Feature | Fixation

Jonny Helm Behind The Scenes, Feature May 18, 2017October 6, 2023

Behind The Scenes | Daniel Hambury

Most professional photographers would be happy running their own picture agency, but London-based freelance photographer Daniel Hambury doesn’t believe in resting on his laurels.

In 2002 he set up Stella Pictures to showcase his varied range of commissions, portraits and editorial work. He then went on to set up Focus Images in 2006 – dedicated to Sports photography – offering a huge archive of images and offering live delivery of Premier and Football league shots.

Daniel in the studio | © Matt Writtle

We caught up with Daniel recently over a cuppa to find out what keeps him motivated in his work.

How did you first get interested in photography?

My parents were Leica dealers. They had a shop in east London and then relocated to the Suffolk coast when I was 9 years old. I grew up surrounded by beautiful cameras.

How long have you worked as a professional photographer?

I graduated from Norfolk College of Art in 1993. An ex Evening Standard snapper called Stuart Goodman tipped me off about a local newspaper job in Cambridgeshire. I got it, and started in the November of that year; I’ve been lucky enough to earn my living with my cameras ever since.

What equipment do you normally use?

I’ve shot Nikon my whole working life. I use a pair of D4s for sport with a 400mm ƒ/2.8 along side a 70-200mm ƒ/2.8 and an old D3 as a remote camera. For features/portraits I use a D810 and a D800 alongside prime lenses. I also, unsurprisingly, have a film Leica (M3) and recently purchased a M240.

What do you enjoy most about your job?

I get the chance to shoot sport every weekend at least, which I totally adore. I love football and still play very badly each week. To be up close and personal with some of the world’s best players in the Premier League is a privilege. Of course it’s not just the top division, sometimes it’s more fun at a lower league game. The Premier League is a little ‘clean and sanitised’ whereas ‘real football’ is found in league 1 or 2.

Scott Parker | © Daniel Hambury | PA Photos

In terms of portraiture, I get the chance to spend 20-30 minutes in the company of some very high profile, interesting people. Alongside my love of sport, I very much enjoy politics and so to shoot portraits of these types of people is such a joy.

I am almost always shooting exclusively so I can engage the subject, boss them around a little and hopefully get them to open up. I learnt very early in my career that portraiture is a combined effort between the subject and myself. If they don’t buy in to my idea it shows. I feel I can talk to people from most walks of life and I honestly believe this is an essential skill in an editorial photographer’s armoury.

You take a lot of photographs on your travels. Does it sometimes feel like a busman’s holiday?

No. I would still be taking pictures of my travels even if I weren’t a pro. I’m lucky to have travelled to about 70 countries and to have my camera with me in almost all of them.

I’m a parent of two young boys now, so when they are a little older, my wife and I will undoubtedly travel with backpacks, kids, and a camera again.

To what extent do you rely on Fixation for your work?

I can honestly say that Fixation has saved my working life on two occasions. When kit fails, which it inevitably does, I can trust Barry at Fixation to ‘just make it OK again’. His friendly nature, and world-class professional standards help me to push my kit on a yearly basis. The cameras are just the tools of my trade, so I’m not overly precious about them, which keeps Barry busy! I also buy almost all of my gear from Fixation, as I’m fully aware of how important it is to keep supporting a place that has helped me.

I’ve been a customer for a while now, since the days in Bondway, and it’s great having a dedicated sales team, with Donal and his colleagues.

As well as this, the sofas by the camera bags make for a very nice place to file from, especially when you get a nice cuppa!

Does video feature much in your work, and how important do you think it will be going forward?

I am a massively late adopter of video. In truth the moving image seemed so complicated I procrastinated for a very long time.

Recently I educated myself a little by taking a two-day course and this has helped me lots.

The timing was great as my company was commissioned to shoot two corporate films in 2016. I hired one of my old mates, a professional filmmaker, and assisted him over the 6 and 3 days shooting respectively. I learnt so much, especially how important pre shoot is, and that sound quality is vital.

Since then, more video commissions have come in. Some smaller, which I have shot on my Nikons, and some larger where broadcast cameras were needed.

It is a very different skill from stills, and I still have lots to learn.

Floyd Mayweather | © Daniel Hambury | PA Photos

Your work covers a wide range of genres. Do you have a favourite?

What I really love is the variety of my work. I shoot sport and portraits as I’ve covered but also have a large number of commercial clients alongside a charity I work for regularly. As editorial work becomes harder to maintain a living from, I need these commercial clients so I can survive in the tough market place. I am happy with a camera in my hand, and the fact I can pay the mortgage by taking pictures still means I’m very lucky.

