2024 Calendar For Sale |
![]() The pre-sale price will be available until the middle of November or until it sells out which it did last year. There is also a special price for a combination of the calendar and the Five Years book, yes there are a couple left so you can get both and have two Christmas presents ;-) If you can share the details on social media I'd love you to tag me in, I am @z70photo on Twitter, Instagram and now Threads, on Facebook you can find me on Z70 Photography ![]() ![]() The Front image of this years calendar won the best in show trophy so I knew it had to be used as the front cover. |
Thrawn |
![]() The new Ahsoka Disney+ show looks to be a fairly direct sequel to Star Wars Rebels and I am definitely on board with that. Direct link to all my Star Wars Designs with a few Ahsoka and Rebels thrown in. |
Scottish Nature Photography Awards |
Delighted to be chosen as runner up in the Scottish Nature Photography Awards for the Land category and third place in the Sea and coast category![]() One on Lossiemouth's East Beach in some beautiful light in June and the other in Lossie forest where the woods suddenly turn into a scene from World War II with bunkers and these tank defences stretching through the trees into the distance. ![]() |
2023 Photography Calendar For Sale |
![]() The pre-sale price will be available until the calendar is sent to the printers which will be around the middle of November, after that the price will go up. There is also a special price for a combination of the calendar and the Five Years book so you can get both and have two Christmas presents ;-) If that wasn't enough of a bargain, any orders during the pre-sale will be in the running to win a large print from 2022's September calendar page. If you can share the details on social media I'd love you to tag me in, I am @z70photo on Twitter and Instagram, on Facebook you can find me on Z70 Photography |
Trentham Live Photography For The Sentinel |
![]() I was given a press badge and told to get photographs of the acts and visitors to the shows, I didn't need any more encouragement to do that as event photography is something I love doing. ![]() As you can see from the top image I got the front cover of The Sentinel, plus a few inside pages on multiple days, and some more printed in the Staffordshire Newsletter a little later on. ![]() ![]() |
Death In Paradise - Etensel |
![]() I wanted a t-shirt with the Beer bottle label that has been consumed by the characters since day 1 of the show as it is Saint Marie's favourite ;-) As there isn't an official product available I made my own ! If you like it as well let me know on Twitter - @zort70 |
Five Years Book |
![]() I have been producing a calendar for five years now and some of the most asked question about it is where can we see the images and can I purchase previous calendars. Well I decided to combine both of those questions into one answer, a book. It is a UK A4 sized landscape book with all the images from the previous five years of calendars, plus covers, and extra images not available in print before. If you like what you see please visit my online shop to purchase a copy. Thanks everyone who has bought a calendar in the past and everyone that continues to support me on my photography journey. ![]() |
Event Photography Awards Winner 2020 |
![]() The second year in a row I have won, this time at a virtual awards ceremony, you can watch my small acceptance video on You Tube |
2021 Calendar For Sale |
![]() Any money from the sale of the calendar goes back into making more images for next year, so if you do purchase one thankyou for supporting me. Click the calendar image or go to my online store for more details - shop.zort.co.uk |
Event Photography Awards Voting |
![]() However the list of photographs nominated for each category has started to be revealed. There is also a voting system that anyone can be a poart of, although it is a little more complex than last year. The good news is at least one of the photographs I entered this year has been selected in the Behind The Scenes category. This is from the Fully Charged Live Event in May last year, and features Jonny Smith giving a much needed massage to the chief camera man for the weekend, Mark Taylor Hankins. To vote for my image and to see all the other images from the categories revealed so far Click Here to register. When you register then you will be sent and email to confirm your registration, then once confirmed you will be sent a second email with the link to the voting form. On the voting form click this image to mark it as number 1 (if you think it worthy of course !) and then click four others you like. You will then be given another link for the other categories. So far there are only three categories available, but once new once are sent out you will get more links sent via email. |
Brooke Competition Prize Part 1 |
The prize for the Brooke competition win was to spend a day with Matthew Seed the professional Horse Photographer and to have a Hasselbald X1D on loan for a couple of weeks. With the excellent organisational skills of Anne-Marie, the Director of the photo studio it was arranged that the photography day and the start of the camera loan period would take place on the same day. I actually got up early to go up towards the studio in Cheshire and took some early morning photographs of Jodrell Bank and the lake at Marbury Park, so photographically the day had already been a good one. ![]() A little wander around the gardens of Arley Hall followed, which is where the photo studio is located, mainly to get used to the feel of the X1D and how it works. Then after a very nice lunch in the Arley Hall restaurant it was time to move to a local stables and start the main photography session of the day. ![]() ![]() I will leave it to you to decide if that was the right decision after viewing the images. After a little more time taking photographs in the new position, unfortunately the rain then started quite heavily and we had to break for cover and end the session. ![]() ![]() I will write some more words soon about my experience with the Hasselblad camera, finally for now though my favourite photograph of the session is below, the most interesting thing for me is that this is straight out of the camera (via Lightroom) without any alterations, something I strive to achieve but usually don't manage with my current setup. ![]() |
