Rugby: Kent Men’s 1st vs St Bart’s & London Men’s 1st
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Yesterday I spent an hour on the UKC’s sport pitches. The Photography and Modelling Society had its workshop on sports photography there and I was covering some games for inQuire, one of which was our Rugby team playing against St Bart’s & London.
Varsity Poster
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This is the poster used to advertise this year’s edition of Varsity, a series of sport events in which the University of Kent and the Canterbury Christ Church University compete against each other. The original idea for the poster was to have students from both universities facing each other in two rows which through perspective would have formed something like this: ><.
However the Christchurch students left before I arrived; I've been told they took their photo in five minutes, so they either have a photographer who can work way faster than me or, well... I haven't been able to find their photo, the Christchurch Varsity page hasn’t been updated since last year and still shows David Cater’s 2008 poster.
Change of plans then, I had the Kent students stand back to back in a V formation in front of Westgate (part of the medieval defence system that spans around the city centre), facing east towards Christchurch. Most sports gear is easily distingushable, the only trouble I had was with trampolining, a sport which distinguishes itself through jumps and figures, none of which could easily have been implemented in this picture without breaking the symmetry. So I had the trampolining representative on the right pull one knee up which she said was similar to one of their figures.
I borrowed a Canon 5DMkII with a 24-70 lens for this shot; it was good fun to work with that combination. I metered for the ambient and dropped it about a stop and a half to make high street a bit darker, then I lit the students with four speedlites. I only had three light stands available, so Cai Robbins, the Kent Unions sports sabbatical stood in as voice activated lightstand. You can see her in the original photo. The one thing that still annoys me in this photo is that I couldn’t get the lights high enough, as a result of which the light which was in the front camera left cast a shadow onto the cricket player’s cheek.
Post processing consisted of cleaning up the chewing gum from the street, removing pedestrians and the lightstands and some cables which were visible in the sky. I dodged and burned the players to give them a bit more edge. With a fifth light behind and in the middle of the players the whole thing would have looked much better, giving them a rim light on the inside to set them off against the background. Time to buy more flashguns, I guess :)
Teams f.l.t.r: Netball, Tennis, Women’s Football, Basketball, Women’s Rugby (2x), Cricket, Women’s Hockey, Trampolining, Lacrosse.
Snow brings the University of Kent to a halt
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On 1st February 2009 it started to snow in Canterbury and large parts of the UK. In London traffic collapsed, flights got cancelled, people didn’t get to work. In Canterbury, on Sunday, the University of Kent campus was transformed into a giant snowfight warzone. People got buried in snow, Canon 5D MkIIs had to prove that they were indeed water- and snowball resistant, students tried to dodge massive projectiles from the three-man snowball slingshot. In the calmer areas, the occasional snowman saw the light of day. The Rutherford field became a massive slope for makeshift sledges, including inflatable matrasses, office chairs, binbags and construction site signs. On Monday, the University sent out an e-mail to all students saying that campus would be closed from 1pm onwards. The library and all colleges closed down. Society meetings got cancelled, parents had to pick up their children from the campus nursery. Only the builders on the Mansell site just opposite the Venue, where a new drama building needs to be completed on schedule, kept working.
Dover Society Trip
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In autumn I’ve already visited Dover, this time I went with the Photography and Modelling Society. Most of our trip was spent exploring Dover Castle, which was closed last time I went.
Deeper Underground
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Shantideva, some mining enthusiasts and myself met up in late December to explore an abandoned French mine which was started in the 19th century. One of the most interesting parts of the mines were the beds that remained from the time when renegades would hide in the mines during WWII. One of the less interesting moments was when I lost sight of the others for a few minutes :/
Terres Rouges
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In late December I met fellow photographer Shantideva for a shoot in the Terres Rouges industry buildings. The model was my cousin Nickie. We photographed for a few hours despite the blistering cold (something around -4°) and incredible amounts of dust. There was dust everywhere. It took well over an hour to clean all my gear when I got home, but my camera was scheduled for a trip to the Canon headquarters anyway.
If you want to see some behind the scenes footage, watch the video, but keep in mind that I’m not a videographer :)
2008 Favourites
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[The video has 23MB, give it a moment to load.] I’ve made a selection of my favourite photographs that I’ve taken during 2008 (with the exception of those which can’t be published.)
