quite often beating them to the scenes of fires and traffic accidents (This was in the days when the 'papers would publish the pix!) He was constantly wired - literally and mentally - and smoked himself to death about twenty years ago, poor sod!

Anyway, better go water the gladioli...

1982. I like it here..

I had a little freshen up of the images on my Twelve for '13 page today, as it'll soon be time to upload the next exciting installment of the project. (May 1st, since you ask!) Yesterday I was talking about my archive to a chap who said that was all well and good but he always looked forwards, never back. I said to him I hoped that by showing my 'old' work I'd get new work and projects from it. I'd be moving forwards - not lingering in the past but using the work - much of which still hasn't been seen by anybody - to produce new opportunities. Having said that, I noticed that one of my favourite bands, The Meat Puppets, are playing in Manchester in June. I've liked these guys since I bought their first album in 1982! I bought a ticket and put it on the pile of other bands I'll be seeing this year .. PiL, The B-52s, Mudhoney, The Exploited, Discharge! You spotting a theme here?
It's the Eighties again, folks! I like it here...

Tell 'em about the exhibition, Martin..

It's like bloody buses round here! Having just teamed up with the chap that's making the Chris Sievey film I spent yesterday meeting with an artist who wants to involve my work in his future shows, and then checking out the venue for a new exhibition I'm having! Three new projects in the space of two days! Phew! Anyway, the 'new' venue is a restaurant in Eccles called Smiths. It offers wall space to local artists, and the owners invited me to exhibit after seeing my Twelve for '13 show at Eccles Art Gallery. This new show will start in the middle of May and, well .. Smiths? Guess what pictures I'll be showing! Correct! Although, as well as my Morrissey shots, the idea came up in conversation that I should show a few of my archive photographs that relate to food and drink. Restaurant? Food and Drink? Geddit? To be honest, I didn't think I'd have enough pictures for that to work ..  and then I started trawling! I've ended up with over a hundred shots that have something to do with food or drink. Today's image is one of 'em.
Have you worked it out?..

Move on up to the Kwik-Save Disco..

I had another of those amazing photographic coincidences yesterday when a piece popped up on Facebook to say that a film was being planned on the life and times of the late Chris Sievey. (He was the singer in Timperley pop/punk band The Freshies, though will always be better known as the head in the head of Frank Sidebottom - if you see what I mean!) I contacted the director of the film to say I'd photographed a Freshies gig at Bowdon Vale Youth Club just two weeks before I shot Joy Division there, and had then set up a photo-shoot with them which we did around Sale, just south of Manchester city centre. Amazingly, he said that he'd been going through Chris' personal possessions, and had come across two sheets of contact prints featuring those very shots. However, being a dimbo of an eighteen year old I'd not put any ID on the contacts, so he didn't know who'd taken the pictures. Then a mutual friend of ours - the writer Mick Middles - identified them as being mine, and the director was just on the verge of contacting me when I dropped him that email. So, with any luck the shots will feature in the film, and I've been asked if I'll be interviewed myself to talk about the work. The funny thing is that last year I photographed Mick's Wedding to the lovely Vicki, and we recreated one of my Freshies' shots down the ramp of the Tesco car-park! Have a look at it here .. and now please join me in a rousing chorus of "The men from banana island whos (sic) stupid ideas never caught on in the western world as we know it" Two, three four....

The stuff of nightmares ..

Well there's a first time for everything, and I was emailed over the weekend by one of my 'brides to be' telling me how she'd been dreaming about me overnight! How lovely! Actually, if you insist on her exact words, she said she'd had a nightmare about me which involved me turning up to photograph her Wedding after it was all done and dusted! It honestly moved her enough to mail me and check I did actually have her Wedding booked for September! I have, I have and, trust me, if there's anyone who's more freaked out about not getting to a Wedding on time .. it's me! I've been known to be at a venue two hours before a Wedding if the journey looked like it might be a bit dodgy. No harm in allowing a little extra time, and I can always do the crossword in the car! Just the second part of her e-mail to deal with now. Apparently in her dream I turned up in a black and white striped top! What a nightmare! Everyone knows if it's a Wedding it'd be sepia!...

Cheesed off ..

News just in, folks! The cheese is off ..

