2014 Wow what a Year!
As 2014 comes to a close its good to look back over what has been a pivotal year, and wow what a year it has been, both professionally and personally.
The year has seen some really amazing shoots featuring some of the rarest cars on the planet, amazing locations, and we've also been blessed with many new exciting clients coming on board as the business has seen continued growth both in the base area of commercial photographic work, and the supply of syndicated stock for advertising campaigns and commercial branding projects literally all over the globe.
The year has seen some really amazing shoots featuring some of the rarest cars on the planet, amazing locations, and we've also been blessed with many new exciting clients coming on board as the business has seen continued growth both in the base area of commercial photographic work, and the supply of syndicated stock for advertising campaigns and commercial branding projects literally all over the globe.
23/12/2014
As 2014 comes to a close its good to look back over what has been a pivotal year, and wow what a year it has been, both professionally and personally.
The year has seen some really amazing shoots featuring some of the rarest cars on the planet, amazing locations, and we've also been blessed with many new exciting clients coming on board as the business has seen continued growth both in the base area of commercial photographic work, and the supply of syndicated stock for advertising campaigns and commercial branding projects literally all over the globe.
2014 started with the busiest first quarter that we have ever seen with major shooting projects such as the commercial photography that Tim shot for our new client 'Triumph North America' and 'Castrol BP' in January. This was continued as February came and went in a flash as we saw further new clients such as 'Folwer Welsh' come on board. We also saw a massive project in February to work with a new UK based Insurance company 'Sure Thing' to supply all the photography for their launch that came a few months later in April and this was closely followed by a 3 part major project for Jaguar UK to help market and promote the 'Heritage' element of their brand for commercial advertising as well as billboard use at such shows as the NEC Motor Show.
Probably one of the largest projects undertaken in 2014 was the completion of shooting for the Aston Martin Book, a massive undertaking and something that Tim has been involved exclusively with since its start in early 2013. The book is a celebration of Aston Martin through their 100 years and is a major publication of over 680 pages of stunning photography from Tim capturing each of their significant models over their first 100 years of building cars, from the very first Bamford Martin car all the way through to the infamous DB5 and onwards to the latest DBS and One77 models of recent years.
Designed and produced to be a general book for the market this publication reflects the history of design and how the cars have evolved over the years but is not a technical based book as many before it have had their base, bit more a book of simply beautiful photography to celebrate a iconic and world famous British brand that is as strong today as it ever was. Printing will commence in 2015 and their are discussions underway to also bring out a limited boxed edition.
Tim - "Being asked to create all the photography for the Aston Workshop 100 year book is indeed a great honour and its a project that we have been working on for just over a year now. The book will primarily be a 'coffee table' style book of great photography looking at each of the models through the history of Aston Martin design and endeavour to create cars that instil both passion and soul. Its a massive project and currently we are very close to completing the project now. Some of the cars that I have captured for this book such as the Zagato's VEV1 and VEV2 that are very rare and today are in the same condition as the day that they drove out of the factory gates. For me personally it's a joy to shoot these cars and we have been working with Aston in the UK and Europe for just over 7 years now so I am very familiar with both the company and the vehicles themselves which is a major benefit to the project for me personally. We are having the final design meetings for the project and we anticipate that the book will launch this year globally, I can't wait to see all that hard work come together in what I hope will be a book that young and old will enjoy a like."
2014 also saw our work featured across the World in many magazine interviews and features, some months there were 2 or 3 articles running at any one time such as Professional Photographer Magazines, The Review in London, and Camerapixo to name a few, as well as recorded TV and Podcast interviews with people such as Photofocus in the US when Tim was asked to be an instructor for the infamous Photoshop World event held in Las Vegas with KelbyOne. The event saw Tim deliver 3 seminars including a live car shoot on stage and a business masterclass that received some of the highest feedback for any seminar at the event, resulting in Tim being asked to return to Las Vegas in 2015 to deliver a expanded business seminar over several sessions this time, a further live car shoot and also be one of the chosen instructors to deliver a major car lighting live event during the 'precon' for Photoshop World 2015.
One of our proudest moments in 2014 was the launch of Tim's very first exhibition which was sponsored by Fuji UK and Digitalab, featured exclusively a body of 'personal work' that Tim captured of the ghost town of Darwin that is set deep in Death Valley in the US. First built in 1877 and was once a thriving town for the miners and their families, now it is all but abandoned and lays deep within the central area of Death Valley with many mysteries surrounding why the townsfolk left and why they left so much behind in their shadow. The photography that Tim captured there work has been published around the world in various magazines and featured and in August Tim opened the exhibition of this work in Newcastle where it was so well received that it is still running currently having been 'extended' 3 times and has broken all previous gallery records for print sales, achieving this within its first 48 hours!