2020 Calendar For Sale |
![]() Any money from the sale of the calendar goes back into making more images for next year, so if you do purchase one thankyou for supporting me. Click the calendar image or go to my online store for more details - shop.zort.co.uk |
Brooke Photographic Competition Winner |
![]() This was a new venture by the charity to try and raise some money and highlight the work that is undertaken by the charity. Reports are that from all the entries nearly £3000 has been raised which is great news. ![]() Out of the blue in mid September I got a phone call with the great news that I had won the camera section prize. A complete surprise and most definitely a great honour. The prize for winning is the loan of a Hassleblad Camera and a day of tuition on professional horse photography with Matthew Seed. I am very much looking forward to that day and as always I will put some details on this site as well as on Twitter and Instagram of course. The news of the win has been shared far and wide, the latest report I have seen came from New Zealand ! Hopefully the competition will be run again next year and if it is, I really encourage you to take part it is fun, has some great prizes and raises money for a very good cause. |
Fully Charged Live 2019 |
![]() For those not familiar with Fully Charged it started in 2010 by the actor and presenter Robert Llewellyn who launched Fully Charged, a YouTube channel focussing on the future of electric vehicles, clean energy resources and other Ecological modern day concerns. Since then the channel has over 1/2 a million subscribers and over 55 million views of the content. ![]() I was at that first event for one day taking photographs. This year I made time for all three days of the show and loved every moment of walking around Silverstone talking to people and taking pictures of the event. ![]() As well as the team expanding the whole event was expanded to fill the Silverstone Wing complex from end to end on several floors, including the pit garages. Great for the show, but my feet were a little tired at the end of day three ! A rough calculation that was theorised by another photographer is that I walked around 8 miles on each of the days of the show. ![]() As well as cars there were many other electric car related products including the pictured BP Polar Network Charger which again had it's unveiling at the show. In fact it was so new I was asked not to post pictures of it before the end of the show as the press hadn't even been shown at that time. It was great to see how much hands on interaction the show had with guests, not only in the exhibition halls, but also outside on the track. BMW, Kia, Nissan and Renault had electric cars that people could drive out on the small Stowe circuit. ![]() There was also the UK Tesla Owners Club organising transfers from the car park to the exhibition front door all for free with any thankful donations going to charity. ![]() The party was a great way to unwind on Saturday evening especially as the weather on the Friday hadn't been so kind. There were several other bands playing on the Solar Stage throughout the weekend which gave a great background sound to the hubbub of the exhibition. The last thing to say is how much I enjoyed the show, I have noticed the photographs taken pop up all over the internet which is always great to see. There might also have been some published in a Danish motorcycle magazine, but I haven't fond a copy yet. Which just leaves me to say that assuming there is going to be a Fully charged 2020 I will be more than happy to take photographs again. Even if I don't take photographs I would go to the show anyway as it is a really well organised and informative event with a hugely positive message about the future. |
Pennine Pen Animal Rescue Dog Show |
![]() If you see yourself or your dog in the Flickr album and would like a high quality copy of the photograph without the watermark, then you can use my online shop to order, if there are any questions on how to do that then simply send me an email - info@z70.uk ![]() Although I was there to take pictures of the event I had also been asked if it was possible to take studio portraits of the dogs. I hadn't done this out of the studio before so had a think about how to do this in the field (literally). ![]() I managed to fit in 11 posed portraits in an hour and a half, which is quite good going for a studio portrait. ![]() If you have any questions about the day or just want to get in touch about future events then see my contact page on the Photography website - http://z70.uk/contact.html |
Ride With M.E |
![]() Photographs from the day can be viewed on Flickr. ![]() Before you do that make sure you know the name of the image e.g. for the bike picture above (direct link) the name would be DSC08448-14, please add that to the order details notes section so I know which one to send :-) ![]() |
Event Photography Awards Winner |
