Fine Art Newborn Photography | Hampshire Commercial Photography | Fareham Photography Studio » commercial work

Editorial Shoot for High-End Lifestyle Magazine

Mike French — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 20:14:49 +0000

This morning we completed a commissioned editorial shoot for a series of high-end lifestyle magazines. The publisher was looking for some specific images to accompany a feature article on families with siblings that have a large age gap between them. With no available images it was down to us to create a set of photographs that fitted the brief and gave the designer variety and layout options.

Working closely with a senior member of the publishers staff who provided art direction we brainstormed some scenarios and scenes, and then sourced some models to feature in the shoot and a location. Then this morning we all met up in Hampshire and in the space of a couple of hours got some excellent images. As this editorial shoot is destined for the next issue of the magazines I’m not showing any images but I’m looking forward to being able to blog some tearsheets from the actual feature in about 6 weeks time.

Initial feedback on the images is excellent, and I’m looking forward to speaking to the designer in the new year as they layout the story.

Advertising Campaign Photography: Christmas at Marwell Wildlife – be enchanted

Mike French — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 19:35:11 +0000

Now that the “Christmas at Marwell – be enchanted” experience is pretty much sold out for the second year running at Marwell Wildlife I felt it was a good time to blog this advertising campaign photography which took place some 18 months ago.

I was fortunate enough to meet up with Father Christmas, Mrs Christmas and their attentive elves back in July 2010 – when they were not so busy with their preparations for Christmas that year to make sure that they had lots of images suitable for the website, trifold marketing flyers and all of the online and print advertising campaign surrounding the experience.

Here are a few of the images from the shoot, many used as feature images in the advertising campaign for both the 2010 and 2011 campaigns .

Whilst I’m now on first name terms with Santa, and his good lady wife, I’m also available for all kinds of commercial and corporate PR throughout the year and not just for Christmas. More information about our commercial photography services can be found on our dedicated website.

Hampshire Food Festival: Indian BBQ at Vatika

Mike French — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 20:43:56 +0000

This afternoon I was again fortunate to be shooting food for Hampshire Fare as part of the Hampshire Food Festival. Today though I was at Vatika situated in the Wickham Vineyard near Botley – an beautiful setting for this excellent Indian restaurant. The event was an Indian BBQ masterclass hosted by renowned chef Atul Kochhar and the Executive Chef at Vatika – Jitin Joshi – who were demonstrating the preparation of different marinades to a large group of diners seated out on the terrace overlooking the vineyard.

The marinades were then used on three dishes, cooked on the barbecue in-front of the guests and then beautifully served for a late lunch. The first course was a tandoori sea bass, followed by tandoori chicken and then a moist lamb chop.

As before I was looking for scenes, portraits, preparation, food, and people enjoying the event, and all of the staff at Vatika and the chefs were very accommodating in allowing me to make some great images.

Once again I was fortunate to be able to taste some of the dishes, and the dessert, all of which were delicious and the best Indian food I have ever tasted.

Here are some images from the day.

Hampshire Food Festival: Setley Ridge Vineyard’s Local Produce Supper

Mike French — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 23:46:19 +0000

This evening I covered one of the Hampshire Food Festival events on behalf of Hampshire Fare. The Local Produce Supper at Setley Ridge Vineyard in Brockenhurst had already run once on the 6th July and this was the second supper in the month long Hampshire food festival during July.

My brief for the evening was to document the event without interrupting the guests and I was looking to capture a sense of place, some portraits, food preparation and prepared food and if possible everyone enjoying the supper. On arrival I met up with Andy Alvis who was cooking this evening. Andy and his business partner Jane run the farm shop at the vineyard and Mange-Tout Catering. I documented some general views of the vineyard, and the setting for the supper and then joined up with the group for an informative tour of the vineyard, which culminated with some wine-tasting back in the farm shop.

The guests then headed into the glasshouse where the supper was served and were greeted with broad bean humous, oak-smoked tomatoes on bruschetta, asparagus and gazpacho shots, and a broad bean, pea, mint and goats cheese medley as appetisers. Having photographed these earlier I then focussed on the main courses of roast belly pork, venison and wild fowl as they left the kitchen and then once Andy had served the desserts of strawberry roulade and a blackcurrant fool I grabbed a quick portrait before I lost the light completely.

Naturally I relinquished my cameras briefly when offered some of the food, and it was exceptional. Local Hampshire produce cooked in a rustic style and out of this world.

Here are a small selection of images from the event.

Southsea Food Festival 2011: Editorial Food Photography

Mike French — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 22:42:33 +0000

On Sunday I headed down into Southsea for the Food Festival and to shoot some food photography in an editorial style as well as getting a sense of place from this popular event. I got there early, and to be honest most of the food stalls were still setting up, and as I was on a tight timescale I couldn’t wait through until 1pm to get most of the dishes in a more prepared state ready for eating. So I concentrated on produce, shellfish and I was fortunate that the Asian food stall was ahead of the game and cooking mountains of food in anticipation. Noted for my next food festival where I’ll block out more time !

The festival was accompanied by a Hampshire Farmers Market which stretched up into the pedestrian area of Southsea town centre with a wide array of vegetables, garlics, cheeses, meats, preserves, fresh rolls and scones and flowers all of which looked great in-front of the camera. As I worked my way through the food festival and stalls I spoke with the stall owners, asking permission to shoot and made some images. The upside of being early was that there was space to work and I wasn’t blocking any of the other visitors.

