Satureyes

Trade Shows – I love ‘em.

Posted by satureyes | Filed under personal, rants and moans

I was thinking this morning about how much I love trade shows. They’re full of brilliant characters and its always fun to see what swag you can nab from the stands.. so here’s my take on the whole phenomena.

Of course, some of these observations are not all about one venue or show – but an amalgamation of years of research and trawling through Trade shows and expos around the country.

You’ve got your pass in the mail, you’ve consulted the ’seminar guide’ and circled the talks you want to go to.. so its time to hit the road and spend 3 hours travelling to the venue.

I love the walk from the over-priced car park where you’ve already been in line for 20 minutes behind overly excited sales-people and visitors to pay for your car park space.

Then there’s the delighful walk miles to the main door, around the back of the exhibiton centre, whilst you desparately try and mind- map the route to the front door so you can get back there later. You could of course wait 20 minutes for the shuttle bus which is caked in leaflets and plastic bags that people have deposisted there because they dont want to take them home- and feel a little disappointed that you’ve seen some leaflets that give away some of the secrets of what lies within the big doors to the exhibition halls.

You’ve inevitably chosen the wrong day to visit. Its ’student’ day so you have to push past loads of Indy kids and teenagers smelling of Joss-sticks and Patchouli oil.

You eagerly attach your lanyard to the pass- and wonder why you have a green band on the badge whereas everyone else has yellow, what DOES it mean, I think I’m special because I have green. I am the best. Green means brilliance. The reality is probably that green meens ‘waste of space, dont even talk to me’

So you collect your show guide from the self-tanned brunette in tight black trousers and flat shoes, and decide ‘This year, I’m going to have a system, I’m going to walk up and down each aisle so I see everything.’

This lasts approximately 5 minutes before you’re distracted by a fire-breathing woman on stilts or a giant teddy bear handing out candy.

Once you wade past all the students looking at kit they can’t afford, you then walk up to stands displaying kit you have been reading about (but can’t afford) have a visit onto the stand that has the MOST expensive kit in the universe on, and watch men take photos of an oriental lady in a short skirt for their ’special’ collection, whilst they pretend its for ‘testing’ purposes.

You become very disappointed with the lack of ‘free stuff’ at the stands. Surely it’s not already been given out. You manically collect plastic bags hoping there’s something other than a pen inside…perhaps a keychain, or a torch, or a torch keychain. Something. Not JUST leaflets. PLEASE!

A few stands grab your attention – but loiter at your peril. You’ve only just arrived and not in the mind-set of wanting some sales-person to chat to you.. so you loiter slightly further from the stand – ‘dont make eye contact’ you tell yourself.. dont.. make..eye..contact. DAMMIT she’s seen you..cue fake smile while she tries to see your name badge. You can hear her brain computing.. ‘name… occupation.. are they worth talking to?.. OH NO HE’S GREEN’ she stops smiling and looks away. WHAT? not even offer to scan your badge.. the ‘green line paranoia’ builds. Not even a M&M from their stand to keep your energy levels up. Anyway… Where’s the free booze?

Twenty minutes later you’re still trying to pry some cheap champaign off a stand. You know the only way you will get some is if you hide that damn badge and pretend you are responsible for a multi-million Euro budget and you may just consider booking their hotel for 5000 people and a 6 month conference.

Mission success! You have a glass of fizz and meander happily to the next stand – now you’ve got your patter sorted. Time to try and get pissed. Four glasses later, the heartburn has started, you’ve lined up for 20 mins to get a scoop of free ice-cream and you’re on top of the world.

So – seminar time. There’s only one, possibly 2 seminars you think are of real interest, so you make your way over to the pre-fabricated ’seminar room’ located somewhere between the male toilets and the area where they push massive bins full of empty bottles past at regular 2 minute intervals. The only problem you’re not the only person who thinks that this seminar is going to give them the secret to unlocking your sales potential, or indeed how to do something on a shoestring budget. The line extends around the corner, past the stand giving chocolate hearts wrapped in red foil…you’re not going to get a seat.

You get a seat. At the back, in the corner, so you can make a quick escape. Seminar starts. Guy in ill-fitting suit on stage with a neck-mic set too low. He asks if we can hear him. ‘No’ we say. Mic volume is put up. Feedback through the speakers. Mic level turned down. Time to check Twitter on the phone.

You then realise you’re sitting in a plastic rectangle with a roof made from strips of material. This has the accoustic properties of a ruler and a piece of string. Coupled with the catering staff pushing bins on wheels full of empty beer bottles past the side of the seminar space you realise you’re on a hopeless mission- but you stick it out. You may learn something…

The presenter informs you he realises you’re all tired after walking round all day. He then makes you stand up and ‘get interactive’. He needs to demonstrate that you can communicate and win business without talking, so proceeds to make monkey sounds and wave his arms furiously. You leave.