The slideshow is made using Animoto. If you’d like to make videos like this yourself, use vemwztgh as voucher code when you sign up to get $5 off an all-access pass.
Notes to the photos, in order of appearance: (more…)
London, along the river
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I couldn’t very well live two hours away from London for three years and not go there to take some photographs at night. Alison and I took a ride on the London Eye, then walked along the river waiting for the sun to set. The HDRs have been combined using Photomatix Pro 3. The zoomable hi-res panorama of the Tower Bridge below has been stitched using PTGui and is presented here using PSCS3’s Zoomify plugin, integrated into WordPress using the Kimili flash plugin.
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Connecting Generations
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About an hour ago the results for a photo competition entitled The Connection Between Generations (Lëtz: D’Verbindung tëschent den Generatiounen) organized by 45Plus together with photogen.lu were announced. My photo above won the public voting and convinced the professional jury. I’m now the happy winner of a Macbook, the photo will make the first page of a calendar and I can take part in a workshop during the Rencontres d’Arles.
I’m a happy camper, and the least I can do is to share some of the behind-the-scenes info of this photo. (more…)
Dover
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Essays handed in. Sun in the sky. Trains on time.
Halloween Studio Session
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On Halloween, the UKC Photography and Modelling Society set up a studio in the Lighthouse at the University of Kent. The aim was to raise some money for the society to buy more equipment, and it worked out quite well.
The last photo shows out setup. The trickiest part was lighting the background without having too much spill on the people since we only had about two metres in depth with which to work. The backdrop is lit with two Canon Speedlite 430 EX flashes, both with gobos to make the light hit the background only. The lights left and right of the camera are a Canon Speedlite 580EX MkI and MkII with Manfrotto 001B Nano stands and Westcott 2001 double-fold shoot-through umbrellas. All flashes were set to slave mode and triggered with a Canon ST-E2.
DPChallenge London GTG
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Once again a bunch of crazy photographers met to walk around London in the rain and take pictures. This time the get-together had a slightly more international feel: Olivier and I represented Luxembourg (we’re used to the rain and the cold). Alison and Mikey from the Photography and Modelling Society represented Bermuda and Barbados, respectively (they’re not used to temperatures below 15°C). The four of us who are or have been studying in the UK met up with Natalya, Andi, Robert, Dain and Matthew. Some of their photos can be found in the DPChallenge.com forums, here. Apart from taking photos, by walking about three miles we also contributed to the Walk Around the World for Brain Tumours.
Related links: International Brain Tumor Alliance, Rose McGill, Digital Photography Challenge.
Dudelange on Wheels
The good old Peleng Fisheye came in quite handy for these skate photos at the Dudelange on Wheels skating event. The fisheye effect looks best when you get really close, and one of the bikers (in the second photo) missed my camera by only five centimeters. No risk no fun.
UKC Welcome Ball 2008
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I’m back at uni, and the academic preparations, my job in the Venue and the work for the Photography and Modelling Society have kept me busy throughout September. So for now I’m just posting some photos from the Welcome Ball at the University of Kent, with Cricket Lane, City Girls, Fake That, and Coolio.
Hengendag
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The eve of the Luxembourg national day, “Nationalfeierdag”, is one of those occasions on which our small capital seems to be bursting at the seams. I set out with my newly acquired 50mm 1.4 USM lens to capture the athmosphere of the evening and it didn’t take long before I bumped into some friends, then I moved on to watch the torchlight procession and the fireworks. Seeing as the last time I watched them I ended up with smoldering firework chemicals in my eye I chose a safer spot this time though.
Wedding: Martine & Mike
Martine and Mike are now enjoying this slideshow in DVD quality on their home cinema, as well as a costum designed hardcover photobook and an elegant traditional leatherbound album, all part of the coverage they ordered for their wonderful wedding in Mondorf.
Artsfest 2008
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Returning from my summer break and with a slight delay I can finally post some photos I took during this year’s Artsfest at the University of Kent. Many thanks to Katie Van-Sanden and Tom Christian who supported me in my endeavour to gain permission from the university to photograph the fireworks from the Templeman Library rooftop.
