November 2011
1 post
It's been a while...
How can I have been so snowed under when it isn’t even snowing yet? Is that something to do with global warming? Can I blame it on global warming anyway? Somebody actually tweeted to ask if I was OK, which made me realise it was time to post…
My biggest recent project has been producing the film of the calendar shoot for the Warwick Rowing 2012 calendar with the boys...
October 2011
3 posts
Warwick Rowing 2012: The Making of the Calendar
It’s finally ready!!! After an exhausting week in the edit, which involved gallons of Nespresso, half a ton of Cheddars and a meteor shower of Skittle Sours, the film of this year’s calendar shoot with the men’s rowing team at Warwick University (@warwickrowing on Twitter) is now available to order as a download, with a full twenty-five per cent of the price you pay going to...
Feature in @GayTimesMag
It was great to get the support of Gay Times last month on my Blue September project. It’s the most established gay publication in the UK, and one I’ve been reading for over twenty-five years, so getting a double page spread was quite a thrill!
If you haven’t seen it yet, there’s a video which gives you a (hot!) behind the scenes look at the shoot where this image was...
Warwick Rowing Calendar
Hot on the heels of Blue September, it’s calendar season, and I’m really pleased with the calendar I’ve created this year for the men’s rowing team at Warwick University. The calendar opens to A3 and is art quality printed on 250gsm stock, with a 350gsm gloss cover, and includes an A3 poster-sized centrefold. Buy it at www.warwickrowing.org/nakedcalendar.
As well...
September 2011
7 posts
Blue September 3 - @BlueSeptemberUK
I’m zipping out of town for a few days to work on a couple of film projects. One is the video of the @BlueSeptemberUK cancer awareness shoot with the boys from @warwickrowing and @theboatrace. The other is about the making of the Warwick Rowing calendar for 2012. Look out for more news on both!
Meanwhile, here are a couple more pictures for Blue September. Remember to visit Blue...
LFW #malemodelmonday @D1models
So it’s London Fashion Week and Male Model Monday. Those two events only coincide twice a year, which must surely have some kind of profound astrological meaning. And talking of stars (I’m not even going to ask if you saw what I did there), here is one of my new favourite models. I know I shouldn’t have favourites, and I would like to state for the record that I love all...
Fashion Week Guys @D1Models
So today is the first day of London Fashion Week, and I thought I would post some more guys I’ve just shot from D1 Models who will be working the runways slash catwalks (wow, I’m multilingual) over the next few days, rocking the London look.
In order, they are Harry, Mack and Paul. Which reminds me of a line from a Lou Reed song, but I can’t quite remember what it is. Then...
Blue September 2 - @BlueSeptemberUK
Here’s another pic from my Blue September campaign, the one featured in the current issue of Gay Times.
Chris was the inspiration for my shoot - he is an extraordinary guy who has raised thousands for charity and has worked with me tirelessly to make the @warwickrowing calendar the great success it has become.
As regular readers will know, Chris has fought his own battle with cancer,...
Blue September - @BlueSeptemberUK
I’m going to take a break from London Fashion Week today, because this month sees the UK launch of an important health campaign that has been running in Australia and New Zealand for a few years. Called Blue September, the campaign raises awareness about how cancer affects men - all cancers, not just the cancers like testicular and prostate cancer that only men get.
As regular followers...
London Fashion Week 2
It’s still LFW, so here is Pete Navey (@petenavey) from Nevs (@Nevsmen), another model I shot recently. As well as being a successful international model, Pete is a photographer himself, and so accomplished that I confess I was a little nervous about shooting him! But I’m delighted to say he was really great to work with, and even stayed on after the shoot to share a few beers. A...
I'm back! #malemodelmonday
I’ve not posted for a while because I’ve been away in Italy, sailing around the Aeolian Islands off the coast of Sicily on this. Watching the crew dealing with all that rope and sail was like living in an Abercrombie and Fitch shoot as styled by Ralph Lauren. So of course I couldn’t resist taking a few snaps, and I’ll be posting some images over the next few...
August 2011
9 posts
Portfolio Shoots 2 #malemodelmonday
This is Harry Newbold, a rising star with D1 Models (@D1Models) who has been jetting all over the world shooting major campaigns - and no wonder. Harry was a great guy to work with, and needed practically no direction - he just threw great poses at me as fast as I could fire the shutter.
