Pointless vanity project of the former Tabascokid

On the 16th of July, word began to get through of the death of former Times colleague and friend Richard Mills. He died on the 14th of July 2008 while on assignment in Zimbabwe. Due to the delicate situation involved with getting Richard out of the country, news of his death was held until this had been achieved. The day before I found out, I’d been asked by a friend how many people I knew had died in my life and I was pleasantly surprised to find that I couldn’t really name any. Richard’s death has come as a real shock.

When I started working for The Times in 2003, Richard was one of the first photographers that I was placed with. It was through him that I learnt how to approach strangers and get them to pose for pictures without complaint but purely through confidence, politeness and, in his case, that gift of the gab. It was also Richard who rang me from Iraq on his Sat Phone to congratulate me when I had some good news despite being warned of the dangers of using it due to enemy detection, never mind the £50 a minute charges at the time. When covering a story about an intensive care unit for newborn babies, I was taught a big lesson through his sensitive coverage of the subject. While I tried to be clever and prove myself, his simple and personal shot of a baby’s grasping hand held the the page of the following day’s paper with more power than any of my efforts.

A former RAF man, Richard covered foreign dangerous assignments for The Times newspaper in Iraq, Afghanistan and Zimbabwe and was rarely on home turf. His recent work from Zimbabwe saw him travelling the country with journalist Martin Fletcher using a variety of covers. Strict media laws in the country carry a 2 year prison sentence for anyone reporting on the state of the country so both Mills and Fletcher had to travel as tourists, priests, chemical salesmen and aid workers at various times to avoid capture by the Government officials who were never far behind. Regularly witnessing the unavoidable horror of warfare, Richard talked to me once of his real desire to avoid the route of so many combat photographers as they forget about the human cost and emotions of war. While it’s easy to create shocking images of burning bodies that will appeal to the voyeur, it takes maturity to appreciate that the body in the Iraq mortuary is somebody’s son. A massive amount can be said without showing the bleeding wounds.

The above images are from Richard’s winning entry from the second annual spider black and white photography awards and from his honourable mentions from the Picture Editor’s Awards.

He leaves behind his wife and five year old son.

More information on Richard’s life and work can be found here and here

A gallery of his work with The Times can be found here

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of getting to shoot Alice Cooper at the ExCel centre in London. I’m sure it must be rather an odd gig for him as he was essentially the “turn” to entertain the crowds at the British Motor Show but he still put on a top show.

Considering this guy is sixty this year, it’s inspiring to see him living up to the legendary persona that he’s created over the last four decades. I’ve never been a great fan of his music (having been more into my Anthrax and Iron Maiden..) but there are some people that are worth seeing for their pure legend status alone.

Following on from my recent post about shooting music, it was great to photograph someone who really savours the theatrical side of stagework with props, lights, make-up and all of the exaggerated behaviour that helped to turn them into such a living legend. Bravo, that man..

I have found the answer, people. If you want to do something, whinge about it in your blog and then it’ll happen. On Tuesday morning, I finally got to take to the skies in an air-filled vessel! Huzzah!  After the obligatory Hindenberg jokes with the other journalists that were flying, we went for our emergency procedure lecture (no lighters allowed apparently..) then it was time to fly.

I’ve clearly earned some Kharma points recently as the day was perfectly clear and warm so visibility was excellent.  Taking off from a small airfield near Upminster, the flight took us over the centre of London and gave me chance to fill my boots with stock aerial photography too.. 

With only enough room for twelve passengers at a time, everyone gets a window seat with great visibility and once the Zeppelin is off the ground, you’re free to move about and look for landmarks.  The back has a huge glass panel that you can sit over.  Anyone with vertigo probably won’t enjoy that part though as even I had a bit of a twinge when I looked directly down.

Priced at £360 for an hour, the flights are running until August 21, 2008.  30 minute sessions are also available for £185.

I think I may be cursed.  Despite having a keen sense of adventure and love of discovery, the Gods of hot air-related flight clearly think I’m not all that.

For Christmas, my lovely lady bought me the gift of flight. To be precise, a hot air balloon flight as dawn breaks over a South African nature reserve.  Two days of 4am wake-up calls to be told that it was too windy before a refund was given and we returned to Blighty.  Shortly after, I spot that the Bristol Balloon Fiesta is taking place so after convincing my boss that it was worth a shot, I set my alarm for stupid o’clock and headed down for my journey to the clouds.  After spending two hours shooting them as the sun came up, the word went round that all flights were cancelled for the day.  It seemed that the totally still and calm blue sky above my head was in fact a gusting blowing torrent of death and destruction, hungry for fresh balloons to chew up.

Fast forward to this morning and after shooting a tear-inducingly funny photo-call for Hamleys toy store’s Christmas range where much fun was had with a Dalek’s head, I get the call to let me know that my luck is in.  It’s fly time.

A new company is launching pleasure flights in a zeppelin over London and I have a £360 ticket to spend the afternoon cruising over the Capital.  Rushing to the collection point, I get off the train to find that due to the whirling hurricane of death that seems to follow me whenever I’m near air-filled transports, the flight is cancelled.

