BBC – FIVELIGHTSDOWN

Articles Tagged with: BBC

Apr

Spring update

How is everyone? These are seriously strange times we’re navigating. The isolation protocols are making photography extremely challenging, but there is still much good work we can do, so here’s a little reminder of my latest projects and work that can continue, despite the lockdown.

BBC RADIO 6 MUSIC FESTIVAL
My last live event before social distancing became necessary, the Radio 6 Music festival is always a favourite in my annual calendar. This year it took place in Camden, London, across multiple venues. I worked with the BBC Creative team, editing live performance photography, managing photographer access to venues and arranging photocalls. These events are always really busy and it’s a great privilege to catch some incredible performances and be part of such a vibrant cultural event.
Catch performances on the BBC Sounds app and BBC iPlayer.

BAFTA FILM AWARDS
Early February saw me do my first ever event for BAFTA. I joined the lovely BAFTA team at the Academy Film Awards as a Picture Editor, live editing pictures and making them available to press throughout the night from the Royal Albert Hall and the Grosvenor House Hotel.
Photographer: Thomas Alexander

Remote Working
Face to face shoots might be hard right now, but there is an awful lot of great work that can be managed easily from home. I’m lucky enough to have my own studio and super fast fibre broadband, so here’s a quick reminder of what I can continue with while in lockdown!

PHOTO EDITING
PICTURE APPROVALS (CAST AND STAKEHOLDER)
CREATIVE DEVELOPMENT
SCAMP ILLUSTRATIONS
LAYOUT DESIGN (FOR BROCHURES, BRIEFS, PITCHES ETC)
UNIT PHOTOGRAPHY PLANNING
PICTURE RESEARCH

If you’re in the position to employ a freelancer at the moment, even for small jobs, then please do consider it.
Stay safe x

Portfolio

Jan

New Year photography update

SEX EDUCATION S2
I’m so excited to see these beautiful editorial images, shot by Matt Holyoak, finally in the public domain. I produced this shoot for Netflix back in the autumn and have been itching to share them ever since! The full box set of Sex Eduction S2 is now available on Netflix. Please check out my portfolio page for more info and full credits for this shoot.

THE GREATEST DANCER
Late last summer I art directed this two day shoot for the BBC’s entertainment programme, The Greatest Dancer. We had a complex mirrored set and a huge shot list, but everything came together in the end! The Greatest Dancer is currently on air and also available on BBC iPlayer.
Photographer: David Ellis

Fate: The Winx Saga
Lastly, this is the first look image for new Netflix drama, Fate: The Winx Saga. I am currently managing the photography for this live action adaptation of the original Italian animation series, shooting in Ireland.

Portfolio

Oct

October update

THE ACCIDENT
This new Channel 4 drama created by The Forge Entertainment is now on our screens and it’s been great to see the publicity photography, shot by Simon Ridgway and Warren Orchard, in the press and online.
I worked closely with The Forge, Channel 4 and All3Media to manage unit photography edits, cast approvals and final image delivery to all stakeholders for this fantastic new drama.

JUNIOR DOCTORS S5
Earlier in the year I art directed this shoot for the BBC3 documentary series, Junior Doctors S5, now available on BBC iPlayer. Many different options were shot throughout the day at the Salford Royal Hospital but this fun shot, for use on social media, is definitely my favourite.
Photographer: Ryan McNamara

Portfolio

Jul

July update

THE CAPTURE
It always seems to take an age for projects to come out of embargo, but
I’m delighted to say the first look image for the new BBC One drama, ‘The Capture’, is now out in the press.
I art-directed this concept led shoot back in March with photographer Guy Farrow for BBC/Heyday Television.

DLW_DarkMoney_181118_297 landscape 35 meg

DARK MON£Y
Sometimes my projects are not just about the creative! For the last few weeks I’ve been working closely with The Forge Entertainment, BBC Creative and All3Media to manage the cast approvals and final delivery of stills photography to stakeholders for Dark Mon£y, a new four part drama for BBC One.

SCAMPS AND CREATIVE VISUALISATION
And lastly, commissions for scamps, storyboards and visualisation of ideas and concepts continues to be very popular. All my commissions so far this year are still under embargo, but the above scamp for Sherlock is a good example of my illustration style.

If you’d like to see more examples of my work, please click on the link below.

Portfolio

Nov

Promax GOLD for Requiem key art!

Wow, I am delighted to say that my key art image for Requiem won GOLD at Promax on Friday night.
For more insight into this picture campaign and how it was achieved, please check out my Portfolio page.
And with huge thanks to Geraint Williams, Todd Antony and Willow Gryls at New Pictures.