Tim - "I found myself in Death Valley moving through the Valley from South to North. Death Valley has always held a fascination for me in its sheer scale and beauty. I had pulled off onto a small clearing by the side of the road to refit the power lead to my GPS that had fallen loose, pulling off the main road in Death Valley is something that signs warn you not to do as soft ground can leave you stranded and once you are in this position with the distinct possibility of not having anybody pass you on the road for the rest of the day, its a dangerous manoeuvre at best. I distinctly remember looking up from the dash and catching a glint of something far down the valley to my left, it was then that I decided to risk it and start carefully driving down the track that led in that direction. The town itself is very hard to find and it was a my second visit to Death Valley trying to locate it, laying so far off the road along a very dusty track with no signs it is a place where it is very easy to pass it without ever knowing that it ever existed, very much the town that time forgot in many ways. Darwin itself is a truly amazing place and I really didn't know what to expect as I pulled onto the dirt track that carried me into this totally silent abandoned area in the middle of the valley. It was early evening and the sky was a golden colour as the heat haze dropped in front of me making viewing anything in the distance across the valley floor very difficult. 6 miles off the main road quite literally in the middle of absolutely nowhere I came across the town sat in the base of the mountains, abandoned and shrouded in the sheer deafening silence that you experience only in places like Death Valley, a barrier across the track warning me to stay out.
I loved shooting in Darwin with all the amazing items and homes that have literally just been left behind as they stood many years ago, the rich textures and the amazing light that you get in Death Valley made the project one thats was very inspiring for me creatively as a photographer. I believe that as a professional photographer, 'personal work' is something thats very important to do each year, it in many ways offers us the freedom to express ourselves more through our work than perhaps day to day commercial work can with its demands and constraints. This entire body of work in Darwin was shot on my Fuji XPro1 and a 14mm f2.8 lens, with nothing else at all, just myself and the camera to capture what I saw before me.
I think the three main things that will remain with me always from my visit there was the sheer deafening silence as the sun dropped across the valley and left me and the town in darkness, the US Army truck with the bullet hole in the windscreen parked out of sight, and noticing that every clock that I came across had stopped at 4:20 on Sunday the 13th even though they were all 'mechanical'…"
2014 was also a year that saw Tim's business seminars make a shift to lead into the arena of motivational talks for the first time. In June Tim was in Wales to perform on stage at the Colwyn Bay Theatre for a charity event that was the brain child of both Tim and Sarah Jones from Cambrian Photography after a chance meeting a few months earlier where both Sarah and Tim came up with an idea to try and raise some much needed money for some charities that Sarah is deeply involved in, namely The King’s Storehouse Food Bank, that help provide food and support for families that are having financial difficulties and unable to feed themselves properly, and also 'Lightbox the Young People’s Camera Group' that Paul Sampson from Oriel Colwyn runs and is a group set up to help and support found disadvantaged children to enjoy photography.
The event was a huge success and lead to Tim being offered a place as a instructor with a European based 'inspirational and motivational' speaker organisation called "Celebrity Speakers'
Tim - "Earlier this year I made a decision that I wanted to try and do more 'inspirational' speaking as I really enjoyed it and it seemed to be something that people enjoyed listening to and connecting too from me. What I did not realise at that time was that a organisation that specialise in this form of 'motivational and inspirational' speaking were already aware of my seminars and the reputation that was building around these.
A few months ago I decided to do a charity talk to raise money in Wales with Cambrian Photography, this went really well and I was very happy to do it of course because it was simply the right thing to do. Recently they started to talk with me and shortly afterwards they launched me as a new speaker into their sites in the UK and Europe as a Inspirational and Motivational speaker.
In truth this is very surreal and sort of blows me away totally, can't still now quite get over this as I sit now with people like James Cameron, Bob Geldof and Sir Sirling Moss not to mention Olympic gold medalists like Rebecca Adlington and David Coulthard but i feel very privileged to be in such good company and I look forward too making new friends and meeting new people.
I came from nothing 7 years ago and all I did was find my own path and work hard for what I believe in, so what am I saying here, be true to yourself, believe in yourself and if you really want something then GO FOR IT regardless of what anybody tells you, and most of all along that journey do good things for people be cause Karma works both ways and life is not about what you can get, its about what you can give.
The year has seen some really amazing shoots featuring some of the rarest cars on the planet, amazing locations, and we've also been blessed with many new exciting clients coming on board as the business has seen continued growth both in the base area of commercial photographic work, and the supply of syndicated stock for advertising campaigns and commercial branding projects literally all over the globe.
