Contracts, Photo Releases and other Nonsense!!

I shot a concert the the other night, unfortunately I was ambushed with a contract at the door, “no signature, no entry mate!” I was told.  Having already travelled 90 minutes to get there I figured I’d sign it, and decide what to do with the images at a later date.  The contract is less ominoous than others that I’ve seen but this had unusual seemingly random clauses that didn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense.  There was no questioning of copyright for once, but other really odd stuff like “images may only appear on a website for a maximum of thirty consecutive days“… why??  who knows, but obviously not very portfolio friendly.  Also the record company who’s contract it was, wanted a byline credit for the record company whenever any of the images were used, again, bizzarre.

I’ll not mention the artist or the record company because I’ve asked to get it recinded, luckily my magazine who commissioned the work is again standing behind me and has told the artists management that there will be no coverage of the artist or event until they drop the contract.

The really bizarre thing is that it hurts the artist and PR agency, because the contract is issued by the record company (not the artists management).  Sometimes I share some shots with the PR/Management comapny as a good will gesture, however the contract I was made to sign disallows this, oops!  I’ve asked at the very least that anyone applying for a photography pass for any of their future gigs should be sent the contract in advance to them to allow them to make the decision whether to attend or not before they travel, rather than getting ambushed on the door!

I’ll keep you updated, in the meantime, I’ve started a thread on Concert & Music Photographers Network to get the feedback from others experiences and thoughts about contracts and photo release forms.

Good shootin’ everyone!

Is the Pap Culture hurting (Music) Photography?

I recently read either read an article or watched something on TV where an old hand in the photography business (it might have been Dennis Stone the Heathrow celebrity photographer), wherever and whatever it was, they were remenising about the kind of access you used to be able to get to stars and how it’s all changed.  Another music photographer recently said that the difference between Paps and most other photographers is that Paps try to make their subject look as bad as possible, other ‘togs do their best to make their subject look as good as possible.  So where did the line become so blurred?  Even in the few short years I’ve been shooting at concerts there seems to be this general anti-photographer feeling, unless you’re hired by the studio/label/PR, at which point you’re introduced by one of the inner circle.  I could have it all wrong, but that’s my feeling about the whole thing.

So my question is, how do we (the music photographer niche) go about winning that trust back and perhaps even going back to the times when proper access was easier to come-by, and when they didn’t have a constant contingent of bodyguards and lawyers automatically assuming everyone is out there to rip them off?

Apologies for the rant.

Getting Back on the Horse!

It’s been a bunch of time since I was out there shooting music, but I’ve accepted a bunch of gigs and feature artist portrait shoots for the coming months, including some really interesting stuff that I’m really looking forwards to.  Some new up and coming bands and some well established artists.  So watch this space, I’ll have some new images up soon.

On a separate note, the Concert Photography Community over at Ning, is growing much faaster than expected and I’ve been quite surprised by the amount of new members every month.  If you’ve not checked it out yet, go ahead and take a look.

Nominate Thinking Rock!!

Most of you will already know that I’m a huge advocate of a piece of organisational software called Thinking Rock.  If you missed my earlier post you can find it here.  If you feel the team that write this software ought to be recognised for an award, click the graphic below, and go ahead and nominate them!!  If they win it’ll all help to make the product better and more complete.  I nominated them for best enterprise product, it seemed to fit best of all.  Nuff Said!

Getting Things Done in Thinking Rock

For those of you that aren’t aware, the title of this post; “Getting Things Done” is also the title of a best-selling book on time and task management by David Allen. Although it’s a self-help book, it’s not in the same category of “Become a Millionaire Overnight” style books, what it is, is a good, honest factual book about various systems of time and task management that are actually applicable to the real world and our real lives. If you haven’t read it, and you are serious about getting your life organised, to a point where your brain is used for thought or creativity rather than trying to remember all the things you had to do today, you should go and buy it now. For less than the price of couple of fast food meals, or a couple of pints of beer (depending on where you live!), it’s something that could really change your life, especially if you have a PDA and/or Outlook and everything is as disorganised as it always was!!

