December! wow

Ok, so I blinked and it became December! how on earth did that happen? My blogging has been limited (well non-existent) as I've been so manic and my son came down with Mumps on 26th November an entire week off school and my Dad's surprise 60th Birthday Party to arrange! Phew! Tog College was also cancelled last week as my tutor was unwell.

So excuses out of the way, I've had a fantastic few weeks, really pushing myself with my photography and loving every minute of it. Lots of street photography but most fun of all recently was the Ice Queen themed shoot I went on with a load of Photographers, it was amazing so I am going to blog all about it this evening.

It was organised by the lovely Claudia of Claudia Rose Carter Photography and sponsored by Aspire Photography Training

8am on the morning of Saturday 3rd December, I hopped onto a train at Northampton station armed with my beautiful new Cheeky Lime Camera bag, Cannon, 50mm lens, leather gloves and a gilet.... and nibbled on a cheese and ham croissant. I was excited and nervous, although I had met Claudia and a couple of others there were going to be several Pro-Togs, plus models and make up artists.

We met up at Sloane Square station then on to the coffee shop where we chatted and giggled and waited for all the Togs to arrive. We took a walk then down to Battersea Park in a Mass Tog Convoy, as we approached the bridge there were some Santas from the recently finished Santa run and I couldn't resist a couple of shots!

We were shooting in Battersea Park, of which we had five models and four scenes to photograph. My team leader was the beautiful Julia of Modern Photographic. We were split off into pairs in our groups and each group was at a one scene at a time. The pairs within the group took it in turns to have a four minute slot posing and shooting the models. Whilst waiting for the models to arrive we had a play around with ideas and positions for shooting... and took some "profile pic" shots of each other too!

I thought I would share two of my own favourite images from the day. There are more on my new facebook page 

Casey Avenue Photography. I will be launching my website soon too!!

Well what a learning curve the day turned out to be. It's so great to meet up with so many other creatives for a start! It was my first time shooting models too, directing them into poses was fun and certainly got easier with each scene. It was such a giggle, immensely inspiring and a whole load of awesomeness for a Saturday afternoon!

After all the scenes were photographed by each group we headed up to the venue for the talks which were held by Julia @ Modern Photographic, Catherine Connor @ Aspire Training, Melissa Love @ Melissa Love Designs and Gary Lashmar @ Marshal Gray Photography. I'm absolutely gutted to say I missed the latter three due to hot-footing it back to Northampton in time for my Dad's 60th Birthday Party!

I will try and catch up with some more blogs over the weekend, I have some great street photography to share with you too.

Can't wait for the next Toggy Meet up!http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.317519821610708.89597.300857529943604&type=1

Manmade Today!

College this evening and we went from fruit last week to manmade this week.

I have a slightly poorly girl after her flu jab yesterday so I wasn't particularly prepared for college. Thankfully other people brought plenty in and we were also given access to the workshop classroom which has some interesting things to shoot.

I did quite a bit of wandering from one room to the next to see what everyone else was up to! The main aim of the game was to experiment with lighting and compositions.

I quite like the 'lastic band ball and how it is lit and shaded...

My random contributions to the class were items retrieved from the boot of my car! Boxing gloves and roller-skates... It was suggested I put them both on and start a new sport whilst the others took shots, I think it could take off!

and finally the slightly worn-nippled mannequin, rocking it with the headphones...

I'm off to Bath this weekend and hoping to get some street photography in!

Baby & Big Brother Portraits

Another delightful weekend and the Canon getting plenty of action!

I had the pleasure of a spontaneous visit to see Bethany and Finley, two beautiful photography subjects I don't think I will tire of photographing!

Bethany was very sleepy when I first arrived but after lots of snoozy cuddles and a good feed she was wide awake and alert.

Following a scrumptious roast dinner we ventured up to the Park to take some lovely outdoor portraits of the Big Man! He's a little camera shy so the art of distraction is the way forward for the smiles...

It was particularly lovely to see a photo of Bethany on canvas on the living room wall, that I took when she was 2 day old... awww!

Juicy Fruity

Well it was a double whammy for me this week. My tutor asked us to bring in fruit & veg for college to experiment with lighting and composition in the studio AND the photography project group I am in set the task for "Strange Fruit", of which I have to upload one image.

So I went along to Tesco and I really wanted a dragon fruit but couldn't find one so practically ended up with half the fresh fruit there!

I'll be honest, photographing fruit didn't exactly get me excited but I knew there was a reason behind it and that was on lighting etc. Give me people, street photography and pretty buildings any day! We had a few things to play with, I started on the product table and began arranging my fruit like some sort of florist! I lit the table underneath....

Then I tried to go a little more minimalist with a back-light to enhance the straw like coconut...

I was getting a little peckish by now, no dinner as I go straight to college from work so was happily nibbling away at the pomegranate whilst pondering my next move! I went for a spot of Macro on the yummy pomegranate...

I moved over to the OHP (over head projector) to have a play on there with light and fruit. I can't actually remember the name of these little babies, I do remember them not tasting as nice as they looked!

Venturing into the dark room for my first time I came across two of my class mates playing around with fruit for photograms... lots of fun and very therapeutic in the dark room, chatting away swishing photos in trays. We were laying the fruit/veg on top of a clear wallet that was placed on the photographic paper, exposing the light then developing. Can you guess what has been used in this Photogram...

And my submission for "Strange Fruit" into my project group was this little number...
"Well you wouldn't want it in your fruit salad would you?"

We're going to London to buy a Heat magazine

Guess where I've been?

