Bullet Holes and Gun Crime

Back when i moved into the house i grew up in (a long time ago), i remember one of the first things i noticed was a bullet hole in one of the sheds round the side of the house. Still to this day i have no idea where it came from. The area i grew up in is a far cry from downtown LA so the likely hood that it was an actual gun that did this is tiny. Most likely it was an air rifle or something. But as i kid i didn't know the difference, a gun was a gun in my head. So i'd make up fantasy stories of armed robbers having a shoot out in my back garden over stolen jewels. 

Anyway on a more serious note, i'm glad i grew up in a town, actually, a country with relatively low gun crime. I understand the need for guns when it comes to security as long as they understand properly how to use them and WHEN to use them. That's where i think the US has gone wrong. It's far too easy for anyone to get a gun and that leads to too many people thinking they know how and when to use them when they clearly don't. Going to a certified gun range to shoot is absolutely fine, don't get me wrong! (Sounds amazing!) It would help with gun knowledge too, which i honestly think is lacking in the US. From people picking one up for the first time to the police, the knowledge of when to use a gun is just not there.

In recent times US has been criticised for a rise in fatal police shootings. A statistic came out recently about there being more fatal police shootings in the first 24 days of 2015 in America (59), than in the last 24 years in England and Wales (55). (For more stats visit The Guardian's article on police shootings in 2015). The US police can definitely learn a thing or two from UK police as in a recent online video became viral of police subduing and arresting a man wielding a knife without resorting to shooting him. Many people have openly said that if that happened in the US he would have been shot. I find it so sad and frightening knowing how so many people can just go out and get a gun in the US. Personally i feel gun laws need to be improved and become stricter. The reason people think they need guns is to protect themselves from gun crime... This just leads to a lot of paranoid and angry people carrying guns. 

Sorry for the more serious post today! Just wanted to share my thoughts on gun crime and gun laws. As always check out my Instagram for new work at peterboothphotography! Hope everyone reading this has a great 2016!

Into The Distance

This is a shot i took quite a while back using my 35mm film Canon camera. The uncrowded image contains strong contrast of the dark trees in the background and her shadow with the highlights of the grass and the outline of the model. This helps to give the image a feel of isolation. That, along with having the subject just off-center staring into the light source, helps to give a sense of wonder to the image. 

Thanks to the gorgeous Alex Edden for being such a great model. As always visit my work on Instagram at peterboothphotography, and check out Alex on Instagram too at alexmedden.

New Business Cards (Review of VistaPrint & MOO)

It's taken me weeks and countless different designs but finally my business cards have arrived! I decided to go through MOO to get them instead of, what is probably the more popular, VistaPrint. VistaPrint may be cheaper in price which is why it does so well, but i also think it's cheaper in quality. Not just paper quality but appearance too. The templates for VistaPrint seem very cluttered and in my honest opinion, not very professional. They're probably ok for certain businesses especially when you just need something to show your business name and a contact number. However showing off your business now is all about standing out while still looking professional. If you needed a lot of business cards printed for a cheap cost and quickly, then VistaPrint may very well be for you. You don't get a lot of control in designs but if all you really need is your contact details on a card for customers to know then this is certainly the option for you.

This is when i started to look at MOO. I first checked MOO out for business cards a few years back and they stood out straight away as being more professional. With MOO you can sort your design out and then get sent a free batch so you can see what they would look like. This gives you a lot more control when it comes to something that will be very important for your business. It all starts with their slick website that allows you to clearly pick which product you would like. From there you can simply start your design from scratch, upload a pre-made design you've done, or have some help from the beautiful templates available. With these templates you can then narrow down your options by choosing to search by industry so you can see other photography business cards, or architecture and real estate cards. With the templates you can still edit the font, size, composition of the text which allows you to make it a bit more personal as well. On top of all this you get the options to make mini business cards, square cards, rounded cards, embossed cards, as well as many different paper types including a more eco friendly green option. These will all jack-up the price of your cards a lot, but i see it as an investment into selling your self and not just your business. MOO and VistaPrint both have good and bad points but i'd say they are for two types of people. 

VistaPrint is better for a mass production of cards for people who need to get their name around to customers quickly. They allow you to buy more cards at a cheaper price which for a self owned business is a big bonus, but they lack a creative flare. They don't allow you to fully customise your design which is a downside if you had an idea of what you wanted it to look like. Also if you wanted it to stay in theme with your website it would be hard to get them to match.

With MOO they give you the option to design every aspect of your cards. You can edit pre-made templates and really make your cards the way you want them so you don't have to settle with anything you're not happy with. They also have a much wider range of papers and style of cards you can choose to really make them stand out. However if you choose anything other than the original paper quality then the price will go up considerably, and it's not as if it was cheap in the first place. 100 cards will set you back around £30.

I'd say if you're in a creative industry or is someone who needs to sell themselves well in their line of work then you have to go with MOO. For mine i decided to go for one of my photographs i feel shows off my work best, and for the information side i kept it simple with a white background, contrasting white text, and my occupation in another colour to make it stand out. 

As always check me out on Instagram at peterboothphotography and give me a FOLLOW and let me know what you think about my work! 

