photography

Think Tank Hydrophobia

Ever since I managed to soak one of my Canon EOS5D MkII cameras at an outdoor event last summer where it rained hard and non-stop I have been meaning to get my hands on a Think Tank Hydrophobia rain cover. I finally managed to get around to it just as one of the longest dry spells (work and weather) hit but I have finally given it a run out. The job actually meant using a tripod quite a lot and, whilst the Hydrophobia wasn’t actually designed for this, it all worked out well.

As predicted, I got a proper soaking (cold, wet rain) and I got very cold but my camera stayed dry and kept on working. The version that I have is designed to be used with a 70-200 f2.8 sized lens and it has small sleeves for your hands to fit inside the cover. There’s an option to have a flash unit attached too on the version that I have and so this is a very well designed piece of kit.

A word of caution

Even the best designed kit has a few features that you need to be aware of. The Hydrophobia does a great job and it worked flawlessly but I’d love to see a big sign included in the package telling you to have a few practice goes at fitting the cover before trying to use it on a job in front of clients and/or other photographers. Fitting it for the first time was a fairly frustrating process. Happily I had the sense (too many bad days with soft boxes and tents) to try it first in the warm and dry confines of my kitchen. The second time was in the car and it was actually my third go at fitting the cover when I had to do it in the dark and the rain in front of others. I was still a little ham-fisted but fitting it for the fourth time today so that I had a few pictures to accompany this piece was a (relative) breeze. Practice does indeed make perfect.

What else you can actually say about a piece of kit that is essentially designed to keep your gear dry than “it kept my gear dry” is beyond me. If it came in a tin, it would do exactly what it said on that tin!

So… marks out of ten? For doing its job it gets 10 but for ease of use I’d give it a 5 out of the packaging rising to 7 after four uses and an even higher mark with lots of practice.

Training on Weymouth beach – an unusual portrait

Sometimes pictures come together without much effort and sometimes you almost kill yourself trying to get something just that little bit special. This portrait of a young athlete who was competing in the sport of Biathle for Great Britain at a junior level whilst studying at a college in Weymouth, Dorset definitely came along after a not insignificant struggle. Nothing to do with the subject – he was cooperative, willing and full of energy – I just tried to get pictures that didn’t seem to want to come off.

©Neil Turner/TSL. Weymouth Dorset, December 2007.

This frame was shot on a 16-35 f2.8L lens at its widest focal length on a Canon EOS1D MkII at 1/250th of a second at f22 and 200 ISO. I was using every joule of power from a Lumedyne Signature Series flash kit with no umbrella or soft box and I just had the power to get this. I have always liked the photo and I was always sad that the paper didn’t use this frame.

I guess that this picture is further proof that I love shooting beaches – especially Dorset beaches!

Fun picture – pigeons checking each other out, Bournemouth

©Neil Turner. February 2012. Bournemouth

I don’t know if spring is in the air but these two pigeons outside a supermarket in Dorset this morning look as if they were rehearsing for Valentines Day next week.

College Principal – the “contact sheet”

Within two hours of posting a portrait of College Principal Jane Rapley at Central St Martins on this blog, I’d had four emails asking to see the rest of the shoot. I can’t do that but I can share the rest of the edit.

©Neil Turner/TSL. London, July 2006

I’m not going to repeat everything that I wrote on the original blog posting but you can see that the image I selected to feature was very much the “odd one out”. I have always thought that this set represented a good selection of portraits from a single session but looking back five and a half years on I have realised how many uprights there are and how few horizontal compositions. I’d like to think that was because I knew that the newspaper wanted uprights but I’m not sure that’s the case. Anyway, to those of you who wanted to see this selection… I hope that you like them!

Fifteen minutes of low level fame

To be entirely honest it was actually thirty-four minutes rather than fifteen but Andy Warhol’s observation that everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes is a gift of an opening and it’s so much punchier than thirty-four!

The half an hour plus four minutes in question was the time that I spent giving evidence to The Leveson Inquiry into the culture ethics and practice of the British press on behalf of The British Press Photographers’ Association. If you didn’t already know, I am very proud to be one of the two Vice-Chairmen of The BPPA – an organisation that supports and promotes news photography in the United Kingdom.

I have written a short blog about my experiences and there is a link to actually watch a Flash (boo!) video of me in action. This isn’t about self-promotion, its about the important message that I was given the honour of presenting to this important inquiry. Did it go well? Go to The BPPA’s blog site and find out…

Canon announces a new 24-70 f2.8L lens

New objects of desire on the equipment front will probably start to appear with monotonous regularity between now and The London 2012 Olympic games. Overnight Canon have announced a new version of the 24-70 f2.8L lens – the mark II.

The older version has been my workhorse for so many years now that I would find it hard to do my job without one and the appearance of a new (and improved?) version makes get my abacus out and start to apply the cost/benefit calculations that professionals need to make every time we consider a new piece of kit.

If I decide that I cannot justify buying it, then it still remains an object of desire! Apparently another major camera manufacturer has also been busy on the launch pad overnight. Nikon have announced the D800 with more megapixels in a 35mm style DSLR body than anyone thought possible/desirable/necessary. Given Nikon’s recent track record of getting things right I would not bet against this being a great piece of kit and a runaway success. For my part, I hope that the next full-frame Canon doesn’t follow suit and re-ignite the megapixel race. A 5D MkIII with decent AF and a chip at around 24-25 megapixels with decent options to shoot smaller (and maybe custom sized?) RAW files would suit my needs rather well.

Archive photo: Carl Djerassi, London, June 1999

©Neil Turner/TSL. London, June 1999

I shot this portrait of Carl Djerassi, co-inventor of the contraceptive pill, scientist and playwright in his London flat. He was mainly resident in San Francisco but kept a home in the UK as well. He was a very quiet and considered man who was used to, but not particularly keen on, publicity. I was attracted to the shape of his dining chairs and the almost egg-like shape of the top. I don’t recall whether we discussed the shape at the time!

College Principal, July 2006, London

©Neil Turner/TSL. July 2006, London.

Jane Rapley was about to take over as the new head of Central St Martins College in London when I shot her portrait in July 2006. After 17 years at the famous arts college in a variety of posts she became the Principal in August 2007. I photographed her in her office and then in one of the galleries that they use for student shows at Central St Martins on Southampton Row in central London.

This particular frame was shot in case the designer wanted to use the portrait full page and run a headline and some text over the image itself. The rest of the shoot was more varied and included some very wide portraits, which seem to have been what I was interested in at that time. It is fascinating that when you look back at your own work on a chronological basis you can definitely see trends and fashions in the way you compose, light and post-produce pictures. This was one of my softer lighting periods!