Later in the day I get a call offering a trip tomorrow but as I’m the only shooter in town, I can’t give up so much time during the day.  I’m reaching the conclusion that these teasing promises are the closest I’ll ever get to hot air..

Of all the protests that I’ve covered since being in London, surely the prize for most unique chant must go to the “Citizens not Strangers” rally in Parliament Square on Friday;

“What do we want?”

“To pay taxes!”

“When do we want to?”

“Now!”

A slightly different cry from the poll tax riots of old..

Organised to highlight the plight of Zimbabwean immigrants who have fled their native country for our shores but are now facing red-tape, bureaucracy and regulations that either block their applications for residency or forbid them from working, banners chants and hand-drums accompanied the rallying cries. With a few speeches from politicians (that can never sound like anything but rent-a-purpose soundbites), campaigners and religious leaders, Archbishop of York Dr John Sentamu took centre stage with considered and appropriate words.

It’s a real shame when you get to hear from Zimbabwean refugees who are desperate for change on one day, then find out that China and Russia have vetoed the rest of the G8’s sanction plans the next. Sanctions certainly aren’t always the answer but without action, it just leaves politicians making ineffective “down with this sort of thing” speeches in forgettable press conferences. Mugabe must be quaking in his boots.

Music photography has always been an enjoyable sideline since my days of drumming, back in Sheffield. Shooting the behind-the-scenes japes of our tour bus and arranging our promo shots planted the seed of having fun with the world of live music and trying to visually record it.

Powerful shots are highly dependent on the artist though as if there’s nothing coming from the stage, there’s often not much that you can do about it. On the other hand, there are times when music photography is definitely like shooting fish in a barrel. Your lighting is picked for you, the artist is not listening to any suggestions for poses, you only get to shoot during the first three songs and you often have limited movement so you therefore have to shoot what’s given to you. When these factors are combined, it’s hard to get excited about shooting a concert as, if you have the right settings, you could get a perfectly acceptable shot with your eyes closed. I’m always baffled by some photographers that turn up at gigs and shoot the artist with straight flash. It may be frustrating leaving your exposures in the hands of the lighting engineer but a flat, lifeless flashed photo is DULL.

My interest is only raised when I try to find something different. There are loads of exceptionally good photographers out there that manage to capture the mood, excitement and passion of these performances and if you’re struggling, look for inspiration, not an easy way out.

Thankfully, if the artist is right and you can get a decent angle, you can get the opportunity to get something strong whether it’s down to emotion, composition or just fluke.

Due to my employers, I’ve been spoiled with the concerts that I cover so I’m more experienced with stadiums than the Dog & Duck but sometimes get to play around with my toys in more intimate venues.

Being a music fan, it’s a real pleasure to be able to get to see and shoot some of these musical legends from all genres while they’re doing what they’re famous for. It’s an honour to get to photograph people that I’d never normally pay to see and am often surprised at how much fun their shows are!

One of the side-effects is that it often makes me want to get up and start playing drums again. An odd coincidence is that for some reason, a considerable amount of the press photographers in London are ex-drummers and, apparently, goalkeepers. Must be something about liking to be in the background, I guess. I was just talking to a photographer from The Times tonight and have decided to have a bit of a go with his band soon. That’s going to be quite a bizarre experience after over 5 years away from my kit!

Now, what was it again?

*Right-left-right-right, left-right-left-left…*

I’m not sure how obvious it is with some of my dodgy colour post-production but I was born with the decided photographic hindrance of being colour-blind. My parents first realised when we were on a family holiday in France and when they pointed to the beautiful poppy field out of the right window of the car, I looked left. Bummer. The available tests have always been incredibly frustrating as there are a significant amount of screens that have absolutely no number in at all to me and, until I decided to try out the only option available to resolve it, I always had a niggling feeling that the rest of the world’s population had met up when I was out to discuss a hilarious practical joke.

For those of you who aren’t that up on their hue-deficient freaks, the best way I’ve described it is that it often feels like I missed the day at school when everyone was taught all about colours. I can see most colours but can’t name them. I say “most” as sometimes it’s completely baffling when people tell me there are two different colours in front of me. It’s only through years of experience that I can start to think along the lines of “if it’s a darker blue, it may well be purple” and “if it’s a darker green, it may be brown”. This might sound completely incorrect but it’s often the only way I can make an educated guess on what hues I’m looking at. In an everyday world, the lack of recognition doesn’t cause any problems (apart from my occasional dress-sense mistakes..) but as soon as photoshop and photography is involved, problems can begin.

Some things in life are easier than others. Sky is blue, grass is green, wood is brown. However, what colour is skin? Skin coloured. Okaaay.. Shooting press conferences in mixed lighting conditions can produce problems for me as magenta and red casts start to affect skin tones. Some software has pre-sets for this issue too but if the person is from an ethnic group other than the safely pre-programmed Caucasian, the results can’t always be trusted so the human judgement returns.

If colour casts are tricky, it’s easy to convert to mono but working for a news agency, even if I do provide a mono image, I also have to provide a colour version too.