Related post: Artsfest 2007
Keynestock 2008
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Last weekend I covered the annual Keynestock concerts organized by Keynes JCC at the University of Kent. The weathergods were benign; it had been raining all week before the event and it’s been raning every day since, but we got through the concerts without a single drop. Even so the day was a demanding one for photography, the pictures you see above are a selection from 17 acts performing over 10 hours.
Below is the lineup for reference – and to make Google happy.
Randol (winner of Kent Factor)
Joel Williamson
Green Diesel
Martyna Baker
Katy McGrath
Maniac and the Circus on the Moon
Fumer Tue
Parker Brown (my favourite band of the day)
Cartoon Heroes
The Legacy
Trick
Catharsis
Inertia
Belleville
Racketbox
Verse
Elena Goulding / Ellie Goulding (winner of Keynestock 2007.
University of Kent Summer Ball 2008
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I present you a selection of 9 hours worth of photographs from last weekend’s University of Kent Summer Ball 2008, organized by Kent Union. The three huge marquees hosted four bars, two stages, tatoo artists, studio photographers, casinos, 2 main stages and more. The main acts included top DJs like Colin Murray and Fearne Cotton on the DJ stage, and the Vengaboys and the Wombats on the main stage. All in all a packed evening – even though we were two photographers sharing the workload I didn’t get a chance to grab dinner.
UKC Summer Ball 2008 Promo Video
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The Fashion Show promotional video which Lee Francis filmed for the UKC Photography and Modelling Society got quite a bit of attention. As a result, he was recruited to also film a promotional video for the University of Kent Summer Ball 2008. I was at the filming location, one of the exam halls at the UKC, to help with the lighting and to take some ‘making of’ pictures, which you can see above. Oh, and I also pushed the caddie for the zoom effects, which led to the Ben Hur photo (taken by David Cater).
Cars
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I put the money from freelance jobs into camera equipment, my friends invest their regular income into cars. Alain recently got himself a BMW 3 and Joe had tweaked his gorgeous Ford Focus ST a bit further (one day I’ll buy me one of those…). Unfortunately it began to rain after sunset, so we postponed the nightshots until next time.
Trivia: Googling around, I found another Ford Focus picture, where the photographer seems to have been a bit trigger-happy with the clone tool. Not only did he or she remove potential distractions from the chassis reflections, but the door handles disappeared as well.
A trip to the city
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In between revising for my upcoming university exams there remains some time for photography. During my stay in Luxembourg I met up with photographer John Oesch for a shooting with model Kimberley at the Abbaye Neumünster. From there I went on to take the first photograph shown above, which I entered in the Photogen competition ‘Luxembourg City’. A bit later I continued for an exploration of the Kirchberg area.
Photography Society Meeting
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Before the Easter holidays the Photography and Modeling society met up for a last shooting session. We started in the Cathedral Cloisters where the basics of flash photography and balancing it with ambient light were covered. I lent my camera to someone else so I have no pictures of that part. After a delicious Sunday lunch in the Dolphin we decided to take some group shots in the nearby park area as well as the pictures of Charlotte in the daffodils. For the eTTL adepts out there I’m happy to report that the 430EXs had no trouble picking up the master signal from the 580EX in broad sunlight from about 15 metres.
World Book and Copyright Day
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These are some older pictures from a shooting with Cazz Walker in the University of Kent Library. The shooting was aimed at the DPChallenge.com photo contest ‘Books Smarts’ where the first picture posted here got second place. There’s something in this photo that adds further interest to it for me. The half a dozen black volumes in the upper right hand corner are copies of Bennett and Royle’s Introduction to Critical Theory, a work that has simplified and simultaneously complicated my life as student of English and American Literature for some years now.
For the copyrigth part of this UNESCO organized international day, this may be a good point to explain why all of my new images that ever see the internet, and most others, are watermarked. One reason is that some of my pictures have been taken from this website and different photo communities and have re-appeared on sites with a somewhat dubitable reputation. Other instances include publicity managers ‘forgetting’ about the payment part of non-use agreements, or even big organizations like the ‘Lëtzebuerger Guiden an Scouten’ printing a book with one of my photographs on its cover without asking permission or giving credit.
So, yes, the watermarks are a necessary evil. It doesn’t make the images theft-proof, but makes stealing them more difficult. [Rant over.]