Newmarket Races | © Daniel Hambury | PA Photos

Daniel was talking to Tim Stavrinou.
To see more of his work, see Stella Pictures & Focus Images

Jonny Helm Feature May 2, 2017October 6, 2023

Stuart Freedman | The Englishman and the Eel

Stuart Freedman was born in London and has been a photographer since 1991. His work has been published in, amongst others, Life, Geo, Time, Der Spiegel, Newsweek, The Sunday Times Magazine and Paris Match covering stories from Albania to Afghanistan and from former Yugoslavia to Haiti.

We sat down with Stuart recently to talk photography and discuss his latest Kickstarter-funded project – The Englishman and the Eel; a journey into the culture of that most London of institutions, the Eel, Pie and Mash shop.

How did you first get into photography?

I did a politics degree and in my final year discovered a magazine called Photography. Edited by Nigel Skelsey (Telegraph) and Victoria Lukens (who I’d go onto work for at the Indie on Sunday Magazine a decade later) it was a beautiful and serious magazine (in contrast to all the other photo mags at the time) that showcased extraordinary work. I had no interest in photography up until that point but I thought, ‘this is what I really want to do’. I was of course a terrible photographer (still am) but that initial spark was the way in for me. After graduation, I came back to London put a really appalling folio together and just went from there… I first joined Select Photos in the early 1990s shooting mostly for European magazines moving to FSP/Gamma Presse a few years later. I’m very proud to have been a full member of Network Photographers in 1999 where I stayed until we sadly closed when I joined Panos.

[gdlr_quote align=”center” ]I’ve spent the last twenty five years making work mostly in Asia and Africa. I wanted however to re-explore my roots and The Englishman and the Eel is an attempt to do just that – recording these simple spaces that hold within them much of the memories of a rich, largely undocumented cultural heritage of generations of working-class Londoners in a city whose only constant is change.[/gdlr_quote]

Says Stuart “Today’s eel, pie and mash shops are now havens for what the East End once was – but this is not a work of nostalgia. I’ve travelled to Lough Neagh in Northern Ireland to photograph eel fishing. I’ve made work at both Barney’s and Mick’s Eels, the two companies that process the fish. I’ve photographed and written about Millwall fans (who sing of the eel) and recorded those that now eat their pies and eels at home, too elderly and frail to journey to the shops. Lastly, I have followed the bleed of the East End to it’s new spiritual home in Essex where Pie and Mash shops are undergoing something of an renaissance. Identifying as they do with a re-imagined and distilled working-class culture that is geographically separate from their traditional roots.

“The Englishman and the Eel is not an encyclopaedic record of every shop, rather I’ve documented what I believe to be the most interesting and significant ones to make a book that I hope is a tribute to a changing institution and I’ve used the eel as a metaphor and symbol of that cultural change. In that sense the book is a companion piece to my last, The Palaces of Memories (Dewi Lewis 2015) – a finalist for best photobook at POYi in America in 2016 – about the Indian Coffee Houses that reminded me so much of my own past – the greasy spoon cafes of Hackney – during my twenty years working and living in India. The Coffee Houses were translational devices that allowed me to see an everyday India away from the stereotypes and understand that people were the same the world over. I hope The Englishman and the Eel will, in the same way, introduce the eel, pie and mash shops to another new audience.”

You’ve been a friend and customer at Fixation for many years. To what extent do you rely on us for your work?

Well, Fixation is the only place I’d ever come to – and ever have come to – for repairs and servicing. No question.

What camera equipment do you use?

I use a couple of Canon 5D Mk III’s and a Leica M-P(240) – but over the years, I’ve used pretty much everything from 6 x 6 to 5 x 4.

You mention that The Englishman and the Eel is almost a companion piece to your last book. Do you have any plans to produce a trilogy?

I don’t think so. I think I’ve said enough about spaces of memory and my past and the next book will be something completely different.

Stuart was speaking to Tim Stavrinou.

To learn more about the project, visit Stuart’s Kickstarter page.

The book will again be published by Dewi Lewis late in 2017.

www.stuartfreedman.com

About Stuart

His work has been recognised in many awards, from amongst others, Amnesty International (twice), Pictures of the Year, The World Sports Photo Award, The Royal Photographic Society and UNICEF. In 1998 he was selected for the World Press Masterclass and the following year for the Agfa Young Photojournalist of the Year.

In 1999 he was invited to speak on Capitol Hill in the USA about the atrocities in Sierra Leone where his initial work on the Mutilated premiered. In 2004 he addressed the Oxford Union about the continued suffering of that country.