For the photo shows, perhaps visit a seminar at Canon or Nikon where they show you the most ridiculously well shot images and try and convince you that with this camera you too can achieve images like that. They dont tell you its been taken by a photographer with 60 years of experience and processed using NASA kit, in zero gravity.

Lunch time.. whoa what a choice.. you’ve spied out the ‘eateries’ while you’ve been wandering.. you’ve tried in vain to get satiated by eating chocolates and canapes from as many stands as possible but you are weak. All this walking has made you hungry.

Why not grab an over-priced dry sandwich and a coke and not get change from 20 quid- OR spend 30 minutes waiting for a 6 inch Subway sandwich and not have anywhere to sit and eat it.

There’s always Pizza Express.. you have a voucher for that somewhere.. you check the small print.. ‘not valid in the Pizza Express you are currently standing next to.’ Of course its not. Dry sandwich it is.

A moment to contemplate the day so far.. and how long you can bear to stay for the afternoon..There’s a load of stands you haven’t seen, and you never know – THEY may have some good freebies.

3 hours later, laden with plasic bags and nothing in them apart from a mouse mat, pink stress ball and a badge. You make your way back to the exit.

Will you do it all again next year? OF COURSE you will!

Tags: exhibitions, london, rant, rick bronks, satureyes, seminars, trade shows

Read more | Comments (0) | March 9th, 2010

NEW STORE NOW OPEN

Posted by satureyes | Filed under personal, photos

It’s been a long time coming but I am please to announce that Satureyes now has an online store.

This will not only enable me to sell my personal work, but also offer clients the ability to have an online gallery with options for purchasing the images. ALL products come with FREE UK DELIVERY too!

I am able to offer the best quality printing onto different high quality papers, as well as onto canvas, perspex and wooden blocks.

The canvas, perspex and wooden block products are all incredibly high quality and the materials used are fantastic. Images look stunning and will last for hundreds of years.

I’m offering a coupon for £5 off your first order (of £10 or more) and this is for the whole of February.

Why not take a look HERE

For £5 off your first order please use coupon code FREEMONEY

Enjoy!

Tags: discount, online, open, photos, satureyes, store

Read more | Comments (0) | February 18th, 2010

No more FREE!

Posted by satureyes | Filed under personal, rants and moans, tweets

More and more the use of ’social media’ is becoming some sort of ‘bargaining chip’ to get free work.

I’ve noticed this becoming more of a trend in the event & creatives industry. I’ve had chats with a few people and it seems it’s not just me who has experienced this. Basically each month I have a load of people asking me for something and and they don’t want to pay for it. It usually is followed by a ‘promise’ of something in return.. ‘I’ll twitter about you’ or ‘I’ll put you on my website’. You get the idea.

Then there’s the ’showcase’ events. We all know these.. ‘If you give us a load of free stuff you can come to the event’ Promises of ‘exposure to new clients’ is a favourite one.

I had a great offer last year – In return for photographic coverage of an event, I was offered ‘membership’ of this collective of venues. I asked if this would enable me to be a preferred supplier to the venues- no it wouldn’t. I was offered the membership which had the cost of 1500 quid..but in return for this I had to do 1500 quids worth of work over the year for these people NOT including the event I was asked to shoot! What tosh.

I am known to be a bit of a grumpy old man, but think about how ridiculous this is. Imagine going into Tesco and telling them that you only want to pay 2 quid for a 10 quid product, or buying a DVD and telling them in HMV that you’ll talk about them on your blog. It’s just stupid!

Yet.. here we are in the event industry and it seems to be becoming the norm that clients ask us for something for nothing.. I don’t mean a discount (which I often give) but totally free.. and worse of all they think its totally fine to ask.

‘Can you throw in another 2 days shooting within the budget?’

‘Can you do it for 50 quid and some tweets?’

‘Can you do 10 days edit and we’ll pay you for 5?’

‘You have a camera, so can we borrow it for a shoot? You don’t need to be there. We’ll pick it up and return it the next day.’

The worst thing is that we are made to feel guilty if we decline the ‘offer’. It becomes OUR issue that the event can’t be shot, or covered, or catered for within the budget that the client has.

Why has this madness not been stopped? We all seem to get suckered in time after time.

Recently I did a video piece for a client. TOTALLY for free. I was promised the world in returns of PR, exposure (no pun intended) and getting my company name around the internet. This was a video for a campaign that was going to go places.. people will love it.. it will be all over the web, you’ll get press coverage, loads of hits to your site.

What do you think happened?

