South London Photographer: Post Lockdown Wedding

I want to focus on the present and celebrate this lovely couple’s intimate wedding at Wandsworth Council but it would be remiss of me to begin without acknowledging recent events … oh, my goodness, how weird were the last few months? None of us is sure it’s all over yet, but it certainly felt good to be getting back to work again. Capturing a wedding was a great way to start. Will and Emma had to change their original plans but they still managed to have plenty of guests via Zoom, along with close relatives in the room. And what a perfect day it was too. The registrars did a super job maintaining social distancing while accommodating the guests – the main difference for me was that I wasn’t allowed to move around in the registry office but, nevertheless, we still managed to capture the smiles, kisses, special glances and oodles of joy. Huge congratulations and best of luck to Emma and Will! I’m so glad they got to have their special day.

PS. One of my favourite images below is the way the bride and groom’s shadows had a sneaky kiss as their owners walked down the street… so romantic!

All images (c)SJField2020

Please visit http://www.sarahjanefield.co.uk for more information on weddings, headshots, and family portraiture. Book before the end of September 2020 to receive a 5% discount off advertised prices – see website. Terms and conditions apply. 

 

 

 

 

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South London Photographer: Last minute shopping

I don’t really get the thing where people manage to start buying Christmas presents six months in advance. Thankfully I only have a few people to buy for as I’ve yet to do my Christmas shopping, and looking at my diary I’m not entirely sure when that is going to happen. Let’s hope I can avoid a frenzied assault in a state of angry panic in the local toyshop sometime after lunch on the 24th. I have friends who have dozens of cousins and nieces and nephews, all of whom need something. Surely a Secret Santa is preferable in that case! If you’re like me and have left it until the very last minute, and have no idea what to get, how about a voucher for a family shoot?  You can choose between a relaxed session where we aim to capture some images of everyone in a favourite place or at home, or something more planned where a family and I will work together to create an image over a period of time that is deliberately made to say something about you and your loved ones. Visit my site for more information or get in touch via email or phone.

Here are a few images from a recent shoot I did where we took a few photographs in the family home and then headed to Merton Hall in Wimbledon.

Happy shopping or whatever else you do at this time of the year.

(c)SJField 2016

South London Photographer: Managing expectations

I like so many women I know, can do lots of different things. And often simultaneously. I can get dressed, hoover the carpet, eat toast and reply to an email on my phone, and all at the same time as yelling at a small child who can’t find his shoes because he’s hidden them in a basket for reasons only he understands. Sometimes I truly impress myself with that common mum-like ability to travel through the day successfully, surrounded by several virtual plates spinning maniacally all about my aura. And often they don’t even come crashing down before I make it to the end of the day. Instead I’m able to place them neatly in the corner ready for the next morning, when once again I’ll be getting dressed, eating toast, tidying up and yelling at a child about getting dressed before he ventures out into the street to hunt for ants to observe, because he’s decided that they are the greatest possible pet option on a growing list of exotic creatures, all of which I’ve rejected so far. Nevertheless, I’m sometimes saddened but also perfectly honest enough to admit, there are plenty of things I have yet to master, and many that I likely never will. I have not worked out how to grow an extra couple of arms, although, lord knows, I could really do with a spare set. I haven’t worked out how to be in two places at once, and I can’t even deduce that young boys in places quite far from me are disgruntled because I’m not where they think I ought to be, at exactly the time they think they need me to be.

“I exist in a reality outside your head too, young boy! I’m a person in my own right, really, I am. How can I possibly know you’ve not got your keys if you don’t call and let me know?” He replied, “I did!” I looked at my phone. And it’s true, he did, precisely three minutes earlier. But not at the very beginning of the 45 minute episode that he’d been sitting on the doorstep waiting impatiently. “Where are you????” he implores with utter indignation on my voice mail.

And no matter how hard I try I will never be able to morph into a dustbin, coat-rack, towel or snack, regardless of how much my children think I am surely any one of those objects at any given point. And I will never, ever, ever be able to control the weather. Nope, not ever. And nor do I wish to either. This comes as a shock and rather bad news to at least two of my children who make weather-dependent demands and then become infuriated when it just doesn’t work out the way they hoped.

