A few months ago I had an awesome commission to shoot lifestyle and portrait images in Cornwall for Crew Clothing. It consisted of a two day job with the first day travelling and scouting and the second day shooting. The images have just appeared in an advertorial piece in Coast magazine and they look great in a double page article.
I travelled down from Bristol on the Friday, looking out of the car window at the sunshine and praying that the weather gods would keep things the same for the Saturday. My brief for the shoot meant that I had to shoot outside and if it was raining - well I would just have to cope. I arrived in Marazion in Cornwall at lunchtime and checked into my hotel, which had the amazing location of being about 20 metres from my meeting spot the next morning with my car parked somewhere in the middle of the two places.
I spent the afternoon with Helen Bowkett who was to be my guide for the shoot. We talked about my brief and the location. I was to shoot members of the Mount's Bay Pilot Gig Club, both whilst rowing in scenic action shots and also in a more relaxed lifestyle setting. Crew Clothing is their main sponsor and this was primarily to feature in Coast magazine to help promote Crew's involvement with the coastal community.
The next day I awoke at 6am to get the first light and when I got outside I realised we were going to have beautiful weather. There was a slight misty haze but otherwise a clear day. So we quickly got the boats out and headed onto the water. Thanks to Helen's organising I had two rowing gig's and two teams at my disposal. So I sat in one and got both boats to row exactly where I wanted making sure that the boat I wasn't in stayed at the right distance and in the right place by shouting at them across the quiet morning water.
After a damn good early morning session I headed back ashore and downloaded files whilst waiting for my contact from Crew to turn up with the clothes for the rest of the day. I was feeling great about the rowing images and knew that I had some stunning shots in the bag.
When everyone had changed in to their branded Crew clothes we headed off over the sand towards St. Michael's Mount with the aim of getting some lifestyle-fashion images. My idea was for relaxed group shots and portraits of the gig club members showing the new line of Crew's GBR Atlantic Series at its best. With about 30 people to look after I let them chat away whilst pulling a few people out of the group to take their images. We wondered around on the beach, played silly games and generally had a laugh. I snapped away, grabbing various helpful people me to assist me by holding my spare camera and reflector when I didn't need it. To put it simply I had great fun running around enjoying the fact that 30 people didn't mind me taking their pictures.
After a big lunch and more file downloading we took a selection of the rowers who we felt had got on particularly well with the camera to grab some more images. We headed off on the beach for a bit to start with. I got my feet a wet because the tide was coming in so fast it caught me whilst I was concentrating on taking pictures and not where the water was. To finish the day's photography we all went to the Terrace of the Godolphin Arms that looks right out over the bay, got a round of drinks in and had a good old chat.
After a good 10 hours of shooting I finished the day and could relax. The 3 hour drive home felt like nothing because I was high on the great feeling of an awesome day's photography.
A big thanks to Crew Clothing for the fantastic job and also to everyone in the Mount's Bay Pilot Gig Club who were wonderfully helpful and understanding when I kept asking them "can you do that again please."
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Labels: coast, commercial, cornwall, Crew Clothing, editorial, gig rowing, Mount's Bay, sea
