DIARY 039

What I've was up to last week; a shoot in Paris, with a last minute diversion to London and making decisions on the spot when working remotely.

MONDAY

This morning at 1am, we landed from 10 days in sunny Spain. Or should that be sweaty Spain… it was 90% humidity the whole time we were there and averaged at 37° - Europe is quite literally on fire this summer and I wonder if this is going to be the new normal… Shooting in those kind of conditions is borderline dangerous (or actually dangerous, if you were meant to be in any of the huge areas evacuated by wild fires in France and Spain at the moment) and if it’s like this every year, it’s going to hugely affect the ‘Euro Summer’ content shooting schedule in years to come. Perhaps things will need to shift earlier to avoid temperatures that are untenable for a working day… something to remember for next year. Anyway, I digress…

I tried to have a real break whilst we were away, and managed to check my email only once a day for the most part, which was heavenly but also means I have a lot to catch up on. I have today to unpack, wash everything, make sure the children are booked and sorted in various summer camps, and pack up again for a shoot in Paris which I leave for tomorrow morning. The shoot is for Spell, who I pitched and shot for in Menton earlier this Spring (listen to the case study here), and came directly from the brand this time not long after I delivered the last one; no pitching needed. The mood is so much fun, and exactly the sort of shoot I really love - running around on the street, shooting into the night, grabbing the in-between moments on a hot balmy evening in a beautiful city, a.k.a. the dream. It’s occurred to me recently that despite really struggling with chaos in real life, I thrive on it on set; the more mad the better. But chaos is only fun when there’s a clear plan and a set schedule to be chaotic within, so I’ve had my new Studio Manager, Eve, doing some remote recce’ing in advance, and keeping an eye on model bookings, travel plans, budgets etc. whilst i’ve been away so I can hit the ground running tomorrow.

TUESDAY

The client won’t be on set again this time, so once I jump off the Eurostar, and check into the AirBnb, (which also doubles up as a location) I spend an hour going through all the emails, styling documents and moodboards once again before heading out to recce, so I have it all fresh in my mind. The apartment is in Le Marais, which is postcard-perfect Paris and there are so many options for places to shoot it’s hard to pin down only 10 places for the 10 looks we have to shoot. It is, however, super busy. Mid-summer in a hot Paris and the streets are thronging with tourists and locals alike. Luckily, the shoot mood very much incorporates a bustling Paris backdrop, but there are chic ‘background people’, and less chic ‘background people’ so tomorrow is going to be about finding spots that are busy, but not heaving, which will trim down the options a bit. It also means that I can update the brand deck with potential locations, but let the brand know that I can’t be as specific as I was on our last shoot, when I had a very clear spot for each outfit signed off in advance, as we’re going to have to react in real time to the spots that are just too busy, and divert if necessary.

Wondering around Le Marais for the afternoon and early evening is heaven though and seeing as our shoot tomorrow is 1pm - 9/10pm, it’s perfect timing to see where the sunset light is going to be. I run back to the apartment, have a 5 minute freshen up and head out for supper with my assistant on the shoot tomorrow, photographer Ileana Contreras, and Dara Danen, a photographer i’ve known online for 4 years. There are some Whatsapp groups that become such a staple part of your life and the group a bunch of us set up after we did Level II of TMPA is still going strong. There is some chat on there pretty much every single day, but I’ve only met one of the girls in person. So putting Dara’s face to a name finally is so amazing, and we cook up a plan to do an interview in a couple of weeks. Dara is an absolute master at pitching, and travels the world jumping from location to location for weeks at a time, purely off the back of an incredible pitching ethic (and her beautiful work). I know how much this process interests you so I think the interview will be so valuable - watch this space.

WEDNESDAY

Shoot day. Whilst walking around yesterday and seeing how busy everything was, I called my sister and asked if she might be free to come out for the shoot tomorrow. There wasn’t budget for a stylist on this shoot, but having thought about the logistics, I decided I would pay for her to come and join me out of my fee. Making sure the clothes are in perfect order is a full time job and not having someone specifically for that on a shoot day like this was going to be too difficult to pull off without mistakes being made, so it was worth the spend, and made such a huge difference. They could go back to the apartment and change whilst we were walking to and setting up the next shot, which made the day run so much more smoothly. Without her, and all having to go back to the apartment together after every look to change we would have lost valuable time. Alternatively, we could have carried outfits with us, and risked them being dropped or dragged along the curb as someone would always have been overloaded with camera gear, plus wardrobe, shoes and everything else. It just wasn’t an option not to have someone there so I booked her on the 7am Eurostar.

