Path building by helicopter on the North Norfolk coast
In a first for Norfolk’s Coast Path today a helicopter was airlifting heavy path building materials on Beeston Bump/Hill at Sheringham on behalf of the Norfolk County Council Trails team. I popped along to get some shots for the local press and was amazed by the speed of the operation. This pilot, for Skyhook Helicopters, certainly knew his craft, it was a very efficient process from collecting the one ton bags to depositing them at various stages along the hill.
Below are a few shots and a short video showing some footage I filmed. Please excuse the soundtrack, I couldn’t help myself!
Norfolk Property Photography – a high-end start to the year
It’s been a very busy start to the year with various property photography commissions and there have been some really incredible places for me to shoot.
I enjoy property photography, I have a system and a gear set-up that I know will get the results I want time after time, I get to see some amazing houses and inspiring interiors. My work as a property photographer is pretty much split 50:50 between shooting for estate agents and photographing holiday homes. The basic principles are the same in that I need to make the rooms look bright & inviting, cosy or airy, spacious & welcoming but with estate agents it’s all about enticing people to book a viewing. Unless there are specific fixtures and fittings that will be sold with the house it’s mostly about the wide shots of the rooms, a few exteriors and if appropriate some aerial photographs to show the grounds and location.
With holiday property photography it is obviously important to still get those wide angle shots of the rooms but I also make a point of getting lots of ‘Detail Shots’, or cameos, of the various features which give the property it’s character. For the Detail Shots I generally use a 50mm lens with a wide aperture (usually around F2.2) to get a nice shallow depth of field (you know, a blurry background!) sorry, I’ll try to avoid getting too technical here.
Below are a few of the properties so far this year (is it really March already?!) which really stood out for me.
The first is Thatched Barn in Mundesley which I photographed for a regular client of mine: Arnolds Keys. Thatched Barn is a beautifully refurbished 4 bedroom barn conversion available for a cool £670K, check it out on RightMove here.
Next up is Liberty House in Suffolk, they don’t have a website built quite yet for the holiday let but as you will see from below it is a huge and stunningly decorated property with extensive grounds and even has it’s own private indoor swimming pool! What an amazing place.
The next property in this post is Tolly House in Wells-Next-The-Sea, a bright & airy holiday property in the town of Wells, maybe not quite as extravagant as some of the other properties featured here but a lovely place to stay for a holiday in North Norfolk nonetheless…
The property below was a real treat to photograph, this time for a new estate agency to me – The Norfolk Agency. Verona House at Ashwicken is a beautiful home, built and lovingly furnished by the current owners. As previously mentioned, since it is a sale property I didn’t do too much in the way of detail shots, so these are just wide room shots but you can see what a lovely place this is…
Keeping on the theme of amazing holiday lets check out this place below. What a stunner! This property is Barn Drift on the North Norfolk coast near Cley. A 7 bedroom 18th century barn conversion decorated and furnished to the very highest standard. Obviously this was taken in winter and I should be heading back in late spring/summer to get some more flattering shots of the exterior, gardens and aerial shots from the drone but the photo below gives a good idea of the unique location of this property right on the coast at Cley.
Wye House, below, is a property I photographed for another regular client, the lovely Susie Hartley. Susie manages (and owns) a number of very high spec properties on the North Norfolk coast and the renovation of this holiday let in Blakeney had literally just been completed when I arrived to do the photography. As with all of Susie’s properties, Wye House has been developed with such care & attention to detail. It’s an absolute pleasure to photograph properties for Susie as I know they will always be beautiful. I have the easy job of going in once all the hard work and thought has been put into making these houses look amazing, I just have to capture all that amazingness as well as I can for the rest of the world to see!
Just look at this bathroom! How cool is that wallpaper?!
Last but not least is a charming little holiday cottage I photographed today in Sheringham for another regular client of mine, Mark Ashby. Kits Beck is in a great location close to the town & beach in Sheringham with off-road parking spaces for two cars (important in the busy summer season!) and again decorated and furnished to a really high standard. I was there today for a refresh of a few of the rooms that have recently had an update but I still thought it was worth including on here as it’s such a charming little holiday cottage.
