I am have a relaxing break in British Columbia, Canada – Last week, I was in Vancouver and the weather was typically for this time of year and rained a fair amount. I still managed to get out and take some photographs built not as many as I would have liked.

This week, I am up in the mountains at Sun Peak Resort which is near to Kamloops and about 5 hours drive from Vancouver. I am of course here to ski but have taken one of my cameras out with me and shot some stuff around the village. The shoot to the right is a view from the house I am staying in. The skiing is fantansic but it is not that easy to both ski and photograph things.

I still need to complete my post processing and plan on adding some of these pictures to one of my galleries next week.

Chris is a gifted photographer who has decided to embark in a Project 365 this year. Please check out Chris Ballard’s 365 Project and follow his progress as he capture a different images every day for a year – in fact because it is a leap year, it will be 366 project.

For once, I finally agree with the judges decision on the winner, Daniel Beltra from Spain for “Still life in oil”. This image is an excellent portrait of pelicans covered in crude oil as the result of the BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill in April 2010. This image is one of six images in the portfolio that also won Daniel the Wildlife Photojournalist Award for 2011.

There were two interesting things that I noted looking round the exhibits; (i) only one photograph was not taken with Canon or Nikon camera and (ii) only one image was captured on film – not the same image.

The only disappointment was that the images are displayed digitally and are not prints. The displays are very very good and I am sure they had been correctly calibrated. This seems to make some sense given that all but one image was captured on digital cameras, but I would have preferred prints.

Now I have to review and post process the images we created which is likely to take me the next week or so. From an initial look at the images, it is going to be another shoot which it is difficult to pick a relative small number of favourites. To go with this post, I have post processed a single images from the beginning of the shoot.

There are a lot of people in Trafalgar Square watching various acts on the stage and In the streets around China town, there are a number of food stalls outside the shops and restaurants alongside the queues to get into the restaurants. Along Gerrard Street, there were chinese dragons bringing New Year greetings to each shop or restaurant along the street. It was so busy that photographing the dragons was challenging – I know what it may be like for the press photographers.

Yesterday, I was back in the studio for the first time this year and it has been about two months since my last studio shoot. December is always a busy month leading up to Christmas and catching up with friends … plus I used my spare time to catch up with some of my post processing too.

This was the third shoot that I have done with a fabulous model, Carolyna. Having a professional model who is easy and fun to work with always makes a shoot much easier and dramatically increases the quality of the resulting images. I am looking to explore some different lighting combinations including the use of coloured gels to produce different images with both colours and shades.

I have spend a fair amount of today post processing which is going to take me some time as I shot a huge number of frames. When I have completed the selection and retouching, I will post some of them but in the meantime here is one of the images in this blog.

After such a great shoot, I hope to be working with Carolyna again.

I don’t have any more shoots planned for 2011 and am starting to think about my shoot schedule for 2012 as well as the themes for future shoots. I would like to do more location shoots but this will have to wait until the spring when the weather gets better. If you are interested in modelling for me them please feel free to email me.

I have been struggling to keep up with my post processing over the summer with lots of studio and event shoots every week. I know it is entirely my fault and I have just about managed it with the exception of two particular shoots – Laos & Cambodia and London Pride.

Well I have finally managed to complete my London Pride 2011 gallery which brought make many happy memories of an absolutely fantastic day back in July. It was a beautiful sunny day with the streets of London packed with happy people who enjoyed being photographed.

If you like my work the please feel free to contact me.