Christina Lauder Portraits

I love having past clients return.  Its a bit like having old friends over for a visit.  And its always nice to see how much the children have grown.  In this case,  Frankie has grown quite a lot, he was last here as a newborn just over a year ago.  And Lucia wasn't up for any photos last time so our last images of Lucia were from aged 3 months and she is now 3 so even bigger changes from her and thankfully a lot more co-operative.  It was Frankie who wasn't keen on being photographed with her this time, rather than the other way around.  One of these times we will get the two together.  For now though we had to settle for individual portraits which are my favourite anyway.  For this shoot I arranged to borrow a few teddy bears from Heirloom Bears as there was a particular look I was going for and these bears I knew would be perfect.  In the end, as they were so delicate, it quickly became apparent that only Lucia wa...

This week I had the pleasure of working with Lainy from Heirloom Bears and I had a fantastic time.  As I've said so many times before, one of the best aspects of my job is that I have variety in what I do.  Rarely are two days the same.  And this experience was truly unique and just the sort of thing to de-stress me and ignite the passion for my work again.  It was just so different to what I am used to doing these days. I knew in my head how I wanted to represent these bears for Heirloom bears however I didn't have enough bits and pieces to complete the look.  Lainy on the other hand had a number of antiquey pieces that she could contribute to the project.  So as a last minute decision I asked if she'd like to join me in creating the images.  Normally I prefer to work on my own but in this case having her on hand made the job much easier as she could make sure I got the animals just right for her.  As they are her creations it would re...

I am just loving the Societies Monthly competition this year.  It has got me motivated more than usual to keep producing work I think is worthy of entering.  This year so far I've received 4 Gold's and 10 Highly Commended's.  And these 10 images will be re-judged at a later date and can be upgraded to Gold if the second judge deems them to be of a Gold standard.  And the most important aspect of this competition is that all Golds get a further assessment in December, this time by a judging panel where the best image in each category is selected giving the photographer the title of Photographer of the Year for that category.  These awards are then presented at a black tie awards dinner in London in January at the Societies annual convention, something I look forward to every year.  I've been nominated 4 years out of the past 6 and I'm determined to make this the year where I walk away with an award.  My f...