Mark, the letting manager was kind enough to write me a glowing testimonial recently…
“It’s simple: Great photographs absolutely sell holiday properties. I’ve been lucky enough to work with Chris over the past few years and he has provided me with fantastic photography for four of our holiday homes here in beautiful North Norfolk. I know, from the feedback from guests and the immediate impact on bookings, that our investment in professional photography has paid absolute dividends and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend Chris to any holiday home owner”
So there’s a few of the properties I’ve been lucky enough to photograph in & around Norfolk & Suffolk so far in January & February this year. If you are looking for a Norfolk holiday property photographer then please do drop me a line to discuss the options. I use a very simple pricing structure and guarantee a 24 hour turnaround time to provide the finished high resolution image files after photographing the property.
Good quality, professional interior photographs are essential to market properties whether for selling or letting. Many of my clients remark on what a big difference they see in viewings and bookings after uploading my photos to their websites. For the sake of a fully booked cottage or a quicker house sale it’s a small investment to make.
Snow Day! Making the most of the first decent snowfall in Norfolk in years
I don’t often post up family shots here in my business blog but we had a great day today and got some lovely shots so I thought I’d share a few.
Between myself and my partner Leanne we have 5 children so we get to be big kids ourselves as often as we like but we haven’t had a decent snowfall here in North Norfolk for a good few years. Five maybe? Possibly more.
So when we woke up this morning to see a good 3-4inches of snow had fallen and the schools were closed we grabbed all the warm gear and headed out to make the most of it. We spent the morning making snowmen, an igloo, a snow cat and hurling snowballs at each other. After an hour thawing out, drinking hot chocolate & having some lunch we got kitted up again (warm from the tumble drier!) and headed up to the golf course/cliffs at Sheringham for some sledging.
The conditions in the wind were pretty much Siberian, with bitter blizzards blowing across in the 45mph winds but we found some good runs in the shelter of Skelding Hill and spent the next few hours hurling ourselves down on various contraptions. It was so much fun! Here’s a few photos of our twice in a decade afternoon….
Kate & Tom – a wedding in Ireland
In October last year we headed over to Ireland to photograph the wedding of Katie & Tom – Katie is a Norfolk lass and Tom a Cork lad so the Norfolk contingent got to sample the Emerald Isle’s hospitality and plenty of the black stuff!
The resort at Castlemartyr was beautiful, surrounded by woodland and horses put out to pasture. Unfortunately, it being October in Ireland it was pretty wet & windy for most of the time, thanks to ‘Storm Brian’ so we didn’t get to take many photos outside but we made the most of it and an amazing day was had by all.
The day’s coverage started in the presidential suite, no less, previous occupants include actual presidents of the United States, films stars, musical legends and Kim Kardashian & Kanye West! On this day the occupants were far more important though – our bride Katie, mother of the bride Sue and Katie’s bridesmaids Leila, Ellie, Jess & Carina.
I’ve got a bit of a crazy day today (nothing new there) so will let the photos do the talking but I’d like to say a huge thank you to Katy & Tom and their families for their wonderful hospitality and for inviting me to be their photographer at this amazing event. As much as I really love the beautiful and varied wedding venues in Norfolk and Suffolk it is always great to get away & shoot somewhere totally new.
If you are planning a destination wedding and would like this Norfolk boy to do your wedding photography please do drop me a line, apart from accommodation & travel it doesn’t cost much more than I would charge to shoot a wedding in Norfolk and I know how much people prefer to have a photographer that they can trust!
The 2018 Scira Viking Festival in Sheringham
Last weekend saw the annual Scira Viking Festival held in Sheringham. The festival is the brainchild of amazing Sheringham-based artist and all round lovely chap Colin Seal. If you’ve been to Sheringham in the last 5 years (at least) you’ll have seen Colin’s beautiful murals adorning the town & seafront. The viking festival has gone from strength to strength with 2018 being it’s 4th year and hailed by many as it’s best year yet.
In a change from recent years the vikings vs anglo saxons battles were held on the beach and it was an amazing spectacle to behold, the sun shone, the crowds filled the promenade for a front row view and the re-enactment chaps beat the living squit out of each other! Centrepiece for the festival each year is a handmade replica viking ship which Colin and his merry band lovingly build and paint over the preceding months only to then burn it to the ground at the end of the festival! Seems a shame but what an amazing sight.