For those of you that are aware or do know about GTD as it’s affectionately known, there’s a fantastic tool coming out of Australia called ThinkingRock. the biggest benefit is its value for money, that it is, it’s free! The second great thing is that it’s actively developed, and slowly but surely is improving with each release. They have a very clear idea about where they want to go with the software, and have great community input, they’ve recently added a Windows Mobile GTD partner for ThinkingRock which allows you to synchronise and take your tasks and next actions with you. Although some people may comment that it’s not the prettiest UI in the world, it’s highly functional has all the tools I need on a day-to-day basis, which is much more important than great looking software that’s good for nothing. So go try it, the beta version (2.0) is what I’ve been using on Windows and OSX and it’s been 100% stable so far. It’s written in Java and is almost certainly available for your current platform.

If you already use it, or find it useful enough to use on a day-by-day basis, why not go and contribute something to the software team (you can find a link at the top right corner of the home page), which will only ensure that they are able to spend more time developing the software and making it even better (and perhaps a little prettier )

If you’re already using it, as always I’d love to hear more about it and what you find as the most useful features?. Cheers… ’til next time.

Of PHP Applications, Security, and Modern Database Concepts - Part 1

Here we are again with another geek entry in the weblog, photography stuff will be back soon If PHP or Databases is not your thing, please tune out now.

It’s come to my attention that there’s a significant amount of PHP/MySQL (why I focus on MySQL will become apparent as the post unfolds) application code out there that far more complex than need be. This is partly due to an insistence about backwards compatibility; i.e. I still have 2 users of my application that are using MySQL 3.21, or simply because there are many part-time developers out there that don’t feel that learning about how real databases can improve their productivity is important, because they can squeeze all the functionality we need out of PHP. So hopefully this will be a polite wake-up call to those of you that fall into one of the previous categories, to help you see why having a full understanding of database concepts is not only a “good thing”, it could help you with writing faster code, easier to maintain code, whilst maintaining data integrity, and improving overall security of your application.

I originally wrote this post as a single post, which started to look more like an essay the further along I got. So I’ve split it into multiple posts simply to make it easier to read and digest.

Now the reason I’m talking about MySQL primarily here is something of a history lesson. Love it or hate it, MySQL started out life as a relatively lightweight database, it sacrificed some of the more traditional database features and functionality, for gains in speed, and agility. The downside is that if you were developing real applications with real data, some of the work around methods to regain or replicate some of the missing functionality was quite painful involving some serious incantations of SELECT spaghetti!!. The reason I’m not talking about PostgreSQL, Oracle, Sybase, or any of these other database products, is that anyone developing on top of them without the legacy MySQL baggage, really should know better!! Database abstraction layers are all fine and dandy, but really, what’s the point of making your app work with Oracle if it’s never going to exploit the advantages offered by that particular platform….. anyway… I digress..

The problem is that there are a lot of PHP or <insert favourite web scripting language here> apps out there that have their roots in the early MySQL era and have suffered sprawl and organic growth, don’t get me wrong this is a good thing, it just brings a bunch of baggage with it. You see over the last few years MySQL has made advances in leaps and bounds, it’s barely a shadow of the young upstart database that it once was, however many owners and developers of legacy applications have simply been too busy keeping on top of refactoring and recoding for the base version changes in PHP and MySQL releases to allow the existing code to work with MySQL both old and new. This means that many of the longest running most popular applications are almost certainly running with MySQL spaghetti SQL under the bonnet. Even many of the apps with extensive Web 2.0 and Ajax and other front-end bling, fall into this category. I would imagine that if you think of the top 3 most popular applications in the categories of Weblog, eCommerce Store, CMS, CRM or other mainstream apps, if they’ve come from a MySQL legacy background, that 2 out of 3 (or in some cases 3 out of 3) are running with Spaghetti SQL. In my next post I’ll talk about some of the ways that the features MySQL has added in the last 5 years can help to improve your applications. None of this is rocket science and I’m no database expert, so any DBA’s or Database Guru’s reading this by all means read and correct me where required, but don’t expect to get any useful info from me, I’m mostly harmless in regard to databases (and PHP for that matter!).