His work has been exhibited widely. Solo shows include Visa Pour L’Image at Perpignan, The Scoop Festival in Anjou, The Leica Gallery in Germany, The Foire du Livre (Brussels), The Museum of Ethnography (Stockholm), The Association and the Spitz Galleries in London. His work on HIV/AIDS in Rwanda and from post-conflict South of Lebanon have toured extensively internationally.

He regularly judges awards and has twice been a judge for the Amnesty Media Awards. He has guest lectured to students in schools across the UK at amongst others, Swansea Metropolitan University, Falmouth University, Regents University and The London College of Communication (LCC). In addition he has written (and taught) the Photojournalism module for the Visual Journalism MA at Nottingham Trent University.

In 2016, his new book, The Palaces of Memory was a finalist at POYi for Best Photography Book of the Year and was chosen for The American Photography Annual (AI-AP).

He continues to write and photograph for a variety of editorial and commercial clients and is a member of Panos Pictures in London.

Jonny Helm Feature May 2, 2017October 6, 2023

Baja Peninsula

Mexico’s Baja Peninsula, home to the San Ignacio Lagoon, is one of the most remarkable places on earth according to Chris Breen, founder of The Natural Travel Collection.

Chris has been leading trips to Baja for four years with a specific goal in mind: to observe and photograph the thousands of grey whales that migrate down the peninsula and visit some key lagoons each spring.

[gdlr_quote align=”center” ]This is a place where the whales want to touch you and play with you, roll around for you, and open their mouths so you can rub their baleen

[/gdlr_quote]

“They blow bubbles for you and disappear to scratch their bellies on the under side of the boats or push on the stern of the boats to turn them round. It all seems to be such fun for them and it’s impossible to know who is enjoying it more, the whales or us.” says Chris.

We caught up with Chris to find out more about his recent trip, and to find out exactly why he keeps returning year after year.

You’re obviously very passionate about your photography. What sort of kit do you take with you on these kind of trips?

After having all my Canon gear stolen in South Africa a few years back I switched to Nikon which I love. I carry a D750 and a D700 with three Nikkor lenses – a 17-35mm ƒ/2.8, 24-70mm ƒ/2.8 and an 80-400mm ƒ/4.5-5.6. As I’m photographing from small boats and the whales are adept at getting everything wet I have two or three small towels in my pocket so I can regularly dry my kit if the whales are on form! I also take a GoPro Hero4 which is good for occasional underwater shots. Most importantly though, I don’t spend all my time behind the lens – the whales need attention too!

You’ve been a customer of ours for quite a while. How much do you rely on Fixation for your gear?

I was introduced to Fixation a few years back and rarely go anywhere else now. Regular camera servicing, sensor cleaning and of course buying good equipment (both used and new) all goes through Fixation.

Do you rent any equipment for your trips or do you prefer to own it outright?

I mostly use my own gear but the rental service is a lifesaver. Before going to Mexico I had the sensor on my D750 cleaned and you discovered that the camera body was damaged with no time to repair it before I went. The rental service came to my rescue with a D750 body in my camera bag within 24 hours – it’s hard to fault that!

What got you out to Baja California in the first place?

One of my friends had been telling me for years how good it was for wildlife, but as I was travelling quite a lot already I couldn’t really see how I could fit it into my schedule. Over a beer or two (it’s often the way!) we agreed to lead a trip together to the Pacific side of the Baja Peninsula with a view to seeing grey whales. It was a couple of years in the planning but we led two very successful trips in 2014… and that was it, the whales stole my heart! I returned home after two weeks of whale watching twice each day I told my wife how amazing it was and booked flights for my wife and kids to visit in 2015 (I already had a full trip for 2015 as well so I just stayed on for another wonderful week when my family went home!). It’s now an annual pilgrimage – and though it sounds strange, it is about as close as it’s possible to get to a religious experience.

Its obviously a lovely place but why do the grey whales go there?

Good question – well, the grey whales have the longest mammal migration of any mammal on earth and they swim 12,000 kilometres from the Chukchi Sea in the Arctic to arrive in the Pacific lagoons in mid to late December in order to breed and have their young. The males disappear northwards from about mid February but the females and their young stay in the lagoons until mid April. Its amazing because there is no food for them to eat here so the adult females are surviving for four or five months without food, feeding their young calves and travelling 24,000 kilometres as well – they are almost ‘super beings’!

But why do they want to play – this isn’t something that I have heard of before?