This year Colin had asked me to capture some shots and video using the drone and since I had recently gained my CAA Night Flying permissions it was a great opportunity to see what the drone could do at night. Actually it wasn’t quite night, more twilight. Owing to the early evening high tide the burning had to be brought forward by an hour or so which actually helped the filming as it meant we had a bit more ambient light to work with.
Below is a short film I put together for the Viking Festival organisers…
Happy Tuesday – a lovely card from Pip & Wil!
Last August I had the pleasure of photographing the wedding of Pip & Wil at the wonderful Cley Mill.
It was a real pleasure to work with Pip & Wil and to meet their families, the sun shone and they had an amazing and unforgettable day. Pip & Wil were kind enough to email me shortly after the wedding to say how much they loved their wedding photos and left me a glowing Google Review so it was a lovely surprise to receive another card from them today, six months later, to say how much they still loved their wedding photos and custom-designed album.
I’m not sure that I had a chance to actually blog any of their photos at the time so thought now would be a good time to share some of their wedding images, some excepts from their thank you card are included below too…
“The more we look at our albums and photos, the more we appreciate the amazing job you did for us”
“You really captured our wedding day”
“We are just thrilled with the result!”
“Everyone who has seen the album is just blown away”
“We are so appreciative of your friendliness and professionalism”
“We couldn’t recommend you more”
So there it is, a little splash of sunshine on a drizzly February Tuesday, thank you again to Pip & Wil for your lovely gesture, it really is appreciated.
For more information about how you can book me to photograph your perfect wedding day at Cley Windmill please see my Norfolk wedding photography info page here.
Now accepting Bitcoin payments – Norfolk photographer looks to the future
As of today I am pleased to say I will be accepting cryptocurrency payments for my photography services.
Using Coinbase‘s new Merchant Payment system I will be accepting Bitcoin, Ethereum or Litecoin payments for my wedding photography and commercial photography commissions.
Over the past couple of months I’ve become really interested in cryptocurrencies and despite their current volatility I can see that they are the future of banking. I’ve personally invested in BTC, ETH and a number of altcoins and although we did see a significant dip (a crash some would say!) in late January, I believe over the future the long term for cryptocurrencies has amazing potential.
If you are planning your wedding and would like to pay in BTC/ETH/LTC please let me know, it’s a very simple process – all you need is a Coinbase account.
If you are interested in getting involved in cryptocurrencies and would like to open a Coinbase account simple follow this link and we’ll both get $10 when you open your account! https://www.coinbase.com/join/5a5fe6c7e115a7011fd4537c
If there is enough interest I may produce a blog post explaining how to go about buying bitcoin and even trading in altcoins. It certainly isn’t without risk but the potential to make huge returns on relatively small investments is definitely there!
Recommended by Glemham Hall – a stunning wedding venue in Suffolk
I received a lovely email from Donna at Glemham Hall today to let me know that their new website is up & running and what a stunning looking site it is. Lovely design, clean layout, great typography and the images aren’t too shabby either!
I’m proud to be one of their recommended suppliers but even prouder that one of my shots has been used for not only their full screen homepage image but also for the top banner on their Suffolk Weddings page and a fair few of the shots on the Weddings Gallery. So good to see the images I work so hard to produce being presented on such a lovely website.
Glemham Hall is a stunning venue, I’ve shot a few weddings there over the years and it’s always worth the trip over the Norfolk/Suffolk border. Glemham Hall is also the venue for the fantastic FolkEast music festival which we went to a couple of years ago, highly recommended!
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How I help people make more money and find the perfect holiday!
I’ve been developing and honing my property photography techniques over the last 13 years with great results. Commissioned by many of Norfolk’s most successful estate agents and tourist accommodation providers, it’s an area of my photography business which has seen huge growth as the potential for online booking has been realised.
It’s well known that many For Sale properties suffer from poor photography, sometimes even using photos taken on mobile phones, no wonder those properties don’t get many viewings!
There are some lovely holiday properties in great locations around East Anglia, sitting empty for all but the ‘high-season’ and clearly not maximising the potential rent that they could be generating. Again this is often down to a website with dingy, poorly shot photographs.
“After updating my websites with the photos by Chris I had more than 20% increase in enquiries with most converting to bookings. Busy periods could now get booked three times over, it’s made a huge difference. Thank you Chris, amazing!” Lisa Broch, Bliss Blakeney
High quality photography can elevate a simple website to create a captivating and professional shop window which brings in more clients and more income.
