Primary Research

I decided to make a start on making preparations to obtain primary research for the assignment, so used my guidance list as a starting point to begin contacting people.

My first call was to IWMN (Imperial War Museum North) where i called and asked to speak to Hilary- the head of the photographic archives, after gaining this contact from a talk i went to on Conflict and the Camera.
I was then directed to another department to be informed that she was based in London and given her contact number and the details of a man named Alan Wakefield.

I called and spoke to Mr Wakefield who was very helpful and more than happy for me to go and see him, he explained that the majority of the archives were held in London so there would be very little to see in Manchester. I advised him that i would like someone to show me around and explain how the archives work and suggested i spent the day there. I have arranged to go to meet him on July 9th at 11am.

As i am travelling to London i thought it would make sense to try and fit in some other visits whilst i was there, so i thought of spending a day at 8 Magazine.

As i read this magazine and find it both interesting and appropriate for my interests and this assignment, i think it would be very worthwhile to spend some time learning more behind the scenes of the printed magazine.

I found the contact details for them:

Unfortunately i had to cancel going to the Imperial War Museum as i had no time before leaving for Peru, and Foto 8 despite constant contact never got back to me about going to see them.

My essay topic has changed slightly now and is more specific to Ethics in Photojournalism so the two may not have been that helpful anyway.

Professional Practice

For the work based learning unit we are required to gain experience in our chosen field in a professional working environment. This includes paid work undertaken independantely, here i will show some examples of the work i have done of this nature.

Recently i have set up a business page on facebook as its free advertising to try to get my work known more in my local area, leading to enquiries and bookings and a reasonable second income.

Firstly i did a portrait day in the studio-offering portraits for families, couples, children, babies and individuals. As i am new to this i decided to charge a fee of £30 for a 45 minute photoshoot and the images on a disk- this was cheap enough to get the interest of the customers and hopefully lead to recommendations from them when friends and family saw the images. I would put my prices up in time when i become more established and have a more professional image (by having business cards and a website etc)

I asked a good friend to help me after anticipating that with so many small children this may not be easy! Although i have photographed small children before i must have been lucky so far, as nothing could have prepared me for the constant crying, screaming, running away and doing anything but standing in front of the camera. It made a big difference that i had Steph there helping me, as she was more than happy to sing to the children, blow bubbles, clap or whatever made them smile and stay still. I think before this i assumed that the parents would be able to do this, but this wasnt always the case. I soon learnt that bubbles for any child under 3- were like gold dust, so have now purchased a battery operated bubble machine.

I also found it quite difficult at first to direct people and make them feel comfortable but this is something that i noticed an improvement on as the day went on. Apart from the obvious difficulties of working with children the day went quite smoothly.

I photographed 5 sets of people for a total fee of £150, not bad for my first effort.

Here are some of the edited images from the shoots i did:


Carrie, Marc and Freya

F11, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F11, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F11, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F11, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F11, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

Below is one of the model release forms i used, i asked each client to fill one in and one for each child was also completed. I explained to them that this was to cover myself in a legal sense and that they should read all of the form then sign. I also mentioned that my images would be used on my website, portfolio and facebook business page- no one had any issues with this.

Anna, Den and Austin

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

F8, 1/125 Sec, ISO 100

Georgia