Frieze in B&W

I was asked by Deutsche Bank to photograph Frieze London Art Fair for them last week. I haven't been for a couple of years and noticed especially on the preview day that the buyers were as interesting as some of the art... Plastic surgery for both the men and women was des-rigure! As was over excitement about some of the artwork - "I'm not sure that I can live without it!"
Frieze always offers nice little theatrical stages - attention seeking art and human interaction.
Though it all ended up being a bit Black and White for me....

Glumtree - Burly biker coming to your rescue, dude!

I have been shooting, directing and editing a short film that was written by the very talented Sarah L King about the joys of help forums and the peculiar technical jargon you get on cycling ones in particular.
It in competition for Virgin media shorts here, vote for it if you like it.

Glumtree

UPDATE - the film has now been chosen for "Pick of the Bunch" on the website. 

Hen V Stag pt 2

Stag party in Brighton involved paint balling and dressing up as a princess for a pub crawl.
Brighton is the epicentre of hen and stag activity, though it is confined to a bunch of big corporate bars that allow the big groups in. Which makes for heards of stags and flocks of hens on the high street of a weekend.

The stag run - everyone shoots at you at the same time for 2-3 minutes

Will post more on my website soon.

Hen v Stag Pt1

I have been sent to shoot a hen and stag party in Brighton. The idea is to sending a male journalist for the hen night and a female journalist for the stag, into unknown territory as it were....
Not sure if there is much difference except the stag party does seem to revolve around humilliating the stag. The hen is more hard drinking and parting.
First up for the hen is nude life drawing - before anyone has had any drinks....

followed by cocktail making aka cocktail drinking and uniform Karaoke 

Will post more of this on my website soon.

Parkinsons - In my shoes

I have been shooting for Parkinson's UK for a couple of years now and its always surprising how random this terrible disease is. It causes widely different symptoms and difficulties doing simple everyday tasks, that really affect your quality of life. However the people with Parkinson's that I have met, have been amazingly strong and fight on despite their deteriorating health.
This was a small mini campaign that was launched to coincide with Parkinson's awareness week. It was called "Put yourself in my shoes" -

I also went to visit the three case studies, who's stories were related to the shoes.

Ken 66, is a keen fly fisherman and recently went no a trek to Peru to raise money for Parkinsons UK. He was diagnosed 9 years ago.

Koki use to love going out and dancing but now she struggles just to get down the stairs. She was diagnosed when she was 46.

Ward is scared to leave the house as he find it very difficult to walk and trips up easily. He has perfected a technique of swinging round the stairs to help him move. 

Above and beyond, Marie Claire this month

A shoot I did with the lovely Martha Hayes in this months Marie Claire.
It was an interactive theatre performance for One, called 'Above and Beyond' by Look left look right which was at the very shinny 5 star Corinthia Hotel. The show was a promenade with the difference being that you were a character that was potentially influencing the performance.
I was the invisible photographer dragged at high speed around the hotel trying to keep up with the random encounters that Martha had.

Socks and Heals!

Ok so it not highbrow, but socks and heals are the thing at London Fashion week!
So Grazia Magazine seconded me to do a foot shoot on the street of London with Catherine Ormerod a woman who knows about fashion.
It was great to have to look for backgrounds that only had to work for 2 feet off the ground, a completely new perspective, and I went with a strong colour play theme with is in keeping with the last post.
The key was making sure that the whole set would work.

Personal project exhibited at Photofusion Gallery

One of my photos from a personal Project called Street Map was chosen for the Photofusion gallery AMPS group show 2012 in November - December.

This is part of a colour lead series all shot in total reportage street photography style in London.

More on this in later posts.

BTC - in Windrush Square

The Nike, Brixton Top Cats portraits in Situ, in Brixton's Windrush Square.

Brixton Top Cats and Nike

I was lucky enough to be asked by Nike to create a set of portraits for the World Basketball Festival 2012, of The Brixton Top Cats, basketball team. 

The event put on in Brixton, London by Nike, is a showcase of local and international basketball talent and they wanted to show off the Local Team.

The Top Cats are Arguably the most famous basketball club in England, with a Trophy cabinet and Alumni to rival any club in the country. The Clubs mission is to provide high quality opportunities for young people in South London, both on the court and in the wider areas of life.

I decided to treat the portraits of each player in an equal way, with no reference to there current status in the team and to shoot them all on the streets of Brixton.

The set of portraits were displayed 'life sized' in Windrush square in the centre of Brixton during the festival weekend. The locations that the portraits were shot in were aimed to look strangely familiar, edges of place that some might recognise, but are not too obvious. Nike also lightly styled the shoot adding there clothes or using the subjects existing Nike kit.

Left - Jimmy Rogers founder of the club, Brixton legend, and father figure to may or the players including Alumni Luel Deng (NBA, Chicago Bulls star).

The show attracted lots of attention and ended up being on display for 6 weeks instead of the 1 week that it was originally allocated.

Check out the full set of portraits on my website

We are In Drought! - Thames Water Ad campaign

This was a Advertising Campaign that I did for Thames water last year. It was shot in March 2012, it hadn't rained for a while and Thames Water where concerned that their reservoirs were depleted through the winter! 

I went out to The River Pang and The River Kennet in Oxfordshire and shoot the driest bits of the river beds. 

The Ads went out on the London Tube,  buses, bus stops etc. 

Unfortunately for Thames water it started raining in April and didn't really stop until August and the UK had its wettest summer since records began.... 

So a very successful ad campaign!

It really was dry.

Some of the other shots used in connection with the campaign.

The Ad Agency was October Sun.

Me

Hi, my name is Amit.
I'm a professional portrait photographer based in London.
I originally come from Israel and can speak Hebrew, I can also speak English without an accent... OK maybe I sound a bit South London.
I'm interested in people, their stories and their lives. I also like colour.
Please feel free to get in touch.
Amit