Two months, two very busy months!

My regular readers (both of you) may have noticed that I've not posted on here since Feb 16th, two months ago.  Well, it's been a busy couple of months, for certain.  The shooting has continued fairly constantly, and I've had a rather significant life event - on March 23rd I married Yolanda!  Getting married was a wonderful experience, one of the happiest days of my life, and certainly a novel one from a photography perspective - I didn't have my camera with me!

Since my last post, the hockey season continued right through to the start of this month, where it culminated in the Play Off Finals weekend in Coventry.  The path to the Play Offs provided me with regular hockey shooting opportunities, which of course I siezed with both hands!

With the Play Off weekend looming large, Yol and myself were all set for a break from shooting the games - our colleague Lauren Freeman was scheduled to represent the Manchester Phoenix as photographer for the weekend.  But a couple of days before the weekend she got ill, and that left myself and Yol to fill the gap and shoot the Phoenix's games from a fairly unique position - the end of the team bench!

Phoenix were up against the Basingstoke Bison in the Semi Final match, and it was a game that went all the way to penalties before the Phoenix took the win!

The Final was between the Phoenix and the favourites, the Guildford Flames.  Again, Yol and myself found ourselves shooting from right in the firing line, or rather the gurning line!

The game was a belter, and the underdog Phoenix absolutely dominated!  The final buzzer went, and I found myself in the wonderful position of being able to go onto the ice, surrounded by celebrating players and in front of screaming fans, and shoot like crazy as the medals were handed out, the trophy lifted and the party started!

More photos from the celebrations can be seen here: Phoenix title celebrations!

Outside of the hockey, my shutterbuggery (still a word) has been indulged on a regular basis, including a trip back Jodrell Bank with Yol.  This time around, Yol was also shooting, getting some cracking shots of her own, and I was on hand to document not only the Bank but also Yol shooting away!

More photos from the visit can be seen here: Jodrell Bank visit




Tutbury Castle was also a venue that had a revisit from us, again shooting with our friends Glyn and Claire, but this time the event was a Medieval Fair.  We had the opportunity to brave the cold and shoot knights in armour, medieval dancing, and some seriously intense hand to hand combat...

A cracking day out, and hopefully some cracking photos from it!  More can be seen here: Tutbury Castle Medieval Fair

Last but certainly not least, I've also had a photo shoot with the very talented Jen Latham, where we tried out several themes including me taking a turn in front of the camera.  How that turned out, well I'll leave that to your imagination, but suffice to say that for one part of the shoot we took inspiration from Monty Python's Lumberjack Song for a costume for me...

Jen herself was, as always, cool as a cucumber in front of the camera, and the results were very pleasing!  Here's a sneak peek of the upcoming photo set!

Thanks for reading!