No one really knows, it is possible that they like the sound of the engines purring away in the water, or perhaps they are just bored of swimming length after length of the lagoon (which they need to do in order for the young ones to increase their strength to prepare for the long journey north) and are inquisitive about what is on the surface. Whatever the reason, they certainly make the most of it – and if the young ones are a little tentative to begin with, their mothers dive down and blow bubbles under them to push them up to the boats. Once they see how fun we can be they just keep coming back for more!

I thought it was unethical to touch wildlife…

Well I would agree everywhere else in the world except here. In simple terms we would never chase the whales, we wait to see if they want to play with us, and if they do then we will play. But, if they want to play with us and we don’t want to play with them, they will simply go to another boat that does want to play – and have all the fun they can!

Are there many boats in the lagoon then?

No not at all. The lagoon is mostly set aside for the whales – it is their private sanctuary. However there is a small part of the lagoon that is set aside as a whale-watching zone and 16 boats are allowed into it. The boats are only allowed in for 90 minutes and it is very strictly controlled.

You would obviously recommend this as a trip then!

Yes, it should be at the top of everyone’s list – it really is the most amazing wildlife trip possible on Planet Earth, and I certainly plan to return every year if at all possible. So far I have done nearly 200 hours of whale-watching in the coastal lagoon and its not nearly enough to get it out of my system!

Chris was talking to Tim Stavrinou. If you would like to join Chris on his next trip to Baja California and experience the amazing wildlife and wonderful photographic opportunities of the area, he is travelling to the region again in 2018, this time on a small vessel departing from San Diego and cruising down the entire Baja Peninsula. The trip is called Great Whales of Mexico’s Pacific Coast and it is aboard a 25 berth motor cruiser with a naturalist onboard.

Jonny Helm Feature, Review April 24, 2017February 7, 2024

Fuji GFX 50S | A Working Day With A New Camera System

Paul Stewart, Night Picture Editor at the Daily Express and documentary photojournalist, has worked in the imaging industry for over 45 years, both as a photographer and an editor. As soon as the first GFX’s arrived in our rental department, we were keen to see what working professional photographers really thought of the camera, and Paul was only too happy to oblige..

I was really interested to hear early rumours of the GFX 50S, as the idea of a mirrorless medium format camera was an exciting new development. Having swapped my full frame DSLR kit for the Fuji X Series and specifically the wonderful X-Pro2s, I knew that FujiFilm’s evolution of digital photography was well up there with their previous take on the medium and always considered FujiFilm to be people who develop their sensors with an eye to their great history as a film manufacturer. In fact, only Kodak, to my mind, produced high end pro digital kit with a similar quality of colour and detailed reproduction. Having seen the GFX 50S at Fixation’s FujiFilm Open Day I was delighted when they asked me to try the camera out.

When I was the editor of HotShoe International and indeed when I reviewed equipment for the British Journal of Photography, I had a strict policy of not doing or commissioning a review unless an actual photographer went out and shot a real job with the equipment (after all if you can’t earn a living with it, it’s not a lot of good to a pro).

The first thing I noticed about the GFX was the ergonomics which are superb. In comparison to my Phase One Mamiya 645AFD, it’s lighter (when used without the battery grip) and handles far more like a high end DSLR, making location use far easier, though it’s happy to sit rock solid on a tripod in the studio. The next thing I noticed was that the firmware, menus and ergonomics all take a big lead from the X Series cameras that I am already used to, which meant that integrating myself into the camera system was a doddle.

This is a really well thought out camera. The tri-axis tilt screen on the back means that you can shoot from almost any angle and still see what you are framing, making a “Hail Mary” more a matter of framing than prayer.

Likewise, the tilting view finder, which I originally thought was not going to be that interesting, turned out to be a godsend when shooting in bright light when wanting to shoot from a lower angle.

So what job did I decide to use it on? I was asked to be the host photographer for a Royal Visit by the Duke of Gloucester, who, of all things, was meeting three Virginia Indian Chiefs of the Powhatan People, all of whom were of the descendant tribes of Pocahontas and who were celebrating the 400th Anniversary of her leaving Brentford, where she lived, to return to America.

Sadly, she only got as far as Gravesend, where she died. The ceremonials were being held in Syon House, so I arrived a bit early to check out the light, which, although soft, was very low outside the venue. Inside, especially in the private green drawing room, it was abysmal but plunging on, I shot this job jpeg only to see just how good the dynamic range of this camera was. I expected it to be good. It was, in fact, exceptional. I shot some portraits of the various Chiefs and dignitaries with extreme highlights and shadow within them and the detail recovery was beyond that I expected.

