Neil Danton

You’ve doubtless heard the expression “Bull in a china shop”, but what about a bull in a restaurant?

Shot recently for the official opening of the new Bull’s Head restaurant in beautiful Dingle, Co Kerry.

That bull may look like a reasonable chap from where you’re viewing, but he was pretty mean-looking close up!

Restaurant owner Gearoid getting approval for the menu:

That had to be one of the strangest PR photography shoots I’ve done in quite a while!

TTFN

…Imelda May!

Had a great laugh recently at a PR shoot for the Clarion Hotel in Cork. The hotel is closest to the venue for the Live at the Marquee concerts, which among many others will this year feature Elton John, Christy Moore and Imelda May, so what better than having the mad staff at the hotel dress up as the stars and check in:

“Imelda”, actually Kasia, was fairly sure I was joking when I asked her to lay on top of the piano. Oh how little you know me:

TTFN

I wandered down to beautiful West Cork recently to do a shoot for the home supplement of a Sunday newspaper. The story was centred around what B&Bs are doing to add value to the B&B experience. In this case it was providing different courses while enjoying a stay, and in particular this one was song-writing in the company of a musician. A guitar playing, piano playing, drummer in fact. The list of who he’s worked with is a bit like a who’s-who of the music world, but includes being tour drummer with Ronnie Wood.

I started off with a few general views of the interior & exterior of the property:

Then it was down to the more interesting but slightly difficult concept of how to convey music, peace & tranquility and anything else I could throw into the mix. A bit awkward when’s there’s no sound in a still image!

The location of the property was right on a cliff edge, and I mean right on the edge, so that was a natural place for an image:

The main room where the course will be run was another:

I was still missing something though, even if I wasn’t too sure what it was. I wanted something extra to add to an image. Then I remembered a “prop” I’d met earlier.

My musician’s daughter is Summer by name and summer by nature and after a quick check that it was OK to include her in an image, I asked her if she liked to dance and let her off to do her own thing while her father played:

It took about 3 frames to get the right shot with enough movement in the dress to show it’s not posed:

I just love that image.

TTFN

In the portion of my life where I still shoot as an Editorial Photographer, I’m often shooting business people, mostly for a couple of sunday newspapers.

It’s always a challenge to avoid the man-in-suit-with-laptop, or man-with-folded-arms type portraits, which need to be saved up for emergencies, as sometimes they really are just about the only thing it’s possible to do! However, I try my damnedest to avoid them.

So here’s a quick business portrait shoot where I managed to create a couple of images without using the “last resort”.

This CEO has a business, which although based in deepest, wildest West Cork is a global operation and there are clocks on the wall showing the various time-zones with some of the countries where they operate, so the first image I wanted to create was going to include those.

This was the starting point light-wise at the aperture, ISO & shutter speed combo I wanted to shoot at:

First thing to fix is the light on the background. Nothing too directional, just a 580EX flash firing into a white shoot-through umbrella, camera right (probably around 1/4 to 1/2 power, sorry, I’m a bit like a chef that cooks “by taste”, there’s not too many rules!).

That takes the background from this:

To this:

Next is to light the subject. This would be a 60cm (2ft) Ezybox soft-box, again with a 580EX fired through it, camera left:

In order to get the right perspective I used an 85mm lens, which meant I was pretty much jammed up against a wall, on my knees, but using any wider-angle lens would have “lost” the clocks.

Here’s a very approximate lighting diagram:

Still trying to avoid the “last resort” we managed to find another location for a 2nd image. Just the soft-box for this one. Get it back far enough and it’s going to light plenty of the general area as well:

Nice and relaxed. Nothing worse than business portraits that are too stuffy, or where the subject looks wooden (usually because they’re scared stiff of having their portrait taken!).

Oh, I didn’t leave the CEO sitting there all the time while I set up lights. The first image wasn’t actually shot first. It was a misfire from the Pocket Wizard on-camera when I started shooting for real.

*That’s because you hadn’t switched it on Neil*

Sshhhh

TTFN

Thought I’d post something different today, and shock horror, there are no people in today’s images. Instead, laydees n gennulmen, I bring you CAKES!:

Black Forest and Madarin gateaux to be precise.

