Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Ta Dar



Just got back from a press trip to Tunisia.

Quite a nice country, actually. Food, especially the fish, was outstanding. The boutique hotels we were shown were stunning.

And the markets, very much in the style of those within the walls of the Old City in Jerusalem, were superb.

Gifts of scarf, dish and camel-shaped plates went down a treat. But I particularly enjoyed watching the man who sold me two brass plates, as he hammered the shape of a camel and the country of Tunisia into two plates, for Teddy and his mate Seamus. Their names are on the there too.

And they only cost £5 each (this price included minimum haggling).






Thursday, September 17, 2009

Dressed-up dogs in Blackpool


“This is the place to be if you like dogs dressed up, and who doesn't love a clothed canine?”

Not my words and not here. No. These are the words of the Peckham Pet-Tastic website, home of the slightly surreal and very eccentric Pet-Tastic event.

And where does Pet-Tastic go for a holiday? Blackpool, of course. Home of the surreal and the eccentric. The brash and the crass. The working classes and their dogs.

Artist Rachael House has the kind of pink hair usually seen in wig-wearing dozen-strong Hen Parties.

The point of her art is that it reaches the working classes, communicates with the masses and takes away the elitism of art. They should give her a summer season in Blackpool.

Anyway, I love owt like this me like.

On Sunday, September 13, I went along (without the dogs) and took photos. Here are a few.








Tuesday, September 15, 2009

The survey said: Bahrain

Managed to indirectly donate £25 to Medecins Sans Frontieres after answering some survey questions on Middle East countries.

They contacted me through my Nantional Union of Journalists listing. Or was it the Journalist Directory?

The research was being carried out on behalf of the Kingdom of Bahrain, eager to gauge perception of their international standing compared to Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and United Arab Emirates.

I don’t recall ever seeing a travel feature on Bahrain. My main impression of the kingdom is of oil and oil tankers – when I was six or seven a boy in my class at school moved to Bahrain when his dad got a job out there as a tanker captain. Oh, and they host a Formula 1 Grand Prix.

Some of the questions were a little mundane. Statements included ‘Bahrain is a base of American and Allied forces’ specified answers ‘very important’, ‘quite important’, ‘not very important’, very unimportant’. Other questions asked were repeated for each of Bahrain’s neighbouring countries.

But I did learn some interesting facts: the country is inclusive of all religions, works hard on peace in the middle east and has an excellent human rights record.

Permission denied. No photographs by Garry Cook in this post

Taking photos of people, mostly without pre-arranged permission can be fraught with difficulties.

People don’t like cameras pointing in their faces. You have to tread carefully.

I always look for danger signs of people looking uncomfortable or agitated.

But when it comes to friends and family I’m a bit more dismissive of their objections.

Sadly for me, I get far more objections to being photographed from people I know than those I approach on the street. Greg Boyd, Anna Byrom, Russell Peplow are frequently annoyed with me.

I took some photos of Boyd at his unusual home in Argentiere in the French Alps in March 2009. He was rather annoyed. I took the photos anyway. He got more annoyed.

Getting the cooperation of those I photograph has always been an essential part of my work. So essential, in fact, that I have not even been able to bring myself to look at the photographs, never mind show them to the world. Six months on, perhaps I should ask him.

Photojournalism and the cash crisis

Photojournalism is a tough industry. There’s next to no money to be made.

You can discuss amongst yourselves the reasons for this. Fewer and fewer printed outlets for photo essays, reduced editorial budgets, lack of appetite from readers.

This last reason has always confused me. People always seem to be interested in photo essays when they published in newspaper and magazines, yet an increasing number of magazines are ditching this content in favour of lifestyle and celebrity pieces. Perhaps it’s just me who despairs at the wishy-washy stuff while being mesmerised by brilliant pictures.

Anyway, the truth is most of the people making money out of photography do weddings.