Here are some of the images from the short visit. Expect more food over the coming month…

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Tennis Open Day: Pat Cash and Dan Lobb play exhibition tennis at Lee-on-the-Solent

Mike French — Sat, 28 May 2011 22:05:52 +0000

Pat Cash returned to Lee-on-the-Solent for the tennis club’s centenary open day. Joined this year by Dan Lobb from ITV’s Daybreak and recently Loose Women, Dan was previously a UK top 20 professional tennis player, and played country tennis with the club’s Director of Tennis Chris Wilkinson.

The format of the day built upon previous successful open days with free coaching for kids and adults in the morning, entertainment in the form of ballon modelling, magic shows, face painting, games, a Zumba demonstration and an excellent selection of drinks, and food. I was shooting for the club as the official photographer, one of a series of PR and commercial photography jobs I do for this client every year with a reasonably open remit to document the day as it happens and capture some key PR images for the club and their sponsors.

The main event was a re-match between Chris and Pat Cash with Dan Lobb commenting, and again it was Chris Wilkinson emerging victorious with a demonstration of consistent and tricky returns which Pat just couldn’t live with. There were some excellent moments with Pat working the crowd, even at one point getting his “guns” out and proffering them to the spectators. Dan interviewed the players throughout the match, and then picked up a racquet himself for a doubles match with Pat and local player Joe Moore taking on the old county partnership of Lobb and Wilkinson and then a final doubles match with club juniors playing an extended tie-break match with Pat Cash and Dan Lobb.

Sadly Dan picked up a (very) minor injury whilst demonstrating his “caterpiller”, and we wish him all the best for a well healed chin before he takes to the Daybreak sofa next week.

Images from the entire day can be viewed, and purchased, in an online gallery. Attendees can find the password in the programme, or by contacting the club. Previous years images can also be viewed from that page.

You can view all of the photos of Dan from the day in an online gallery which also has options for purchasing prints by clicking here.

Here are a small selection of the images from the day. Now I’ll return to editing some of our beautiful newborn baby photography.

Baby Hampshire Magazine – Our images used to illustrate an article

Mike French — Mon, 23 May 2011 21:46:52 +0000

Baby Hampshire magazine have used some of our images to illustrate an article on travel routines. Found in the summer issue, on sale from the 15th May for 3 months, the article is on pages 138 – 140.

We have a good working relationship with the team at Little Media who publish the Baby Hampshire magazine, and are advertisers in the magazine and online directory for our newborn portrait photography. They loved the images when they saw them, and after getting additional approval from our clients featured in the images, selected some to go with the words.

Our client is delighted with the article, as are we, and it is a pleasure to be a contributing photographer to the magazine.

Baby Hampshire magazine is published by Little Media, and is a premium title. It can be found across the county or is available on subscription.

Our advert is prominately placed on page 13 opposite the “Your Letters” feature and shows one of our well loved fine art newborn images.

Baby Hampshire have kindly allowed me to show the pages, and our images from the magazine.

PR Headshot Photography for a Wedding Planner

Mike French — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 22:57:57 +0000

This evening we welcomed the team from Isabella Weddings to the studio for their PR headshot photography and portraits. We work closely with Isabella Weddings and so they are no stranger to our photography – but this is the first time the camera has been turned on them. Marie was looking for some images to use for their PR, websites and brochures and I was happy to oblige. Along with Emily Tudor, the current Miss Portsmouth City, who works with Marie we had a short photo-shoot using a pink backdrop – the company colour !

Looking to get some variety of images from “relatively” serious to very relaxed we shot for about 30 minutes and got a good selection of individual portraits, headshots and some of them both together. With the images captured we caught up briefly and I was able to show them some of my new wedding and newborn baby work before they left the studio.

Here are small set of the images from the session

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PR shoot for a Leisure Business in Lee-on-the-Solent – Centenary Celebration

Mike French — Sun, 23 Jan 2011 19:52:12 +0000

Todays commercial photography job was a PR shoot for a Lee-on-the-Solent leisure business. Celebrating their 100th year in 2011 they kicked off their centenary events with a mayoral planting of a centenary rose bush with Counsellor Roger Allan then staying for an Edwardian tea party complete with finger sandwiches and cup cakes. The event also featured an archive of photographs and documents from the first 100 years of the club.

Images from today are going to be used in press releases, are likely to be featured in the local papers, on their website and of course added to the archive for the next 100 years celebration.

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Commercial photography in Winchester: High Street Mortgage Business

Mike French — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 22:58:57 +0000

I spent the afternoon on a commercial photography commission in Winchester, Hampshire with the team at The Place For Mortgages (TPM).

Managing Director, Jon Walker, was looking for some images of and inside the new Winchester office for their website and marketing materials as well as some business portraits taken on-site. Jon has previously had some photographs done at the Southampton offices although these were several years old.

We ran through some fairly standard setups of some client interaction with various members of the team, some natural portraits whilst they were working and then some interior images and general views and details of the outside of their office on the high street in Winchester. I finished with some set-up business portraits taking advantage of some great natural light coming in through the windows with the TPM signage behind for context.

I’m looking forward to seeing some of these on their new website soon.

Here are a few example images from the shoot