2014 started with the busiest first quarter that we have ever seen with major shooting projects such as the commercial photography that Tim shot for our new client 'Triumph North America' and 'Castrol BP' in January. This was continued as February came and went in a flash as we saw further new clients such as 'Folwer Welsh' come on board. We also saw a massive project in February to work with a new UK based Insurance company 'Sure Thing' to supply all the photography for their launch that came a few months later in April and this was closely followed by a 3 part major project for Jaguar UK to help market and promote the 'Heritage' element of their brand for commercial advertising as well as billboard use at such shows as the NEC Motor Show.
Probably one of the largest projects undertaken in 2014 was the completion of shooting for the Aston Martin Book, a massive undertaking and something that Tim has been involved exclusively with since its start in early 2013. The book is a celebration of Aston Martin through their 100 years and is a major publication of over 680 pages of stunning photography from Tim capturing each of their significant models over their first 100 years of building cars, from the very first Bamford Martin car all the way through to the infamous DB5 and onwards to the latest DBS and One77 models of recent years.
Designed and produced to be a general book for the market this publication reflects the history of design and how the cars have evolved over the years but is not a technical based book as many before it have had their base, bit more a book of simply beautiful photography to celebrate a iconic and world famous British brand that is as strong today as it ever was. Printing will commence in 2015 and their are discussions underway to also bring out a limited boxed edition.
Tim - "Being asked to create all the photography for the Aston Workshop 100 year book is indeed a great honour and its a project that we have been working on for just over a year now. The book will primarily be a 'coffee table' style book of great photography looking at each of the models through the history of Aston Martin design and endeavour to create cars that instil both passion and soul. Its a massive project and currently we are very close to completing the project now. Some of the cars that I have captured for this book such as the Zagato's VEV1 and VEV2 that are very rare and today are in the same condition as the day that they drove out of the factory gates. For me personally it's a joy to shoot these cars and we have been working with Aston in the UK and Europe for just over 7 years now so I am very familiar with both the company and the vehicles themselves which is a major benefit to the project for me personally. We are having the final design meetings for the project and we anticipate that the book will launch this year globally, I can't wait to see all that hard work come together in what I hope will be a book that young and old will enjoy a like."
2014 also saw our work featured across the World in many magazine interviews and features, some months there were 2 or 3 articles running at any one time such as Professional Photographer Magazines, The Review in London, and Camerapixo to name a few, as well as recorded TV and Podcast interviews with people such as Photofocus in the US when Tim was asked to be an instructor for the infamous Photoshop World event held in Las Vegas with KelbyOne. The event saw Tim deliver 3 seminars including a live car shoot on stage and a business masterclass that received some of the highest feedback for any seminar at the event, resulting in Tim being asked to return to Las Vegas in 2015 to deliver a expanded business seminar over several sessions this time, a further live car shoot and also be one of the chosen instructors to deliver a major car lighting live event during the 'precon' for Photoshop World 2015.
One of our proudest moments in 2014 was the launch of Tim's very first exhibition which was sponsored by Fuji UK and Digitalab, featured exclusively a body of 'personal work' that Tim captured of the ghost town of Darwin that is set deep in Death Valley in the US. First built in 1877 and was once a thriving town for the miners and their families, now it is all but abandoned and lays deep within the central area of Death Valley with many mysteries surrounding why the townsfolk left and why they left so much behind in their shadow. The photography that Tim captured there work has been published around the world in various magazines and featured and in August Tim opened the exhibition of this work in Newcastle where it was so well received that it is still running currently having been 'extended' 3 times and has broken all previous gallery records for print sales, achieving this within its first 48 hours!
Tim - "I found myself in Death Valley moving through the Valley from South to North. Death Valley has always held a fascination for me in its sheer scale and beauty. I had pulled off onto a small clearing by the side of the road to refit the power lead to my GPS that had fallen loose, pulling off the main road in Death Valley is something that signs warn you not to do as soft ground can leave you stranded and once you are in this position with the distinct possibility of not having anybody pass you on the road for the rest of the day, its a dangerous manoeuvre at best. I distinctly remember looking up from the dash and catching a glint of something far down the valley to my left, it was then that I decided to risk it and start carefully driving down the track that led in that direction. The town itself is very hard to find and it was a my second visit to Death Valley trying to locate it, laying so far off the road along a very dusty track with no signs it is a place where it is very easy to pass it without ever knowing that it ever existed, very much the town that time forgot in many ways. Darwin itself is a truly amazing place and I really didn't know what to expect as I pulled onto the dirt track that carried me into this totally silent abandoned area in the middle of the valley. It was early evening and the sky was a golden colour as the heat haze dropped in front of me making viewing anything in the distance across the valley floor very difficult. 6 miles off the main road quite literally in the middle of absolutely nowhere I came across the town sat in the base of the mountains, abandoned and shrouded in the sheer deafening silence that you experience only in places like Death Valley, a barrier across the track warning me to stay out.
