The latest task assigned to me was by a friend whos Grandfather owns a butchers shop in the town where I live. The shop dates back to the 1890′s, is a listed building and has retained its rare old butchers tiles and architecture. The family had some older photos of the shop and my task was to get some up to date shots. The photographs were to be used as part of a suprise for the Grandfather so I had to spin a few white lies first to enable me to get in there to take the shots!

Photo above shows the rare butchers tiles dating back to 1890′s.

Saturday morning came, I lingered about outside the shop trying not to look suspicious while checking out the tiles that made up a bulls head on the exterior of the building and having one last think about what I was going to say. In I went and reeled off my story about being a student, explaining that part of my photography project involved taking photos of local shops and I had chosen theirs because of its features. They agreed I could come by early the following Saturday morning.

On Saturday, I got up early and went down to the shop. The trays were stocked with meat ready for the customers and the butchers were wearing clean aprons and welcoming smiles. Despite being only 9am there was already a steady stream of people coming in and the telephone was ringing with people phoning down their orders.

Click on photos above to see larger image.

At the start, the butchers were reluctant to be in any of the photos. I got on with the task in hand, taking photographs of the outside of the shop when it was busy with customers and going in when it was quieter to take pictures of the meat. One of the butchers kindly offered to demonstrate how they prepare a boneless stuffed chicken so I also captured some images of them in action.

Photographs above show a stuffed boneless chicken being prepared.

I thoroughly enjoyed the job and there was a great atmosphere in the shop. Despite their earlier protests of not wanting to be in any photographs I found the butchers to be more than willing to stand together for a quick photo before I left. They even picked up their knives to use as props without any prompting!

My blogs will contain details of photoshoots I am on - the funny bits, the hard parts, the people I meet, the end results and hopefully through my blogs you will be able to get a feel for my personality. When you view my photographs you see what I see through the lens but you know very little about the person behind the camera.

I know there are people who are interested in improving their own photography and I am often asked questions relating to this. As a photographer, I believe there is always something new to learn, a new photo subject to be taken, a new setting to be trialled, I am always learning…that is the beauty of photography, you never know everything. I would like to be able to help any of you who do have queries, even create blogs that help you understand my work and explain how you can capture similar photographs.

So, you will hopefully gain an insight into my life as a photographer and learn a little about me as a person, maybe pick up one or two handy tips and I hope I can share my interest and life in photography with you. As the title of this blogs says…nothing ventured, nothing gained!

Back to last night, here are a few of my favourite photos from last year:

I love this photo, it makes me smile. I don’t do photos in studios with someone waving a bear at a child to make them laugh while they’re sat in a basket! I take them somewhere like the beach or a park and let them run around. The photo above is a true reflection of Adam’s joy of being at the beach and his personality shines through.

I took this photo in January 2010 in Co. Antrim. It had snowed for a few days and when it all melted I went out for a walk across the hills and just happened to have my camera with me. It was freezing cold and I slipped over that day and was covered in mud! It was all worth it though just for this one shot, a perfect reflection of our beautiful country.

The good thing about going on holiday is that you never know what you might come across. This photo was taken while we were passing by on a train.  Crete is a beautiful island with friendly people. This is a great photo to remember my break by, as if being proposed to while away wasn’t enough of a memory of a fantastic holiday!