Pin-up girls ..

Loving all this stuff on TV lately about Debbie Harry and Kate Bush. I never could decide which of them I fancied more! In the flat I shared with my Dad I had a poster of Debbie on the front room wall and a poster of Kate on the door (The one where she was in the shiny blue leotard. Phwoar!) I know my Dad would have been much happier if they were pictures of Tammy Wynette and Billy-Jo Spears but I beat him to it and, as far as I remember, Country and Western posters weren't a very big seller in sunny 1978!..

It was whilst I was looking for a shot I took of the 'Debbie' poster that I came across this old picture of a girl in our office called Karen. That's all I can remember - just Karen. Before I got my first job on a newspaper I worked in the Progress Office of Gardner Diesels in Eccles, and Karen sat directly in front of me working as a typist. She must have been 19 or 20 when I was 17 so, to me, she was the absolute height of sophistication and the pin-up fantasy of practically every bloke in the factory! How envious they all must have been when I asked her if she'd let me take some photographs of her, and it must have taken the timorous young O'Neill an age to come up with a classic pose like this one! Still, it was all about learning my trade, and growing the confidence that has stood me in good stead from that day to this. I wonder what Karen's been doing these past 37 years!..

How times change ..

Well, there you go! I've done a Cake-Smash! Smashed it! Ha-ha! I've entered a new phase in the evolution of my photography .. despite most people still not knowing what one is! Never mind, it went well, now you ask, and it didn't take that long to clean up the studio floor afterwards, though I still can't help thinking it's a terrible waste of a good cake and a way of raising a child that I personally have my doubts about. How times change ..

I've been on more familiar territory other than that, with a family shoot yesterday and another booked in - with pet dog - for this morning. Funnily enough, I had a reminder of the 'old days' of press work last night when I got a call from a newspaper asking if I was free to shoot a 'snatch' shot at Preston Crown Court today. A 'snatch' is a grab-shot of the person who's been on trial and it's unfortunate that I'm already booked today but, to be honest, I haven't done one of those since 1978! Still, it brought back fond memories of my years on the newspapers when you'd fly out at the drop of a hat to whatever it was the Picture Desk needed a shot of! After moving across to Wedding Photography I used to joke that my idea of a 'rush-job' meant a bride asking if I was available next September! How times change...

Come into the garden ..

Easter, and time to tackle the garden! Well, that and shoot a Wedding tomorrow! I'll always remember my first Good Friday as a young Press Photographer on the Sale and Altrincham Messenger. Living in a flat with my dad, I merrily picked up a big pile of my laundry, and began to do my ironing. There was a knock on the door. One of the other snappers was standing there, looking irate. (I should mention that we didn't have a phone back in those medieval days) "What are you doing here?.." he blurted "You're supposed to be at work!" "But it's a Bank Holiday.." I said, which caused him to laugh out loud! "Photographers don't get Bank Holidays off.." he said "Get ready and get back to work!.." Guess the ironing had to wait...

Happy Easter, everybody ..

Looking back ..

Today's what the old newsrooms would call "A quiet news day" and so - you know me - I'll grab any opportunity to put out yet another photograph of .. me!! There I am, looking back through a chemist's window - circa 1979/80 - all Deirdre Barlow glasses and scruffy jacket, working hard to become a famous Street Photographer (Still working on that bit, by the way!) I found this image in a folder on the desktop called "To Do" .. images I've yet to make up my mind about, though I think this one's grown on me enough now to gain inclusion into my archive (And no, not just because I'm in it!)

January of old was always like this. Nothing going on yet still a newspaper to fill. You could go out as a freelance and set up photographs with the most tenuous of stories and they'd be snapped out of your hands and put in the paper before you could say 'My other camera's a Hasselblad'! I remember going down to a grey gloomy lake on a chilly day in 1983 and finding a guy paddling about in a bath-tub! (I cannot for the life of me remember why but I think he was in training for some weird kind of forthcoming charity event) Well, cue 'January Sail' photo and the cheque's in the post, thank you very much! Ah, those were the days...

Press, plus portraits plus...

A quick change of home page photography over the weekend, with Joy Division back into the fray as a new version of my Bowdon Vale images is put onto YouTube!
Big thanks to Richard at Dukes, Lancaster.

I'm getting paranoid about the way I write this blog, though, as I've just had an email offering me new software to check my spelling, grammar and punctuation. Its subject line reads - Awesome Martin, Better option to write like Anglo Saxon- Do you think it's a scam ??
And, erm, I might be missing something here, but I ended up watching Britain's got talent (That really should have a question mark after it!) over the weekend, and one of the entrants, some kind of weird dancer, actually needed an interpreter to be interviewed. What part of Britain is he from?
(And don't say Newcastle!)