All of which made me immensely grateful when I spoke to a client who has some weather specific aims for her photographs. We’ll need to play things by ear and see what the weather is doing for that, I said. Of course, she replied, I’m all over ‘flexible’. When you’re dealing with small people on a daily basis, flexible seems like a most precious and cherished trait to come across in someone. Mind you, my client is a yoga teacher, and not a somewhat willful and intractable 8-year-old boy, so it seems perfectly acceptable to expect that of her. And because she’s a mum, I bet she can do loads of stuff at the same time, and a sun salutation to boot too. But of course she wouldn’t even try, because we all know, that way sheer madness lies.

(c)SJField 2016

If I could control the weather, as I’m sure my children believe I can, I’d make sure it was foggy a lot more often. I love the mysterious atmosphere it brings and the diffused light is just beautiful. I’d also have been able to order a bit of lovely dappled sunlight in the woods this evening. (c)SJField 2015

South London Photographer: A very local wedding

A couple of weeks ago I dropped the kids off at school and sauntered down the road to Wandsworth Registry Office to photograph one of the loveliest weddings. Maybe most weddings are lovely but I particularly liked being witness to the genuine and extremely evident feelings of joy I hope I was able to capture in this one.  And what a cute baby to make my day too.  I’m so pleased Hannah & Andy got in touch with me so I could photograph their day. All in all, everything about my morning at work that day made me think, this job’s pretty good indeed. As always in blog posts about weddings, I think I’ll let the photographs do the talking.  Have a great week, SJ

All images (c)SJField 2016

South London Photographer: The start of a new era and another baby!

Last week as I walked away from big boys’ nursery school, having just dropped my youngest son off, No 1 said to me, “So, this is the first time in nearly 12 years you will be free…” I don’t know what to say about the fact that at the tender age of eleven he had decided his presence no longer counts in the mix of small boys I am responsible for, but anyway, I did try to answer at the time without twitching and also maintaining a clear and reasonably calm modulated voice, “YES!!!”   Not that I was excited by the prospect of a few hours of daily uninterrupted work time available to me from now on, or anything. Oh no, I’m lying. I was!!

Later that day Son No 3 who had waved me away so cheerily that morning, and with so much confidence and a genuine sense of happy independence, put his head in his hands over supper and moaned, “I haven’t got a life!”

Oh, my god, I thought. One day at school and he has obviously realised that this is it for him; the start of a life long journey, which for many of us is made up of going to school, then possibly university, then work, then retirement followed only by the inevitable end.

I was just about to quote Woody Allen, who’s alter ego Alvy Singer, says in the opening gambit of Annie Hall, “Life is full of misery, loneliness, and suffering – and it’s all over much too soon” followed by “so stop your wailing small boy and make the most of it!” when I noticed the plastic cutlery he had thrown on the floor ….

…Aaaah, yes, he wasn’t actually having an existential crisis. He simply can’t pronounce the word ‘knife’ properly and was merely expressing his sadness about the fact that he (and no one else, take note) threw his knife on the floor and was really quite annoyed that it hadn’t magically jumped back up on table ready for his grubby little paw to grab hold of.

Phew! I mean I do like a thinker and all, but there is a limit and succumbing to the futility of a modern, Western, materialist-driven existence when you’ve not reached your 4^th birthday is under-stepping the mark, surely. I don’t think he can have overstepped it at this stage, but of course I may be wrong. And actually, even if I do say so myself, he looks to have a fantastic life from where I’m sitting, which at that time was not as near as he was to the knife/life he’d discarded, and so I said to him, “Well, pick up the knife you’ve belligerently and churlishly chucked on the floor then.  And your problem will be marvellously solved!” He did.

This morning Son No 1 started secondary school and so now I truly do have a great deal more time than I’ve had before to get on with work and studies, and, oh yes, that other murky thing I don’t quite get…domesticity. Yes, time for that too. I have a million things to do though before I begin balling socks and folding clothes; such as editing clients’ baby and wedding photos as well as setting up a blog for my new course, which all come at the top of the list.