In short – they got a free viral that would have cost several thousand in pre and post production.. squeezed every ounce of patience out of me, then complained when I raised the issue that their campaign was a pile of piss and no one cared enough to even watch the film. 200 views on YouTube doesn’t constitute a successful campaign. I’d have got more hits in a videoof me dangling my testicles over a fence.

So good people my new years resolution is that I’m done with free. Its time we took a stand and did the same, or we will be perpetually made to feel guilty for not doing everything for nothing.

Wishing you all great business for 2010.

Here’s a video that sums it up perfectly.Enjoy!

Tags: business, corporate, events, free, photography, rick bronks, satureyes, video, viral, work, youtube

Read more | Comments (1) | January 6th, 2010

The revolution will not be televised (but it will be photographed)

Posted by satureyes | Filed under personal, photos, tweets

This week has seen me move into the wonderful world of wedding photography.

The main issue for me not doing this years ago was that it’s an area of photography steeped in mystery – especially for the clients. There’s a whole bunch of wedding photographers out there that really should not be there.. and certainly not charging what they charge for what is quite average work. So I’ve set out to revolutionise this, and I really didn’t feel comfortable being labelled as ‘one of them’

However, over the last 12 months I’ve seen my portfolio grow substantially with work for magazines, interiors food, live events and travel, I believe that the wedding world is ready for my new ideas!

I actually thought that a new wave of young creative photographers would have emerged onto the wedding scene by now but it seems not. On a recent trip to a photo expo in Birmingham I wandered around and noticed a LOT of wedding snappers there they generally were older chaps with their wives, meandering from booth to booth drooling at kit they would like to buy but probably not be able to operate. It didnt seem like the industry has moved on in years.

It’s absurd how some photographers operate. Just because you live with someone you automatically have the ability to absorb a skill set. We’ve all seen them – these photogs who bring their wives along on a job who stand there snapping away – either its an amazing co-incidence that the couple are BOTH pro-photographers.. perhaps they met at a local photographic club.. or perhaps they didn’t. More like they are over-charging and not actually having the skills to do the job. Does the wife of a cardiac surgeon assist her husband in the operating theatre? Of course not, so why does the wife of a photographer become a professional by proxy?

Much of the wedding photo world still bases itself on the fact that people who are organising weddings have buckets of cash to spend and they are VERY anxious about their photos and choosing the right person for the job – and quite right they should. Some prices that are being banded about are insane. Much of this is based on the vulnerability of people at a time in their lives where they are about to embark on a massive adventure.

What also gets me is the ‘extras’ such as the additional prints.. It harks back to the days when getting prints made was a time consuming process that needed many days or weeks to finish, so charging a premium for prints and not releasing the negatives was another way for the photographer to make some cash and covering his time and costs of getting prints done. I think this model needs to change. Its out as out dated as the people taking the images.

YOU pay for the photographer and their time.. YOU have a right to those images.. they are YOURS.. its outrageous that some photogs keep them and then charge and charge again for the prints. Its unfair, and greedy but its almost universally accepted. Why? Well because people don’t challenge it.

Many of my clients are more than happy to get their prints done themselves or on a canvas or in a photo-book that they can order online. Of course I offer the usual trimmings.. albums, canvases and other items of memorabilia but I believe that the client can get it done cheaper and think it better value for money that they do. I want to concentrate on my work as a photographer, not as a money leech for vulnerable folk.

My rule is simple. I Charge a fair and competitive price for the work – and offer the finished images in all their glory on a disk for the client afterwards. I process every image, select and sort, putting care into each one.This is how it should be. My corporate work follows the same model and all my clients come back to me tim and time again.

So.. here’s the offer.. for £750 I will shoot the WHOLE wedding (none of this running away at the cake cutting) up and including a good stint of the dancing. I will then process every image and all the useable ones will be available in their highest quality on a disk for you to keep. No hidden charges.. just great photos!

Feel free to drop me a line for more information

click here to email me for more information

Tags: moans, photos, rant, rick bronks, satureyes, wedding photography

Read more | Comments (0) | December 7th, 2009

Here’s a short I’ve just finished cutting…

Posted by satureyes | Filed under personal, video

Save the office party – have a lookiee see!

Tags: forcefed media, office, party, satureyes, save, viral campaign

Read more | Comments (0) | November 6th, 2009

It’s competition time!

Posted by satureyes | Filed under personal, tweets

Ok.. its rubbish weather, we all have swine flu, so I thought I would run a little competition for you all.

THE PRIZE: A gorgeous limited edition A3 print of your choice from any image on my website

THE CHALLENGE: ‘What is your visual ecstacy?’

Feel free to send the answers by twitter/email or however you like. Competition closes 12pm GMT on Friday August 7th.. so get thinking and WIN!