Examine the winners at the various awards ceremonies which take place around the world, Arles or Perpignan for example, and you’ll be surprised at how many of those stories honoured have failed to be published.

This has forced photojournalists to be ever more inventive in how their work is promoted. Sometimes a cult magazine like Vice comes along to promote the art on its pages.

There’s a brilliant magazine called vewd which is doing its best for photojournalism. As with all things innovative, it is backed up by a strongly designed website and includes the facility to download paid-for pdf versions of the magazine.

While vice is superb example of a free magazine succeeding around the world, it is not that easy to get hold of. There is a pay subscription option on the vice website - but who wants to pay £35 in the UK (or £60 for the rest of the world) for something that most others get for free just because they live in a big city?

Museum of the People


It took seven-and-a-half hours to get there. Preston, Lancashire, to Deptford, London. I’ve had better journies.

But it was worth it to see six of my Outsiders photos form part of the Museum of the People exhibition at Utrophia, curated by Evie Manning (she’s from Bradford but is half Geordie thanks to her lovely mum).

There was some intriguing and highly personal work on display. I particularly liked the drawings by the local school kids of who they would like to interview for the project, based around my Outsiders project.

Did I like these because they were inspired by my photos? Probably.


Monday, September 14, 2009

Photojournalism and the cash crisis

Photojournalism is a tough industry. There’s next to no money to be made.

You can discuss amongst yourselves the reasons for this. Fewer and fewer printed outlets for photo essays, reduced editorial budgets, lack of appetite from readers.

This last reason has always confused me. People always seem to be interested in photo essays when they published in newspaper and magazines, yet an increasing number of magazines are ditching this content in favour of lifestyle and celebrity pieces. Perhaps it’s just me who despairs at the wishy-washy stuff while being mesmerised by brilliant pictures.

Anyway, the truth is most of the people making money out of photography do weddings.

Examine the winners at the various awards ceremonies which take place around the world, Arles or Perpignan for example, and you’ll be surprised at how many of those stories honoured have failed to be published.

This has forced photojournalists to be ever more inventive in how their work is promoted. Sometimes a cult magazine like Vice comes along to promote the art on its pages.

There’s a brilliant magazine called vewd which is doing its best for photojournalism. As with all things innovative, it is backed up by a strongly designed website and includes the facility to download paid-for pdf versions of the magazine.

While vice is superb example of a free magazine succeeding around the world, it is not that easy to get hold of. There is a pay subscription option on the vice website - but who wants to pay £35 in the UK (or £60 for the rest of the world) for something that most others get for free just because they live in a big city?

Saturday, September 05, 2009

Pointless photography press release

Received a press release today from a public relations company called Six Degrees on behalf of their client Serif.

It was offering photography tips for kids.

Started off a bit desperately (money is tight this summer/families can’t afford to take kids to theme parks/why not give them cheap digital cameras instead and it was sent with less than a week of the school summer holidays remaining.

Still the tips (below) reminded me of the workshop I did a few months back teaching journalists at Trinity Mirror in Birmingham how to take decent images on their camera phones for their newspaper.

Here are the tips from Six degrees' press release:

“Top tips for little fingers:

1. Hold the camera still. It sounds obvious, but it’s a mistake
that many of us make, which is why sometimes our pictures can look a little blurry! Make sure your child is holding the camera completely still in order to get a clear shot.

2. Heads-up. Make sure you’re standing far enough back to get
everyone into the shot, or zoom in/out to avoid chopping their heads off!

3. Bright light!! The light is your friend, use it carefully and you will achieve some great pictures. Just make sure it’s behind you rather than in front as this may cause over-exposure.

4. Get creative and clever. Use photo editing software like Serif’s PhotoPlus X3, which allows you to adjust your photo’s colouring, add black and white effects and even do retouching, like adding a suntan or whitening those teeth!

5. Sticky fingers! Avoid taking pictures straight after eating wet or sticky foods—the smallest amount of liquid can damage your camera (and the shot) so be careful!”