Ok, not off off, just postponed! Oh, sorry, what I mean is the cheese factory shoot I was scheduled to do next week has been put back a few weeks. Their web-designers are going to town with a whole new revamp and want to make sure they get it right before they 'send me in'. One mistake now and it could be the thin end of the wedge .. !

Anyway, about the Tom Wood exhibition at the National Media Museum. I went to see it the other day and, erm .. I'm not impressed! There was one photograph that I liked from the whole show. One! And the thing is, the work is very similar to mine - with only a tenth of the humour. (I told you the Green-eyed monster would put a show in) I'm really pleased he's got a big show like this, but I really wish someone would show an interest in my archive.  Until then, just my hard-cheese, innit!

No Blog! Hot dog...

Blimey, too busy to write a blog? What is going on? Here, have a hot-dog, instead! This is one of the favourites in my archive. Did she ever get any ketchup on that hotdog?...

Stamp your mark ..

I passed a derelict Post Office in Salford yesterday. God knows how long it's been closed but look at this .. a book of stamps for 50p! A book! Nowadays a single first class stamp costs 60p! Anyway, I was on my way to the Deli-Lama cafe on Chapel Street, who have said I can have their walls for a mini Music Photography exhibition when they next become available. Don't all rush out at once, though! We're talking this time next year! God knows how much stamps will cost then!..

I'm going to Bradford today to check out the Tom Wood exhibition at the Media Museum though be warned .. I may return an envy-ridden, spiteful twisted snapper! There's just something about his work that makes me think 'Well, if they're showing his, why don't show mine?' The green-eyed monster has risen!..

Great times for PR photography at the mo! This week I'm shooting everything from a plain old cheque presentation to a Teaching Academy event, from winners of a motorbike competition to a new brochure with Gordon Burns, and next week I've a whole day in a cheese-factory to look forward to! I'm really enjoying stamping my style on the work...

Boston ..

By a bizarre quirk of fate I had already planned to show you this photograph on my blog today, as it's one of the latest additions to my 'Seen..' project on Flickr. After last night's bombings in Boston I wavered a little over my choice, but I've decided to leave it in as a mark of respect to those poor people whose beautiful lives were so tragically cut short. One of the reasons I was going to show the shot was because I wanted to wax lyrical about the wonders of Spring and how, despite everything, it's so amazing to be in the middle of all this burgeoning new life. It's all we can do to honour those murdered by terrorism - in whatever country - to try to hold in our minds that it is, it really is, a wonderful world we live in!

Funny story brewing ...

Life threw me one last funny story to end my music photography exhibition in Eccles on Saturday. When I arrived to take down my photographs there was a young chap looking at the work, and the gallery 'boss' introduced me as the photographer. "Great pictures.." he said to me "Fantastic! Amazing! Brill..." Ok, he didn't go that mad, he just said he liked the work, and asked the cost of a 16x12. "It's not for me.." he added, rather too quickly for my liking "It's for my girlfriend, she's crazy about Morrissey!" "Well.." I said "She's not alone. Did she see him on that programme last week?" (Victoria Wood made a programme about the story of tea, and interviewed Morrissey over a cuppa in New York) "See it?.." he laughed "She's so nuts about Moz that now she knows he uses a tea-pot she's gone out and bought one!!..."

Hmmm... Tea! Photography in Eccles! How am I going to tie those two together? Aha, a nice old picture of me dear old Dad, clutching the packet of tea-bags he'd just nipped out to buy on his lunch-break - circa 1979! It proved to be one of the more popuar photographs in the recent Twelve for '13 exhibition. Dad used to drink tea like it was going out of fashion. With five sugars! Sweet!...

The writing's on the wall..

Off to Nunsmere Hall this morning to shoot the engagement portrait of Sam and Steve, whose Wedding I'm photographing there in three weeks. The engagement photograph I'm showing you today is of Laura and Chris - and Odie! - who got married last Saturday at Thornton Hall (Just Laura and Chris, not the dog! Oh, you got that bit ..) Anyway, I made it into a big signing board and it was placed at the door to their Wedding breakfast for guests to add their best wishes. (I even supplied the Sharpie!) Unfortunately, it seemed no-one 'dared' start the signatures off, and the board was still empty as I left the Wedding, meaning I didn't get a picture of it full of squiggles. I've made a mental note to tell Sam and Steve's Best Man and Chief Bridesmaid that they should get the ball rolling and have signatures on the board before anyone else sees it. Two write!...