The camera behaved faultlessly throughout the shoot. I never had to go onto the second battery that I had as a back up and was incredibly pleased with the results. Everything you see, including the grip and grin type PR shot of the Chiefs with Lord Watson of Richmond, were shot in a low level of available light. In fact the very first shot I shot with the camera in anger was the one of the marble statue in Syon’s Great Hall.

Looking at this just on the back of the screen made me realise just what a great camera this is. Although, like all medium format cameras it is expensive, when compared to Phase 1s and other makes, it’s well priced. The only down side to the camera that I have seen so far, is that FujiFilm went back to a Bayer Pattern rather than adopting their fabulous X-Trans sensor design as used in the X Series, which I find to be the best sensor I have ever used. It would have been nice to see a larger format version of this. However, in terms of colour rendition etc I find it hard to fault the GFX 50S.

I don’t feel that the Mamiya would have allowed me to do the location shooting that the Fuji allowed and the only downside is that I now have to try and sell my Mamiya 645 AFD/Phase One System so I can get a GFX!

You can see more of Paul’s work here

To get your hands on the Fuji GFX 50S, pop into our showroom for a demo, or contact our rental department and try one for yourself.

Jonny Helm Feature April 24, 2017February 7, 2024

Crash Course | Introduction To Sound Recording

It’s very easy to focus on the visual side of video production, but sound recording plays a huge role in the quality of the finished piece.

We sat down with our Rental Manager, Rob Gardner, and asked his advice on the basics of location sound recording.

Can you give us an idea of the basic kit needed to record professional quality sound on location?

In essence all you need is a means of gathering the sound with the highest fidelity – a microphone – and a means of capturing that sound, a recording device. The tools and techniques vary but at core it is that simple.

Most video-capable DSLRs have built-in microphones. Some, like the Nikon D5600 pictured here, have stereo microphones.

Can’t I just use the built-in microphone on a DSLR?

Certainly in-built camera mics fit those criteria, but anyone who has used them will know that they produce poor results. The first problem they create is one of distance. In recording studios you see the singer inches away from the microphone. On set you’ll sometimes see boom swingers heroically hanging microphones in from over 10 meters away to capture sound as well as possible. Sound recordists go to great lengths hiding microphones in costumes and even wigs in order to get as close to the source as they can. The in-camera mic is often just too far away to be useable.
The next consideration is that the in-camera mics are just too small and too low quality to gather satisfactory sound quality. A top end microphone can cost thousands of pounds and the reason for this is the materials used, the research that went into their design and the expertise in their construction, the mics in cameras just can’t compete.

Recorders such as the Zoom H4n are perfect for location recording and offer a choice of microphone inputs alongside built-in XY mics.

My DSLR has an external microphone socket. Can I plug one in and record the sound directly to camera, or should I use an external recorder?

It will largely depend on your shooting conditions. An external recorder gives you more control over the recording but it is then an extra bit of kit to monitor and operate. If you are moving around this might prove problematic. In an ideal world you would have a dedicated sound recordist to take care of all of this, a lone operator may have to think about simplifying their approach.

On-camera microphones such as the Nikon ME-1 offer a better recording experience than built-in mics.

If I record the sound on an external recorder, what is the best way to sync it back to the footage?

Traditionally the clapper board at the top or end of a take was used to give a frame accurate sync point. A less professional but equally accurate technique is to have someone actually clap at the top of the take to give a sync point.
A more modern approach is to use embedded timecode generated by externally synced generators – again, this would normally fall under the auspices of a sound recordist.

Should I use auto or manual record levels?

If you are on your own you’ll almost definitely have to use the auto levels. Monitoring the image will be taking up too much of your focus. If you have an external recorder and someone to work it then manually ‘riding’ the levels is a more versatile approach.

How does a limiter work and what does it do?

Limiters are there to stop the analogue signal from overloading, thus corrupting the digital recording. They can also be used to set a lower limit to the sound recorded to avoid too much bass.

I’ve read about Directional and Omni-directional mics. Can you tell us the difference?

The names of these mics pretty well cover it. Omni-directional Mics are indiscriminate and pick up sound from all directions. Directional mics are designed to have a narrow ‘beam’ or corridor of sensitivity outside of which significantly less is picked up. For the majority of applications relating to AV recording, Directional mics would be the more appropriate tool.

Directional mics such as the Rode NTG-2 are perfect for location recording and can be mounted on a DSLR hotshoe (with a suspension mount) or on a boom with a wind-jammer if necessary.

Fixation’s rental department carries a wide range of microphones and recording equipment. For advice on your needs, speak to one of our advisors on 020 7582 3294 or email rental@www.fixationuk.com

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