And just to prove that big fingers sometimes don’t have a clue what they are doing, these are some of the photos I used in my presentation to illustrate how not to take a photograph.








NOTE: After some exhaustive research I came to the conclusion that the consistently best-rated mobile phone for taking photos with was a Sony Ericsson Cyber-shot (mine’s the K810i, there are several in the Cyber-shot range).

Wednesday, September 02, 2009

The Outsiders project

The first half of my project Outsiders has been completed.

It’s a book of portrait photographs and accompanying interviews.

The profiles examine how we judge others, not just through the experiences of the subjects but also by our own thought processes while reading the interviews.

Subjects include a politician, a Ukrainian rock star, a homeless person, a treasure hunter, a vicar, a homosexual hater, a transgender dominatrix and a paedophile.





Fun fair having fun

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It’s no good bleating about the brilliant coastline if you don’t use it.

“I really enjoyed the funfair,” said Teddy Cook, aged three and a half during August 2009 visit to South Shields' Ocean Beach Pleasure Park.

Berlin, bikes and queues

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My fascination with bikes and tourists continued in Berlin.

Queuing to get in to the Reichstag reminded me of queuing to get in to the Golden Temple in Amritsar. It reminded me of Ryanair check-in desks. Queues are what make tourism torturous.

Cycling around Berlin reminded me of cycling in Klagenfurt, Vienna, Amsterdam, Den Haag and Leiden. If only Britain could embrace the cycling culture. In Bristol they just started one. It's a start, just not a very good one. The registration fee is prohibitive for visitors to the city. The city itself is too hilly. And wet.

Anyway, these pictures celebrate tourism in Berlin. The Reichstag (German Parliament), Berlin Dom (Berlin Cathedral) and the Holocaust Memorial.

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Sunderland versus the World (Cup Host City Bid)


I was fortunate to be invited to Sunderland to photograph the Football Association’s delegate visit for the city’s World Cup Host City bid.

Basically that means important people came to have a look round to see if the city could host World Cup football matches in 2018, should England win the bid to host the competition.

The city struck it lucky with the weather but the real gold are the people of the North east. Welcoming, excited, interested and friendly. Photographing them at Herrington Park and Roker and Seaburn seafronts was brilliant.

Then there were the kids from schools across Wearside and the teenage football club visiting on tour from South Africa.

There are a lot of preconceptions about Wearside, Tyne & Wear and the North east, but let me assure you the brilliant coastline is worth the entrance fee alone.*

South Shields to Roker, past Souter Lighthouse and Marsden Grotto, is a surprisingly stunning coastal drive. The North west coast of England does not have any beaches to rival those on Wearside and further north in Northumberland. Formby Point is good, but it can’t beat Roker beach or Marsden when the tide is coming in.





*Entrance to Sunderland’s coast is actually free.

Tuesday, September 01, 2009

Sunderland versus the World (Cup Host City Bid)



I was fortunate to be invited to Sunderland to photograph the Football Association’s delegate visit for the city’s World Cup Host City bid.

Basically that means important people came to have a look round to see if the city could host World Cup football matches in 2018, should England win the bid to host the competition.

The city struck it lucky with the weather but the real gold are the people of the North east. Welcoming, excited, interested and friendly. Photographing them at Herrington Park and Roker and Seaburn seafronts was brilliant.

Then there were the kids from schools across Wearside and the teenage football club visiting on tour from South Africa.

There are a lot of preconceptions about Wearside, Tyne & Wear and the North east, but let me assure you the brilliant coastline is worth the entrance fee alone.*

South Shields to Roker, past Souter Lighthouse and Marsden Grotto, is a surprisingly stunning coastal drive. The North west coast of England does not have any beaches to rival those on Wearside and further north in Northumberland. Formby Point is good, but it can’t beat Roker beach or Marsden when the tide is coming in.




*Entrance to Sunderland’s coast is actually free.