Last week I photographed a little boy who was just 5 weeks old. His mummy and daddy look like they’re doing amazingly – They won’t believe how fast it all goes. I remember so very clearly, like most parents, bringing home Son No 1 for the first time and wondering what on god’s earth I was meant to do next.  Thankfully, almost twelve years later the two of us are able to muddle through together, which sometimes results in minor scrapes and mishaps, like this morning when he left his brand new school bag on the doorstep at home, as we drove off to the start of his first day. “Oh, crap!” he announced when he realised and we were already half way there.

Here are some of the images from the baby shoot. I love these jobs and I do absolutely adore babies. But having tasted what is now nearly 4 hours of my newfound freedom I am certain that photographing other people’s tiny people is the way forward. My latest baby is my photography and that is just perfect for me.

SJ x

(c)Sarah-Jane Field 2015

South London Photographer: A metaphorical lesson from my kids

“Can you literally open the door, Mum?” said my three old child to me the other day.“What do you mean, can I literally open the door? How else I am meant to open it for you, small person? Metaphorically?”

“MUM!!” he wailed, “Literally open the door!”

Wow, I think perhaps I should stop reading to them. They’re all getting much smarter than me and quickly too. Why am I embarking on a metaphysical/philosophical conversation with Son No. 3 at 8am in the morning?

Son No 1 is no better. As we left a friend’s recently, he discussed various parenting styles and compared mine to my friend’s.

“Oh, you use to be just as overly patient and understanding with me. Then No 2 arrived and you grew up.”

“Did I? How so?”

He was fairly sanguine when he answered, “Now you just scream that you’re going to castrate us all and throw us out the window.

“Oops!” I said.

A few days later I tried to excuse my insane and ludicrous threats made in rage and said that at least I don’t literally castrate them. Son No 1 looked at me and smiled,

“No, but you’ve definitely metaphorically castrated us…”

Oh my god, have I? Really? What if he’s right? I’m going to console myself with the fact that Son No 1 wouldn’t even remotely be able to have such a conversation with me if he were indeed castrated in any metaphorical sense and in actual fact, despite a traumatic and horrible family break-up, he’s doing pretty well indeed. And why do I say such ludicrous things – because I kind of feel that by making truly and utterly ridiculous threats I send them all a very clear message that even though I’m furious, I’m also minded to turn myself into a cartoon, therefore making myself less threatening to them while there are metaphorical flames flying out of my ears.  Well, that’s the theory anyway.

There is so much parenting advice out there. Basically, if you breathe the wrong way you are potentially damaging your child forever, so don’t, whatever you do, breathe the wrong way. That kind of atmosphere makes us all terrified. And so we compensate by over-parenting, which is probably what I was doing with Son No 1 before any more children came along.  Many of us do it at some point in one way or another.  It’s difficult to avoid nowadays.  But what over-parenting does to children is make them totally unprepared for real, robust and three-dimensional relationships. Relationships where people are able to express their themselves and know that it is OK, that an angry person has not stopped loving them, but is simply angry. I’m not saying it’s easy. And there is no failsafe ‘recipe’.

Paranoid Parenting by Frank Ferudi is one of the best books I’ve read on the subject of over-parenting. In it he says, “Parenting is not a complex science. It is not even as a science at all. Sometimes boring, ordinary, and even banal, bringing up children is always demanding. Parents can afford to make mistakes but they would do well to learn from them”.

I know the quote I’ve used invites plenty of “but what if” questions and sure, the subject is probably a little more complex than can be summed in that paragraph – which is why I absolutely recommend reading the whole book.  Whether or not I’m doing my best by threatening castration as a behavioural solution (mind you, you never know…) is of course debatable. It is also subject to personal opinion, cultural outlook, and the sort of relationship you might have with children in general.