We’re hoping to work together again, but meanwhile I’ll be bringing you more images from our...
Portfolio Shoots 1 #malemodelmonday
I’ve been busy over the last week or so, getting the @warwickrowing calendar for 2012 to the proofing stage, and doing portfolio shoots with models from Nevs (@nevsmen) and D1 Models (@D1Models).
Let me first of all say that next year’s Warwick Rowing calendar is going to be super hot, not least thanks to some valuable input from the divine Abbie @fauxpink, who knows how to make...
Eliot 3
This shot, unlike Eliot’s body, would have to be called a work in progress. It will be a great shot with a little help from Dr Photoshop, but right now the arms are too dark and the background too light.
But I decided to post it because Eliot looks so great in it.
I’m reminded of one of my favourite stories from British politics. Back in the sixties, there was a gay MP called...
#malemodelmonday - Teco Arias
Given that today is Male Model Monday on Twitter, brought to us by the wonderful peeps at FIASCOMagazine, I thought I would publish an unseen pic of one of my favourite Sydney models, Teco, who is represented by Vivien’s Models in Australia.
Teco is a very experienced model with a long track record in his native South America. So it’s extraordinary that his shoot with me was the...
Eliot 2
Here is another image of Eliot, shot against the door of the apartment in Sydney where I did my shoots.
If you’ve read the previous posts about this apartment, you’ll know that it was like a camera itself - windowless on three sides with a single light source coming through the fourth side of the apartment, which was made entirely of glass and overlooked the whole of Sydney right...
Eliot 1
We’re back to the Sydney shoots today, with Eliot. Eliot is in the Australian Navy, but had just started to pursue his interest in modelling when I discovered him.
I can usually tell the guys who have a military background - they turn up on time and do what’s asked of them with no argument. The opposite of diva, in other words, and Eliot was no exception. He was an extremely...
Sam 3
I have hundreds of pictures of Sam, but here is my last one for now. Again, he’s wearing Paul Smith. What I liked about this top was that it was somehow evocative of messing about in boats in the 1920s, and I thought that Sam’s look leant itself particularly well to the glamour of that era. I can imagine him as a matinee idol!
Sam and I shot a lot of nudes, and what I really...
#malemodelmonday - Sam in Paul Smith
It’s Male Model Monday on Twitter, and I thought I would post another pic. So here is Sam again, wearing a beautiful jacket from Paul Smith’s mainline collection.
Paul Smith is one of my favourite designers, and I often feature his clothes in my fashion portfolio shoots.
Sam 2
What I particularly like about Sam’s physique is that he has focused on tone rather than bulk. A lot of guys make the mistake of going for quantity over quality, and it rarely looks as good as they think it does, especially in modelling shots. In fact, they can look rather bloated and even (yes, I’m going to go there) a bit tubby.
Sam is just as dedicated and serious about his gym...
July 2011
23 posts
Sam 1
I was very excited when I spotted Sam on a modelling website, where he had decided to test the waters. I immediately saw his potential, and invited him to come down to London for a test shoot. I was delighted to discover that not only does Sam photograph well, he’s an extremely nice guy, too. Some days you get lucky!
Sam has the most extraordinary face. The high cheekbones, sensual...
Dylan 3
Dylan and I actually did two shoots together, and these images are both from our second shoot. He’d radically changed his hairstyle, which gave him a very different look.
I still can’t decide which look I like best. He has amazing hair, and I loved photographing him playing with it in the first shoot, but I also like the sharpness of the shorter haircut. He has wonderful facial...
Dylan 2
Being a backpacker on a limited budget, Dylan didn’t have the funds to pay for a fancy London gym. So I was very impressed that he was managing to sculpt such an amazing physique (and it’s completely unretouched) just using resistance exercises with no equipment in the privacy (or lack of it) of his own dorm room.
It just goes to show that you don’t need lots of expensive...
Dylan 1
It’s like when Dorothy went to Oz. And if you don’t get that reference, what are you doing here?
Yes, for the first time, we bring you a pic in glorious Technicolor. Of course, digital cameras always shoot in colour - depending on the settings, the image is then converted to black and white either in the camera or through your editing software. But how you set the shot up is what...
Jose Luis 3
Here’s one last image of Jose Luis - at least for the time being. It’s got a dreamy quality that I really like, and have accentuated by adding a light grain.