Out, out, out..

Yes, this was taken in a Labour heartland - or Eccles, as we call it - back in the days of the Miners' Strike of 1985, and I just love the mis-spelling of the word 'Thatcher' on the posters. The writer liked it so much he wrote it twice, even though it's such a bugger to pronounce! (I've been spitting all over my desk since I dug the picture out!) Actually, Eccles might not have been such a bedrock of socialism as it appears, judging by the way the 'Victory' poster has been vandalised. Happily, we're all entitled to our opinion and, as the pickets proved, you can't beat a bit of a banner-waving crowd-rant to get your views across - something Paris Brown might be mulling over right now. As the first - and most fleeting - Youth Commissioner she found out the hard way that what goes around comes around, and if she did one useful thing in the run-up to her new job it was to show the kids of today that, in a decent society, you can't just creep round under the cowardly cover of the social media saying what the hell you like about people.
For that, I thank you, Parith!..

Rock 'n roll, eventually..

I was like a kid in a sweet shop when I heard that 70s punk band The Exploited were playing a one-off gig at The Ritz in Manchester, and I suddenly had this bizarre vision of myself as a doddery old bloke turning up to watch the relics of some long-split band slowly going through their set at tea-party in Manchester Town Hall. You know, like 'old people' go to dances of a Wednesday afternoon? Or sit in the park watching brass bands on Sundays? I'd be just like that "Ah, the old ones.." I'd sigh "They don't write 'em like that any more! Eeeeh, Mildred, look at Charlie Harper go! He's a hundred and six, you know!..."
Bloody Nora!...

Bits, bobs, moustaches..

Time for a little light relief after all that doom and gloom of Thatcher/North Korea/Benefit Cuts/Man U losing in the Derby (The Man U bit was a joke! I really couldn't give a monkeys!) Here, have a picture of Laura with a moustache! You'd swear I'd set the shot up, but it really was just a little trouble with the wind! Gave us a laugh as we fired off the last couple of 'formal' portraits before Saturday's Wedding Breakfast, and I know (Hope!) Laura will forgive me for showing it to you all!

My Music Photography exhibition ends this Saturday and that really - no, really! - will be the last stuff I show at the gallery for the time being. What started out as a four week show to launch my Twelve for '13 project turned into a four month 'residency' as I ended up featuring in the next two group shows with my Florescence and Music photography. Anyway, get down to Eccles Community Art Gallery this Saturday if you want to catch me!

Remember that exciting news I spoke about? The 'stuff in the pipeline' .. ? Well, it's still in the bloody pipe and I can't get anyone to shake it out! Aaaagh! I really hope it comes off! I'm dying to tell you...

Must dash! ..

Bye bye, Marmite..

  

 So that's the end of Marmite Thatcher! You either loved her or you loathed her but one thing's for sure .. you'll never forget her! I had the honour of photographing her twice - either side of her time at Number Ten. I photographed her first when she visited Manchester on her campaign trail in 1979. That was before she'd had her teeth done! She was walking amongst us accompanied by Winston Churchill! No, not that one, his grandson, the Conservative member for Stretford and Urmston! You can just see his receding hairline in the left-hand picture! The second time I shot her (Oops!) was when her premiership was all done and dusted and she'd just published her autobiography in, I think, 1993. I went 'backstage' with her, at Waterstones of all places, and actually asked her for her autograph. She gave it me, too! That's my photo of it in between the portraits. 

So, another 'Great' of our time is gone, but it does make you wonder .. 

Where are our 'Greats' of the future??...

You got me, sunshine...

Married! And Saturday's groom Chris just couldn't resist showing off his Wedding ring to new bride Laura! Wow, what a fantastic Wedding Day that was - the kind I haven't had for a good five months. It just had that certain extra something, that wow factor, that ..  erm, hang on, it'll come to me .. ah, the sun! That was it! It had sunshine! All Day Long! It even, as I mentioned on Saturday, gave me sunburn! But what a delight it was to see bride, groom and guests actually willingly going outside at Thornton Hall to enjoy their celebratory drinks! Jeez, I'll never complain about the sunshine being too bright, ever again! We're finally back to the season of contrejour and fill-in flash! Hurrah! Yippee! Yee Haaa....  - it'll probably pour down for seven months now that I've said that! But do you want to know what really brightened up my day, though? A guest came up to me whilst I was shooting and said "It's great to see someone who enjoys their work!" Man, the sun started shining out of .. Anyway, check out the pix here, and see what you think...