I do know, however, that my children are more or less doing pretty well with life. We have been on quite a bumpy journey over the last few years and it continues to be less than smooth at times. But we’re all doing OK.  Literally and metaphorically.  It’s a hard slog getting over a divorce, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise, and it takes a long time. (I was going to write about the reality of that in response to a post on a forum I saw the other day which had some ignorant and flippant comments in it but I think I’ll wait and let those thoughts formulate for a little longer). Weeks go by and I think, yes, we (I’m) are getting through this.  And then something happens and I feel like I’m back in the early traumatising moments all over again – and on those days, Son No 3, I am barely able to open any doors literally or metaphorically.  But when Son No 1 laughs and teases me about my slightly wonky parenting style by making a pretend quiz-show buzzer sound followed by “Parenting fail, Mum!” I am filled with the knowledge that for now the 4 of us are just fine.

I’ve managed to do some work over the summer but I’m posting some recent family shots this week. Mainly because they tie in with the text, and because I feel that if I posted a client’s family to illustrate this week’s blog they might take offence at being associated with my brand of parenting. But also because these photographs were taken at the same place as some photographs I posted last year – West Wittering Beach. And I am quite heartened by the steps we’ve all taken over the last 12 months. They may be small steps in some instances but things have certainly moved and all for the better. For me, at any rate, that positive journey is evident in the difference between the photographs I took last year and the ones I took the other day.

Hope everyone’s bearing up with the long summer hols. I have to say there are days when I’m not sure I am, but thankfully they are countered by some really great days such as the one recorded in these images. SJ x

All images (c)Sarah-Jane Field 2015

South London Photographer: Summer holidays….Really? Yikes! Whoo Hoo! Yay! Oh, god…..

I am filled with joyful excitement and nervous horror all at once about the impending summer hols.  The smallest one finished nursery two weeks ago and asks me daily when he can start big boys’ nursery school.  In six weeks, I say.  Who knows if that means anything to him whatsoever?  If it did it would seem like an age, I’m sure.  I know it will fly by but even to me it’s a little daunting.  Six weeks of waking every morning and wondering what I can do that day to get them away from screens for a few hours.

But before it begins Son No. I will come to the end of his time at primary school. How did that happen?  When did it happen?  It has just sped by so fast.

I remember him starting nursery at the same big boys’ school No 3 can’t wait to get into when he was 4.  They are very different boys.  No 1 was born pretty much attached to my breasts.  “That will hurt if you let him keep doing it,” I was told by the midwife in hospital.  I didn’t care.  He seemed to need it.  And when he started nursery he was attached to my legs. Tearing us apart in nursery seemed like the cruelest thing in the world and he would wail and flail about as the very patient teacher prised him off me.  As I walked away there would be tears streaming down my face.  Apparently on his second day there, he just stood at the gate the whole time waiting for me.  First children are so different to third, that’s for sure.  Son No 3 adjusted straight away when he started at the little kindergarden round the corner in preparation for big boys’ nursery and is more than ready to get on with it.

No 1 though took forever to adjust.  But of course, he did and although he remembers very clearly standing at that gate all day he now barely says goodbye when we part at the gate.  And heaven forbid I should try to hug or kiss him.  I wasn’t even allowed to greet him properly when he came back from the week long school trip he recently went on.  Par for the course, I guess.

I think I need to really appreciate this summer with Son No 1 though because once he starts secondary school, I am told it will race by even more quickly. I’m glad I ignored that midwife – it did hurt but he’s Mister Independent now and it was such a short time, in the grand scheme of things, when he really needed that connection.

So, anyway my blogs might be a little haphazard and irregular over the next six weeks is what I think I’m saying.  You never know, there may be another tomorrow… who knows how it will all pan out.  I’ve got some exciting work things coming up and there will be plenty of kiddie photographing opportunities.  I might even manage a joint selfie with Son No 1 hugging me at some point.  Overly hopeful?  You just never know…

Let’s hope the sun does it’s thing as often as possible – by that I mean shines through because this grey week has been most disappointing!

Happy summer hols everyone!

Image (c)sarahjanefield 2015

South London Photographer: In another life I was an actor and a funding call for The Lights, a short film.