I’ve been busy working on new shoots, mainly studio-lit, in preparation for my next London show and for a big charity shoot I’m doing this coming weekend. More on that soon!
And since I’ve been focusing on...
Jose Luis 2
Jose Luis has stunning green eyes, and in yesterday’s post I tried to convey how piercing they are, even in black and white. But Jose Luis is also a top athlete, with a fantastic physique.
I have a friend who is a high-end retoucher - her slogan is “Proudly not keeping things real since 2001” - and it’s amazing what she can do. She could make Kirsty Alley look skinny...
Jose Luis 1
Jose Luis is a Sevillano from sunny Seville, the capital of Andalucia, who was spending time in Sydney to improve his English and look for adventure. I think I helped him to find it when I responded to his Gumtree ad looking for bar work.
I texted Jose Luis that I couldn’t help him with the bar work, but I could offer him an opportunity to do something different that would be a lot of...
Artur
This is another experimental treatment of one of my Sydney images. Artur was just setting out to explore the possibility of becoming a model, and we agreed to do a TFI shoot for our portfolios.
For those who don’t work in the business, TFI means Time For Images, and usually refers to shoots where a model and a photographer agree to work together for images only. It used to be TFP...
Arno 3
Here are a last couple of pictures of Arno, given rather different treatments. I’ve always tended to go for the softer, lower contrast approach that you can see in the second image, with Arno lying on the sofa. But when I started doing test prints for exhibitions, I realised that what looks great on screen doesn’t necessarily translate to the page quite as well.
I guess...
Arno 2
A lot of people are surprised that the images from my Sydney exhibition were created with natural light. It was really down to necessity that I chose to shoot this way, and good fortune that I found a location that made it work.
When I came to Sydney, I had the choice of hiring lighting and/or a studio, or shooting with natural light. I had no models lined up when I arrived, and wasn’t...
Arno 1
Hot on the heels of Cedric, here is Arno, another Frenchman living in Sydney.
Arno is an experienced international model, and we had spoken about doing a shoot in London a couple of years earlier, before he decided to settle in Australia.
It was great to reconnect with Arno in Sydney. Although actually half-Swedish, Arno has a very Mediterranean look and a full complement of Gallic charm. ...
Cedric 3 - Nostalgie de la Moue
I have very fond memories of la moue de Cedric - Cedric’s pout - and am always drawn to the portraits I took of him. Today I’m posting a portrait that I have reworked – do let me know what you think of the effect! @angus_malcolm.
The other thing that I loved about Cedric was that, once he’d decided to pose nude, he did so with a Gallic insouciance that was utterly charming, so I’m also posting...
Cedric 2
What is it about the French and their ability to pout? I think it must be at least partly the French language, and the demands it makes on the lips as you shape those extraordinary vowels. Trust the French to come up with a language that not only sounds sexy, but actually makes you look sexier, too. It’s a particular kind of genius.
Cedric is a native Parisian, and his pout has got to be up...
Cedric 1
I photographed a couple of French guys while I was in Sydney. This is Cedric, who seems to me to have a particularly French sort of charm. I contacted him after I saw his ad on Gumtree, looking for bar work, and soon realised he didn’t speak any English. Fortunately I speak reasonable French - though some of Cedric’s slang texts were completely beyond me.
As soon as I mentioned that I would...
Eddie
This blog focuses on my art nude work, but nudes aren’t all I shoot, so today I thought I would bring you some fashion shots I did of Eddie, a rising young fashion model in Sydney.
Eddie, who is represented by Chic, was a joy to work with. I could tell from the clothes he wore to the shoot that modelling wasn’t just a job for Eddie. He is fashion through and through, with his own innate sense...
Nicklas 3
This is the last picture of Nicklas for now, looking rather contemplative and serene. And indeed he was a very chilled out guy, who was fazed by nothing - including, as we know from the last post, finding out on the day that he was going to be spending most of the shoot with no clothes on.
Nick was very good at holding poses, which was great for me - when I see a perfect pose, I often go into...
Nicklas 2
I loved Nick’s hair. Even though he’s actually a rugby player, his hair made me think of the classic blond surfer look of Southern California and, of course, Australia, the hair tousled and bleached by whole summers spent in search of the perfect wave.