Also, battery chargers are nearly always a pain; charging=flashing, charged=solid colour. Why can’t everyone stick to that rather than having a pin-prick of light change from a subtle hue of red to a subtle hue of green? My batteries must be the most over-charged in the world. Software has helped as well as various toys like the expodisc but having an improved general colour vision is the holy grail.

Having moved to London and finding that I was earning enough to consider making enquires about the latest technology, I decided to give the Chromagen lens a go. After researching who offered the service, I went along to one of the larger opticians in London to discuss what was available to me. In my consultation, we went through the basic tests like the one previously mentioned and the optician ascertained the exact type of deficiency I had. Once it was decided, I then had the option of getting glasses made or a contact lens. Here lies the first problem that you can see from the image at the top of this post; for the system to work, you only need one eye to be covered. This means either having one freaky eye a la David Bowie or wearing mirrored glasses in all situations (mirrored due to the fact that one lens would be clear and one bright red or green). The main idea is that colour blindness is a form of dyslexia with information travelling through both eyes and hitting the brain at the same time. Getting a bit freaked out with so much information at once, the old lobes just try to bluff it and send out dodgy info to the rest of the brain. To fix this, Chromagen tests work out which colour is needed then one eye is covered with that colour so that the information is somehow slowed down through one side. This means that the brain has a millisecond to see one side, work out a theory on the what colour it is before the second eye’s info hits it to confirm the guess. This slight delay seems to give the brain breathing time and improves colour blindness and word-based dyslexia. I opted for the contact and placed my order.

A week later and I returned for the fitting. Having 20/20 vision aside from colour issues, it took me a considerable length of time to get the lens in. Poking yourself in the eye on purpose could not be more wrong.

Anyhow, once it was in and the tears had stopped flowing, the difference was considerable. I’d never realised how weak my depth perception is until I tried this lens. Immediately, the floor seemed to sweep into the distance. I know that sounds like I’ve just broken out the peyote but it really is a unique feeling. Reds were vibrant to the point of fierce with the McDonalds sign feeling as though it was punching me in the retinas. As I wore them that day, I wandered around London, savouring traffic lights, leaves, the blue sky and any primary object I could find. The best way to describe it is that everything looked “popped”. It was as though I was seeing everything as though it was shot on slide film with ultra-saturated vibrancy.

The downside came when I tested the lens in a work environment. The thing that is not explained in the brochures is that despite you suddenly having a broader range of visible colours, depth perception and contrast, it doesn’t help in actually recognising the colours. When I attempted to edit skin tones and subtle casts, I was still just as much in the dark. The primary colour looked lovely and punchy but I never really had issues with these anyway. Tones and hues were as confusing as ever. My brain still couldn’t “get” the differences.

That was about six months ago and despite splashing out on the lens, I admit that it now sits in the bottom of a drawer. It was an interesting experiment but it’s almost like discovering you have the power to fly but however hard you flap, you can only get six inches from the ground. Ultimately, you just end up walking again.

Ahh, Glastonbury number 6. After enjoying the heat of 1995, then four other randomly soaked years in between, I’d promised the rest of Team Glasto that 2008 would be dry and I was right! Yay! I RULE! (aside from a lot of rain at the start..) *cough*

Despite lugging my poncho and boots from the car, it was bliss to again savour the feeling of being able to sit down at will without searching for one of the highly-prized benches. As last year was the year of Editors on every stage and sound system, the band of the festival for me was Elbow. With a huge uplifting show in front of tens of thousands of people as the sun set on the Other Stage, the crowds were left chanting “Throw those curtains wiiiiide, one day like this a year will see me riiiight” as they wandered off to other stages. After their big stage appearance, it was a pleasure to get to see them playing again in a much more intimate environment on the Queens Head stage. Playing acoustic versions of fan favourites, the dedicated few who battled through the crowds to get into the small tent before they had to introduce the one in/one out policy were rewarded to a warm set from the band. If it wasn’t for finding out that my girlfriend has a crush on Guy Garvey, I’d think they were a pretty good band..

Having only made it to a few stages to see actual bands, we spent most of our time in the Dance tents and Glade area. After last years fantastic DJs and bands, it was a huge shame to find that this year found us wandering from area to area, looking for ANY decent dance music. As we entered each arena, the music was either shite or just finishing the final track. Considering it’s such a huge festival, I was really surprised. Thankfully, the Igloo area in the Dance field provided some decent tunes and as soon as we found it was on until 7am, we could take to the podium and make proper gimps of ourselves. There’s nothing like a pineapple and cheese crepe at 5.30am as you walk back to your tent in the new day’s sun..

Glastonbury is one of the few things that I actually really do my best to avoid shooting as I love having those few days a year to just bimble about, chill, dance all night, have a drink, doze and just recharge without the panic of rushing back to the press area to wire. I think my luck may have run out for next year though as I’ve been told I WILL be shooting it. Booo…

Monday came around and as we made our way back across the site to our car-park, it was SO much better than recent years to be able to stop and have ice-creams rather than fight through the mud in silence. Bravo, Glastonbury 2008!