Geek Chic
The concept was Geek Chic and I shot it with a minimal vibe against a white washed brick wall. I wanted it to look as muted as possible and did this by keeping poses as subtle as possible and muting the colours of the overall images. I thought this desaturated look would make the images look aged, almost like I found a set of photographs from the 1980’s.
Free Art Friday – Vitamin C
So it’s January, apparently the most depressing month of the year. People are praying for pay day and fighting off the flu
Free Art Friday is a relatively new art movement that’s rapidly gaining in popularity around the World. Artists create a painting, sketch, sculpture, photograph or installation and leave it on the street. The piece can then be picked up by anyone and claim it as their own.
Salvage Shoot
Here’s a fashion shoot that was published last month in the Irish Independents’ Life magazine. We shot it in a Salvage yard in Dublin. The location was great with everything from dentist chairs to chimneys. I could have spent days there. With the time pressures of a fashion shoot we had a day….well more like a half day.
The team on this shoot was:
model niamh clinton
stylist david brittain
hair by christian sheenan (brown sugar)
make up by dearbhla keenan (brown sugar
Published in Sunday Independents LIFE magazine
Here are all the shots from this shoot.
India – time bomb photography
This was a flying visit to New Delhi and a few other towns that I can’t pronounce or spell. I was piggybacking a friends work trip. One thing that always bothered me about photographing in developing countries is that people love getting their photograph taken yet can only ever see it on the back of the camera and never get to keep it. I’d bring my Polaroid camera and take pictures and give them to locals. The great thing is that although Polaroid is pretty much dead in the west, it still has novelty factor in the small villages of India. At first I wanted take Polaroids of people and then photograph them with my regular camera holding the Polaroid just taken. Simple!!!! Or so you’d think. You see, a Polaroid takes about two minutes to develop and in India, two minutes is more than enough time to muster up a crowd, each wanting a photograph.
The result: “Time bomb photography”. Take the Polaroid, hand it to them and run. When the developing really kicks in and they see themselves with excitement (which is what I wanted to photograph dammit) masses are gathered around them and they start to chase you down wanting one too. Thankfully you’re already a street away and get the tuk tuk out of there.
Here are some other shots I took while I was there also. More snaps than anything:
Trawler
A week out on the Irish Sea in a fishing trawler is enough for any city boy to go crazy.
This is a project that I have wanted to do for a year now, but finding a skipper willing to take two sets of youthful land legs has been hard work…..not to mention that the thoughts of the project itself was letting me use this difficulty as a way of putting it off. But June of this 200great I found a fisherman who said he’d bring us out and we could “muck in” for our keep on the boat. Thus begins the adventure:
One week. No land in sight… well saw a bit once. Empty sea in every direction you looked, stuck in this small piece of crap trawler. 9 smelly dudes crammed in. Girls were just a memory or a really bad photo on a sticky magazine in the kitchen. Our skipper, Adrian from Donegal, Conor (writer) & myself (photog) and six Egyptian fisherman in the middle of Ramadan. An education in itself.
I totally fit in
Between working shifts on the boat I got to shoot and it’s been a hard edit but here’s the first draft. There was a few hurdles to get over when shooting this project…. protecting equipment from sea water…. the filth…..the fact that we were never still and fast shutter speeds we needed as a tripod isn’t going to be any use…….the hold was a very dark place and so it was hard to expose for both the hold and outside on a bright day. ah these are all my excuses..
Published in Vice Magazine – The Universal Sadness Issue
Read the article online : http://www.viceland.com/int/v16n1/htdocs/prawns-ahoy-504.php
Ireland’s national newspaper the Sunday Business Post also published this project as a cover story for it’s Agenda magazine in January 2009.
check out the photographs below:
Leprosy, Nepal
Staying a week in the worlds busiest Leprosy hospital is humbling experience to say the least. Given that the Madheshi’s & Maoists are just villages away, the hospital was one of the most peaceful places I’ve ever been.
There are certain things in life that when you are in the moment, you know you’ll never going to forget them. Having a conversation with a man while he’s getting his toe amputated without anesthetic, helping a nurse take over ten maggots from another mans foot and befriending a 16 year old boy, Ram, who works 14 hours a day, 7 days a week for €16 a month while be riddled with leprosy are just some of them.
Published in Vice – The Sundaes Issue
To read the full story: http://www.viceland.com/int/v15n8/htdocs/leper-mesiah-159.php?source=db
To learn more about Nepal Leprosy Trust and it’s work please visit:
* Now, we used the word “leper” here because we wanted to reference an old Metallica song. But you should know that people with leprosy consider that word really offensive. It carries a stigma that they’ve been trying to beat for years, and it’s outdated and ignorant. So next time you meet someone with leprosy, you are under no circumstances to call them a leper.
Ireland’s national newspaper the Sunday Business Post published this project as a cover story in May 2008.
Here are some more images from this project:
Barrys Tea – Advertorials
At present I’m doing a series of Advertorial shots for Barrys tea. I’m rather partial to the peppermint, in the herbal range of teas, so it’s working out nicely. It’s a lot of fun as we are taking portraits of Irish “creatives” in a relaxing moment when they take a break “Irish style” with a cup of tea.
Andreas Pettersson – Sunday Times Culture magazine
Being asked to take a portrait of a photographer is like asking your maths teacher to take your final exam and expecting them to get 100%. Thankfully in this case Andreas is a good friend and this assignment gave us an opportunity to work together on an idea which was less intimidating than doing it alone. What we came up with was to do a shoot an then reshoot it a few days later but with prints of the original shoot. Needless to say it was a lot of fun.
Simone Rocha – Totally Dublin
Last month’s creative was fashion designer, Simone Rocha and was published in Totally Dublin magazine. The idea behind this shoot was to photograph Simone relaxing at home in her Bedroom with her tea. These shot’s were brought to you by a cup of peppermint.
Codes – Hot Press
This month we spent some time with the Dublin based band, Codes, which was a lot of fun. We used Muzu’z studio as a location, (www.muzu.tv) which was cool. This Advertorial was shot specifically for the Irish music magazine Hot Press. My concept was to shoot the band in their rehearsal space as a group enjoying some down time with tea. Then to shoot them individually enjoying some tea in their “own” private space. Originally I saw this as a set of four images cropped square but the final layout (below) went for a linear series of images which also works. I’ve included the outtakes in a gallery below.
Here’s the shot’s individually. Click to Enlarge:
A pint with Shane MacGowan
Photos: Steve Ryan
Words: Conor Creighton
I’ve been slacking with this blog and so am only getting around to posting this one now. Last Christmas, can’t believe it’s already eight months ago…nearly nine… we went for a drink with the man himself. When I say a drink I mean several trips to the ATM. Here’s the layout used.
It was a really interesting day. What a fascinating man.
