Bring on the Wall!
In full JFK-style, I became “ein Berliner” when I flew over to Germany last week to work with the Berlin bureau in the coverage of the celebrations and events surrounding the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Never having visited Berlin before, I had the usual mixture of anticipation and nerves with [...]
“Beached” now available in TK-Vision
As I’m trying to put together a selection of audio slideshows for presentation I might end up doing, I thought I’d post one on here to see how (and more importantly if) it works. Please feel free to give me any feedback on how you think it looks as it’s all a bit new to [...]
The knowledge continues to grow..
http://www.leonneal.com/blog/2009/06/11/the-alternative-london-knowledge-v10/ http://www.leonneal.com/blog/2009/06/15/the-alternative-london-knowledge-v20/ http://www.leonneal.com/blog/2009/07/10/the-alternative-london-knowledge-v30/ Following on from my three-part guide to the press photography “knowledge” listed above, it’s good to see that others have offered hints and tips from their own fields of expertise. New additions include a helpful guide from the PA picture desk on the view from the other side.. http://paphotocall.wordpress.com/2009/07/24/the-pr-picture-editors-knowledge/ and music photographer [...]
Nature’s flashgun
After seeing some of the great shots that came out of the storms at Glastonbury, I realised that I had yet another hole in my photography knowledge that needed filling and last week, I had the perfect opportunity to experiment. After reaching fatigue point recently, Kirsten and I got the chance to stay at a [...]
File under “Good week”
Wow. Do you know how sometimes everything just goes wrong and other times it all just clicks? I guess I’m on the peak of the rollercoaster ride at the moment (See #12) as I’ve just won the the “Portrait of the Year” category in the Press Photographer’s Year awards, here in the UK. I’m staggered [...]
Broken Cabinet? Yeah, it’s a Common’s problem..
With tonight’s news that Works and Pensions Secretary James Purnell has quit his position in the Cabinet and released an open letter to various newspapers calling on British Prime Minister Gordon Brown to quit, it reminds me how fascinating this job can be. The news from Westminster over the last few weeks has been slowly [...]
Madchester? I’m f@*!in’ livid!
As many of you know, I LOVE football. Everything about it excites me, be it adding new parts to your kit, learning new grooves or finally nailing a fill you’ve been working on for a while… Erm.. Hang on. That’s drumming. Oh, FOOTBALL. That’s the one I don’t like at all. Pushing this from my [...]
Going through the change
After months of speculation among the head bods, AFP London moved to the dark side, or more particularly, the black and gold side. Now armed with Nikon D3 bodies and various lenses, I’ve wandered the streets of London zooming left rather than right and pushing the exposure the wrong way. I mean, who in their [...]
West Bank Story
Yesterday, I hitched a lift with AFP driver Mano and headed into West Bank for a press conference and another grip’n’grin with man-of-the-moment US envoy George Mitchell at the Palestinian HQ, the Mukata. Heading into West Bank was quite an eye-opener for me as, until I saw it myself, I had assumed that it would [...]
Likud into shape
With my grasp of Israeli politics now so strong, it’s comparable to the vice-like grip of a sleeping toddler, I headed off on my first real assignment today as Benjamin Netanyahu formally launched the Likud Party’s election campaign. I say first real assignment but this doesn’t include yesterday’s mission to cover the funeral of a [...]
Got wood?
If you go down to the beach today, you’re sure of a big surprise.. After an unsuccessful attempt to catch Jonathan Ross heading in for his first day back at work, I was sent down to the East coast to have a look for some of the wood that was reported to have begun washing [...]
A day in the pool with the Queen
One of the very regular parts of shooting for an agency is the “pool photographer” job. Unfortunately, this has nothing much to do with shooting a swimwear competition and more to do with men in suits shaking hands in front of a fireplace or members of the Royal family meeting random bods (such as the [...]
Czech yo’ head
Being the selfless martyr that I am, I know that the best birthday present to give anyone is the one that results in you also getting to enjoy it. As I was pretty sure that Kirsten wouldn’t be too impressed with a Nintendo Wii, I opted to book a weekend in Prague. Thanks to the [...]
Apparently, “Yes We Can..”
So after two years of build-up, the moment of truth arrived as America went to the polling stations. Here in England, I headed down to Yates’ bar in Leicester Square, London to watch US ex-pats and politically-aware revellers get down to some serious Wolf-Blitzing.. Despite everyone knowing in their hearts how it was going to [...]
Thank Credit Crunchie, it’s Black Friday..
In my previous work for The Times, the monthly week of shifts for the business desk was seen as a bit of creative desert so as a Radio 4 discussion programme talked of the next four years of global recession, a part of my brain withered a little. Does this herald the beginning of half [...]
Labour Pains
Another year, another political party conference. This time, it again saw me heading to the Labour Party conference. All of my previous years of conference work have been in either Bournemouth or Brighton so heading to the sunny climes of Manchester was the new twist on familiar photographic territory. As a little background for anyone [...]
The Cucumber Season
August. To many, the month means pleasure, happiness and relaxation as they flee the country and head off to rows of pre-poured cocktails next to their beach lounger on the Costa Del Swank. To photographers and journalists across the land, it signifies the beginning of.. (cue lightning strike) ..the silly season. When this annual news-drought [...]
Mad on her? She’s alright, I suppose..
With a distinct sense of deja vu, I headed out to Cardiff on Saturday to catch the opening night of Madonna’s latest world tour, “Sticky and Sweet”. Taking in 27 dates around the globe, this will be her first tour since entering her 50s. I last shot her in 2006 at the same venue on [...]
Misdirected diatribe v2.0
Following the breaking news of yesterday’s air-crash, I headed up to Coventry to cover the story. As it’s currently the quiet or “silly” season for news where events just stop happening resulting in stories about penguins getting knighted and maize fields trampled to look like James Bond making the front page, this is the kind [...]
Richard Mills
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 [...]
The war continues..
I’ve just returned from Glastonbury festival (of which I’ll be scribbling something down soon), filled with the joys of love and spiritual freedom to be faced with my first ever collective of virtual burning pitchfork wielders. Yup, it seems that after a quiet few months that I hoped had seen the end of the campaign [...]
Weighing responsibility
This morning I received an email from a person who had seen my site and the image of a girl who has scarred herself through self-harm. Not receiving mail on this image very often, I was interested to hear what the person had to say but found that I was being involved in part of [...]
Tabasco-Globe
Just a quick update to combine a healthy dose of trumpet-blowing with pointing all you photography fans to a great new site that’s causing quite a stir among photo fans on the internet, the Boston Globe’s Big Picture. Rob Galbraith‘s site featured it recently, saying, “Launched officially only three weeks ago, The Big Picture, a [...]
Euro-ver 2008
The final job of the trip arrived yesterday with France v Italy. Never having seen Italy play before and only having heard the old stories of their “interesting” techniques, I was stunned at how ridiculous their diving is. The game looked more like an am-dram performance. Every few seconds, a player in white would collapse [...]