Not just big cakes though, you could also have something more bite-size. Chocolate or fruit?:

Maybe a slice of Apple & Cinnamon?:

Or a piece of Madeira perhaps?:

All these cakes are handmade and the fresh cream ones are unbelievable. Have a slice of one of these Swiss Rolls?:

All these images were produced for a bakery who make them all in-house, by hand, for wholesale and retail customers. One of the nice advantages of shooting commercial photography in Cork is that sometimes you get to shoot something you can eat!

Fresh Cream Slice anyone?:

My tastes would be more towards savoury things in all honestly and so I’m not a huge fan of sweet things, at least regarding food

I saved my favourite until last though, as I could definitely go for one of these at any time!

Fresh Cream Eclairs, wonderful!

TTFN

As it’s Cork International Jazz Festival time, I’ll throw this post out today

Had a great fun shoot last week for the launch of the line-up for the Clarion Hotel here in Cork. As well as other acts, the hotel is featuring a couple of jive bands, The Jive Aces and the Slammers Maximum Jive Band so what else would you shoot but some swing-dancers for the launch?

The shoot was timed for early evening and now that the nights are drawing in fast I was thinking it would have to be an inside shoot. Luckily though on that day the weather had been great, and I changed my mind and decided that we might just get away with an outside shot before I lost all remnants of ambient light (even though the light-level was dropping by the second!). No need to panic though, I was forgetting how powerful a Ranger Quadra is. One test shot on 3/4 power and I blew the whole side of the hotel to a complete white-out. Think I m-a-y need to turn the power down a little. In the end I needed less than 1/4 power:

We then moved inside for a few more shots and the dancers really got into the groove. You were fabulous lads!:

Seeing as things were going so well I thought we could push the boat out a bit and finish with a last image that might be good for a laugh and so we roped-in the the unsuspecting client-contact at the shoot:

She’ll never be the same! Thanks and well done to Zuzana from the Sales & Marketing team at the hotel.

One take for that. 2 frames and that was the first and best.

While I’d like to take the credit for everything, ‘cos that’s just the way it is , I can’t but not mention all the hard work that was done by Christine Duggan, PR consultant at DMPR who did all the arranging & organising and worked with me on ideas for the shots. Wouldn’t have all come-together without her efforts. It’s nice to work with a PR contact where the creative process is a collaborative effort.

TTFN

Using the sun as a backlight is a common thing to do, but what about when it’s pitch-black night-time? Here’s something that’s a lot trickier to do than you might think from the resultant image.

Sometimes you get stuck having to create an image when you’re pretty low on options with the location. In this instance, it was evening-time and dark, there was nowhere indoors that lent itself to be a reasonable backdrop and all I had outside was a field. OK it was a pitch. Not a pitch at a big stadium where the stands might be suitable to place a subject, no, just a pitch. OK it was a field then.

The one thing it did have was the pitch floodlights. There you go then – artificial sun! Sometimes they can work well. They provide a backlight to separate the subject from the background, which obviously on a pitch at night is… the sky. The black sky. The floodlights give something to feature in the side of the image as well.

The bit that makes it tricky is the floodlights are so powerful, it’s pretty difficult to focus accurately. One of the few occasions where having a camera-mounted flash might have been handy. The focus-assist feature (a pulse of infra-red light) would have come in handy. I didn’t have one handy though, so I switched to manual focus. Now that takes me back a bit!

The thing about big floodlights like that, is that at some point, even though you don’t realise you are doing it, you will look directly at the floodlights and then you can’t see anything at all in your nearby field of vision for about 5 minutes until the light-spots in your eyes fade away. It’s only when it’s too late do you realise you’ve done it. Very similar to walking down the street and suddenly you get a whack on the back of the head from your partner, and you didn’t even realise at the time but on reflection, yes you had actually had a tiny glance at the pretty girl who had walked past.

My excuse is that I’m a photographer and I’m looking for potential models. The fact I only work with models a few times a year doesn’t count for much though. In total I’m pretty sure I’ve been whacked more times than I’ve worked with models.

TTFN

..Ladies. Or Gentlemen I suppose. *Not wishing to appear judgemental*

Here’s something that’s a bit different, and I only use it to point out a couple of things (well three actually having thought about it).

