On a changeable day the tennis, and practice, was interrupted by several rain showers but the evening cleared and produced some excellent doubles and beautiful light.

I was stationed on court 9 with a view over to court 10 and had the pleasure of photographing the matches between Richard Gasquet and Rajeev Ram and then the doubles match between Novak Djokovic / Jonathan Erlich and the British pairing of Jamie Delgado and Jonathan Marray with some glimpses of Marin Cilic and Andre Sa playing another British pairing on 10.

When the clouds broke and the dry spells long enough the practice courts also saw a lot of players either warming up or getting a good hit for tomorrows play – notably Rafa Nadal who played for over an hour with a huge crowd in attendance so much so I couldn’t get anywhere close.

Here are some images from the matches. Click on an image to view and then step through the gallery…

I’d be crazy to say I’m not pleased, because I am, but the reality is I could have walked away with nothing depending on the other entries and most importantly the judge. I am very pleased that when he looked at my images he saw the quality. Notably one of the images is from a professional shoot up at London Fashion Weekend, and the other a personal piece of work of a kitesurfer at a local beach – demonstrating an ability to take high quality images both under the demands of a shoot and when I am relaxing with the camera.

So here they are my two award winning images and a precis of what the judge said about them.

The judge commented on the dynamic nature of the print noting the wave, and the beads of water in the air, and the thrust of the kitesurfer. He commended the concentration of the image on the kitesurfer and not the kite, and acknowledged both the strong directional edge lighting with plenty of detail in the dark areas of the face and wetsuit.

This image is shown as originally posted back in February when it was taken at London Fashion Weekend. The competition image has a panoramic vertical crop removing the London Fashion Weekend TV screens and concentrating on the catwalk, lighting and model only. The judge recognised the environment this shot was taken under,  noted the lighting on the background and the unique lighting on the model and declared that he hadn’t seen another image like it before.

With all of my work I’m looking to make sure I have good quality images in the bank and then push myself to get something different, a little out of the ordinary, but still with good composition, great lighting and impact. I like to think this is one of the ways that I differentiate myself from some of the other Hampshire photographers in every wedding I shoot, portrait session and approach to commercial photography.

Both of these images are on display in the studio at the moment, and I’m looking forward to taking my next award winning image.

I have worked with a model on location before but predominately in natural light, and this was an excellent opportunity to try some things out as well as work with a very experienced model. You may well see images from this shoot on other photographers blogs and websites – these are all mine, including the direction of the model ! I hope you like them.

We also broke out the location lighting for a mains free lighting demo overpowering the sun and getting some striking images.

I would have loved to have stayed longer, visited the rally track and kept a better eye out for some of the professional drivers and of course the celebrities driving some of these stunning cars. But I have a wedding tomorrow and so I needed to get the kit back to the studio, cleaned, checked, batteries charged and ready to go out and photograph another of my passions….

Here are a few images from the festival. The abstracts are toned, the action images are pretty much out of camera – and the panning shot is real and not faked in Photoshop

I have missed the touring cars for the last couple of years with weddings booked on the same dates, and so this time got out early and bagged my spot at the chicane.

The TOCA package this year had Ginetta Juniors, Ginetta 50′s, Formula Renault, Renault Clio Cup, Porsche Cup and of course the HiQ Touring Cars it was all good fun and here are a small selection of some images of the day both on the track and a few from inside the paddock.

more after the jump….

With the tide going out I wandered down and perched on a wooden post near the shoreline and photographed some of the kitesurfers and windsurfers enjoying the wind and the waves. Whilst this was just for my own enjoyment there is no getting away from the fact that using the kit regularly keeps your eye in, and helps with the professional photography. After all good documentary wedding photography is all about anticipating the moment – looking for good light, and predicting where your subjects are going to be or move to.

I only stayed for 30 minutes or so, as the tide went out more and more of the guys came in and I was left with less to capture. I was however delighted with some of the images I did get, and really love this atmospheric capture – especially with the slash of water at the bottom.

I hope you like it as much as I do.

Today I was at Marwell Zoo, home of lovely wedding venue Marwell Hall where I am the photographer for a number of Hampshire weddings every year. Marwell also houses some lovely creatures in modern enclosures and the zoo and it’s keepers are very photographer friendly. My aim in photographing the animals is not to pretend they are in the wild, not to just get a quick snap of them in their zoo habitat but to look for character, shape, an interesting composition, good background and of course some nice light – the kind of things you would expect to see in any portrait of a child, family or pet.

This morning I headed for the reptile enclosure up in the Australian biome which is one of the furthest points from the entrance and where it would be quietest (for longest) allowing me to photograph in a tranquil environment and with the least stress on the animals to allow me to get some lovely images.

Here are three from the day.

This water dragon was posing at the front of the enclosure for a few split seconds until a family entered in through the door after which he scampered up a branch to give a profile view of his body. That gave a nice image but this one taken fractionally before it was disturbed shows the character of this lizard to much more effect.

This Gecko is facinating. I have photographed it before when I was testing the 1Ds MKIII for Canon, but a completely different image – and again I was looking for a portrait. Impossible to get a good full length I opted to show the bulbous bright yellow/orange eyes, the bright head markings and a hint of the sticky feet.

Finally I could not believe my luck when I saw these two stick insects hanging from a branch in the amazing form. Compositionally attractive, and some nice behaviour you can see the larger one looking down. Combined with a good background I’m really pleased with this image.

For the photographers reading this blog all images were shot handheld at 1600 ISO and apertures from f/4 to f/4.5. They are all through glass and have minimal post-production, and none on the creatures themselves.

So on my way back from taking some photographs at the Stubbington 10k road race I took a walk along a wonderful stretch of Hampshire coastline – the Hill Head beach – lined with predominately green beach huts. Without spending too long, and with only two long lenses I got some details from the huts, focussing today on the locks many of which are wrapped to shield them from the sea water. Now I know this isn’t unique, it has been done elsewhere by other photographers but it was a worthwhile exercise to get different images from essentially the same subject – critical when you photograph many weddings a year across Hampshire and the surrounding counties of Sussex, Berkshire, Surrey and Dorset, and need to make sure you treat each with the special attention it deserves, keep working your eye for different images and capture their details with a fresh approach as well as with some consistency in style – there is nothing worse IMHO than going back to the same venues and photographing exactly the same images time after time.

So here is a montage from this morning….

As with all others these individual images, and the montage, are copyrighted and may not be used elsewhere under any circumstances….

The Stubbington 10k is one of Hampshire’s biggest 10k races and very early on in the race calendar. With a new course this year, which came along the Meon Shore and therefore within strolling distance of the studio, I loaded up a couple of bodies and lenses and some cards and met the leaders ahead of schedule coming up from the Hill Head sailing club. Fortunately I got some good backgrounds and then stationed myself where I really wanted to be with the Tichfield Haven vistors centre as a backdrop and then with the boats in the small harbour.

Just for completeness it is worth stating that I as not the official photographer for the Stubbington 10k – these are not official race photos (nor do I wish to be next year!), these were taken for my own purposes, and experimentation and are not for sale or for use elsewhere.

Here are a few of the images from the race. More about my journey back to the studio in another post.