And if you still have 0.5% of your users that run MySQL 3.23 or older on their servers, which means that they can’t use a newer version of the application, then I suggest that you point them at an application with similar functionality that has ceased development, then they’ll be able to carry on working with that, whilst editing the files with ed, and viewing the html with lynx, reading their emails with elm, and before I get lambasted, I realise that there is a time and place for these apps and they are still valid, but NOT all the time in everyplace (oh and vi is so much better than emacs too!!).

We’ll start to dive into the detail in the next post, which will cover Triggers.

Photoshop Channel Mixer - Black & White Film Settings

I couldn’t think of a better title, so there you have it! I’ve been reading a book over the last couple of days which any serious Digital Photographer should probably have in their library, called “Black and White in Photoshop CS3 and Photoshop Lightroom: Create Stunning Monochromatic Images in Photoshop CS3, Photoshop Lightroom and Beyond” by Leslie Alsheimer; I know it’s a big old mouthful, but it’s a great book, and whilst it’s not complete rocket science front-to-back (for example anyone that’s been using Photoshop in anger for a couple of versions should have at least some of this down already) I can almost guarantee that there is useful content in here for even the most seasoned professionals, and for the rest of us mere mortals, there’s a stack of useful information that goes way beyond the basics. So if you’re serious about editing or developing your B & W images in a controlled way, it’s money well spent. It also covers workflow using Adobe Lightroom in some detail too.

Now to the meat of the post, which was the whole reason for this post, that is within the book Leslie talks about some basic Channel Mixer settings which give the appearance of traditional black and white films, the list includes some old favourites like Kodak Tri-X and Ilford HP5, it covers something like 15 films in total. I sat down the other evening playing with these settings, and whilst I quite like the general feel that they use, I’m afraid I have a hard time telling a deal of difference between all but the most extreme ends of them. But my shortcomings aside, for those of you that are interested, I’ve saved them to a Channel Mixer settings file which you can download and import into your own Photoshop. They were created in CS3, but I’m guessing that they’ll work in CS2 and possibly CS also; in CS3 they are also picked up inside the new Black & White Adjustment tool (which is really just a fancy front end to Channel Mixer anyway, but obviously gives you the additional control over the CMYK aspects of the image along with hue and toning capabilities. Anyway, enough waffle, I hope you find them of use, if you don’t believe that they accurately represent the films… Don’t Shoot The Messenger!! I’m simply sharing something I did with anyone that wants to use it. Of course, no one would point out a problem without offering a solution would they?? So if you tell me that they don’t represent the films closely enough, I’ll be expecting your new improved settings in the same message, then I’ll probably amend (or addend) the settings appropriately with your offering. Click on the link at the very bottom of this post for a handy zip (about 6KB) file of the following settings: Agfa 200X, Agfapan 25, Agfapan 100, Agfapan 400, Ilford Delta 100, Ilford Delta 400, Ilford Delta 400 Pro & 3200, Ilford FP4, Ilford HP5, Ilford Pan F, Ilford SFX, Ilford XP2 Super, Kodak Tmax 100, Kodak Tmax 400, Kodak Tri-X.

I know there is much more to making a digital image emulate film, these just offer a simple starting point to work with in terms of RGB response, again, don’t shoot the messenger!!

You’ll need to save them to wherever your user presets live, in the case of a Mac it’s in your user directory under “Library -> Application Support -> Adobe -> Adobe Photoshop CS -> Presets -> Channel Mixer” or alternatively you can save them anywhere and simply use the “Load Preset” option inside Channel Mixer and navigate to the directory at that time.

Disclaimer - Obviously I offer no warranty of any kind with these settings, they’re offered as is, and if you make anything explode, implode, or they screw with your images in any way, don’t blame me. If you’re not sure what you’re doing find someone to help you who does.

Download The Channel Mixer Settings Here!!