This was an editorial shoot for a beauty/female supplement and the focus was on the make-up:

Point 1: Use a custom white-balance. Don’t want the different skin tones as the make-up is applied to affect the white-balance and the camera try to compensate.

Point 2: Use a 2-light set-up. In this case I used one of the classics for ladies, the over-under. Your subject will love you for it. If the focus was on the hair, I would have added a 3rd as a hair-light to err, highlight the hair.

Point 3: I’ve only thrown this composite together very quickly, so the images don’t line-up 100% but that’s the 3rd point to note. Use a fixed focal length lens instead of a zoom. You are more likely to stand in the same place then and get the same aspect ratio of the subject. You need to either use a tripod to maintain the camera position (I don’t like using a tripod) or put some kind of mark on the floor to maintain the same position for each shot.

I find it easiest to take a hammer with me, and use a couple of 6 inch nails to secure my feet to the floor. Maintaining the same position is pretty easy after that.

TTFN

I’ve photographed some famous people, some unknown people, some Very Important People, both those who really are VIP and a few who are only legends in their own minds. I’ve photographed royalty, presidents, Taoisigh (Prime Ministers of Ireland) and lots and lots of common-or-garden people just like me.

Recently was the first time I can ever remember that I was nervous about photographing my subject.

It didn’t help that I only had half an hour notice as he just happened to be in Cork City at a meeting regarding his up-coming exhibition and I had to squeeze in this shoot before the other two I had that day. Then the classic three drops of rain and the traffic comes to a standstill in the city factor, meant I was 20 minutes late for the appointment before I even started, and I’m NEVER late usually.

Whether he was actually in the slightest bit bothered I’ll never know, but he certainly didn’t seem at all concerned and after an all too short chat (about 4 hours too short as far as I was concerned) I knocked-out a couple of quick portraits in the (very short) time I had available.

My subject was music photographer Fin Costello.

You might not know the name, but I’m sure you’d know some of his images. He’s been a photographer since the late 60s and shot The Stones, Kiss, Pete Townsend, Cat Stevens, Peter Gabriel, Robert Plant, Phil Lynott and many others. His portfolio is like a who’s who of the music industry.

The shoot was for a magazine supplement in a Sunday newspaper but it was much too early to have his exhibition images at the shoot, so much as I’d have liked him with some of his work, it wasn’t to be:

A brilliant photographer but just as importantly (maybe more so), a true gentleman.

His Pictures in Rock exhibition will be at the Cork Vision Centre from 2nd June – 28th July. I haven’t seen the exhibits but it’s highly recommended anyway!

TTFN

…Don’t They?

Apologies if you’ve just used a search-engine and are looking for the 1969 Sydney Pollack directed film about a dance marathon, but this is nothing to do with it.

This is about me shooting horses, actually more about shooting a horse-trainer, and only shooting with a camera.

I was assigned last week by one of the “Sundays” to head out into the countryside early on a very cold morning to shoot a feature on former jockey, now trainer, Jim Culloty. Jim won many races as a jockey, including the Cheltenham Gold Cup three times in succession aboard Best Mate.

I met up with the journalist and we arrived together, so while the interview was taking place, I was off scouting locations and setting up lights.

By the time the interview was finished, I had my shot-list sorted out in my head, and lights set-up in two locations.

First up was a shot in the Yard, one-light with a mini softbox:

Then there was an archway that led from the Yard to the Gallops and I wanted something there. This was going to be quite difficult to balance the daylight coming into the arch from the Yard, with the darkness underneath the arch itself. I had set-up two lights on stands behind the conveniently located doors that hid them, both firing out towards the entrance at about 45deg. As best I could guess I had the power about right, at least that’s what the images of the back of my hand were telling me!

I had my subject lead a horse through the archway, and believe it or believe it not, I’d nailed the flash-power with the 1st image:

I made another couple in different locations, here’s one:

The one that was used was actually taken in one of the stables, no lights, just subject interacting with one of the horses. Out of about 6 frames I chose this one to transmit and it was used pretty-near full page width:

That was it. 15 minutes to set-up lights, 20 minutes shooting, 5 minutes to pack-up lights and 30 minutes & 20 miles down the road before I could feel my fingertips again.

TTFN