Rombald and his Missus

After a lovely weekend celebrating Sue`s early retirement (again) with dear old friends we had a trip out today. My eldest Katie and boyfriend Neil were keen to climb and walk in Yorkshire`s countryside. Well , they wanted to go to Betty`s and take in a short stroll on the way. As it happened the stroll was shorter than planned as the rain came and forced us to shelter with Betty`s finest  afternoon teas earlier than expected. As reasonably priced as ever (yeah!) the sandwiches were plentiful (though would have doubled in size with the crusts left on!). Still nice to have a treat with your nearest and dearest - and anyway I`d accidentally forgotten my wallet!

What of Rombald? Well Neil and Katie were keen to know the history of the Cow and Calf - so called because of their staggering (not) resemblance to a cow and it`s calf. Of course I explained that it was caused by a giant but had to check it out at home. The story goes that the Calf was split from the Cow when the giant Rombald was fleeing an enemy, and stamped on the rock as he leapt across the valley. The enemy, it is said , was his angry wife. She dropped the stones held in her skirt to form the local rock formation The Skirtful of Stones.

 

Ah that it were true! The name of the giant Rombald is likely to be a retrovention, due to the name of the entire 'Rombald's Moor', which is most likely to derive its title from the de Rommilles, who held the honour of Skipton in the thirteenth century.

Still it allowed Katie and Neil the chance to do some serious climbing with Neil demonstrating his famous backwards descent. After climbing the main crag with ropes they then skydived to the ground.

It`s Summer Festival Time!

Despite the threat of rain I set off to Kirkstall to try and get some festival pictures. Not "official" this year as I did not think I would be free to go but it did not get in the way of getting some shots.
Amazingly the weather held out well and it was quite warm and sunny.

I was only there an hour and a half but great fun with bands, gymnasts, horses, loads of great food, rides and live music / dance performances. Nice to see some fellow Leeds Flickr shooters out and about too and missed one or two others when I had to go. Great to see a local festival keep going strong and everyone enjoying themselves.Interesting to see Tesco sharing plans for their new Kirkstall development too.

Nice to pick up a programme and see so many shots of mine nd other Flickr Leeds group members  from last year printed too!

You`ve got to admire the triers!

Another weekend event shoot - all day football tournament in the sun and heat. This week I remembered water and suncream so am not a shade  of scarlet now! Good God I ache though - never understand how just standing on my feet shooting for 8 hours can  leave me exhausted!

Anyway lovely event this weekend with supportive parents and coaches and under 6`s even playing for fun - just exhibition stuff! Exhibition matches at 6 - don`t make me laugh. Mind you I liked some of the illegal airborne throw ins:

This lad did well even with the disability of actually having a football in place of his right hand - confused the ref at times though! Rather reminiscent of Maradonna at his peak I thought.

Of course with under 6 hard men of football there are always opportunities for a flare up!

But in general just some good hard effort and play:

There were even girls playing! Shock horror!
 Great fun and hoping to do some more event stuff and maybe get some equestrian experience going.

Sress! Anxiety! Insomnia!

No , this is not one of those self- help blogs. rather an encouragement to go and see Jaume Plensa`s exhibition at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. I went on a glorious day and enjoyed it enormously - one of the best I`ve seen at YSP. It`s i=on until the last week in September. Just wished I had been able to go at dusk when the lighting comes into play on  some of the outside pieces. One of the best things about the Plensa exhibition is that he has given permission for people to take photos of exhibits even in the underground gallery - very unusual. No tripods and preferably no flash  they say.

I`ll be putting more images up on my flickrstream and saying a little about each piece but apart from the head / body sculptures there are some great sound installations using gongs, metal letters etc that visiting school kids could not stop playing with. Great day out when the weather`s good like at the moment. See here for details:  http://www.ysp.co.uk/exhibitions/jaume-plensa

Advertising - how do you know when it`s a scam?

Since setting up properly a constant issue has been when / how to advertise and how much to spend. Given that I am aiming at a semi-pro existence allowing time for other things and making the best of all the jobs I do for maximum customer satisfaction it`s not easy to pitch it!

I started off with the usual free Yell listing. Big mistake! Cue loads of advertisers aiming to get as much off me as they could - especially Yell who I was warned off by an unhappy Leeds based customer.  I tried a free 3 lead trial with another web based group - got my 3 leads. All highly suspicious would be brides seeking quotes with hotmail accounts and no telephone numbers for 2 and an incorrect one for the third. No replies to emails even when offering big discounts. Didn`t bother to buy any more leads.
Latest one is Facebook who until tomorrow are offering me 1000 new Facebook contacts / likes, a designed facebook webpage and social network plug built in to drive customers to me with a 6 month money back guarantee if I do not see any business. The most tempting but not convinced! What`s a man to do - anyone heard of this Facebook approach?
At a local level I have hooked up with North Leeds Life - an advertising magazine that goes to 30,000 homes in my area. They are using me for stock images / one off shoots in return for credits and web page listing - you can see my shots on page 6 and 14 of the July edition and hoping to get some of these in next months.

You might even see my old cat Joey or one of my dog portraits

in there in a pet feature if they like them.

"Hold it", "Time", "Get Rid of it"

Yes this weekend brought another soccer event shoot at Pudsey Football Tournament. 54 teams from under 6`s to under 12`s! Scorching sun, demanding  coaches and lots of willing little runners and some talented players around. Once again some coaches and parents felt it necessary to castigate their kids for "letting themselves down" and had the mistaken belief that bawling to a team of under 7`s to "keep wide" and " Throw it down the line" would transfer a ball chasing pack resembling a herd of wildebeests being chased by a lion into some kind of total football outfit. Got to laugh! That said there were other parents and coaches who just relished their kids having a good time and encouraged them all the way - surely the right way.

 

Shooting wise great learning again - developing my skills of organising group shots by being clearer instructions and demonstrating - somehow under 9s still find it hard to tell left knee from right or keep close together. Action shots even harder. With the pack chase isolating an individual with the b  all enough to get a saleable shot is hard! Good practice for getting ti right in camera with a jpeg first time and shooting with as wide an aperture as you can though. Great fun!

I liked this one - saleable or not

Why did I go legit!

Unlike many of you out there trying to make a quid or two with your photography I decided, in the light of being signed on as a contractor for a major construction company, that I would go legit and register as self employed. First mistake was that the first job was April 1st and pre-dated the new tax year. This initially led to HMRC (the taxman) deciding I would have to do a tax return for the whole of 2010/2011 and gave me a bill for class 2 contributions for 2 weeks within days! After protracted attempts to call them - does anyone ever answer! - and a detailed letter they finally accepted that as the only paying job in my new business in that year would not be paid until 2011/2012 I could do my first return for 2011-2012 and can claim back my insurance paid! 1st victory and probably the last.

Went on an HMRC free course for self employed today - the basics and nothing new to me really. Took the opportunity to discuss a couple of possible product shoots with other newly set up businesses looking for photography so might not have been a total loss.
Anyway I now know I`ll claim my mileage on a 45p per mile rate (up from 40), have more idea what format to keep my records in and know what I can claim for the office in my house. Next week is another one specifically dealing with capital allowances and claimable expenses. Remarkably more interesting than you think it would be when it means paying less tax if you get it right. I`ll be there with a few promotion leaflets and business cards eager to learn!

Just need a few more well paid jobs now. Facebook are calling me back Friday offering to sell me an all singing and dancing business page with 1000 friends all seeking a photographer in the area in the next 18 months - con or not?