Wed/Tanned...

Blog update! Back from the Wedding at Thornton Hall Hotel. Nearly 800 shots and the year's first sunburn! Oh joy, oh joy!! Congratulations to Laura and Chris!...

Now post the past...

No Grand National for me today, as I'm off to the Wirral to shoot a Wedding at Thornton Hall, though I'm rather hoping I won't get a repeat of a ceremony I did a few years back. The Wedding was in a room in a small hotel in Cheshire, which had a bar adjacent to it with a TV showing .. the Grand National. All you could hear through the walls were the squeals of the viewers as they cheered their horses on! I'll have a tenner on pure silence! Somebody call the bookies....

You serious?...

I can write about this now because I've spoken to tomorrow's bride and we've had a laugh about it, but when I asked her to think about which 'formal' shots she'd like me to arrange she presented me with a list of twenty-six different group shots! And that's before I start to take any pictures of her and her new husband! Fortunately, when I pointed out that shooting all those arrangements would take up quite a bit of her Wedding Day she was quite relaxed about it. "Why do you need so many variations?.." I asked her. "Well.." she said "I don't really. I just copied a list my friend had had at her Wedding!..."

Phew...

Party, party ..

It's my lovely girlfriend's birthday today, and I need no more excuse than that to chuck an appropriate archive shot on the blog! Jeez, it's a long time since I've been to a party like that one, and thank God I don't have to go to another one ever again! Funny, isn't it? We all go on about ageing but, quite frankly, I wouldn't want to be that young again. I know everybody says it but I feel 'our generation' hit it just right with the best music, lifestyles and technological advances all within our 'four score' .. although, I admit, the jumpers needed working on!
Anyway, put that down .. that's my beer!...

Poo...

Take dog for walk. Check! Pick up poo and put in bag. Check! Drop bag on floor and walk off. Check!...

Just what is the mentality of some people? Lesley and I can follow these trails of poo bags all around the streets in which we live. Inconsiderate dog-walkers who seem to think it's actually still ok to leave their animals' plop all over the roads. Still, I suppose it's better than not bagging it at all, but it's yet another indicator of the fact that standards are sliding down the pan in this country. Yesterday's blog was going to be about the general decline in decency and politeness in the UK. Just the little 'thank-you' and 'You're welcome' stuff that makes you feel warm and noticed - whether you're giving or receiving the acknowledgement. We seem such a glum, insular, hardened society now that it's almost as if it's a sign of weakness to let someone know you've appreciated their efforts. Well, it was going to be about that, until Angela and Robert emailed me from Thailand with a lovely 'Thank you' note for their Wedding photography. See, there I go, talking sh*t again!...

It may be winter outside..

Despite everything, there are signs of Spring out there, folks! We have frogspawn in the pond .. and bird-plop all over my windscreen! Better weather's on its way, folks. Just be patient!..

Now, I have to admit I've been somewhat knocked off my theme this morning. I'd just sat down to write today's blog when an email popped through from Thailand. It was a fantastic 'Thank you' from last weekend's bride and groom, who've taken the time - on their honeymoon - to send me some kind words about their Wedding Photography. I'll share a sentence or two with you .. if you insist! Firstly, they wrote "We've just sat down and looked at our on-line gallery and all we can say is WOW! The moments you captured were amazing, it's such a nice feeling looking back through the pictures and thinking, we didn't see that!! They will be our memories to treasure of the best day of our lives, and thats all thanks to you" and then they wrote "We cannot thank you enough for your hard work on that freezing cold day, you definitely helped make the most of a snowy situation!!"

How does that song go? Ah, yes! "It may be winter outside, but in my heart it's Spring..."

You'd be a fool to miss it..

And so off we go into the fourth installment of my Twelve for '13 documentary photography archive and, if my fingers can type on this unseasonably cold April 1st, I can tell you that this month we have everything from photographs of Eccles Outdoor market to Jumbo jets and stage diving at a punk gig! In between, supermarkets, nightclubs and the demolition of old Salford. I hope you enjoy it...