This is especially true with property photography where poorly produced photos can instantly turn-off potential customers.
A one-off payment for professional photography is an investment which can generate many, many more times the initial fee in sales and bookings.
In short I help people make more money!
• Estate Agents – Crisp, bright and welcoming photographs bring more people to visit a property, the increased interest & demand reduces the sale time and often leads to a higher sale price.
• Holiday Lets – Images which clearly and accurately show the rooms, location of the property and the details which give a house it’s character can significantly increase bookings throughout the year. A fully booked property means demand is great which in turn can offer the potential for increasing prices in following years. The holidaymakers have a clear idea of the location and style of property they are booking so they can pick the property best suited to their needs and have a great holiday. Everybody wins!
For my Norfolk property photography I take great care to ensure that the building is best represented from all angles, including exterior shots of the property, crisp, bright interior images and, if required, some aerial shots showing the grounds and surrounding area (all included in the shoot fee).
Over the years I have developed a system of techniques, settings and specialist equipment which allow me to produce great results every time, even in the smallest, darkest of country cottages!
Below is a brief description of what I look for in each of the areas…
Exteriors
One of the key elements of taking good exterior property images is to minimise the keystone effect (where the building appears to get thinner at the top when photographed from eye-level) it ensures that all verticals run parallel and horizontal lines are level. To do this it is necessary to have the camera pointing square at the building and raised up from eye level (usually at about 10ft off the ground). The light on the building is obviously critical too so knowing the aspect in advance allows us to plan the shoot at a time to benefit from the sun’s position.
Photographs of the gardens and grounds of a property are important, these also require the right weather & light. Time of year is a consideration to ensure flower beds & foliage are looking their best although I often find that owners contact me because they want photos doing asap and this is often in the first few months of the year. The solution is to book a shoot to capture the interiors, (diffused winter/spring/autumn light can be good for this with a more even balance of light between inside & out) and some exterior shots so they have some to use on the site even though the gardens may not be looking their best. I then head back in late spring/summer to get better exterior & aerial shots to replace the winter ones when the place is really looking it’s finest.
“Chris confirms the theory that you get what you pay for! We used to try and capture our locations on a shoestring and although the results were OK, the service Chris offers as a specialist is in another league. Combine with this a flexible approach, quick turnarounds, a really good eye for matching images with what the location is trying to portray and you have a winning formula. I would not hesitate to recommend Chris.” Iain Wilson, (Beachside apartments, Byfords, The Pigs at Edgefield, Norwich Assembly House, The Kings Head Holt, SPONGE, The Dial House Reepham, Back To Your Place and The Ffolkes).
Interiors
Photographing rooms to look bright, warm, cosy/airy and inviting is definitely an art and I have a number of techniques I use to best capture the ambience of a room without resorting to complex, drawn-out lighting set-ups. My method ensures that the true atmosphere of the room is captured while also showing as much of the room as possible from the best angles. As well as the wide shots I like to photograph the details and features which make each property unique. I find these images can really help capture the feel of a room/building which isn’t possible through wide shots alone. Looking for interesting angles and using a shallow depth of field these shots can really help a holiday property website stand out from the crowd.
Aerial Images
Using my drones I am able to offer aerial images of property & grounds at no additional fee. Aerial photography can be particularly useful to show the full boundary of the property (using plan views and oblique angles) and aerial images from a higher altitude clearly demonstrate the surrounding area and proximity to beaches, countryside or amenities.
I am fully licensed (PFCO) and insured for commercial aerial operations by the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), my specialist Norfolk aerial photography and video website is here – Aerovisuals.co.uk
Fee
I offer a simple rate for photographing properties starting at an hourly rate of £200 p/h (pro rata if extra time required), moving up to half and full day rates (supplied on request). No VAT payable.
The fee includes:
• Supply of the finished high resolution image files supplied via Dropbox with no usage restrictions.
• Images supplied just a few days after the shoot, if required urgently a one off fast-track optional fee (£100) will guarantee delivery of the full set of images within 24hrs of the shoot.
• All images resized & optimised ready for web usage if required
Smaller 2/3 bed properties with 2 reception rooms & 2 bathrooms (as an example) can generally be photographed inside & out (exteriors, grounds & aerial) within 1.5-2hrs, sometimes less but I would rather quote higher & come in less than the other way round!