I loved shooting in Darwin with all the amazing items and homes that have literally just been left behind as they stood many years ago, the rich textures and the amazing light that you get in Death Valley made the project one thats was very inspiring for me creatively as a photographer. I believe that as a professional photographer, 'personal work' is something thats very important to do each year, it in many ways offers us the freedom to express ourselves more through our work than perhaps day to day commercial work can with its demands and constraints. This entire body of work in Darwin was shot on my Fuji XPro1 and a 14mm f2.8 lens, with nothing else at all, just myself and the camera to capture what I saw before me.
I think the three main things that will remain with me always from my visit there was the sheer deafening silence as the sun dropped across the valley and left me and the town in darkness, the US Army truck with the bullet hole in the windscreen parked out of sight, and noticing that every clock that I came across had stopped at 4:20 on Sunday the 13th even though they were all 'mechanical'…"
2014 was also a year that saw Tim's business seminars make a shift to lead into the arena of motivational talks for the first time. In June Tim was in Wales to perform on stage at the Colwyn Bay Theatre for a charity event that was the brain child of both Tim and Sarah Jones from Cambrian Photography after a chance meeting a few months earlier where both Sarah and Tim came up with an idea to try and raise some much needed money for some charities that Sarah is deeply involved in, namely The King’s Storehouse Food Bank, that help provide food and support for families that are having financial difficulties and unable to feed themselves properly, and also 'Lightbox the Young People’s Camera Group' that Paul Sampson from Oriel Colwyn runs and is a group set up to help and support found disadvantaged children to enjoy photography.
The event was a huge success and lead to Tim being offered a place as a instructor with a European based 'inspirational and motivational' speaker organisation called "Celebrity Speakers'
Tim - "Earlier this year I made a decision that I wanted to try and do more 'inspirational' speaking as I really enjoyed it and it seemed to be something that people enjoyed listening to and connecting too from me. What I did not realise at that time was that a organisation that specialise in this form of 'motivational and inspirational' speaking were already aware of my seminars and the reputation that was building around these.
A few months ago I decided to do a charity talk to raise money in Wales with Cambrian Photography, this went really well and I was very happy to do it of course because it was simply the right thing to do. Recently they started to talk with me and shortly afterwards they launched me as a new speaker into their sites in the UK and Europe as a Inspirational and Motivational speaker.
In truth this is very surreal and sort of blows me away totally, can't still now quite get over this as I sit now with people like James Cameron, Bob Geldof and Sir Sirling Moss not to mention Olympic gold medalists like Rebecca Adlington and David Coulthard but i feel very privileged to be in such good company and I look forward too making new friends and meeting new people.
I came from nothing 7 years ago and all I did was find my own path and work hard for what I believe in, so what am I saying here, be true to yourself, believe in yourself and if you really want something then GO FOR IT regardless of what anybody tells you, and most of all along that journey do good things for people be cause Karma works both ways and life is not about what you can get, its about what you can give.
Tim -"I would say that 2014 has been quite simply the very best of years, and one that will drive me forward into 2015 with both excitement and motivation to continue to push the business forward and further develop new avenues along the way. Successful business is not just about making money, its about planting seeds for the future, and also about seeing opportunities and allowing things to 'evolve' and grow naturally.
From the very first week of January this year I can hand of heart say that its been a non stop full on year, sometimes challenging but always inspiring. I have had the continued pleasure of working with some of the most amazing people in my industry, I have met new colleagues and built new friendships along the way. I always feel very honoured to have the privilege of working alongside such amazing people and also very humbled by some of those I meet along this journey of life. One of the very best moments for me personally this year was having the opportunity to do the talk in Wales for charities that are very close to my heart, a moment in my year that left me feeling very wealthy emotionally to have been able to give something that would make a small, but important, difference to a few people.
All along this journey this year has been the woman that stands by my side, my partner Angela. A truly amazing lady that is my own personal inspiration, a professional, capable and motivated lady that is there always in the shadows to support me and keep me on a straight and true heading when the waters become rough and the storm is hard to navigate through.
So finally to her I would like to just say thank you, and I love you completely, you are my world and forever you are my rock !"