Winner will be announced on Tuesday 11th August

Good Luck!

Tags: competition, ecstacy, photo, satureyes, win

Read more | Comments (0) | July 29th, 2009

Olympus EP-1 – Hands on

Posted by satureyes | Filed under personal, photos, rants and moans

So, we got hold of a sample EP-1 for a project we’re working on and decided to take it out for a trip, to a huge rock concert at Wembley Stadium.

There’s been a lot of buzz about this camera, people really want to get their hands on it, and with good reason, it looks great and for many it harks back to the days gone by where cameras were used by real men who knew a little about how to shoot photos. If you’re interested in this camera you already know what it looks like – and you’ve read the reviews, so I thought I would offer a personal look at how the camera was to use, in a real life situation. There is no techie reasoning here.. no pixel peeping.. just little old me, a pro(ish) photographer looking to potentially invest in something nice to take on holiday.

When the kit arrived (the 14-42 lens kit) I looked at it and thought ‘why do i need MORE kit’ I spend the afternoon thinking about who this camera is aimed at.. where it sits in the market, and if there is indeed a market for it. I still dont have an answer. I have a couple of DSLR’s and the lovely Leica S-lux 4 so I think I’m pretty happy with my photo tools. I just don’t know who would be buying this camera. Its not cheap – around 6/700 quid with the lens, so its a pretty major investment for a keen amateur, and to add lenses to this you have to be making a fairly major commitment to the 4 thirds system, so for someone like me who has Canon kit, I’m not sure I’m ready to be getting a whole other kit.

I thought that if I owned one, then I would use it instead of a DSLR and then take it to more places where a DLSR cant go. Here’s the thing though – take the EP-1, a flash (there is not one built in) and a couple of lenses, and I’m pretty sure it will be in a similar size bag to a xxD and a lens (even if you make do with a built in flash on the Canons)

So.. that was the initial thoughts.. of course I’d not taken any photos yet. The menus seemed to befuddle me.. you can customize pretty much everything which lots of people will like. Personally I had to actually read the manual off the PDF because it was too much – not very intuitive. I realised how we take for granted a great UI until we encounter one that is a little too complex.

So home the camera went.. took some snaps around the home.. the usual – cat, kitchen, some hight ISO shots.. the ones we all take when we get a new camera and its too late to go out and shoot something. Popped the card into the Mac.. problem 1 – Aperture doesnt recognise the Olympus RAW file. It will in time, but its a brand new camera so you will be tied to the Olympus software if you want to use RAW. I then switched to RAW and JPEG just so I could see what the camera is capable of.

The day after…It was time to go to a huge rock concert at Wembley Stadium. I decided to leave my Dlux 4 at home and take a chance with a camera I didn’t feel 100% comfortable with. I like the idea of shooting some HD video there too (hell why not). I was really debating whether to take the EP-1 or not. I wanted to get some nice shots.. but I wanted to take something more compact. THIS I thought was the real reason why I would have one of these units.

Bravely (well I thought it was) I toddled off to the concert EP-1 in bag, excited about putting it to the test.

OK.. it wasn’t like I was in the press pen, so i could get some amazing photos of the band, but I wanted to put it to real life testing. The people I was with needed to take a decent photo of me when I hand them the camera, and it needed to take some pretty good photos if it’s to live up to the hype.

Long story short. It was a mixed bag of feelings. The focus didn’t work a lot of the time.. it ‘hunted’ in any mode apart from full Auto, and would not lock focus. Took the lens off.. cleaned the contacts.. reset the camera.. and well.. no use. No matter what I tried it just didnt want to play.

I shot some video – it looked nice. Put some of the fancy built in filters on it.. was fun.. but well nice but not something I feel the need for in a camera but nice to have.

Once the light went, then the only thing we could take photos of was the stage because it was so well lit. We needed a flash badly for snapping us having a good time. ISO3200 wasn’t great.

I still dont know. I am desperate to really like the camera. If felt great – a good weight to it and seemed it was going to be a no brainer. I just feel a little underwhelmed. I think for many they are in love with the the idea more than the actual practicality and real life usage.

I also think its possibly people lusting after a rangefinder camera (read: M8) who will try this.. but its not the same beast. No way.

I will give it some more go’s, but right now I am not sure. If i was gonna shell out 700/800 quid for some more kit I think I’d think about a new lens (or even a 50D body) and keep on with what I have. I just don’t understand the market for this camera. I’ve spend 3 days trying to think of who would use it and why, and still can’t. Perhaps its me being a little dumb.

I’ve posted some images.. JPEG’s straight from camera.. as they are, some with the effects..one is taken of me by a stranger. They have been shrunk to keep the size down.. thats about it..

As always, over to you. Comments people?