One Last thing, if you like these, and find them useful, leave a trackback to this post or if you don’t have a blog or don’t know what a trackback is then just leave a comment on here. It gives me the ability to know whether it’s worth me doing something like this again or not.

Artist Profile - Sean McHugh

Another artist that is probably long overdue for a nod and a tip of the hat is Sean McHugh. Sean is is a fantastic photographer, with a mind numbingly firm grasp on technical aspects of photography to a great depth. Perhaps best known for his work in and around Cambridge University on his site Cambridge in Colour, particularly his amazing low light, long exposure photography, which is some of the best I’ve seen (both of Cambridge and low-light generally). I beleive Sean is now selling his work and you could do far worse than to adorn your walls with a piece of his work. In addition to his work, he’s spent a huge amount of time sharing his knowledge in the form of photography tutorials which 95% of photographers out there could learn something from! I’ve emailed back and forth a few times over the last couple of years with Sean, and he’s agreed to allow me to tag along one evening that he’s out shooting, alas, due to his schedule being even more hectic than mine, the opportunity has not yet presented itself, maybe one day everything will come into alignment and I’ll be lucky enough to get my chance. Sean, thanks for sharing, please know that your work and tutorials are very much appreciated!! Good Luck in your future endeavours!

Artist Profile - Jo De Banzie

Whilst I’m on the subject of paying my respects to the people who have inspired me in my growth so far as a photographer it seems almost bizarre that I’ve written this many posts without actually showing my appreciation for the person who, perhaps more than any other has inspired me and brought out a side of my art that I wasn’t aware existed.  In a single morning she exposed me to more of my artistic and creative side than any other single event.  Please step forward Jo De Banzie!!  Jo is a highly capable artist who brings her talents equally well to photography of all types, including a thriving commercial career in the area of fashion, she also has been known to do a lot in the realm of very well known pop artistes as well as her own very impressive art portfolio which is highly acclaimed by all that I have seen view it.  In addition to this Jo has had time to win a few awards in the last year or two.  Jo, I owe you a great deal, please consider this a huge “thank you” from the heart!!  I wish you all the best in all your future endeavours and I hope to have the opportunity to work with you again sometime.

Damien Lovegrove - Lighting Genius

I’ve been incredibly fortunate to twice have the opportunity to work with one of the finest (in my opinion) Portrait and Social Photographers in the UK (and perhaps the world). Damien Lovegrove is a master of lighting, having a background in Film and TV lighting, Damien has probably forgotten more about lighting than I’ll learn in my time as a photographer. His style of picture is often high key and very artistic, he’s quite comfortable with throwing the rule book out of the window in pursuit of a great image. All of the portrait photographers that bemoan high-key images should spend a day or two in the company of Damien, and realise that an image doesn’t have to be heavy, moody, and serious to make a good portrait, light, bright and airy can bring the most fabulous feeling too. I worked with Damien once on an Annabel Williams course, where we worked with daylight, and once with Damien on his Photoshop course, where again, Damien’s grasp of working with images (as one might have in a darkroom with silver halide) in a non-destructive way, in order to enhance rather than manipulate is fantastic.

But perhaps the one course I’m missing which I suspect would potentially carry more benefit than probably any other is his location lighting course. I suspect this is where Damien’s true love of his art would shine.

He’s released two tutorial DVD’s, one on using natural light and another on using flash, it was discovering these that prompted me to write this and pay homage to the man. I’ve not seen them yet, but I do plan on buying the pair and hopefully in the near future have the opportunity to work with him again on one of his courses.

If you’re looking to learn the business of Contemporary Wedding, Portrait or Social Photography, I personally believe that working with Damien is possibly one of the best places you could spend your money. Many have asked me if Annabel William’s classes are worthwhile, I would say unreservedly yes, they are fantastic, but….. if I only had enough for one class, I would probably look to see what courses Damien had running first, not to take anything away from Annabel, but is simply a testament to how I rate Damien.

I’d love to hear from anyone else reading this that’s worked with Damien or plans to in the future!!