Charlotte, Robin and Other Animals….

A couple of months ago I met one of my lovely couples, Charlotte and Robin at Wellington Riding near Reading, Berkshire. Charlotte keeps her horse there and wanted to have some pictures with him and their dog Oswald. Pirate the horse and I originate from Cornwall so we had something in common, he is definately more handsome although my nose is smaller! I love photographing people as well as animals so this session was going to be great fun and possibly challenging as Oswald and Pirate do not always see eye to eye!

It was a great session and I think we all enjoyed it, even Pirate and Oswald! Here are some of the pictures that Charlotte and Robin had in their signing book for their wedding.

Keep a look out on my Facebook page http://www.facebook.com.marklordphotography for a sneaky peek at some of their wedding pictures from last weekend!

Portrait of Film Director, Amit Gupta

Film Director Amit Gupta recently asked me to do a few portraits of him for his press releases. We spent 15 minutes together getting a few pictures and he recently contacted me to tell me his portrait is in Empire magazine and also one now online.

Amit’s first film that he directed was called Resistance and was set in a Welsh village in WWII, imagining life had the Germans invaded. With a cast including Michael Sheen it is a brilliant art house film and is well worth a watch.

To find out more about Resistance and to watch the trailer please click here

Amit’s latest film I am looking forward to watching is Jadoo the Movie, a British comedy that takes Amit back to his roots of growing up in Leicester. Its about two brothers who are chefs & what happens when they fall out. They set up rival restaurants across the road from each other in the Belgrave Road in Leicester, close to where Amit grew up.

To follow the latest news of Amit’s film Jadoo the Movie please sign up to their blog / Facebook page or Twitter by clicking here

If you are looking for portraits for publicity purposes please contact me for more information. info@marklordphotography.com

Brother in Arms – A personal photograph or two

Dont worry folks I’m not going to be talking about the album by Dire Straits but a personal photograph I took recently.

Ever since I started on my photographic voyage through life I have loved photographing people, just being themselves, as they are within their own environment. One of my first projects many years ago was photographing the villagers of Budock Water in Cornwall, where I grew up. This project was all black and white portraits of people I have known most of my life and people that have spent most of their years living in the village. Sadly many of those dear people are no longer with us but it is a project I always revisit in my head. It has led me to my career in a photography, namely being a portrait photographer.

So, a few months ago when Becky and I were in Cornwall staying with my parents I thought it would be nice to grab a portrait of my Father and his brother Joe. Dad and Joe spend many hours a week at the local churchyard maintaining the grounds and the graves. Being in their late seventies and early eighties I find the two of them incredible – they just don’t stop working. If they are not working in their own gardens, they are ‘up churchyard’ cutting the grass, cleaning grave stones and tidying up. All in their own time for the love of it and each others company.

So here is a couple of portraits of two great brothers who aren’t afraid of getting their hands dirty. As I said in my wedding speech to my Dad ‘you are amazing and I only hope I have your energy when I’m your age’ – half of it wouldn’t be bad either!

To see some of my wedding photography at Budock Church please keep scrolling down.

Princes Countryside Fund charity clay shoot at West Wycombe Park now online

For those that attended the magnificent West Wycombe Park yesterday for the Princes Countryside Fund clay pigeon shoot hosted by Sir Edward Dashwood the images are now online and ready to view. Please contact me or the Princes Countyside Fund for the access code.

If you were not lucky enough to be there you missed a real treat. Fabulous weather, generous hospitality and brilliant clay pigeon targets presented to the guns over a variety of stands. The day started with speeches from Rob Fenwick of E J Churchill who organised the event & set the course & Mark Price Managing Director of Waitrose on behalf of H.R.H The Prince of Wales. With top UK and International clay shots there with some impressive shooting, namely from George Digweed, Ambassador to The Princes Countryside Fund, Charlotte Kerwood and Micky Rouse who put on a fine demonstration afterwards. Also showing their support to the fund were Phil Vickery, Cornishman and England Rugby Pro and Heston Blumenthal the highly renowned chef.

The fund raised approximately £50,000 yesterday with the generous support of several of its supporters who attended the shoot along with friends of the fund.

I am the official photographer to the Princes Countryside Fund and some of the projects I have photographed for them can be found further down this blog. The fund is there to support rural communities, train farm apprentices, and educate the public what goes on in the British countryside.

With many farmers suffering with the bad weather in recent months losing crops as well as their livestock the fund has donated nearly £600,000 to farmers and their families since the new year.

