In October I was asked to go and take stills on a TV advert set for an advert being produced for a Sony Competition, marking the launch of their new ‘Rolly’, (pictured above). Essentially it is an MP3 player with speakers that can also role around the table and open it’s speakers. Kinda cute if you like that kidna thing!

There were 5 sets spread over three days filming in London

The whole thing was shot on 16mm film. It was my first time on a set for such a long time, I tried to pick up as much as I could about what they were doing. Amazing how much skills and effort goes into producing one tiny clip of film.

Due to the fact that filming was going on, it obviously wasn’t possible to use flash for the photos, so this meant using wide open lenses at high ISO settings, ISO 800+ generally and a steady hand! This wasn’t one of the shot setups specifically, but I noticed the sillouttes through the plexiglass formed a nice graphic image

Nothing like lying on the cold concrete floor to get a smile!

Arri lighting provided a massive LED wall for the set which could display a huge range of colours, and be programmed to create a vast array of interesting lighting effects.

In the foreground of this shot you can see the tracks that the dolly runs on to get smooth zoom shots. This shot was taken on a tripod to ensure a higher apperature, and lower ISO could be used. I also used a Canon Speed Lite flash to illuninate the foreground to create a balanced exposure.

With the main fill lights off, the LED wall can be used to create some great silloutte effects

A vast amount of money was spent buying roses, to form a rose petal floor covering! As they were being laid I caught some of the floating down through the air

This was one of the other scenes that was shot, a futuristic news reader.

The 3 day shoot was a really interesting experience for me, I would love to do some more work along those lines one day. Watching the filming crew was fascinating too, and made my button press on my camera look like kids play! When the film gets produced I will try and post up a link.

For those who want to see more I have split the remaining pictures into three galleries:

• Arri lighting LED wall photos
• Behind scenes photos
• People around the set

Any who was part of the filming crew feel free to use the images, just right click on the to save them. Please link back to my site if you do though.

I had a couple of photos in this months Ride BMX UK magazine. This one appeared in the Stephen Murray  fundriasing jam article which was held at Aliano’s trails. It was a fun jam and lots of money was raised for a good cause. Also the after party was at a bar called the ‘Mars Bar’, classic!

I went to Redditch skatepark on Saturday, got the camera and flashes out for some pictures with Poll and Local. It’s a really fun skatepark and the moody, cloudy (and very cold!) skies made for some nice backgrounds.

I have done a proper write-up with some videos at BlewBMX, so go see that too if you’re interested.

Yesterday I went on a trip up to London to see some galleries and a day out with the family. Didn’t take many photos, but here are a couple I did take. This second-hand book shop was under one of the bridges on the river Thames.

The main thing I went to see in London was the Annie Leibowitz exhibition at the National Portrait gallery. I had slightly mixed feelings about the show, on the one hand there were some amazing photographs, my personal favourite being the White Stripes. There were also a lot of personal photograph randomly mixed in too, I know it was supposed to show her life as a photographer but I felt it detracted from the really stunning photographs in there. I am not claiming to be an art critic, but thats just what stuck in my mind about the show.

I also went to the Tate Modern, and my personal favourite gallery space in London, The National Theatre. There is always something good on display in the foyer, and it is free to view.

I usually don’t take shots when I go to the usual sites around London, always feels like it has been done before. But I figured I would just snap away like a tourist anyway! I just rested the camera on a wall on the riverbank and did some long exposures.

I really loved the lighting this bridge had, and how it showed up on the pebbles. I would like to go back there and shoot some people/portraits there in the future.

If you look carefully on the left of this shot you can see one of the most important and influential features of London; the Southbank skate spot. I have never actually ridden it, but I have walked past it many times and wished I had my bike with me. The security guard on this side was paying no attention to the skaters, not quite sure what he was protecting, but it made for an interesting shot.

I heard there were plans to build yet more coffee shops over Southbank, but luckily someone had some sense and realised that a legendary skate spot, which has formed one of the most influenical cultures was more important than yet another big corparate coffee house…

After finishing a job last week I noticed how big and bright the moon was, so got out the 70-200mm and put a 1.4x tele-extender on it and this was the result. I had never really looked at the moon in much detail before that, but it is pretty fascinating.

For anyone who is interested in how the shot was taken, this was shot hand held at ISO 100, F/11 and 1/100 of a second exposure at 280mm on a Canon 40D. If you put the camera on burst mode and have a steady hand it is pretty easy to get a blur free exposure. Always interesting to shoot something a little different!