Paris: Tough Love

Known as 'the city of light', Paris is one of the most widely visited cities on earth. It's architecture is famed the world over and this is coupled with it's reputation for fine dining and romance. Like most things the reality can be a little different. I recently became aware of a medical condition called 'Paris Syndrome' which seems to particularly affect people from Japan - arriving in Paris Japanese visitors are so shocked to find that the harsh reality of Paris is so completely different from the magical image they had been led to believe that they have a sort of nervous breakdown ending with their embassy having to take charge to repatriate them back to their homeland.
I have spent a lot of time in Paris and when living there I tended to live in the, how shall I put it, less exclusive parts of the city. Of the many commissions I have carried out for magazines and guidebooks across the city there are areas I have never been asked to photograph. These parts of Paris, especially the 10th arrondissement, have largely been ignored and forgotten by both Parisians and guidebooks alike. I decided I wanted to get some images concerning this, showing the parts of Paris that others choose to ignore. Ironically these were the parts of the city I knew best, the image above was taken a few meters from the front door of my old flat on the Boulevard de Magenta between Gare du Nord and Gare de L'Est, having spent some time away from the area this far from uncommon sight now made quite an impact on me. The writing above the unfortunate soul in the shot also acted as a catalyst for me as it juxtaposed the reputation Paris has as a city of romance and the uncomfortable reality of life for some in the city.
Below are a few more shots on the theme, I'm in Paris regularly so this project I feel warrants being expanded upon.

iPhone Paris

Another good reason to use Canon...

*If you use Canon products you'll definitely want to read this post*

Canon for me, lead the way. Apart from being ahead of the game with technological advances compared to their competitors they also like to look after their customers.
One great example of this is their CPN: Canon Professional Network website, this site has a wealth of information on new and existing Canon products, interviews with photographers, opportunities to promote your work and reports from current festivals such as their extensive coverage from the Visa pour l'image annual photojournalism festival held in Perpignan earlier this month.
Apart from all this, and most importantly, you can also join their Canon Professional Services programme which entitles you to prioritised repairs to your equipment at any Canon pro centre anywhere across Europe with a guaranteed turnaround time and free replacement equipment loan in the interim. At large events, such as the current London fashion week, Canon will have a pro centre on site so if your lens gets smashed or your SLR develops a fatal fault you can simply visit the centre to get your equipment mended or a replacement loaned and carry on shooting.
Having this to call upon is a fantastic service and in many respects priceless, which brings me on to the cost of this service: nothing - it's absolutely free. All you need to do is have at least 2 qualifying bodies and 3 qualifying lenses to become a member of the programme.
As a member you also get sent a great quarterly magazine which is full of showcases of photographers work and information on the latest Canon developments. A direct link to apply to join the Canon Professional Services can be seen here and the Canon Professional Network site can be viewed by anyone, even Nikon users...

Paris: Pension reform demonstration

A selection of images from last Tuesdays demonstration in Paris against the proposed raising of the age of retirement from 60 to 65. The route of the march was from Republique to Bastille and then onto place du Nation, the turnout was huge and most of the time I was on the Boulevard Beaumarchais between the start and mid point. All of the unions and left wing parties were out in force to make their voices heard, at one point I found myself inadvertently walking into the middle of a press call for the leaders of the French Socialist party with the subsequent crush of people creating a real headache for their security.
More images from the day can be seen via this link on Alamy.com

Recent Shoot: Roundtable discussion

In between returning from Paris and the final edit of the pictures from Tuesdays retirement reform demonstration I was commissioned to photograph a roundtable discussion at the London offices of global real estate firm Savills for Property Week magazine. The shoot held in a boardroom consisted of fifteen sitters around a table and I was asked to get individual head shots of each attendee aswell as shots showing the discussion in progress.
I took lightstands and umbrellas along with me and planned to set up my flashes in the corners of the room to trigger them remotely (on camera flash would have very distracting for those present), in the end I decided to set up the flashes at each end of the long table and bounce the flashes off the ceiling (a nice low white ceiling - important) in order to ensure even lighting across all those around the table. I exposed the images manually to ensure that the light from the flashes was the dominant light source, these were at 1/8th power and this gave me working exposures of 125th at f4 at 500 ISO. A lower ISO is always desirable for image quality and the working aperture of f4 also gave me the option to use a shorter depth of field to isolate the sitters if desired.

Need directions? Ask a policeman...

...that is if he's not too busy of course.
An image here from the tail end of yesterdays demonstration in Paris against the proposed reforming of the retirement laws. The manifestation, or 'manif' as they are referred to, was largely peaceful (as usual) during the day as people gathered around the Bastille to make their protests heard.
The rally ended at Nation and as darkness fell the smaller number of protestors that remained refused to allow the traffic back onto the busy roundabout and (as usual) the French riot police the CRS had to gently hurry things along a bit.
I finished shooting yesterday evening and returned back to the apartment to quickly pack and was on the Eurostar first thing this morning (this morning?, let me see, yes it was this morning) back to London. It's the first chance I've had to look through the images and I'll do a complete edit tomorrow morning (no lie in as I've got another shoot in the evening) and will post a selection of images from throughout the day shortly

Paris Funk

I'm here in Paris at the moment, the weather and light has been fantastic and I've been out shooting on a few occasions. Below are a selection of images taken one day when the light was particularly inspiring, images are taken around the Louvre pyramids and the ajoining Jardin des Tuilleries. I suppose there is no real theme to these images, just my observations as I move around this fair city. Due to my temperamental internet connection where I'm staying I'm having to write this post from the terrace of a Cafe where I can tap into their WiFi connection, still I can't really complain, it's a lovely evening and my cup of tea is going down nicely in the sunshine as I write this...











I'm here in Paris until midweek next week and have a few more shoots planned before I head back aswell as some other images shot earlier during my stay, I'll post these once I'm back in London and have an internet connection that does not rely on the price of a cup of tea...