To find out more and to see how you can do your part in helping rural communities please checkout the Princes Countryside Fund by clicking here

In the meantime here are a few images from yesterday.

Portrait Of Heston Blumenthal

Today I was photographing The Princes Countryside Fund charity clay pigeon shoot at West Wycombe Park, Buckinghamshire. One of the ambassadors of the fund is Heston Blumenthal, a cookery legend.

I asked Heston if I could do a few portraits of him before we went into the house for lunch and he obliged giving me a couple of minutes. I spotted a small archway on the West Wycombe Estate where the light was great and did a few half length pictures of him, then I spotted this magnificent statue and asked him if I could photograph him underneath it. ‘Of course’ came the reply. Here’s the picture!

I will soon finish the rest of the pictures from today and will post a few on here soon.

Love a hairy dog? You have not seen anything yet!

Recently I was at a farmers market and saw a lady I knew struggling with her bags. Being a gentleman I though I would ask if she wanted a lift home with her groceries. On taking me up on the offer of a lift I was greeted by this hound of a dog bounding towards me to lick me to death in her driveway. Well, anyone who knows me knows how much I love to photograph animals, namely dogs, so I could see a great opportunity wagging its tail in front of me.

‘What type of dog is this?’ I asked whist negotiating how to protect the eggs in the top of one of the bags.

‘It’s a Lagotta Romagnolo’ I was told, ‘an Italian breed of dog with her winter coat still on’

I said I would love to take some photographs of the dog and the lady said that was fine as long as it was soon as she was soon to be clipped now the weather has finally warmed up.

So last week I met up with the lady and her dog. I shot a few daylight images in the window as the dog sat in an armchair then we popped to a local field for a few pictures.

Here’s a couple of my favourites…..

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#MerryChristmas to you all

Lake District Hill Farmers

I’m finally back on the ground after shooting several projects for the Princes Countryside Fund over the last few months, Biomass fuel projects, portrait sessions, booking weddings for 2013 and 2014, photographing jewellery for a client, and now tonight a Christmas party to photograph in a 14th Century barn.

Now the dust is settling and we are just about ready for Christmas it’s nice to be able to sit down and reflect on some of the work I have done over the last few months, I will continue to blog about my Princes Countryside Fund projects as they were most interesting and something I would like to share with my viewers.

After my trip to the North Yorkshire moors I travelled to the Lake District to photograph two more farming apprentices in the hills who are sponsored through the The Farmer Network. It was damp and miserable but that’s what these lads have to put up with day after day, it’s a hard life but also most rewarding I would imagine.

Here are just a few of my favourite images…

Hill Farming Apprentices, North Yorkshire Moors

I had 3 projects to shoot ‘Up North’ (of Oxfordshire) so decided to organise and photograph all three in one trip. I arranged to photograph the Yorkshire Moors Agricultural Apprentice Scheme one day, then a similar project on the following day in the Lake District followed by a community bus project in Shropshire on my way home. So please keep a look out for the future projects!

This project was a feast for the photographer, travelling around the dales and moorland was stunning and a real privilege to photograph with plenty of colour left on the trees. The farmers and apprentices were most accommodating to my suggestions and I am delighted with the results.

The Princes Countryside Fund will enable full-time apprentices to work on the farms of the 9 group members and receive training in partnership with Askham Bryan College. The project will not only increase the labour supply on upland farms but ensure there are future generations of hill farmers to manage and maintain the environment of the North York Moors.

Here are just a few of my favorite pictures…..!

Community Pub Project for Princes Countryside Fund

For all those followers out there, apologies for the lack of posts but I’ve been too busy to blog recently. I decided to get as much photography done in October and early November whilst there was some good colour on the trees and the weather was reasonable. Wow, what a great decision to have made with this terrible weather we are having at the moment. I have now shot all of my Princes Countryside Fund projects for this year and just need to work on the images which I hope to complete within a couple of weeks.

Here are some of my pictures from the White Horse Community Pub in rural Norfolk. The pub closed a few years ago and the residents of the village feared it would be bought by developers and made into housing. With help from The Princes Countryside Fund along with other funding the residents managed to save the pub for the benefit of the community. To find out more about the project please click here.

The pub is open and trading but there are a lot of exciting new developments happening as and when funding allow to include a local shop, micro-brewery and learning facilities.

Here are some of my favorite images of the buildings in need of development along with some of the pub, the people of the village enjoying a drink and stake holders receiving their share certificates. There are also a few ghosts and ghouls lurking as I visited during Halloween so be prepared!

Mark Lord Photography

Oxfordshire based photographer specialising in people and our rich landscape

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