Once upon a time, a long time ago, I was an actor. It’s odd because I gave it up over 16 years ago which is getting on for two decades and yet it still seems like it was a huge part of my life. I stopped for lots of reasons but mostly because it wasn’t making me happy; in fact it seemed at the time to be making me desperately unhappy. And so one day I decided I was going to get a ‘proper job’. It must have been the right decision because the moment I made it, a proper job materialised.  So I told my not-very-understanding agent at the time I was going to take 3 months off to see if not being an actor made me feel any better about life at all, and would she mind waiting for me. She promptly returned all my publicity which arrived with an unceremonious and rather rude bump on the floor behind my front door the very next day.  So that was that; I was without an agent and a couple of days later I found myself walking down to Clapham Junction Station with the rest of the world during rush hour to catch a train to my first proper job.

I knew immediately that not being an actor, for the time being anyway, was the right thing for me. I didn’t earn very much but I had some structure and learnt that I was quite good at organizing things and planning events. So after a few months I decided to get a better proper job and it must have been the right decision because before long I found myself sitting at a desk in an office in The City of London being a marketing assistant. I have to admit I had no idea what I was doing and I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I tell you I did very little other than sit and stare at my computer screen for 3 months.  (And what on earth was that thing called the internet computer in the corner of the office for?) Thankfully, some internal moves, resignations and rehiring led to me being thrown in at the deep end, at which point I had no choice but to get on with it.  I discovered that as well as being good at organising and planning I also enjoyed writing; yes, even about investment funds which I had to learn all about in the first place because I’d never even heard of them when I was an actor. (And very soon after I started we all got internet access on our own screens so the weird computer in the corner was removed.)

I spent about four years in The City and discovered all sorts of things about the world and myself, which I’d never have realised had I not stopped being an actor.   And I suspect not knowing those things didn’t help me when acting – how can you play anything other than an out of work actor if you’ve never been anything else in life?

Recently I was very pleased to be asked by a friend, Lucy Barrack, who had written a short film along with her writing partner, Keiran Grant, to do the stills on their production. The film, called The Lights, is produced by Andrea Ferran and Sophie Reynolds and will be part of the Film London festival.   I went along and met a fantastically hard working and good natured crew and actors, Bradley Walsh and Joseph Kloska, who from what I saw, were doing some pretty excellent stuff on set.  I took a whole bunch of photos documenting the day’s shoot, as well as some stills for publicity.   Because the film is being produced based on ethically sound principles everyone on set apart from the director/writers and producers were paid the national minimum wage. That doesn’t sound very much but I can tell you it will have put a huge strain on the budget and it is quite rare for low budget productions. Actors and crew are often expected to work for nothing at that level which I always found really quite extraordinary when I was doing it all those years ago. The company are now looking to raise further funds to ensure the editing process is done as well as it can be. If you or anyone you know are interested in supporting them you can do so here. Forward the link to people you think may be interested if you can’t do it!

I’ve never gone back to acting. Eventually I left The City and looked after my kiddies for ten years, although I did teach acting and drama for many of them to children and adults before embarking on my photography adventures. Sometimes I’d love to get back into it and other times I think, thank goodness I left all that behind. Who knows what the future holds though…

I think however that my time as an actor on sets and in rehearsals meant that I was quite comfortable working on The Lights and really enjoyed my day there. It was certainly challenging given the very low lighting but I think I managed to capture some of the atmosphere they were aiming for.  I probably might quite like to do some more film stills so if anyone out there is planning on writing/producing/directing a film and wants someone to photograph it, I’m your woman! In the meantime here are some images from The Lights.

©sarahjanefield 2015

South London Photographer: My first exhibition and promises of more to come

Here I am making time for a second blog post this week although truth be told, I could probably be catching up on some college work.  It will wait.  I have to talk about my first small but significant outing as a photographer who is trying to make some kind of art for people to hang on their walls.

To be honest, I have been a bit shy up until now about my non-portrait work, hiding away online and not really sharing it with people I know or who are close to me. Instead I got caught up with a bunch of fellow photography nuts on the internet but it was an inward looking process – useful but only virtual and therefore certainly quite limited. As I turned outwards, learning about how to get everything ready was a trifle challenging, but I was lucky when an offline photographer friend introduced me to an amazing guy who did my printing for me, and did it extremely well.  And the very sweet people at Lavender Framers on Barmouth Road, SW18 gave me lots of advice and practical help.

