Author: Stewart Weir
City Travel Workshop – London
In association with Calumet I’m running a city travel photography workshop. This is an exciting, and intense all day travel photography workshop which is suitable for anyone who has a basic understanding of photography, up to more advanced photographers looking to progress in this area of photography.
The day will begin in the classroom where we will discuss the foundations of travel photography. We will then venture outside where you will be set a series of exercises to get you thinking. Stewart will be on hand to support you throughout the day, helping you progress in both technical and creative areas.
Course Content:
In The Classroom 10:00 – 12:00
- Introduction – Objectives
- Research and Planning
- What to Take (and leave behind)
- Why A Notebook Is Essential
- Camera Setting Options
- Legal Considerations (for stock and general urban shooting)
- Shooting in an Urban Environment
- Commercial vs. Non Commercial Images
Outside 12:00 – 21:00
We will choose a route taking in a variety of landmarks and lesser known areas, learning as we walk. Along the way you will be given a series of exercises including the following;
- Shooting for a Varied Portfolio
- Learn to Become ‘Invisible’
- Avoiding the Cliché Image
- Finding the Unusual
- Composition
- Candid and Unposed Portraits
- Urban Architecture
- Colour vs Black and White
- Using Light
Workshop Debrief: Within 2 weeks of finishing the workshop you will put together a portfolio of 30 images with captions, and Stewart will give you feedback on the images.
Requirements: Any digital or film camera. There may be restrictions on tripod use but if you’re happy to carry one around on the day then please bring one along. This is an intense, long day so wear good walking shoes and clothing for the likely weather conditions.
The cost for the day is £150 (10.00 to 21.00hrs plus review of images).
Link to Friday April 1st Workshop
Link to Friday May 6th Workshop
Link to Friday June 3rd Workshop
If you would like any more information about this workshop Stewart is happy to speak to you. Please message here, thanks.
The Last Goal
26th April 1997 – The Last Goal ever scored at The Goldstone Ground (YouTube video link), home of Brighton & Hove Albion FC (from 1902 to 1997). It was a Stuart Storer goal giving the Seagulls a 1-0 victory over Doncaster Rovers and lifted them out of the fourth-tier relegation zone but it took 14 years for the club to find another place they could call home. Brighton & Hove Albion FC are now in the Championship play-off places playing in front of the largest average attendances in the division.
I am offering an open edition A3 print. If your interested please message me direct by filling out the contact form here.
The Screaming Woods
Otherwise known as the Screaming Woods, on the morning of November 1, 1948, twenty people from the Maltman’s area were found dead, eleven of whom were children. Many reported seeing strange lights coming from the forest on the night of Halloween, when the massacre took place. The autopsies couldn’t determine the cause of death and after a few weeks the local authorities quickly ended the investigation, stating that the cause was carbon monoxide poisoning. In 1964, private investigator Robert Collins conducted in-depth witness interviews designed to uncover hints about the alleged activity of an unknown religious cult in the village of Smarden. His research stopped after he died in a tragic car accident the following year. In October 1998, on the same night as fifty years before, four college students who were visiting the forest went missing after people from Pluckley reported seeing “figures of light similar to spider webs” in the sky. Their bodies were never found and after three weeks, the police investigation stopped.
The Inspired Eye
The Inspired Eye run a feature about Krung Thep – City of Angels and Demons shot last year in Bangkok. Click on the image to be taken there!
