Anyway here I am now.

My next image in the 10People series is of Derek Knowles of Altium, a corporate client of mine based in Manchester. I asked Derek at the last minute to be one of my subjects as my original person had to drop out due to time constraints.

I have worked with Derek for many years on corporate assignments, so I called him to explain my idea. He was interested and agreed to model for me.

I set this one up and started shooting pretty quickly because Derek was a little pressed for time. I had a few ideas which we tried out, eventually I settled with the drinking the cup of tea idea. It just seemed to work, the location really made the shoot.

Here are some of the out takes, not sure about them, what do you think?

I have know Darren for a few years having worked on various projects, he also designed this website you are looking at.We  catch up with our geek talk about photographic kit on a regular basis. As well as being an equipment geek he is mad into snowboarding. So the idea behind this shoot was to get him with his snowboard, budget restrictions limited us to the UK and as at the time of the shoot there was no snow in the UK. I thought lets go to the beach, there is a link with snow boarding and surfing so we set off to the Lancashire coast one cold Febuary afternoon. Late afternoon sun in winter at the coast is superb, so Cleveleys (how exotic) it was.

We tried a few different shots as you can see below and I must admit I was torn between a few of them. Out of the series of 10PEOPLE the shot of Darren is a favourite with many people.

Any comments as usual are more than welcome. Here are the alternative shots.

Next in the series of my project 10PEOPLE is Michael Taylor of Business Insider magazine. I have worked with Michael on a number of projects for Business Insider magazine over the past few years. I knew that Michael was an avid fan of Blackburn Rovers football team, so I thought it would be interesting to photograph him at Ewood Park the home of Blackburn Rovers.

I contacted Jennifer at the ground who was really helpful and asked me just to give her a call when I wanted to set the shoot up. They where so accommodating even though we re-arranged the shoot a couple of times.

We arranged the shoot for a Tuesday afternoon in April as Michael was in the area.

My idea behind the photography was that I had interrupted Michael in a private prayer like moment at the ground. I wanted to get most of the ground in shot with the ‘ROVERS’ name in the background.

Michael was great throughout the shoot, we had a laugh and he just let me do whatever I wanted.

I got the shot I needed pretty quickly as I knew what I wanted. We then tried a few experiments to see what else we could come up with. I still went with my original idea but there are a few of the alternative shots featured below.

As well as my ideas, Michael asked if I would take some shots of him in football manager mode remonstrating with his team. So I fixed the telephoto lens to the camera and did some pitch side shots of Michael shouting at his ‘team’. A few of these shots are also featured below.

I would also like to thank Blackburn Rovers for use of the ground.

I would love some comments and feedback

The shot of Caroline was all about location. As Caroline lived and worked in Burnley, Lancashire I decided to use the ‘Singing Ringing Tree’, which if you have read any of my previous posts is a Panopticon sculpture at Crown Point, Burnley Lancashire.

The ‘Singing Ringing Tree’ designed by architects Mike Tonkin and Anna Liu of Tonkin Li and it won the National Award for architectural excellence by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) in 2007.

The sculpture harnesses the energy of the wind to produce a low, tuneful sound.

I arrived at the location about an hour or so before he shoot as I have already scouted for potential scenes. It was a freezing cold sunny day with intense blue skies. I decided on a number of shots using the low winter sun as my main light source.

The whole shoot took around two hours and  I must thank Caroline for her patience as she was clearly very very cold.

Here are some of the out takes

I have known Richard for well over 15 years having worked with him at the Lancashire Evening Telegraph (Now the Lancashire Telegraph), and with various local PR companies eventually meeting up with him again about 10 years ago. Richard set up his own PR company SlaterPR (now weareslater) shortly after I set up my photography business. We worked together on numerous projects including  the now very successful Lancashire Business View magazine which he launched around 6 years ago.

