I can’t believe this is my 25th diary… this feels like such a milestone so thank you for all those who continue to support PP. and for all your lovely comments, DMs and feedback over the past year and a bit. People often ask me how I find the time to commit to this (almost) weekly bit of writing, and in truth I now feel a bit weird when I don’t do it. It’s really helped me to keep myself accountable to intentions I’ve outlined on here, and it’s also made me aware of how much I achieve in a day, week, month. Last week, I received some really lovely emails in reply to the diary, mostly saying that they were impressed by how much i’d done that week. As someone who is chronically hard on myself, and having just been through a spell of not good mental health in which I start to think I’m never going to ‘make it’ (whatever this means?!) or that I’m crap at this, that, or the other, this surprised me - and actually really lifted me out of what had been quite a low patch. This past week I feel completely different: really buoyed up, energised and positive and I think a large part of that was to do with the interactions I had on here - so, thank you so much. In case any of you have any of the same tendencies, this can be your reminder to be a bit less mean to yourself - am sure you’re achieving more than you think you are too. Anyway - on with the week:
MONDAY
More outreach if you can believe it; this time to journalists. I’m about done now - time for a break - but I feel like I should have laid some good foundations for future work. In the past, outreach like this has opened a door to a job that hasn’t actually come for a year or two after the first email was sent so, whilst I’m not expecting instant results, I see this as investing in my future business.
I do however have a lot of replies from last week’s emails so after deciding the office is simply too cold to bear, I head home and spend the day replying to those, booking in a couple of coffees for next week and having a call with a potential agent. I’m shooting a lot this week so today I just sort of potter around.
TUESDAY
Eye test. Bought a new sketchbook.
I’ve got a quote to pull together for a production I’m doing in April so I’ve pulled together everything I achieved with my 3-day Sicily trip to send to the hotel I want to partner with in this new location. I paid full price for the Sicily hotel as it had so few rooms I wasn’t sure the owner would be interested in press discounts etc. but this time, the hotel is a little bigger and I can show them everything they can expect by using the Sicily trip as a case study. A brand campaign, lots of hotel imagery, a travel story in a great magazine and content of the surrounding area is a lot to offer a hotel so I hope this helps me secure a good deal.
Boteh, who I shot for in Sicily, are launching the campaign this week so I answer some questions and send over some BTS for an interview they’ll be posting on their website. You can see more of the campaign here if you’re interested and the ‘director’s cut’ campaign video here. The brand didn’t actually commission a campaign video (they just requested Super8 Clips of one or two styles put together) but I really wanted to pull something like this together, and delivering this as a surprise for them felt like a great way to keep the relationship flourishing.
Pack my kit up for the rest of the week. Head home for kid’s tea time and then drive down south for a two day shoot.
WEDNESDAY
Shoot day #1 with a repeat client who I shoot for twice a year. This is the fifth time I’ve shot for them so it’s a finely tuned machine and it’s the same set up each time for continuity across their website - a sort of lookbook/ecomm format. I don’t really do this sort of thing for anyone else, but actually really enjoy it for a bit of light relief from bigger productions and being on location etc. Sometimes being inside a warm studio in a quiet patch of the year is just really pleasant. The team is great, the food is great, the whole thing is just a really nice way to spend two days whilst being a reliable bit of biannual income.
This time, I’ve recorded a few videos and took some BTS of the set so you can see what we use. I know a lot of you feel less than confident with lighting so I thought this would be quite a useful reference. It’s a really simple set up with three lights which is very easy to replicate, so I’ll be posting that a little later this week with a kit list and examples of the final images.
Post my Boteh Campaign video on Instagram after a lot of agonising about how to get the layered audio to work. Shout out to Dara for guiding me through how Instagram Reels actually works. I’ve never bothered to investigate it much beyond just whacking a video up and actually there’s so much scope for editing on there. The video has the audio from a famous scene in The Godfather layered over the top of the music and I really didn’t want to lose that, but didn’t want to run the risk of the video being taken down because the audio is so recognisable and definitely not licensed (ripped off YouTube in case you’re wondering…). It turns out you can put the Spotify music over the video which is sanctioned by Instagram, and then layer any other audio you want over the top whilst altering the volume levels, so it maintained all the audio but without the copyright infringement. Nice.
THURSDAY
Shoot day #2. Same as above.
Wrap at 5 and drive back home for 8pm. Unpack and repack my kit as I’m on a 7am train to London in the morning.
FRIDAY
Remember last week when I said an old client had moved to a new company? I’m shooting for the new company today. It’s a half day shoot, but with a full day shoot budget (the dream) and the imagery will sit in their new brochure. It’s an interiors shoot, which I haven’t done in a while but featuring an industry personality/talent. I love this client and have always enjoyed working with her and it’s another really easy and pleasant day with a great team. I borrowed my assistant’s Profoto B10s after yesterday’s shoot which were so necessary as the lighting in the location was bizarre (we shot in the brand’s massive store which had limited capacity to turn off house lights in certain areas so there were all sorts of floodlights and spotlights to contend with). I then pack them back to her in a courier before catching the 2.30pm train home. N.B. I need to buy my own lights - this is definitely my next purchase.
*RECS*
As a break from tradition, instead of telling you what I didn’t do this week i’ve got a few recommendations:
Ciara’s on Substack! After our interview and my extolling the virtues of the platform, Beyond the Brush was born revealing the behind the scenes life of a make up artist. Expect product reviews, BTS action, career advice, industry knowledge etc. Sort like a Picture Papers. for beauty.
Another favourite travel photographer of mine Pie Aerts has joined as well. Pie’s Substack will be every two weeks and explore storytelling in photography with examples from his archives. I’ve been chatting to him about the platform and I’m hoping to get an interview booked in so keep your eyes peeled.
Early readers of PP. will know I often recommend Rob Haggart’s A Photo Editor on Instagram. Rob has now launched a new community called The Photographer’s Union. You have to apply to be in it, but is proving to be a wealth of information so I recommend giving it a look.
P.S. Do you have any assisting opportunities you need to get great photographers for? Or are there jobs you can’t do that you want to pass onto someone else? To list them on our Job Board and tap into this amazing community of creatives, just send the details to studio@aliciawaite.com.