In mid January I was at the London Boat Show as a presenter and speaker for a series of demo’s and talks revolving around kayaking, my other life passion along side photography! It was incredible to once again spend time with a crew of passionate and motivated individuals, needless to say that around my work at the show I rarely put down the camera so here’s a glimpse of a few behind the scene images. Many thanks from myself and the kayaking community go to Rob harris for his continued dedication to presenting and promoting kayaking in such a professional show at London’s Excel Centre.

Enjoy

Ed

The last two months have been busy, with new clients coming into contact and gaining support from the Princes Trust (PSYBT), 2012 has potential to be a very exciting year. This is a quick post of a couple of images from a recent shoot for Davidson and Robertson Rural, for whom it was a pleasure to create a portrait of retired partner Michael Reid Thomas and PR images from a drinks evening in The New Club, Edinburgh.

Michael Reid Thomas. Lit specifically for a black and white photograph, to fit in on the board room wall alongside images of former partners dating back to the early 1900’s.

Drinks evening, third floor of The New Club, Edinburgh.

Other shoots soon.

Ed

Despite the weather warnings, a couple of friends and myself tried to get out of Glasgow to the highlands today. We ended up stuck on a section of road that was blocked by an overturned lorry at one end and a cluster of fallen trees at the other. With a queue of traffic behind us, around eight people chipped in to clear the trees with a couple of experienced tree surgeons and a JCB… the road was re-opened within just over an hour.

Ed

Canal Culture update

I’ve been going up to the Forth and Clyde canal over the last couple of weeks getting to know some of the people who regularly use it and document the diversity of this area. The project is going to be a long-term body of work, to make sure I have images that hold weight from all seasons, in all conditions and of people from all social backgrounds as is the reality of the place. Just now it’s getting quiet due to some bad weather but never the less I’m finding the area a great source of inspiration. So many satellite communities provide an abundance of variety that new project ideas have come to light, which I hope to engage with fully in the New Year after contacts have been made and research done.

My most recent update to the website is a portraiture portfolio - http://www.edsmithphotography.com/portraits.php. It’s an aspect of photography that I love… trying to capture character, whether it be in two minutes or two hours it’s always a rewarding challenge. So as it’s an area of the industry that I hope to direct and base a lot of my work in the future, it seemed silly not to have a broader range of these images online, presented separately to my documentary work. Out with a photo-story, looking at very separate individuals and images, it was hard to choose a close set that presented a range of work and in the end I couldn’t help including two favourite portraits from my documentaries! Making up for this there are some images which have never been shown on this blog or website in the past, and even more scarce there are some which have not been seen by friends and colleagues from Falmouth University!

A few months ago I started photographing on the Forth and Clyde Canal, just north of Glasgow’s city centre. Using the towpath as a running route, I was inspired by the connection it created between people on the canal side, it’s banks representing an area of common ground which breaks down social barriers and becomes a community in its own right. Constantly fluctuating through minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and so on, this transient community exists as a perception of the liminal with a character that shifts and and evolves like that of a weather system.

This is an ongoing body of work which will evolve over the coming months.

Having been dedicated to working in colour for my last couple of projects, it’s been a while since I put a roll of B/W film through my camera, the last of which produced this shot (below)… A single image which gained the title White Shadows during a memorable class with former tutor, and B/W master, Yiorgos Nikiteas. The image was taken in the early hours of the morning, a bit blury eye’d having just driven from Scotland to Cornwall.

Settling back into Glasgow life where there’s loads of street photography to be done, perhaps time to order some B/W film!

Ed

The full series of On These Isles will be added to my website soon, keep an eye out in the Portfolio section…

Some great news came through at the end of last week that I’ve been selected as a winner in the Magenta Foundation’s Emerging Photographer of 2011 award. I’m excited about the result, which I’ve had little chance to celebrate as the end of uni is near with final hand-in being less than a month away! I’ve scanned a few new negatives from my project ‘On These Isles’ - images below - which arrived from the lab yesterday… more to come soon as the final negs of the series will be processed tomorrow!

Hope you enjoy!

Ed

Since the last update of images from my current work On These Isles, which focuses on daily life on the Scottish Small Isles, I have spent another couple of weeks between the Isle of Muck and Isle of Eigg. While Eigg is community owned, Muck is laird owned so traveling between the two gives a great contrast and having previously got to know everyone, it was a great trip back to these islands which are starting to feel like a second home. Also good news… I woke up today with an email to say I am the recipient of a sponsored place to attend the Celtic Media Festival, at Stornoway between the 13th and 15th of April. This project has a lot more to come as this festival marks a broadening of boundaries while my interest also looks towards the concept of what can be classed as an island. Enjoy some of the new images below, over Easter I’ll be working on a photo-film incorporating this series with sounds and interviews from the Isles. As for developing the project around the Scottish Isles in the near future, I’m looking at North Uist as an intriguing next stop!

More soon, Ed