Amsterdam Morning

 Amsterdam, Netherlands 'Prinsengracht'

 Amsterdam, Netherlands 'Herengracht'

Amsterdam, Netherlands 'Sunrise Singel #2'

Amsterdam, Netherlands 'Sunrise Singel #1'

Amsterdam, Netherlands 'Untitled #2'

Amsterdam, Netherlands 'Untitled #1'

Amsterdam, Netherlands 'Reguliersgracht'

Amsterdam, Netherlands 'Theater Tuschinski'

Camera: Fuji X100

A few days working in Amsterdam and travelling light with my Fuji X100. The trip is accompanied by a pinched nerve in my neck which leaves me struggling. As luck would have it the nerve in question ends at the finger pressing the shutter, nice.

I manage to arrange it so I get a day off in Amsterdam, but to keep with the lucky theme it decides to piss it down all day. Fortunately, through the misfortune of waking up ridiculously early due to the aforementioned pinched nerve  earlier in the week, I got a few good hours to have a wander. There's nothing new here, yet more photos of canals, but I've not been before so tough, the cafe photos didn't make the cut. 

Paris Fashion Week

Opera District, Paris 'Chic'

Gare Du Nord, Paris 'Britain Starts Here'

St Pancras, London 'Morning Fog'

Brent Cross, London 'Ticket to Ride'

Camera: iPhone 4S with Hipstamatic and Snapseed, Canon 5DmkII

Up well before the sun today. Work calls for me to be in Paris for a lunchtime event, nicely coinciding with Fashion Week in the 'City of Lights'. So it's an early morning departure from a fog shrouded St Pancras on the Eurostar,the ultimate symbol of Entente Cordiale. Fashion Week means the departure lounge feels more like a fashion show with impeccably dressed women with expensive luggage everywhere as opposed to the usual frumpy middle class types from Hampstead en route to Provence. There is of course a sprinkling of Americans as always, the young backpackers full of excitement at the start of their european adventure proper and the retiree's on a modern day 'Grand Tour'.

After much gentlemanly behaviour helping ladies lift heavy bags into overhead luggage racks, a strong coffee, pain au chocolate, and Photographers i on the iPad see the journey fly past, thorough a misty England and onto France and it's Franglais booze warehouses. The fortune of being in coach 18 at the front of the train and the lack of heavy luggage mean I get to the taxi rank at Gare Du Nord first and I'm off and away whizzing through Paris with a typically kamikaze taxi driver.

The event is a great success and Paris puts on it's best chic for the occasion, ok let's be honest, Parisian women are always this chic.

There's time for a late lunch with a French colleague including an amazing desert - pastry base, bananas, creme fraiche, and caramelised brown sugar. Then it's time to grab a taxi back to Gare Du Nord though this time through hellish Vendredi rush hour traffic where stopping for red lights seems to be optional.

Where St Pancras is clean and efficient Gare Dun Nord is cramped and dirty and the security queue is long and slow. I do however get to witness Zandra Rhodes getting a pat down, only after she is asked to step aside to let me through. Less belts and buckles next time Zandra. The departure lounge at this end is small and cramped and every available space is occupied with French ex-pats and holidaymakers including a further sprinkling of Americans.

A brief nap, followed by a very strong coffee and a catch-up with the cameraman and recording engineer from the earlier event in the buffet car and we are soon back in England. A quick scan through my photos from the day, deleting any shots that aren't keepers, fills the remainder of the journey and I'm soon back in St Pancras. There's time for a brief pause to take in the utterly breathtaking station now complete with massive Olympic rings, surely just there to rub it in to Parisians who missed out in the race to host 2012.

But my day is not over yet and it's on to the tube and another event, but that's another story...

 

 

Root & Groove Element

Nick Philpin, Musician & Producer

Coco Malone, Singer

Camera: Canon 5D mkII

Ok it's probably time I posted some of my portraits. Nick and Coco from the amazing Root & Groove Element. I'll post a video of this eventually or they will.

Their debut 7" E.P. dropping soon.

http://rootandgrooveelement.com/

 

This Years Snow

Brent Cross, London 'Too Late For Santa'

Brent Cross, London 'Snow Line'

Obligatory winter scenes from North London.Camera: Fuji X100

Snapseed for Mac

Brent Cross, London 'Brent Viaduct'

Brent Cross, London 'Vintage Roundel'

Brent Cross, London 'Suburban Heartland'

Brent Cross, London 'Sunrise Commute'

Brent Cross, London 'Way Above the Chimney Tops'

Watford, Hertfordshire 'Evening Kick-Off'

Watford, Hertfordshire 'Bacon Roll £2.50'

Camera: Fuji X100 all edited with Snapseed for Mac

I've been using Nik Software's plug-ins for some time now in conjunction with Apple's Aperture software and have become a huge fan. The combination ( plus Pixelmator 2 ) has enabled me to ditch Photoshop for good. Better tools, a simple clear process and no need for layers. Nik's U-Point technology enabling subtle editing with out need for masking or mucking around with histograms.I know some people like that kind of thing, but I prefer to spend time creating the content not sitting in front of a screen.

Realising the booming market for iPhone photographers Nik distilled some of the key features from their plug-in suite and called it Snapseed, and I've been using it since release. It's a quick and easy way to make corrections to exposure and apply filters to get punchy striking images and then share.

So now rather than the common route of being adapted from a full size computer and optimised for iOS it's gone the other way and is available for the Mac via the Mac app store.

So is it any good ? Well on first impressions I'd say yes. It provides a quick and dirty way of creating the same results as the iOS version albeit on a bigger screen. It is pretty much identical in interface and editing options available as well as sharing options, however, and this is the big 'but' , it will only save to Jpg and there's no choice on file size either. I'd guess this mean's that they are positioning strictly at the consumer, much like Photoshop Elements works for Adobe, holding back features to ensure the market for the full price version exists. It is however a lot of fun and in many cases simple is best and I'd recommend it with small warning of the restricted save options.

Find out more here http://www.snapseed.com/

Northern Heights Sunset

Edgware, Middlesex 'Northern Heights Sunset'
Detail: Looking west on A41 towards Spur Road with it's pebbledash towers and London's 'Northern Heights' , Christmas Eve.
Camera: iPhone4 + Snapseed

Ketchup Classic

The Lido Cafe, London 'Ketchup Classic'
Detail: It's been years since I've had the pleasure of using one of these. Lunch with Ben from the brilliant White Russia @ Lido Cafe, a dying breed of Italian family run cafe's that once fed working London, now usurped by Starbucks et al. All day breakfast for a fiver, White Russia album £7.99 from iTunes
Camera: iPhone4 + Hipstamatic