Stars

This post is about some shots i took a couple of years ago of the night sky. It was the first time i had ever tried taking photographs of stars and there were some obvious hit-and-miss images. It's DEFINITELY harder than it sounds.

I used my Nikon D90 and the standard kit lens for this shoot as it was just after i got the camera. The settings for it weren't the same for each shot as there was always tweaking going on with the settings. This was because if i turned to a different part of the sky there were lighter areas on the horizons due to light pollution over towns. But the general settings were around f5, 25-30 seconds, and ISO 500-750. You really have to do a couple of practices shots so you know the best settings, then make sure the light and the composition is right. 

These were just taken in my back garden but you have to be careful about the amount of light pollution that will get in the way of the light from the stars. Enough and you won't be able to make out the stars at all. It's always better to go somewhere with very little light pollution although in this instance it gave my images a nice burnt orange gradient which i quite like.

As always visit me on Instagram at peterboothphotography and give me a FOLLOW. 

View From My Producer's Seat

Long distance relationships will always be hard, but one of the many little positives you never hear about is that you get to spend time in another place you know you'd never probably go to. Back when Alex was at Cardiff uni and i'd come to visit she inevitably had lectures and seminars to go to which meant i'd spend the afternoon walking around and getting to know what really is a beautiful city. (Oh and doing some of my own uni work of course...)

I normally took my Canon A1 with me just because it's my go-to travel camera. Easy to carry round and takes beautiful pictures. What more do you really need? Perfect for snapping new places. Well one thing she was a part of was Cardiff uni xpress radio, which meant when i went with her it was another trek to the top of the building. Upsides to that were that i could pretend to be a radio producer for the day! (I think people mistook my joke snapchats and Instagram posts and thought i actually was a producer...). As well as that there were some spectacular views from the top. The weather in Cardiff is definitely unpredictable so i was lucky enough to capture some clear blue skies, as well as some mist creeping in through the buildings in the distance. 

As always these and other shots are on my Instagram page so follow the link peterboothphotography to check out my work and give me a follow! Would love to hear from more of you!

Under The Bridge

As a kid when me and my friends were finally old enough to be allowed to walk down to town by our selves, we would always go a way that would lead us down a thin path through the middle of an industrial estate. About half way through this path you'd have to cross over a train track. As good young children we would hurry past it quickly and be on our way. As we got older though it was only natural to be curious of it because about 120ft down the track it passed under a bridge. There was enough space to walk along side the track and be safe just before people freak out too much! Checking it out occasionally meant avoiding piles of burnt ash, broken bottles, needles, tires, an empty gas canister, and sadly at one time some bedding which would be up along the sides.

Every time i would wander down there it would look different. Concrete slabs moved over for a bike jump. New graffiti. Different brands on bottles... It really got me thinking as to what actually happens down there. I have a pretty good idea as where i'm from isn't particularly full of junkies. More chavs who like to get drunk and start fires... But i much prefer to not to know exactly what happens there. I prefer seeing this gloomy and discarded place in the light and seeing the what's different. Allowing my imagination to take over as to what went on. It's much more interesting thinking about a photograph than just looking at it.

Just so everyone knows walking on train tracks is DANGEROUS. I know this. Just don't do it. Be safe, not stupid!

As always check me out on Instagram on peterboothphotography. Give me a follow and please let me know what you think!

I'm Ready For My Close Up!

"I'm ready for my closeup!" - Norma Desmond Chairman Meow

I've always been the kind of photographer that likes my digital photography pin sharp and perfect, and my analogue photography a little bit rough around the edges. This is probably because with digital you can take thousands of photographs in a sitting so there isn't much of an excuse for it not to be sharp and in focus, yet with analogue it's no more than 30 shots. Some images will be over exposed, some under. Some will be in focus, and some inevitably out of focus. But this gives 35mm and other film photography an edge in some ways. It makes you think about the story of the image more as well as making you a technically better photography. It makes you think more about what was happening when that picture was taken. Those "mistakes" become quirks of the photograph making them more intriguing. You don't stop to criticise what is wrong with an image, however makes you consider whether that "mistake" makes the photograph what it is. 

While trying out my first roll of Agfa APX 100 (which is now my standard black and white film i shoot with when going analogue), i thought i would grab a couple of shots of Chairman Meow, the most dog-like cat the world has seen. The problem with that is he didn't stay still like a cat. Instead he bounded forward straight into the camera head first. Some might look at this image and think straight away "why is it not in focus..?". Others might look at it and think clearly that cat loves his picture taken! 

Either way, the point of this blog is to explain that in some forms of photography there is room for error or mistake to make a photograph so much more than a pleasing piece of art to look at. You can plan and plan a shoot until the cows come home, but the ting which makes it will be something you didn't expect. However areas such as product, advertising, and landscape photography will tend to benefit from perfect, sharp, crisp images as you're trying to sell something or show something as being beautiful and perfect. But in others don't be too quick to dismiss an image just because a part you wanted to be in focus isn't. 

As always visit peterboothphotography on Instagram to see more of my work and give it a LIKE, and give me a FOLLOW!