But Nick’s physique is classically rugby. Despite the blond curls and the pretty face, he’s workhorse, not a show...
Nicklas 1
This is Nicklas, a model, actor and semi-pro rugby player. Half-Danish and half-Australian, Nick was filling in between modelling and acting gigs with work on a building site when I found him. That was typical of him. Completely unassuming and unpretentious, Nick was willing to do whatever it took to make the day work and get the job done, whatever the job might be.
I always direct models to...
Sunny 3
This is my last one of the wonderful Sunny for now, once again giving great face and making the camera fall in love.
We’ll come back to Sunny another time, but there’ll be somebody new tomorrow.
Sunny 2
Sunny is a consummate model. He really works it, and he makes it work. A lot of people thing modelling is just turning up and standing in front of the camera, including far too many people who call themselves models. It isn’t. You have to be inventive, and playful but serious – even goofy only works if there’s an underlying cool.
I love Sunny’s work in these shots. Just by allowing his...
Sunny 1
Sunny is a bit of a mover and shaker on the Sydney scene, and is signed to one of their top agencies. Of all the models I shot in Sydney, he was probably the most creative and dynamic. His modelling was a performance, and he knew what would work on camera.
Henley 4
Here are a couple more images from previous Warwick Rowing calendars. You can get hi-res downloads by going to http://www.uwbc.org.uk/other.php?Doc=calendar - please think about buying them, as the team really need your support to keep going.
The first year we did the calendar, the boys only sold it on campus. It did very well, but it was last year that sales really took off, after we were...
Henley 3
I turned up at Warwick University back in 2009, eager tor try out a brand new camera and lights. With around fifteen guys and several locations, this was my biggest shoot to date, and I was running over the logistics in my mind as I entered the university sports hall for the first set-up. I don’t know who was more nervous – me trying to direct a whole bunch of naked guys I’d never met before,...
June 2011
27 posts
HENLEY 2
I’ve always been fascinated by Dieux du Stade, the calendar produced by French rugby team Stade Francais. It has hugely increased the popularity of rugby in France, and I had an interesting conversation once with Mark Simpson, the London-based journalist who has written about the whole sports erotica phenomenon, and coined the term sporno: http://www.marksimpson.com/blog/2010/04/17/sporno/
I was...
Henley 1
If you’re a fan of rowing, you will know that today marks the start of Henley, the Wimbledon of rowing. You can see world-class racing and acquire a world-class hangover from all the Pimms. This very English summer drink ideally comes “dressed” with strawberries, cucumber, orange, lemon and mint, and seems to be particularly identified with Henley.
If you haven’t tried Pimms, here’s what...
Brant 3
Brant was doing a major catwalk show in Sydney a couple of days after our shoot, and the art director had called for facial hair. Brant takes his work seriously, and turned up for our shoot with a straggly beard like he’d been stranded on a desert island for twenty years. “Hmmm. About the beard…” I began. “Yeah, I wondered if that was going to be a problem,” he replied. Being a true...
Brant 2
Believe it or not, nude shoots are just as stressful for me as they are for the models. I normally start models dressed and we take things slowly until we both relax a bit.
Brant had only done fashion modelling, and there was a funny moment right at the beginning of our shoot when he went off to get ready.
I heard him say “I don’t really know what the protocol is on this, so…”. He trailed...
Brant 1
At 6’3” with a natural grace and a great physique, it’s no surprise that Brant is a successful fashion model, but I think he probably spends more time on his surfboard than on the catwalk.
Maybe it’s all that time he spends communing with the waves, or maybe it’s because he lives in a small community quite a way from the crazy world of the big city, but Brant was one of the most chilled,...
Alberto 3
I took Alberto out for a drink at a local bar after the shoot. It was empty apart from a couple of girls who were having a rather loud conversation about their plans for the weekend – until they clocked Alberto. They both fell silent, and their jaws dropped ike something out of a cartoon. This is definitely a guy who gets lucky on a Saturday night.
That’s my last of Alberto for now – next up...
Alberto 2
Like a lot of the guys that I shoot, Alberto was very uncertain about posing nude and I spent a long time discussing it with him. Coming from Spain, a Catholic country which is still somewhat conservative beyond the big cities like Barcelona and Madrid, Alberto had understandable concerns about how these images might be received by his family and the community in which he lives and works back...