Holiday Cottage Stills Shoot in the North Lakes

A nice little last minute pre-Christmas stills shoot for a holiday cottage company in the North Lakes. A lovely little gem, hidden away under the towering shadow of Skiddaw.

Glowing in the Dark

One of the many challenges we faced this year was to shoot a collection of glow in the dark educational resource products for a local company here in the Lake District.

It was certainly an interesting day's shoot and a lot of post production grading and painting was required to finish the images to print standard.

A big thank you too to our star model who behaved wonderfully well and did everything asked of her, even at the end of the day when she was tired..!

The challenge of shooting luminescent 'Glow in the Dark' products.

Sensory, luminescent, 'Glow in the Dark' products certainly make for a challenging photo shoot. It's not so much about how to light, as how NOT to light.

This little test shoot for Wigton based educational resources company Twoey was certainly a bit of fun...

Behind The Scenes

Ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes on a stills or film shoot? There is often a lot more going on than you might think. One of the challenges we face with new clients is conveying what is involved in producing high quality pictures and footage. Once a client has witnessed the the whole process, it is usually a bit of an eye opener...

Need a bit of sunshine coming through the window on a dull day, or maybe the sun just isn't in the right place... no problem...

A bit of 'sunlight' brings a whole new dimension to an otherwise dull looking shot.

Other times a bit of 'moonlight' is required...

Shooting outside on location also requires the addition of controlled light to produce the desired look... even on a bright sunny day. That is a common misconception too... that on a bright day no lighting is required... it's actually quite the opposite and often we are trying to control and reduce the sunlight with diffusion, flags and various other light control devices.

Above top: Using a jib to create a big camera move adds massively to the production values of your finished film or video. Directly above: Using camera track and a dolly to achieve a moving shot, again adding interest and creativity over an otherwise static and uninteresting shot.

Sometimes sunlight and an artificial window pattern are required to be created from within a room if it's not possible to position a lamp outside or maybe the window is just in the wrong place.

Reflectors play a big part in lighting too... sometimes making use of the natural light and sometimes the source is artificial as in the set up above.