Keep your eyes peeled ..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Keep your eyes peeled, because a selection of my photographs is about to be published by Café Royal Books. Based in the north of England and run by a chap called Craig Atkinson, CRB is "an award-winning publisher of documentary photography, committed to producing high-quality, limited edition, affordable books." My little addition is entitled 'Eccles, Salford, Manchester 1970s 1980s' and I'm delighted it'll be seen in the company of some really great names in photography. To mark the occasion I'm offering a limited edition of forty of the books, available numbered, signed and with a 7"x5" ink-jet print of one of the images, for just £20 each (Plus that pesky P+P). There are 26 images in the book. Email your interest and pick a number between one and 26. I'll then print and sign whichever photograph that corresponds to in the book. A bit of lucky-dip for ya ..

See you in two months ..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the receipt for a camera I bought in 1975. When I was fourteen years old I was winked at by a beautiful Halina Paulette Electric, sitting in the window of Alan Halkyard's camera centre in Eccles. I fell in love, and then into debt. This baby would be my first step up to 35mm photography but she didn't come cheap. Paulette's price-tag was an outrageous twelve quid and there was no way I had that kind of money at such a tender age. So I part-exchanged my Kodak Instamatic and began to pay for the camera in instalments. A pound here, fifty pence there, it took me two months to get my sweaty teenage hands on that little beauty. I wonder what today's kids would make of that ..

News just in ..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There's a lot going on in the world at the moment. Elections in the UK and France, Putin chumming up with Kimmy, China ramping up its stockpiling of nuclear weapons, extreme weather conditions across the globe and .. wait, what's this .. there's a new book of photographs by Martin O'Neill? Now there's reason to be cheerful amongst all the global gloom and doom ..

I'm delighted to say I've been 'picked up' by Café Royal Books, the distinguished publisher of photography in the UK, and will have a collection of my pictures in one of their iconic photo-books from mid-July. I say 'delighted' because it means my work will now be available along with such renowned names as, among many others, Shirley Baker, Daniel Meadows and Chris Killip ..

It's the first time any of my work has been compiled by anyone other than myself, and fascinating to see what the editor considers to be an interesting selection from my archive. Perhaps you'll buy the book and let me know your thoughts? (It's called Eccles, Salford, Manchester 1970s-1980s, by the way, and I'll be offering a limited edition of signed copies of the book complete with a print of one of the photographs in the collection. Details to follow, as they say!) ..

And now, over to the sports desk ..

       

Father's Day

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's fifteen years since my Dad died, so the fact that today is Father's Day hadn't registered with me. No nipping to the shops for a last-minute greetings card, no stopping at the off-licence for bottles of Bell's and lemonade. But always the thoughts of him in my head. I don't need a 'day' to remember my old man, but I wish he was here so I could tell him ..

Branson's pickle ..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I see in the 'paper that Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic is celebrating its 40th birthday. Astonishing to think how quickly all that time has passed, as I well remember the launch and, indeed, won a trip to New York in one of the airline's early promotional competitions. (Took my Dad, caught the Greyhound to Niagara Falls and The White House. Great trip!) Astonishing to see it's still going too, albeit running at a loss, as I look at a picture I shot of Branson in '93. This was at the launch of one of his other projects, Virgin Radio 1215 am, and a quick Google tells me the station lasted until 2008, so it had a decent run before moving to the FM frequency where it's still going strong, although probably more so on the internet and DAB. The shot was taken outside Virgin Records Megastore on Manchester's Market Street, another icon that's long gone. (Records and CDs eh? How retro!) All we need now is a nice, low return fare on Star Trek's Teleporter and Branson'll be buggered for ever ..