English Woodlands
So far its been a 5 year journey of photographing English woodlands and trees. This image was taken in the rain in private woodlands close to the village of Woodchurch in Kent. Like most personal projects I work on they dont seem to have an end in sight, rather they stop and start depending on my mood. I guess it’s something that afflicts all creative types … the stopping and starting, the feeling of enough is enough and then you wake up several days, weeks or months later and think NO, I’ve not finished yet …
An English Landscape
A Guy Called Tim
I shall start this entry in Tim’s words from his blog;
“In May 2007, I answered an advertisement in Time Out from Graeme Montgomery, whom I know now to be an extremely talented professional photographer. He was compiling a book of nudes and wanted to photograph the first 100 people to answer the advert so I thought ‘why not?’ and went along and found that I was number one! Strangely enough, two other photographers advertised in the following two issues of Time Out, this time for people to pose for portraits, and they both photographed me subsequently. That was that for a while until, in February 2008, I answered an advert in our local newspaper from a student, Daisy Lang, who wanted to photograph people with illnesses for her final year’s project. Subsequently, I discovered that there were many photographers advertising on the Internet for models for particular projects. I wrote an email to the first photographer explaining that I was 57 and had Parkinson’s Disease and that ‘I wanted to continue on my path of being photographed by different people during the course of my illness’. Suddenly, as I wrote those words, I realised that I had my own project. Since then, over 300 different photographers have photographed and filmed me and it has been incredibly interesting and exciting as I have seen the project develop day by day. I have met many wonderful, skilful people many of whom, normally, I would never have met let alone spent several hours with them.”
Seven years later the project still runs and I was to become photographer 334 in Tim’s marathon project in early March this year. We met in The Mad Hatter cafe a week before the shoot. Every so often our paths cross with someone whose presence you feel immediately comfortable with and that was certainly the case with Tim. It is as the cliche goes, like you have known them for longer than those few moments you have just met. Tim Andrews is a man who has defined himself rather more post Parkinson’s Disease than before in his previous life as a lawyer I feel. Rather than sitting back and waiting for nature to do it’s thing he has taken life by the throat and began a creative journey to document his life and persona by working with amateur and professional photographers.
I must say that before every shoot Im just a little nervous. Anything can happen from gear failure to just making a complete idiot of yourself due to stupidity. In my life Ive done many street portraits which is in my opinion the most difficult to get right but nevertheless even with a willing subject and time the pressure is always there and I like to self impose the pressure regardless. I think only creative people understand the feeling of when ‘it’ happens. It’s that knowing of and rush of excitement and happiness when you have a result which defines what your wanting to achieve. The addiction of creative souls is the search for that elation and it’s as much a curse as it’s a blessing. So the shoot took 90 minutes and I quickly ventured into a realm Ive never visited before.. the nude portrait. Tim has experience and was so at ease it relaxed me which is just as well. I think it’s a measure of trust between the photographer and subject when the flow becomes seamless. We tried a variety of poses but the portrait of serenity (#3) followed by the scream (#4) shows two sides of all of us. What we strive for and those moments in our lives when all we want to do is scream. Tim of course doesn’t have what most of us take for granted.. he has a condition which can only be managed for a time but not cured.
The following images show an edited progression of the shoot. I think they speak for themselves. How you feel about them is for you to decide. The last two portraits show Tim in his alter ego of Roger A Destroyer and he can be seen talking here. The last portrait has been chosen by Tim for the project Over The Hill. Here is Tim’s blog entry about the shoot.
“Photography records the gamut of feelings written in the human face, the beauty of the earth and skies that man has inherited, and the wealth and confusion man has created. It is a major force in explaining man to man.” – Edward Steichen.
Shadow Perspective
If the best camera is the one you have with you, then the mobile phone is now the best camera. It’s now responsible for producing some outstanding images and capable of producing prints up to around 10×10 inches (8mb sensor). Photographers like Ben Lowy have over 150,000 followers on his Instagram feed so there’s no doubt the mobile phone has the power to draw in viewers to our work. For me moments I see would never have been shot without my phone and the image above is a perfect example. I saw the shadows being cast by passers by and pure luck gave me this shot. No camera, no shot. Please click the image to go to my Instagram feed or just click here. Ive a long way to go to 150k, but hey ya gotta start somewhere!
Ratchadaphisek Road
Devon Cock & Hen
Stewart Weir 