The idea for the shoot was to get photographs of Richard in Corporation Park in Blackburn, Lancashire. Richards offices are situated at the entrance to the park on East Park Road, so I thought it quite appropriate to use this superb location. I asked him to bring along items associated with swimming as he is a keen swimmer. I had a few ideas and we spent around two and half hours trying all sorts of different shots, I abandoned the swimming shots as it just was not working. So we tried shots of him on his phone, shots of him lying down on the muddy paths (in his new suit!!). Eventually I settled on the final image of Richard walking down the Broadwalk area of the park,  an area that the Victorian people of Blackburn would use to promenade on a Sunday.

Richard was great throughout. He was relaxed and calm (even though admitting he hates having his photograph taken), it made for a fun, relaxed photographic session

Richard really liked the shot of himself on the phone, he asked if he could use it on his twitter profile – @richardslaterpr, I agreed, as it was not going to be the photograph used in the final project.

Enough of my ramblings here are the out takes.

I will start off with the first person in the series, Charles Tattersall of City Press in Manchester.

I asked Charles Tattersall from  the Manchester based PR company if he would like to be involved in a photographic project. I was to looking at celebrating 10 years in business by photographing 10  people  I had worked with over those years

He agreed so we set a date at his offices in Manchester city centre.

I mulled over a few ideas one of which was using a gyroscope as a prop, why a gyroscope? well PR if you don’t already know is about balance and spin. I explained to Charles what I wanted him to do and he was more than happy.

I spent an hour setting up and deciding on locations and lighting etc. I only needed 20 minutes or so to capture what I needed. The session went so well that we spent over an hour trying out different ideas etc.  Charles was superb throughout, he agreed to my ideas and I reckon we could have carried on for another hour. Just goes to show if you have more time then your get the best ideas and ultimately the best photographs.

Here are a few of the photographs, a couple of these are more suited to a more corporate style of photography. I would be happy using any of the photographs for my project but ultimately I had to go with my first idea.

Well it has taken 12 months and loads of planning and favours but we are finally here. The big project that I have been going on about.

The photographic project is to celebrate my first 10 years in business. I decided it would be nice to photograph 10 people I have worked with over the past 10 years.

Most people I asked where up for it and I would like to thank them here. You where all very patient

Charles Tattersall- City Press PR (www.citypress.co.uk)

Richard Slater- Lancashire Business View (www.lancashirebusinessview.co.uk)

Caroline McNamee – CMC HR ( www.cmchr.co.uk)

Karl Zaldats – MRA Architects (www.mraarchitects.co.uk)

Michael Taylor – Insider Magazine (www.insidermedia.com)

Darren Wilson – KP Studios (www.kpstudios.co.uk)

Derek Knowles – Altium (www.altiumcapital.com)

Debra Brown – Global Hugs ( www.globalhugs.com)

Carlton Watt – CW Weddings (www.cwweddings.co.uk)

John Garrod – Ology (www.ologybusiness.com)

Special Thanks to Blackburn Rovers (particularly Jennifer Whalley who sorted everything) for the use of the football ground for the photograph of Michael Taylor.

Please click on the 10PEOPLE logo above. Here are a few as a taster. I will blog more about each shoot through out February

When it snows I often get asked “Being a photographer, I bet you go out and take loads of snow photographs”. Well I don’t because everyone is doing it, I don’t want to do the same as everyone else. However a very good client of mine asked the same question and when I replied no they said “You could always do it just for yourself”. They where right, I rarely go and do photography just for myself, so I gave it some thought and decided I would got out and photograph some snow scenes, they way I want to.

The Christmas break gave me a great opportunity to give it a go, so I decided to concentrate on the local golf course, I am not a golf fan but I do like the weird man made landscape that a gold course is. I spent quite a bit of time on the course and I have posted a few of the results below. Also is was great to photograph something on my doorstep, it just goes to show you don’t have to travel miles and miles to get interesting results. I will let you be the judge of that, comments very welcome.

Oh by the way Happy New Year