And last Friday it all culminated in a fantastically enjoyable evening when quite a lot of people turned up to see and buy my work.  I was so relieved and had a great night.  I have had some solid and positive feedback, including from people who couldn’t make it on Friday but who have called me up to tell me they’d like to buy a print, which is a great feeling for someone who hadn’t actually sold art work before.

So, what do these first public pictures of mine represent? Well, that’s up to you. Perhaps they’re just pretty pictures of random spots, some quite colourful, some a little less so. For me they’re a direct response to events in my life. A search for growth, for colour following a very dark personal time, and most importantly for some solid structure – both internally and externally.  These photographs also, without any doubt in my mind, stem from a desire to record the landscape within which my community exists,  a community that means the world to me. All in all, things went very well on Friday and I now have the confidence to keep going and am looking forward to bigger and perhaps more ambitious projects in the future. Now that I’ve got over that initial ‘dipping of my toe in the water’ other things have already begun to appear on the horizon.

I went out with for dinner with the sweet, kind and adorable Mr & Mrs C on Monday night to The Thai Grocer on Garret Lane which if you haven’t been is really worth visiting.  The food is delicious and the atmosphere perfect.  Mr C took it upon himself to become my agent and promoter and I may have an opportunity to show some work there too now.  I like Mr C’s terms – he’s happy always to work for free – thank you!!  So all in all the meal was extremely satisfying; tasty food and wine, genuine friendship, lots of laughter, a helpful and generous sense of community spirit from Mr. Thai Grocer all of which add up to lots of well-needed and much appreciated nourishment for me.

If you weren’t able to make my little opening at Barmouth Kitchen you can see the images hanging there for a few weeks yet or click here for an online experience, and don’t forget prints are for sale.

Prices available on the website.  Image (c) Sarah-Jane Field 2015

South London Photographer: Editing photographs I took nearly a year ago!

I have just edited a bunch of photographs I took last year. I remember doing them. It was the second job in a single day and I’d just finished shooting my first christening. I’d been pretty nervous at the time and was tired. I went along to the subsequent job, got a little lost on the way and arrived feeling stressed. I managed to get through the job and got home later to edit two sets of photos.

I can be quite hard on myself and I was a bit worried about the photos I’d taken for job no 2, as I was in the very early days of all this photography stuff at the time. Well, I still am but not quite so very early now… The family were just about to move back to the States at the time and it has taken them quite a few months to come back to me with an order. Which, of course added to my concerns. However, not only have the family got back in touch and ordered their images but they have also ordered many more than were originally offered in the package, which is pleasing.

What’s interesting for me after all this time is to see that I had actually taken some photographs that were OK, despite my reservations. Yes, there are some that I’m not at all happy with but then there always are and I suspect there always will be. I hope however that by now, after 18 months or so of slowly building up my little business, I would have found different ways to solve some of the conundrums that come up when doing family portraiture. The images that work, work well (enough) and I needn’t have been quite so tough on myself at the time. Nevertheless, opening yourself up to the world with work that will be liked and disliked by people depending on their tastes is part of the job.

I recently read a very helpful blog by a successful and thriving photographer/blogging person, in which he wrote that he is sometimes told he takes horrible photographs, writes awful blogs and a whole bunch of other such negative stuff – all of which he helpfully advised to ignore if you were to find yourself in that situation.  Good advice!  And goodness knows, there is enough truly ridiculous crap in life to be getting on with without piling any more crap on myself by being overly harsh and negative about my own work! (I do wonder as I write this if I’ll ever take any real notice of my helpful realisations…)

So, that’s it for now – just some photographs I took nearly a year ago which have been helpful for me to revisit.  Interesting to see where I am now in relation to nearly a year ago, and I think was more than heading in the right direction. Anyway, I will have to write another blog pretty soon to chat about my very first foray into exhibiting my work to the general public, well, I say general public, I mean mostly my very supportive and lovely community… but it was a good start.  Does that mean I am going to step up to 2 blogs a week yet… it’s something I’ve been contemplating for a while… we’ll see. Certainly, I might make it to two posts this week.

Right, that’s it for now… off to get those kids to bed.  Have a great couple of days – back soon. All images (c)SarahJaneField 2014