Canon's Having A Joke!

I dont know if this is Canon playing a game with me but on the same day they have discontinued both my Flash and my L lens lol 

Just had a look at Canon Rumors today and the 1st post is this...

"Say bye! The following products have been officially discontinued by Canon, so if you find them in stock anywhere, the time is now.

The 580EX II is highly recommended, I rent a lot of them and they’ve been bulletproof.
THE LIST!

Canon Speedlite 580EX II

Canon EF 24 f/2.8

Canon EF 28 f/2.8

Canon EF 24-70 f/2.8L

Now I know that the ne 24-70 is due to be shipping out soon but taking out the 580exii is just silly, as The only other flash near its class(for Canon) is the 600ex and thats nearly £550! I think there taking the piss as I was planning to grab another 580exii soon and now the price is going to sky rockit!

LINK

Yongnuo RF-603 wireless flash trigger

Today my new triggers came in the post. ~The Yongnuo RF-603 wireless flash trigger are both a wireless flash system as well as a camera trigger (firing the camera without having to push the button itself).

Now as I only got them today I have not fully tested them but I am happy that they are hear as I was worried that they would not show up till after the Wedding this weekend.

Me and Fluff took a walk around the park today and I had a play with these triggers... So I will upload some images in a few hours, if I get any time tonight to edit them. Watch this space!

Sucker Punch (A Year On)

Hidden Symbolism

Sucker Punch is one hell of a movie. Its screen play and director Zack Snyder made an great looking film with some amazing set pieces that lived up to the trailer for this film. That being said if you look beyond the the action and titillation you end up with a very deep film. Now if you have not watched it I would say to check it out, No really! Buy it, Rent it, just watch it!

Me and Fluff saw it at the iMax in London last year and are still talking about it now. This film could be used as a case study with with its use of effect and composition to all of the hints and double meanings placed with-in its frames. Most will just come out of it with the images of girls in hot outfits, or an over whelming idea of a computer games cut scenes action with a light weight story. This is a simplistic view in my opinion.

Freedom or detachment 

Now I love films to have many layers as I think about everything in a film, not only what's in the film but what they chose to keep out. What mind set the director is in or what hidden meaning are placed within the movie. I do feel that many people just did not understand what was told with this story. Its not just empty action and CGI, this film has depth and meaning for those who wish to look.

Sucker Punch really can take you as deep as the rabbit hole goes... There are many articles online that can take you throught the looking glass but I am not going to take you there with this blog, Such an article will take me a long time to write. I am not going to push you down that way of thinking, just watch and make up your own mind as both me and Fluff still have many things to say about what I personally think is one amazing mind fucking film.

Sucker Punch in more ways then one!

EA gets is Achievement!

The Consumerist (a consumer based website) voted EA the WORST COMPANY IN AMERICA!

LINK.

Yes, the country that has had some of the nastiest company's in the world, and has some of the worst banks that are only money driven (the profit motive) as well as the cause of the world wide recession came after the once adored and highly beloved Electronic Arts.

"After more than 250,000 votes, Consumerist readers ultimately decided that the type of greed exhibited by EA, which is supposed to be making the world a more fun place, is worse than Bank of America's avarice, which some would argue is the entire point of operating a bank."

WOW, And I through I was going over the top saying that Battlefield 3 was going to be my last EA game... Dont get me started with them, lets just say that I popped BF3 into my xbox the other day to play the SINGLE PLAYER and I could not play the SINGLE PLAYER because the SINGLE PLAYER could not connect to EA Online...

 FOR THE SINGLE PLAYER

Twist presents..Music of the Gods (THE PHOTOS)

 

Ok there final done... I dont know why but it has taken me all f'ing night to export these images... I dont know why but its done now and here is a LINK to the full set of images.

Once again for the full set use this LINK!

Twist presents..Music of the Gods (20120506)

With a Bank Holiday always comes a Sunday night rave! Something about being out so late on a Monday morning always makes me smile and I was free of work to really enjoy myself.

I was told about this event the other week by a good friend and it looked to be a good night out. The event was Twist at Club Colosseum. It was my 1st time at the club but I am an old hat at Twist, Twist started out as an after party event in Vauxhall. Many a morning I headed up to Twist for some post rave dancing and many of my old school rave buddies spent many an hour on its smoky dance floors.

This was not there 1st night event they have had but it was a really good one, as the tag line said "Music of the Gods"

Now there will be some images going up on my site later but for now there only on facebook, to see them check out my page SKINS ELLIOTT PHOTOGRAPHY. 

Poverty Wizards!

Today I ordered my 1st set of "poverty wizards"!

