On Friday 11th September I took some photos at Ivy Live, a weekend long music festival in Ivybridge that attracted a crowd of over 3,000.

Seven bands were playing on the outdoor ‘Mount The Curb’ stage that evening:

• The Quails
• Outfit
• Adventures Of
• Os Vampiros
• Tamakai
• The Dolcet Tones
• Spies

I shot a few general pictures of the venue (amazing sunset that night by the way), but of course it was the live music that got my attention.  I had free reign in front of the stage, but I only hung around for three songs by each act since that’s the standard thing to do.  All the shots were taken with my Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens, which I’m steadily growing to love… Read more »

On Sunday 16th August I shot over 20 bands at Dodd Stock in Brixham.  I’m still trying to get rid of the bodies.

It was a great day, with a tagline of “One day of Peace, Love, Art and Music” and all in aide of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, Amnesty International and Surfers Against Sewage.  I shot over 800 frames throughout the day, of which I kept just over 50% (not bad for me).  There were two stages: a large outdoor stage and a smaller indoor area.  There was also an open mic jam tent, which became an open air open mic jam, um.. ‘place’ when the tent blew away. Read more »

On Tuesday I filled a few rolls of digital film with the Paignton Regatta firework display.

The last time I had shot fireworks was with my Kodak point-and-shoot several years ago, so I seized the opportunity to let the 50D and 24-70 loose :)  Apart from some kids mumbling “why duz evrywun av such bloody big camraz?” as I passed by, the evening was quite devoid of both adventure and whimsy.  Shame.  Still, I managed to claim a good vantage point with the tripod about half an hour before the show.

Something that I’ve noticed time and time again with other people’s firework photos is that they are of… fireworks, and nothing else.  I can only assume that these individuals follow their instinct to get as close to the display as possible, only to be forced to shoot upwards against the night sky with no other features in the frame.  This is utterly boring in my opinion.  Why?  Because there’s no reference, no anchor: the fireworks could be anywhere in the world.  For this reason I chose to set up on the far side of Paignton harbour, looking inland-

Groovy.  An explosion or five is all that picture needs. Read more »

On Saturday I partied on Paignton Green.

Dirty Blues initially asked me to go and photograph them rockin’ the casbah during Palm 105.5‘s lineup of live music, which also included performances from several other local acts including Emily Howard, Stillyano and Too Hot.  The whole event climaxed at around 9.45pm with a somewhat anti-climatic performance from a Kylie Minogue impersonator, who’s only redeeming quality was her stage name: ‘Rogue Minogue’.

The Dirty Blues set gave me an opportunity to play with my new Canon 24-70.  I can fanny around in the kitchen with rulers and bits of string until the cows come home, but the only way to really establish how this lens performs is to take it out ‘in the field’ so to speak.  My conclusion?  Superb contrast and colour, poor focus :(.  I did a bit of research and discovered that this lens is notorious for ‘bad copies’.  Oh well, time to whip out the Canon warranty and get it seen to.  If it turns out to be miscalibrated (I hope it does!) then I may have to withdraw my last blog post… Read more »

I am now the proud owner of a Canon 24-70 f/2.8 USM L lens-

Read more »

I’ve just been sorting through some photos I took on Dartmoor three weeks ago.  It was the wettest I have ever been whilst out with my camera.

You may not know this, but taking SLRs out in the rain is not something you want to do unless a) you have a weather-sealed camera body such as Canon’s flagship 1DsIII (below left) or b) you are prepared to buy a monstrous trunk-like weatherproof Barbour coat for your camera (below right). Read more »

I’m not a train spotter.

But on Thursday I did go chasing trains with my camera.  I took my opportunity to get outside while the English cloud (singular – just one giant cloud) was off harassing other parts of the country.  I decided to shoot one of the steam trains on the local Paignton to Dartmouth steam railway, an endeavour which didn’t not require an uninsignificant degree of planning, so that I was in the right place at the right time.

Armed with only a wide angle lens, I knew I had to get in close.  I grabbed a timetable from Paignton station and drove to a good spot along the line.  It was late in the afternoon so the sun was shining East, towards the Bay: perfect for a shot of the train with the water behind.  I deployed my tripod. Read more »