![]() On the 14th of May in a very glamourous awards ceremony held at 4 Hamilton Place in London's Mayfair, the Event Photography Awards took place. It is fair to say I had no idea of what to expect other than seeing some great photographs, meeting some other photographers and having an evening out in London. It was all of that and more. ![]() In fairly short order the award announcements started and the categories were worked through. Soon the Cultural section, where I had two images shortlisted was reached. As with all the categories that had preceded it, commended images were mentioned first and then the runner up and winner was announced. ![]() The ceremony moved on and the other award category winners were announced, all brilliant images in their own right. ![]() The other winner was an excellent photographer called Katie Frost who was also a category winner in the Music section. ![]() I have already said thanks in person and on the various social media sites, but I just want to say again here how much I appreciate being selected for the prize it means a huge amount, and will give me a big boost going forward. I now have to take some great images to enter into the competition next year. |
Event Photography Awards 2019 |
I got some great news, I have been shortlisted (twice !) for the Event Photographer Of The Year Awards. Two of my images in the Cultural section were chosen and I am so pleased they are both images taken locally in Stoke On Trent. If you have a spare moment then all the photographs are eligible for a peoples choice award, so head over to the shortlist page, find the two images below and click like, I would be very grateful for any votes and help in sharing the information. ![]() |
LOST 2020 |
![]() I tried to blend an eye theme and the church door scene together to evoke the theme of the event which is celebrating the 10th anniversary of the final episode. Head on over to http://thelostcon.com to find out more detail and to book your place on what is sure to be a great event on "The Island" |
Photography Calendar 2019 |
![]() Get your copy in my online shop Featuring photographs from the last 12 months, printed on UK A3 sized pages. |
Olympus Cameras |
![]() The first event was the Olympus lighting workshop in London at the Park Cameras store. The second was the almost legendary Giffords Circus workshop which was in the grounds of Blenheim palace, if you ever see this advertised put your name down immediately ! Both of those events are covered in much more detail in articles previously published on this site. While attending these events I got to learn about a special service that Olympus UK run that allows people to take a camera and different lenses for a test drive for a few weeks in the comfort of their own home. I asked to take part in this scheme and a few months later managed to arrange some time to take delivery of an OMD EM-1 Mark II, and several lenses, including a F1.2 25mm, F1.2 45mm, F4 12-100mm, F4 300mm ![]() I am no camera reviewer and I am not going to try and become one overnight, but my initial thoughts on the camera are that is a well rounded and balanced piece of equipment that I would be more than happy to own and use on a daily basis. The menu system is easy to use once you learn the basics, and there are a lot of configuration options to suit the style of most users. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() The next thing I have to sing the praises of, is the in body image stabilisation, simply wonderful, uncomplicated to use and adds several extra stops of use to my usually shaky hands. I was taking images with the 300mm lens at shutter speeds far slower than I could have without the image stabiliser and they were pin sharp. Now for the inevitable part of any camera write up, I have to talk about the ISO performance. Happily I can say that if you expose your images correctly and don't have to do much post work to raise shadows etc then high ISO shouldn't be much of a problem. The downside is that this is a Micro Four Thirds system and there is no getting away from the fact that it is a small sensor, compared to a 35mm full frame equivalent, which means to get the right exposure the ISO quite often has to be higher. The higher ISO noise is not too distracting or ugly, it is just there if you pixel peep. At the time of the loan my main camera was a Canon 80D and I much prefer the noise from the Olympus to that of the Canon. ![]() I am very grateful to Olympus for the loan, and the events and workshops they arrange throughout the year, I might even see you on one of those soon as they are always a lot of fun and very informative. ![]() Link to a large selection of images on my Flickr Site If you see any you like why not let me know on Twitter or Instagram |
Fully Charged Show Live |
![]() The second part of my photography weekend after the Circus trip was to be an event photographer for the Fully Charged Show Live event at Silverstone. ![]() ![]() ![]() It was actually quite hard to see all of the panels as they proved very popular, there were two panel areas, one with the panel and one with a video screen showing the main stage and both areas were packed out most of the time with people also standing and watching from the sides. If anyone is familiar with the pioneers of the electric car world and the charging infrastructure being developed independently around the country, they were all present at the show and many many more people who are making names for themselves in the brave new post fossil fuel age. ![]() The organisers have said that the show will return next year bigger and better, and even if I am not asked back to do any photography I would go to the show anyway just to see all the exciting new developments in this area. Who knows I might even be taking my own electric car next time. |