In the world of photography there are 2 types of gear, The great and the cheap! Not being rich makes it hard to get good gear but there is nearly always a cheaper option. If you save ALOT then owning something like an L lens is well worth the wait (believe me I own a 2.8 L and LOVE IT!) but if you dont mind having or cant wait/Save that long, Getting slower lenses can be much cheaper and does the job (but you do get what you pay for).

50mm 1.8(£80) - 1.4(£340) - 1.2L(£1200) (left to right)

Just like with lens other photography gear has the pricie things and the cheap version, This brings me to Flash Triggers. The industry stranded are Pocket wizards, These are amazing triggers and I would love to own a set one day but as there around £300 per unit and you must have a min on 2 so you can see how costly they can be. 

Pocket wizards Plus II

The set above only allow full manual control, There are a set that have E-ttl (through the lens) called the Flex and the mini flex, At 1st I wanted a set of triggers that had E-ttl and the "cheap" set did look really good, and at only £130 for a trigger and reviser it was much cheaper then the Wizard's and had some great reviews themself.

But over the last few weeks I have kinda ditched E-ttl because I watch a video on one light set-up telling me how to control your flash using your aperture. Using this you will always get the same amount of light from your flash and you can use it on a lower setting. In turn... using it at 1/4 power makes the refresh time faster and makes your batters last longer. Then it dawned on me, I use my camera in FULL manual so why don't I use my flash in the same way.

Yongnuo RF-603 wireless flash trigger

I had a look online for a good set of cheap manual trigers and came across the 

Yongnuo RF-603 wireless flash trigger, Watched a few different YouTube vids and they look to work very well. and with a cost of only £25 for a set of 3 its worth checking out.

Finally there live!

I posted a while back about doing a shoot with my friend and her sister while she was over from Germany... Well a month later I have finished the images passed them on and (after giving them the images) I have posting some of them on my site.

The shoot was a 2 stage shoot, 1 on location and 1 high key in my studio (Aka the MSC). The location was the bridges under Waterloo, Yes I have done it before but after seeing the images with the WaterLoo Jack Shoot my friend feel in love with that spot. Well its not the same spot but the same road in south east London.

The 2nd stage was at the flat and after borrowing a 2nd speedlight from another friend we set up. I had 2 assistants for the shoot.. I know 2 of them! The 2nd was not really a photography assistants but one that did everything else like cook and grab drink and all that. Its really good to have friends sometimes.

So it ended with me, 2 hot Germans girls and 2 hot Swedish girls... I am a really lucky man sometimes hehe

Anyways the images took a while to work out as I was not used to having 2 lights (And I don't think that I will till I get another one for myself) 

ANYWAYS..... 

There is a like to some of the images on my site and some that will not be made live there just for the clients.
LINK to the images can be found HERE. 

Not The Event...New Glass!

Ok so I am skipping the event on this one... Don't worry it will come. Unless your reading these blogs in order of date and I have already posted the event blog, Just roll with it people.

You have heard me go one and on about a new lens and last week on Thursday it arrived and I went out to have a play with this shocking amount of view! I headed up to Camden to shoot some wide open cool looking things. Trouble was that weather was a little wet and unlike my 24-70 this lens is not weather sealed.

Anyways I had a really short trip out with getting everything ready for the shoot on sat that I only got a few images... You know the drill, use this LINK to see the full pics or just see the images below!

Hen Photo Shoot!

After waking up with a bit of a hangover (read post before) I got my stuff together and checked my camera and gear before heading out the door for the Shoot.

The shoot was for a friends hen do, the one Fluff had been at all weekend and I had already had most of my stuff taken over there the night before. I had to get everything set up in a very short time and then surprise the hen. Turns out that I had alot more time than I needed as everyone was in make-up.

Some images will be up soon but I have to work on them and non are ready from now.

The shoot went well but it was hard work getting 13 girls to look good in each frame without someone blinking or pulling a silly face. But I only took around 330images and got some really good images in camera so there really is not that much work to really have to do and all the girls looked amazing.

Once the shoot was done we headed off to Nados for some food and then off to Camden palace for the event!

More on that event later!

WOW What a Weekend!

This was one mental weekend for me... Leaving party on Friday. Shoot on Saturday and then a Club night and last by not least... A chill out day in Elephant on the Sunday.

Friday:

With the hen weekend under way, Fluff was out and I had the flat to myself. As I was not working I wanted to do something fun so I asked around on facebook to see if anything was happening. The only thing I had planed was to drop off the disk with the images from my last shoot to my friend. She was feeling ill so I let her chill out and when back to see if anyone was planing anything in the night.

Turns out that A friend from Spits was leaving, moving away for the city to be with the Welsh. So I headed up to Hoxton for a night of fire spinning and drinks. We did have alot of fun and I many had one to many as I slowly made my way back  down south. I did make it back in the end but via a McDs to fill my belly with nice wholesome food.

Here are the full set of images from this night in Hoxton LINK!