London photo shoot with Anastasia | Gavin Conlan UK Wedding & Portrait Photographer based in Essex | www.gavinconlan.com

A couple of weeks ago being the hardcore people we are we planned a little shoot around the Embankment/Southbank area of London.  It maybe wasn't the greatest idea to shoot next to the River Thames as the wind chill factor was really and I mean REALLY cold.... I think it took a couple of days just for my hands to thaw out and warm back up...

Besides from the cold and grim weather on the day we had a great laugh and managed to capture a lot of images that I love, below is a selection of images from the shoot (thank god for that warmish stairwell), I hope you enjoy the results....

All images were shot with either available light or daylight balanced video lights with occasional use of a nikon speedlight for some back lighting.

Ps... big thanks to Anastasia for braving the weather...

PPs... big thanks to ME for not moaning much...

Portrait Photography at Avalon Shoreditch, London | Gavin Conlan Essex Wedding & Portrait Photographer | www.gavinconlan.com | www.londonspeedlitescene.co.uk

This was my second meet up with the awesome LSS (London Speedlite Scene) group this time at the trendy Avalon bar in Shoreditch, London.  The meet up was massive loads of photographers/models/make up artists all in one place it was really hard not to get carried away with it all.  

I really had to limit myself with what I wanted to shoot otherwise I'd of had months of processing work to do afterwards, but there were so many models I didn't get the opportunity to work with but hopefully that chance will come on future meet ups.... 

All the models were again provided by Elect Model Management and MUA's by Intense Make-up Artists both agencies were formed out of London Speedlite Scene

http://www.intensemua.com/

http://www.elect-models.com/

http://www.londonspeedlitescene.co.uk/

Location - http://avalonshoreditch.com/

If you missed my images from the first LSS meet up I attended at Ingatestone Hall you can view them here, otherwise please enjoy my Avalon selection....

Lingerie shoot in Essex from a few years back | Gavin Conlan UK Wedding & Portrait Photographer | www.gavinconlan.com

As I mentioned previously I've been going through some of my old shoots and re-editing them to co-inside with my latest post processing techniques.

This shoot is approx 3 to 4 years old and it was the first time I had ever shot lingerie, it shot at home back in the day before I owned the Lastolite Hi-lite background. I ended up using a white cloth background in the dining room held together with cloth pegs to capture the "studio" style shots.  

I've never been that keen on shooting in a studio environment there's just something about location shooting that I love and the challenges it can bring.  The outdoor shots were all taken in the woods near my house, we found this great tree trunk that had been cut down and decided to use it as the prop (as you can see :).  

Looking back now I wish I had taken more variations of this location but I remember at the time I was so concentrating on the lighting that I just got carried away....

I have never used any of these images until today they have sat gathering dust on my harddrives, that's the thing with digital photography if your not careful images just get lost on drives.

Anyway I really hope you enjoy viewing them.  All shots were lit using nikon speedlights shot through umbrellas and a ezybox softbox, daylight and captured on my nikon D200 camera....

Romantic Portraiture in Venice, Italy | Gavin Conlan UK Wedding & Portrait Photographer | www.gavinconlan.com

Venice is an amazing place quite possibly my most favourite place in the world it's a photographers dream.  I've been lucky enough to spend quite a lot of time here in the past and have built up a large image library although I still need to see the place in the snow and when it's underwater.  

I am currently in the process of updating all the imagery on my website (finally!) and as I was sifting through my photographs it made me think about re-editing some of my favourite images taken over the last few years. What started as a cool idea has led to hours of work (i'm not complaining one bit) to take some of my favourites and give them a total make over, using some of my new and current styles of post production techniques it has breathed new life into them.  

I hope you enjoy these pictures; once I'm finally up-to-date with my work I am going to start posting before and after images to show you how my techniques have evolved over the years.

Portrait Photography at Ingatestone Hall, Essex www.gavinconlan.com | www.londonspeedlitescene.co.uk

A couple of weeks ago I attended my first London Speedlite Scene meet up, I've followed the group for a while now on facebook and they put together fantastic monthly meet ups.  The Ingatestone Hall meet up was perfect for me being fairly close to where I live and by the fact that I've wanted to do a shoot there for a long time.

I honestly didn't know what to expect from the day I went there with a completely open mind and my god it was awesome, everyone made me feel really welcome and it was such a great laugh.  The LSS put so much effort into these meet ups and whether your a photographer, model or Make Up Artist/Stylist you get so much out of it - everyone was awesome.... 

A HUGE thank you to all the models and make up artists because without all your efforts nothing would be possible. The models were provided by Elect Model Management and MUA's by Intense Make-up Artists both agencies formed out of the London Speedlite Scene, please check out the links below;

http://www.intensemua.com/

http://www.elect-models.com/

http://www.londonspeedlitescene.co.uk/

I've put together a selection of my images from the day, I hope you enjoy them.  If you would like to view more then you can do so via my facebook fan page http://www.facebook.com/gavinconlanphotography.

I really can't wait until January's meet up, the location looks amazing in Shoreditch and it'll be great to catch up with everyone again.