Previous clients
Businesses that have used my property photography service include estate agents Arnolds Keys, Waterside Estate Agents and Brown & Co), The Dialhouse, Byfords, The Pigs (Edgefield), The Assembly House in Norwich, Chaucer Barn, Voewood, Blakeney House, Home Farm Cottages, North Norfolk Escapes and many more. A gallery of some recent North Norfolk properties I have photographed is here.
“We at Arnolds Keys have been delighted to use the services of Chris Taylor Photo. His attention to detail is superb and clients love his relaxed approach to a highly professional service. The quality of the photography is unsurpassed and Chris has the natural skill to pick out features of a property that enhances saleability.
We have used his services with our Collection branding to great effect and, where necessary Chris has used his drone to show angles of a property otherwise unseen. This collaboration has been invaluable to us.”
Clive Hedges, Residential Partner Arnolds Keys.
If you’d like more information please email Chris at info@christaylorphoto.co.uk or call on 01263 821589 / 07941009745
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Introducing Aquavisuals – professional imaging to the marine industry
I’m always looking to adapt, improve and find new ways to further my business. If I’m not innovating then I would stagnate and that’s as bad as moving backwards as far as I’m concerned! This constant drive has led to the introduction of two new websites alongside my main social & commercial photography site (christaylorphoto.co.uk).
In 2014 I qualified as a commercial drone pilot with the CAA and launched Aerovisuals – offering aerial photography and video throughout Norfolk and the UK. It’s brought me some amazing commissions and experiences and I became the world’s first RNLI accredited drone operator. Taking off & landing a drone from the foredeck of a Tamar All-weather lifeboat when the boat is drifting with the tide & wind, pitching & rolling on the swell and the drone is wavering in the wind takes some nerve!
I’ve also become a BBC Approved Supplier for aerial video footage and had work featured on various BBC programs including The One Show, Saving Lives at Sea, The Politics Show and national & local BBC news. I’ve had work published in the Daily Telegraph, The Times & Mail Online and had video featured on Sky News, ITN national news and on Channel 5’s extreme weather programs twice.
The new angles and opportunities the drones offer has transformed what I can provide my clients, not only media/press jobs but so much more. Aerial photography has become invaluable for property photography – imagine you have a holiday home near the coast and can now have aerial photos/video on your website to show potential clients just how close you are without having to hire a real helicopter & pilot! At weddings I will often put the drone up for a few quick shots to provide that general view shot (GV), all important in storytelling as an opening shot to set the scene. I’ve done roof surveys for people within an hour, cutting out the time, expense & inconvenience of having scaffolding on their house, filmed hole-by-hole aerial fly-by’s at golf courses (always reminds me of the golf video games where you can fly over each hole before playing it!). The list goes on but I won’t bore you as this post was supposed to be about my newest site – Aquavisuals which I’ll come to next.
Aquavisuals is a new line in my business aimed specifically at the marine industry. It offers high-quality, professional photography & filmmaking to sailing organisations, boat manufacturers, coastal leisure companies and more. Basically any business connected to/using the sea.
I have always loved the water, being on it, in it, near it and I really enjoy any shoots I have on the coast, especially if they involve being on boats!
Combining my photography and the sea can only be a good thing for me and they always say ‘do what you know’ and ‘do what you love’. I sailed on Barton Broad at school in the summers, have a degree in marine biology, been RNLI lifeboat crew here at Sheringham since 2000, own two boats myself (plus two kayaks, does that make it four boats?!) and enjoy surfing, scuba diving, mackerel fishing and beachcombing so it was a bit of a no-brainer to take my business in a nautical direction.
Aquavisuals was launched a couple of weeks ago, and already 2018 has been a fruitful year with lots of projects in the pipeline. We went to the London Boat Show in early January & made some good contacts, I’ve been in conversation, through a mutual friend, with the official photographer of the Land Rover BAR America’s Cup racing team which has been invaluable. We have an apartment booked right by the yacht club for Cowes Week this year and plans are in place for a spot on the media boats which will awesome! I also have dates booked to photograph some local boat-building businesses and this Thursday I’m off to photograph and film a local rowing club who make their own boats.
For more information on my marine photography please visit my Aquavisuals site but fear not, this doesn’t mean I’m not going to be photographing weddings in the future, it’s just a side-line which I hope will bring me some swashbuckling new adventures on the high seas!
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