June 30th, 2009 §
I figure that I should probably give more blog-space than I do to local commercial and corporate photography shoots so here’s a couple of photographs from the Foot Anstey Solicitors 2009 Sports Law Conference held in their impressive new building at Sutton Harbour in Plymouth. Foot Anstey’s dedicated sports team gave talks and fielded questions concerning recent changes in the law affecting athletes and sporting groups and clubs. Photographed above is the Chair of the conference Jack Buckner, a former Olympian and medal winner at the Commonwealth Games, World Championships and European Championships in the 5000 metres running event, and featured below is Foot Anstey Associate and Head Of Sports Julian Summerhayes.
June 29th, 2009 §
Some photographs from a recent commercial photo-shoot at the Westmoor Veterinary Centre in Tavistock, Devon for their new brochure. The practice required commercial photos of the staff and premises to give a broad overview of the day-to-day running of the business and illustrate the depth of experience and facilities/equipment on hand. I love that photography takes me to places and gain access to things I’d never otherwise see and experience… I spent a half-day at the veterinary centre and got a brief insight into the workings of a vets’ practice and met some great people while also meeting (and hopefully exceeding) the client brief; made some great frames of the impressive equipment such as the big (really big) microscope above, through to consultations, surgery, and headshots of every one of the 19 employees and partners for their staff profiles. That’s a lot of photos…
June 25th, 2009 §
I travelled up to Bristol earlier this week for a photo-shoot with Giant Global Team professional mountain biker Oli Beckingsale, for an upcoming Shred Magazine cover feature. The Bristol based Beckingsale is a three-time Olympian, Commonwealth Silver Medallist and five-time National Mountain Bike Champion. Oli was on a rest day with no other commitments so the shoot was pretty relaxed; as always I knew what I wanted but was open to seeing what happened… We ended up in Woods Cafe on Park Street for a chat over coffee and a few candid frames, and then headed up to Brandon Hill where the above image was shot. Can’t believe that Bristol City Council still haven’t repaired Cabot Tower which must have been closed for nearly two years now? There were workmen on site at least so hopefully the cracks will be fixed and the tower open again before long. Speaking of council workmen; we got to the bottom of Park Street and there’s a cherry picker next to the Banksy painting, and Oli tells me that it was paint-bombed (along with the ‘Mild Mild West’ painting on Cheltenham Road) and so there’s two guys in hard hats on the cherry picker painstakingly removing the graffiti… from the graffiti. Priceless.
June 12th, 2009 §
The new issue of south west bicycle magazine Shred West is now available featuring the portrait I created of Cervelo Test Team professional cyclist Jeremy Hunt on assignment for the magazine. Although Hunt has been a professional athlete riding for European teams for 13 years he still thinks of Devon as home; he was back in the area recently which is when I caught up with Jeremy at a personal appearance at Colin Lewis Cycles in Paignton. Options and time were (very) limited and I ended up shooting the portraits in a bus station behind the shop in just a few minutes before Jeremy was dragged off by Mr Colin Lewis himself for other commitments… And all while being heckled by local kids. As ever the photos look better in print so pick up a copy from your local bike shop or get a subscription direct from Shred. Also featured in this issue are my photographs from the Exeter round of the Tour Series, the Totnes Town Centre Bike Race, and the Springtime Pursuits.
June 11th, 2009 §
Earlier in the week I travelled to Bournemouth in Dorset on Assignment for Triathlete’s World Magazine. The subject was PC Rob Hammond of the Dartmouth & Poole Constabulary’s West Howe Safer Neighbourhood Team who has represented both the Great Britain and Ireland teams (he has dual nationality) in international Triathlon competitions. I was to meet and photograph PC Hammond at a primary school in Bournemouth where he was spending the day talking to the pupils about triathlon as part of a community outreach program; kind of an odd job for me as it involved spending the day at a primary school for the first time in twenty years… The portraits will illustrate a feature about Police Constable Hammond in the Personal Record segment of the next issue of the magazine.
June 3rd, 2009 §
I figure that I should probably make more of the fact that I shot the official photographs for the Olympic and World Champion’s own team earlier in the year so here goes. Nicole Cooke is one of the most successful British athletes of all-time, and the first woman ever to to win both the road cycling Olympic and World gold medals in the same year. I photographed Nicole and the Vision 1 Racing Team at a training camp in Italy earlier in year with very little time available and a lot of images required; we have the group photograph in team racing clothing with bike above, also without bike, in the sponsor’s (Nike) apres ride clothing below (again, with and without bike), and then the individual rider portraits both in race kit and casual clothing for a total of 22 portraits all wrapped up within about a hour to fit with the girls’ busy schedule. The images will be used by the team for the 2009 for PR and commercial use, including the team riders’ fan cards.
June 2nd, 2009 §
More city centre criterium/bike racing; this time from the second round of the Tour Series Professional City Centre Cycle Races held in Exeter last Thursday with television coverage on ITV4 the night after each stage. The photograph above is the race winner Rapha-Condor team rider and current National Criterium Champion Dean Downing, celebrating as he crosses the finishing line; Downing took the win comfortably by several bike lengths. Watching the TV highlights the next day I could see that the race was won in the final corner; Dean went into the narrow turn at the front of the pack and carried momentum while the chasing riders slowed, giving the Rapha-Condor rider a huge advantage and a clean sprint to the finish. Having spoken to a couple of the riders, I know that racing on a 1.5KM circuit for 1 1/4 hours isn’t necessarily the most exiting prospect for the athletes but the Tour Series bike races make for a great event and attract a lot of spectators plus good TV coverage thanks to the city centre location and short closed course. Below is Team Halfords rider Ed Clancy who won the sprint competition, and some podium photos featuring the Exeter Tour Series round winning rider Dean Downing, winning team Rapha-Condor, and series leaders the Candi TV-Marshalls Pasta team.
June 1st, 2009 §
I’ve been a little slow in updating the blog but now it’s finally been moved ‘in-house’ to a WordPress powered blog here at www.simonkeitch.com/blog I’ll try and get back into updating this thing on a more regular basis. I was at the Totnes Town Centre Bike Race about a week or so ago to photograph the event for the new issue of Shred Westcountry Magazine which goes to print this week. The streets of Totnes provided a perfect venue for criterium racing with a short, tight circuit and narrow streets amplifying the speed and spectacle of the racing and drawing a lot of spectators out to watch the event. It’s not easy to capture the speed and frantic energy of a race like this but there is the advantage of having much better accessibility at these smaller local races – which can be a problem at the bigger events even with media accreditation – which I took full advantage of and hunkered down on the inside of a tight corner with my back against the wall of a pub, safe enough for both me and the riders but with the lead group leaning right into the curve only inches away from the end of my lens hood. That close proximity combined with a wide lens gives the viewer a very different perspective from the staid long lens approach which I’ve been trying to get away from recently as it’s starting to look a little sterile to my eyes. Featured above is the race winner Blake Pond riding for Southfork Racing, and photographed below is Graeme Lackford of the Pendragon-Kalas Racing Team.
