Norfolk Photographer – a summer round up of my photography & filmmaking
As the dust settles on another incredibly packed summer I have time again to update the blog with some posts of what I’ve been photographing and filming over the last few months.
I’ve photographed lots of lovely Norfolk weddings which I’ll be sharing soon as separate blog posts but I thought I’d do a bit of a mash-up of the other stuff I’ve been photographing on our beautiful North Norfolk coastline.
This year has been a special year for Wells RNLI as they celebrate 150 years of having a station at Wells. I headed over there in early summer to get some drone shots of their boats in action and again on the day of their regatta to document the getting-together of a number of historic lifeboats…
In early June I headed to the Worstead Estate to photograph their Wagyu herd and to sample some of the produce. I was quite excited as I’d never tried Wagyu beef before. We enlisted the talented Alex Firman aka Alex Chef to prepare various dishes to show off the meat and I can confirm that it was incredible!
This year I joined Norfolk Constabulary as a Police Support Volunteer (PSV) to help out on the Police boats operating in the North Norfolk harbours of Wells, Morston & Blakeney. They needed people with boating experience and I guess my 19 years on the crew at RNLI Sheringham probably helped! We’ve had a few interesting trips out on the boat, one night launch on which we noticed the bow & stern waves glowing bright blue with bio luminescence, an absolute treat to see! Below is a blurry shot of it – pretty hard to get a sharp shot in virtual darkness on a moving boat but hopefully it shows the beautiful colour of this natural phenomenon.
I’ve had loads of interesting video commissions this year including some for the Deep History Coast project – a great initiative to promote the North Norfolk coast’s rich collection of finds and prehistoric past. One of the film commissions for the project required a helicopter flight along the length of the coast to capture the full length of the Deep History Coast. I had spoken Alistair MacKinnon, a local business-owner and helicopter pilot/owner, in the past about helicopter flights so we got in contact and arranged the flight.
Below are some shots and a short behind-the-scenes film of the flight, Leanne came along to film some footage of me doing my thing, what a great experience!
My home town of Sheringham has had a rocky summer season due to the well-publicised sinkhole which opened up in the high street right at the start of the summer. I decided it would be interesting to see what it looked like from above so one morning took the drone over the hole for some photos & video. These were the only aerial shots taken of the hole while it existed and generated some press interest. The hole was finally filled in & the road re-opened just as the schools went back at the end of the summer holidays and many local businesses suffered, let’s hope it’s all sorted now and we don’t see any more appearing.
…a more natural subsidence happened just along the coast as a huge cliff fall at Sidestrand took place. It was captured in some incredible footage by fellow photographer Brad Damms, I have to say I was very envious of him seeing it actually happen but I consoled myself with some aerial shots of the aftermath which again made the local newspapers.
I’ve also been busy making a series of short films for Visit North Norfolk, showing some of the fabulous attractions that North Norfolk has to offer, I won’t post them all up here but this is one of my favourites…Sea for Adventure….
I’ve been photographing at Sheringham Golf Club for a few years now. I enjoy golf course photography, captured in the right light they can look really beautiful, especially such a special links course as Sheringham. This shoot was more to show some of the lady members in action and the hardworking greens staff working their magic but we still got some shots showing the majesty of Sheringham Golf course, I may be biased but this is the most stunning course I have ever played on….
One project that has taken more time to shoot than any other this year has been the incredible Bacton & Walcott Sandscaping project – a £22 million initiative involving 1.8 million cubic metres of sand being pumped onto the beaches to protect the coastline from further coastal erosion. The pumping ran from early July to mid-August and was a fascinating process to observe. Below are a handful of shots taken over the course of the project, the first in Britain of it’s kind and hopefully the start of many.
Two of the three films I made for the sandscaping project are below, the third & final film is currently in production…
It was really lovely to catch up with Kimberley & Gareth this summer, I photographed their wedding at Cley Mill back in August 2017 and they returned to the mill to celebrate their anniversary, complete with bump! We had a fun afternoon at the mill and Cley beach getting some maternity shots for them. So lovely to catch up again!
Always finish on a sunset! I love the simplicity of this shot taken one evening while we were out for a walk on the cliffs. Some moody clouds were gathering as a commercial ship passed the windfarm. Shortly after the shot was taken we decided to make a swift retreat to the car and got back just as fat raindrops started falling, timing isn’t just about when to release the shutter!
