Rob Birrell’s Photography Blog

I was extremely pleased with my unprecedented success in this years Annual Regional BIPP Awards. In my first year of entering I took 1st and 3rd places in the Commercial Category of these prestigious awards.

Winner – Commercial Category

This year’s annual Photography competition for the North East region, held by the British Institute of Professional Photography, took place on Thursday 26th November 2009 at the Ravens Dean Hotel in Gateshead.

3rd Place Image – Commercial Category

The competition was divided into five photography categories; Weddings, Portraits, Press & PR, Commercial and Pictorial. Professional photographers from across the North East submitted their best photographs into the competition for judgment by BIPP Fellow Mike Roper, who has won Scottish Photographer of the Year for the past 3 years running.

Mike praised the technical skill of my winning photograph commenting on the exceptional sharp detail in even the darkest parts of the image.

One of my images “Mobile Phone” has been selected for this year’s Shot Up North (SUN) Awards. The SUN Awards – now entering its 20th year – recognises and rewards the best commercial photography in the UK regions, working in the disciplines of Advertising, Design, Fashion or Editorial Photography. The 50 chosen images are currently exhibited at Manchester’s Lowry Hotel and after that set off on a coutrywide tour.

SUN AWARDS Exhibition Tour 2008/9
MANCHESTER – Lowry Hotel, 6 November – 2 December 2008
LEEDS – Design Innovation Centre, 7 February – 2 March 2009
NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE – The Biscuit Factory, 6 March – 19 April

the SUN Awards will also be at these Calumet branches:
Liverpool (Special Edition) January 12 – 31
and then Sun Awards as follows
Birmingham April 23 – May 10
Nottingham May 12 – 31
Drummond Street June 3 – 18
Belfast June 22 – July 10
Manchester September 1- 31

In addition to being selected for the main awards the image is also available as a limited edition print at a cost of £245 unframed, including delivery Buy Print

I’ve finally got around to a long overdue update of my commercial website, Rob Birrell Photography at RobBirrell.com. Along with a new colour scheme you’ll find loads of new images that hopefully better describe what I do. Let me know what you think, if it works for you and how it could be improved further.

Valve Assembly in makeshift studio

Finished Image of Valve Assembly

I recently completed a commision for a German Engineering company who asked me to shoot some images of a valve assembly before it shipped out to their customer. Problem was that the assemblage was about the size of a mini and could only be shifted about with a fork lift truck. Well the sub-contractor, VA Kirkdale of Wallsend, was most accomodating and agreed to paint the floor for me. The backdrop is my studio white muslin backdrop turned on its side and stretched as taught as possible between the uprights. Even then it wasn’t quite high enough so I ended up shooting from about 5 foot off the ground on a scaffolding tower.

Thankfully the job had been postponed from the original intended day as a couple of days previously I was largely immobilised by a nasty stomach bug which meant that I didn’t dare venture more that a few feet from a toilet. As it was I did the shoot drugged up to the eyeballs fueled by little more than 3 litres of water. I lost 7lbs that week!

Click through on the above images to see the finished images.

I’ve decided to take an opportunity to share some thoughts on what photography books I like and/or have found useful by adding a book shop to my blog website. Hopefully you will something useful and inspirational here too and if you click through from this website it will serve to bolster my meagre income in a small way as I will get a small amount of commission for each transaction. The cost to you is exactly the same as if you had gone through the standard Amazon website. All orders are fulfilled by Amazon.co.uk so you can be rest assured as to the security and quality of the order process. I apologise to international customers … as yet I don’t cater for you at this moment in time, though you’re are at liberty to order from the UK website. Watch this space however, as I hope to have something up and running for Amazon.com/US customers soon.

I had the pleasure of working with Ali Zaidi while on the GLEAM Programme. Ali is an internet entrepreneur from Middlesborough with fingers in many pies. One of his successful creations is Bollywood Chat. Having realised that he didn’t have much to exhibit at the GLEAM showcase we hastily organised a photoshoot.

I must say that I was very happy with the results even if it was threatening to look like the Dating Ali showcase. We must try and get some other models next time we do a photoshoot.

Firstly, I have to apologise, its been a bit quiet on the old blog for a while now. I’ve been pretty busy with one thing and another namely organising an exhibition of my work for the GLEAM Showcase 2008. I didn’t advertise it here lest it became some sort of rave. Anyway, if you didn’t make it along click through on the image to see a representation of what I exhibitied.

The showcase was the culmination of a 6 month programme run by GLEAM. The programme aims to help creative graduate entrepreneurs (like me) through the early stages of the startup of their businesses. 18 other businesses and myself took over a disused warehouse, 51 Lime Street in Newcastle’s Ouseburn Valley and converted it into an exhibiton and performance space for 9 hours of Thursday 1st May, 2008. All in all it was a great success and great fun was had by all.