Oct

Promax 2018 shortlist!

I’m really excited to announce my alternative key art image for the BBC One drama, Requiem, has been shortlisted in the ‘Best Key Art’ category at the Promax Awards. Whoop!

Photographer: Todd Antony
Retouching: Geraint Williams
Image (c) New Pictures

Mar

Eurovision 2015! Oh I do love Eurovision :)

Last week saw a last-minute shoot land on my coffee stained desk. Microseconds before I let out a shreak of despair at my burgeoning TO DO list, I thankfully noticed that the shoot was for Eurovision 2015, and all was right with the world again 🙂 Even better, I managed to catch the lovely Sarah Dunn on a rare quiet week and she jumped at the chance to do the cheesiest shoot in Europe 😉

Well actually, the shoot was not cheesy AT ALL. In fact, I hope you’ll agree, it’s rather lovely. Good luck Bianca and Alex!

I believe this shot will become the cover shot for the music single release.

I believe this shot has been snapped up by the record label and will become the cover of the single – (c) BBC

Electro Velvet for Eurovision 2015! – (c) BBC

Channeling a bit of ‘Cabaret’ for this one. (c) BBC

Jan

Winter Olympics – Sochi 2014

Publicity pictures for the upcoming Winter Olympics in Russia finally went live yesterday, so I’m now allowed to talk about them!

This shoot was probably one of my favourites of 2013. The idea for putting the BBC’s key presenters in a dynamic winter environment came from the brief for the TV trail. Often sports presenter images can be quite static as it’s hard to know what kind of environment they should occupy. The first thought is to put them on the pitch/track/slopes, but they aren’t athletes, so this could get a bit visually confusing for the audience. This time the creative proposal for the trails was really inspiring and I found a way to tie these images into that creative and produce something a little bit different. I hope you agree that they work really well!

Jonathan Edwards

Hazel Irvine

Clare Balding

Amy Williams

The photographer for this shoot was Adrian Myers, someone I hadn’t worked with for a while but I knew his style would suit this idea very well. We also pulled in SFX make-up artist Bill Turpin to create the ice and snow effects on our presenters. I felt it was essential we do this in camera rather than trying to achieve it in post production. I really wanted it to feel like our presenters were up there on those fantastical looking slopes, freezing and gritting their teeth against the harsh conditions, just to report back the top stories!

Lastly, the super talented Kaia Zak brought all the elements together in post production. The beautiful wintery backgrounds were created by the CG company building the TV trail. High res renders were supplied to us before the stills shoot and Adrian matched the lighting on the day to the light conditions in the backgrounds. A fantastic job all round and a really fun day, rounded off with a fake snow and ice fight! 🙂

BBC coverage of the Winter Olympics starts on BBC Two on February 6th!

Oct

Citizen Khan S2 starring Adil Ray

The new series of Citizen Khan kicks off tonight on BBC One and I am finally able to show you a couple of my favourite photographs created for the series.

All the main set ups were shot by the lovely Jay Brooks in Manchester after the cast had finished doing one of the studio recording sessions with a live audience. We had decided to build our alternative ‘lounge’ set in the studio next door to give us more room to work than on the actual set used for the programme. This also gave us time to set up and test the lighting while the live episode was being recorded.

As usual Jay’s lighting was exceptional. The finished shots inevitably needed a couple of ‘head swaps’ and other retouching work to get just the right combination of facial expressions, but little aside from that. This was managed by one of our great in-house designers, Alicia Kulikowski, who has since moved to Montreal (we still miss you Alicia!!! sob). I can’t remember what kit Jay used (sorry – maybe a later post!) but I know we were shooting straight to Capture One on his Mac laptop so the producer could review the images as they were being shot.

May

Rickie & Melvin

Just a quick pic of me with Kiss FM’s Rickie & Melvin at the end of our shoot. I seem to be collecting quite a few random shots of me with various actors or on set in a random location 🙂

This was shot by the lovely Jay Brooks and I was actually doing the publicity stills for BBC3’s Sweat the Small Stuff which is on air at the moment.

May

Underwater in Malta at MFS

Last weekend I had a brief respite from the rain in London, shooting at the Mediterranean Film Studios in Malta.

I was delighted to be working on a project with the talented Zena Holloway. The stills are for a new BBC drama out later this year with a watery theme 🙂 The lead actor is the young Charles Furness.

Here are a couple of behind the scenes shots. Zena was using a Canon 5D with underwater housing.