For this particular shoot concept, I need a reliable on-camera flash and seeing as my TLA200 is out of action (another one I sent to the camera menders which they did nothing with…!) I bought a new (old) one on eBay whilst I was in Spain - the Contax TLA360, which is the original match for the Contax 645. When I got into the studio on Monday morning I fired off a couple of rolls of film with the flash, testing a few different settings. I then sent the rolls Next Day Delivery to the lab in London, with a 24 turn around promised so I could make sure all was working ok before I committed using the flash on this shoot. In the end the scans turned up half way through the shoot day (all a bit squeaky bum) and was able to use the TLA360 for the end of the day but it was a tight turn around to say the least, so I made sure I packed back up in case the scans had come back dodgy; my digital camera and the Profoto A10, plus a remote trigger if I needed to use the A10 on the Contax and/or my Canon 1V.

Rachel, the model arrives at the apartment at 1pm for hair and make up, and we shoot the apartment looks first from about 2.30pm, before venturing out on the streets. The last few looks of the shoot were supposed to feel like evening and we were struggling to find places dark enough so I planned the ‘lunch’ break at 6.30 to push the last few looks of the day as late as possible. As you know, European evenings are light and bright until a ridiculously late hour (which is one of its charms) so sunset wasn’t until 9.15pm, and it still felt like proper daylight for at least an hour after that. The locations I’d scouted, down slim alleyways facing away from the sun, were shadow-y but definitely not dark even at 8.45pm so we shot in the darkest corners we could, using the flash to create a more evening-y look, then retreated back to the apartment building, using the stone steps in the entranceway and inside the flat with closed curtains to create a dark cosy nook. In France, the working day is strictly 8 hours with an one hour break so, whilst I tried to push the shoot a little later, even wrapping at 9.45pm it was still so light we had to improvise. It’s in these moments that having a client on set would be really nice as you can spitball ideas together and their expectations are managed in the moment. In this case, remotely, with the client in Australia so unreachable most of the time due to time differences, you have to make the executive decisions on your own and hope for the best.

By the time we had packed up our kit it was 10.15pm and all plans for a late supper went out the window and we decided to hit the deck, ready for an early Eurostar tomorrow.

THURSDAY

I had planned to hang out in Paris for the day today, and go to a few galleries before heading home, but on the day I came out here I was booked on another shoot for today. It’s a relatively small shoot, but for a big US brand, and has come through another photographer friend who wasn’t able to do it due to an unexpected change of plans. I really felt it was such a generous gesture of her to loop me in with them; in our industry there’s a temptation to keep clients ‘to yourself’, or feel threatened when recommending other photographers for a job but really it’s unlikely to make a dent in the relationship you have with a client, if the relationship is the right one for you, unnerving as it sometimes is. I will admit I had a situation lately where a current client of mine, who i’ve shot with for years on and off, messaged me asking me if I had any ‘cheaper’ photographers to recommend, as they had decided to reduce their budgets. I felt offended, and that I didn’t want to contribute personally to the reducing of rates in our industry. But in hindsight, perhaps that was just a sign that that relationship was no longer for me? I decide i’ll get back to them and ask her more details of what they’re after as perhaps one of you guys will be right for the shoot. I’ll let you guys know if so ;)

Arrived into the train station at 11.30am and headed for West London for a 1pm start (Eurostar is so civilised, honestly I wish I could train everywhere), and had a very quick and easy shoot, capturing the subject in three looks at her home and in Notting Hill. I shot it all on digital, straight to card, as the client needed a quick turn around and I didn’t have my tethering kit with me in Paris, and I just cannot get enough of the colours and the quality in the R5ii. It still has the warmth of the old 5Div and I feel I can still get that soft texture (perhaps as i’m still using my old EF lenses?) but you can push it so much further in the shadows; I love it.

Back to St Pancras, onto another train, and I’m home for 6pm. How is it only Thursday and how is it only four days since we left Spain? Travel really does stretch time - it’s one of the best things about our job: a quick 3-day spin to another territory and you feel you’ve really made the most of every minute.

FRIDAY

Unpacking, repacking and off to my in-laws for the weekend. I’ve had next to no time in my inbox, so I make the most of my husband driving, and my kids passing out in the back to catch up on admin. Thank goodness I was blessed with an iron stomach and can type in the car.

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