Had an awesome time in London at a friend's annual work party. Mr W came up trumps with the most amazing hotel in Soho... the Sanctum Hotel... amazing! The double upgrade was a bonus but the best thing about it besides the decor, the luxury, the professional photographs framed and lining the walls... was undoubtedly the concierge! With a voice like Ewan McGregor and the biggest personality, the man would quite simply do anything for you, I can think of a few people to send to him for a lesson in customer service, just fantastic, oh and there's the bowler hat.
He obliged for some photographs but actually the best shot I got was of him talking to a client in the lobby...

I also used this shot in my first submission to a project group, the theme was product placement... I'm a little nervous of what the other Togs will think of it... 

We went to the National Portrait Gallery this morning, was great to look at Portraiture paintings and photographs. I particularly enjoyed the comedian section.

There was so much to see around London, I must confess I am a mahoosive fan of people watching, probably why I enjoy portraits so much. As we pounded the pavements of Trafalgar Square, The Strand, and The Mall, I kept stopping for shots and giggling to myself each time Mr W noticed further up that I was no longer walking by his side!

I've gone for a bit of a black and white thang today... I absolutely love black and white but feel the need most the time to try and not do too much of it as I am going through this journey, however after my visit to the Gallery today I became inspired, I realised that portraits are amazing in B&W and if I like it then I should just go with it... they're my shots after all.

More Street Photography than Portrait but I love this shot

Best Busker ever!

And finally, I just had to share this photograph, nothing to do with the merits of the shot as it's not the best photo... just check this dude out in London in NOVEMBER....

London Fields

Today I met up with a group of Pro Togs :)

It was a great day, even with my monster hangover!! Claudia Carter of Claudia Rose Carter Photography set the meet up and it was plenty of fun. We hung out around London Fields, snapping away at each other and anything else that took our fancy. The meet up is sponsored by Aspire Photography Training of which I have an eye on a course for when I finish my City & Guilds!

I really got to "know" my camera more today shooting in Manual and playing around quite a lot. Gary was great and got a particularly nice shot of me by the canal, great experience and made me realise I just need to be more bossy... I mean "confidently instruct" my subjects!

Here are a few of my favourites from the day...

Hot Pink Sunrise

I haven't blogged for a while... my Brother in Law went for a fantastic trip to Rome with his Girlfriend and took the Canon. They got some great shot, would love to go myself.

So in the meantime I used my husbands 35mm film camera... I thought it'd be a good idea to learn, might even see if my tutor will show me how to develop it in the dark room. It's hard taking pictures with it because you can't veto it before continuing... you just have to hope it's good enough! that and the fact it had an old film in it... I thought he'd put a new one in! doh! Really looking forward to seeing the pictures, they're mostly of Erin... playing at the park, helping Daddy strip wallpaper etc When we get a bit further with the house renovations I will get some shots up of that too.

So it's been quiet on the photography front, I missed college too last week and it's half term this week.
I have busy weekend ahead with a ladies night away (can't wait!) with some great friends, food and wine! I'm also very excited to be meeting up with some fantastic photographers on Sunday so will undoubtedly have lots of photographs to show you then :)

This is the sky view from my house this morning, isn't it pretty!

Exploration....

I went for a leisurely stroll to a derelict delight. I first spotted this place when I was doing lots of outdoor running. It was actually dusk when we ran past it and the building was lit up and eery. I decided to check it out in daylight and see if I could get closer to get some images.

I wasn't disappointed... we found a little hole in the fence and creeped through...

It had such a grand entrance, it's been like this for some time as you can see the plants are growing from the inside out now. I looked it up online for some background on this place, it was ruined originally by fire 10 years ago. Approximately 60% of the building was gutted within 12 hours, destroying the house and it's extravagant  features and has pretty much been sat there since. It is up for sale for a cool £1million but is guessed to probably cost £5million to restore.

For some reason, some twurp has felt the need to dump a load of tyres here, just on the inside of the little hole in the fence... I don't get it?! it's not like you were being opportunist as you drive past, it's about half a mile up from the main road.

There were loads of "floating" fireplaces... I would have liked to get in a bit further but it really didn't look like it would be safe!

You can see the charred wood here on the right, remnants of floorboard or ceiling too!
I should have got a picture with myself and Jake... my 12 year old trusty tripod carrier!! I was a little nervous though as it was the first time I'd explored a derelict building for photos. Think he quite enjoyed the history of it all... history is his best subject at school!

Can't wait for my next exploration...

Tinkling the Ivories

I have finally decided on what theme to run through my portraiture project! People's interests and hobbies, i did on Tuesday evening actually! I then had to keep writing ideas down after they kept popping into my head... whilst I was trying to sleep!

I also have my homework of contrasts so had a little think of how I can do this to run in with my theme too. I began with photographing my daughter at her tennis lesson this morning and then on to my Mother-in-law's which is what I am going to share with you today.

Gill is a doting Grandma and loves to play the piano together with my little lady. Having been a music teacher, as well as a head teacher, it was lovely to watch them together. She would ask Erin to play animal music... snakes, monkey, hippopotamus etc and Erin would change the style to suit. Erin was also partial to a spot of sad music and even monster music!

With windows at both ends of the room and the piano between a wall and sofa, the light was tricky and angles even trickier! It did give me the chance to use my lovely new flash and I am pleasantly pleased with this action portrait...

And for my contrasting image I have gone with young & old, love this picture of their hands playing away...

I didn't want to leave, they played so beautifully together, it was especially cute that Erin picks the music book and selects different pages... she is intelligent but not quite genius, she can't actually read music!
As you can see music makes you smile... especially the improvised ivory tinkling of a five year old :)