Moving postcards

 

Previously on this blog I had a “Postcards from…” series which I will admit, I haven’t really kept on top of. However I have been travelling around just as much as before. Rather than just supply stills from each trip, I have been trying to find my feet when it comes to video. Below are a few videos from recent trips I have been on in 2018:

Amsterdam: this was a small weekend away with some of my closest friends for my stag-do. I had shot most of this on my iphone with a DJI Osmo Mobile 2

Barcelona: Amy and I got married in May and we went on a mini-moon to Barcelona to enjoy all that Spain has to offer. Most of the footage from this was with my iphone with the DJI Osmo Mobile 2 and GoPro footage.

Gatebil: This was the big one, the trip I have most been looking forward to. I have shot this event numerous times in the past and I finally wanted to share with you what it is like. GoPro and Canon 5D Mk3 for this one.

What do you prefer? Do you prefer the standard postcard format or do you like the videos more? Or what about both? Let me know below.

Don’t for get to follow me on instagram too.

SHOOTINGDAVE

Dipping my toe

Funny isn’t it? I never expected to make the jump into YouTube and yet, here we are.

After writing my last post on Light Painting, I found that I really enjoyed sharing what little knowledge I have with you. When I was starting out as a CG artist, I used to write tutorials, and I loved it. This mini, let’s call it an “explanation” of a photographic technique took me back to that.

Words aren’t always the most effective way of showing you how to do something, especially when they are sprawled out in printed form across a screen. Hence the natural jump onto YouTube. And here it is, enjoy…like…comment…subscribe…you know how it goes.

What can you expect from me going forward? Well, to be frank, not much. This is new to me, it requires enormous amounts of conscious thought to do. I have about 9 videos that I would like to make but don’t hold your breath. However you can subscribe to my channel here if you so desire.

If I do finally pull my finger (tripod, microphone, lights and camera) out then there are some areas that I would like to cover. I’d like to show retouching tips and tricks. Different photography techniques including lighting techniques. Possibly gear reviews, this is actually something that I used to do. I may occasionally try and make some travel videos too. But my initial plan was, is to show you what goes on behind the scenes at a shoot and through the editing side of things.

My thinking about this whole thing is that I am currently dipping my toe into it. I don’t want to buy any new gear for it yet but if it does start take off, then I will try and focus more time, money and energy into it.

Let me know what you thought, I’d genuinely love to hear what you have to say.

SHOOTINGDAVE

Published Work – Gatebil Magazine

2016 has been a year of polar opposites, work wise I have been incredibly busy, photographically I have been very quiet. I have shot much less but what I have shot has gone much further. Because I have been shooting for clients and not myself a lot of my work has remained on hard drives until they have been published. In July I attended an event called GATEBIL at Rudskogen Motorsenter in Norway. If that name rings a bell, it is because I went last year which you can see here. This is hands down my favourite motorsport event I have ever had the pleasure of attending and this year I got the extreme honour of shooting for their own magazine, predictably called GATEBIL MAGAZINE. I was tasked to shoot several feature cars, one of which is this super rare, Steatlh B7 which is one of one! What I didn’t know until this month was that I made the front cover. And I don’t mean I got a small picture on the front cover…I GOT THE MAIN IMAGE! Thanks guys! Anyway, here is a few images that didn’t make the cut. Thanks to Jan Øivind Ruud and Team RR for being so helpful during the shoot and thanks to Kaj Alver for getting me the gig.

SHOOTINGDAVE

Published Work – Ace Cafe Year Book

From an automotive photography point of view, this year has been pretty quiet for me. The amount of posts I have put up on Fueltopia has been laughable, the reason for this is twofold; work (I’m an Automotive CGI Artist) has been insanely busy this year meaning I have lost a lot of my weekends, secondly, some of the work I have been shooting has been for magazines so I couldn’t share it anyway. However, I am stoked to announce that I have now, for the first time (as far as I am aware) managed to get my work published in a magazine. It is in the Ace Cafe Yearbook which you can pick up here. Inside it celebrates all that is associated with Ace Cafe from events to music, to the culture and the people. It also includes some of my coverage from the Fueltopia Barrel Sprint. Here some of my favourites:

SHOOTINGDAVE

Postcards from LA

Now I’m not going to pretend that I am anything other than lucky. I am not going to pretend to be one of these people that has a boat load of money and can pop off to the other side of the world whenever I see fit. No, I am lucky. Late November I got the message that there would be a possibility that I’d be heading to LA for a photoshoot with Honda for work. I tried to down play the whole idea as in our industry, these decisions have a tendency to be reversed. Quietly however, I was screaming like a little girl inside. I held my breath until the first week of December when things like flights, hotels and cars were being booked. Holy fuck, I was actually going!

Camera gear was the first thing I packed and repacked, then passport, then toiletries and then clothes. I was going from England where the average temperature has been around 12 degrees Celsius to LA where it was hovering around 22! NICE. I was also going to having a 2 and a half days down time whilst out there so it wouldn’t all be work. I was so stoked about getting the opportunity to drive around and explore. Like I said, LUCKY.

Like any trip, I always carry my eyefi card so I can ping snaps from my camera to instagram whilst on the move. I tend to use VSCOcam to edit the pictures and I liked them so much I made a new preset in Lightroom to mimic the look using Kodak Gold 200 as a base. Enough chat, here’s some pictures.

It is safe to say that in the 5 days that I was there, I fell for the place. I wasn’t that blown away from it when I first landed but after spending time, speaking to people, travelling around, trying out the food (and beer) that I loved it. I would quite happily move there. There is so much to see and do and having a beach, mountains, big roads, deserts and all the sunshine you could want, why wouldn’t I want to be there.

LA, I’ll be back.

Oh and if you liked this, why not check out;
Postcards from Salou
Postcards from New York
Postcards from New York II

SHOOTINGDAVE