Website Relaunch, Atma and Madeleine and Art Takes Times Square

Website Relaunch

A couple of weeks back in a previous post I re designed my business cards and updated my portfolio, since then I have also been working on my website and I had been waiting for my last two shoots to be published before I announced it properly!

The site now looks completely(ish? haha) different as I'm using a new template design on 4ormat.com. I have streamlined it a bit too, not only are my editorials there but I've also added a portfolio section that reflects the one I have printed, I thought that would be useful. :P

You can check out the new site here! www.tomsimmonds.com

Atma and Madeleine

Last weekend I had two test shoot, one on Saturday with the Atma and the second on Sunday with Madeleine, it had been a while since working with some new people so it was quite refreshing! This time of year is always slow so two tests on one weekend is rare but excellent! :)

I love working on large shoots with a big team but it's really great to get back to basics and just go to on an adventure with a model and shoot wherever we end up! It's great for experimenting and it's always good to be in a situation where you don't know what to expect and having the challenge of getting a great shot. :)

For my shoot with Atma we explored around Buckingham Palace, and with the chosen styling we got a little bit extra attention from the hordes of idiotic tourists, it's like they had never need a woman before, but secretly I was hoping to get a complaint from the police to add to my list of places I've been told off at for shooting haha. Luckily though we were unhindered and were able to get some really cool images, and some that were perhaps a little unusual! :) 

Here is a little back of camera preview!

The next day was my shoot with Madeleine, the weather was a little worse for this one but as we were setting up in Madeleine's place we were able to shoot inside a bit too! We went for a little explore around the Sloane Square area for some images and afterwards we shot a little in and around the apartment. Both of these shoots were cursed by the sunset at 4 problem that you get this time of year so we did a little experimenting with a flash, which is something I barely ever use, and it was fun! Although my flash is older than I am so it is very slow at recharging and kind of ruined the flow a little bit haha.

Here is a little back of camera preview from the day! :)

Art Takes Times Square

Way back in June of 2012 I was part of the See Me - Art Takes Times Square competition and at the time they were offering an art book featuring all of the artists who were featured. So much time had passed since then that I thought it would never arrive but completely out of the blue a huge box arrived in the post last Wednesday and sitting inside was the book! A photo of mine that I took with Stephanie features on page 39, here is a photo of it:

Guise, Xquisit Magazine and Analogue Publication

Guise and Xquisit Magazine

Back in late August I had my third studio shoot, I'm still learning how to use artificial lights but the resulting images have definitely boosted my confidence in the area, this was in no small part due to the fantastic team who I was collaborating with! You can see the behind the scenes blog post from the shoot here.

To my utter delight the images were accepted for submission to the wonderful Xquisit Magazine, and not only was the shoot included it made the cover too! :D You can read the issue by clicking here, or the image below! Our images are on pages 44-51.

Here are some more of the final images! You can see more on my website too at www.tomsimmonds.com/guise

Credits for the shoot are:

Model: Toni Bently @ Leni's Model Management
Make-up/hair/styling: Lydia Pankhurst
Assistant/styling: Lizzy Perry
Photography: Thomas Cole Simmonds
Brands/boutiques/designers: Rouge Pony, RCK+SKLL, Miss Selfridge, New Look, Zara.


Analogue Publication

As in my last post where I showed you the work in progress that was my Skeleton Project publication, this week I decided to put together another one off while I wait for the proof of the last one to arrive.

This time I thought I'd focus on just the analogue images I have taken over the past few years. When I do a shoot, depending on how much time we have I normally shoot a roll or two on film to get another version of the shoot with a different feel. I picked my favourites from my collection and started putting together the pages, here is a little preview.

Autumn Afternoon, Coco Magazine and The Skeleton Project

Autumn Afternoon

Back in August (bloody hell that went quick) I had a shoot in London with a lovely team, the shoot has just been published in the latest issue of Coco Magazine and I can finally share the images! You can check out the editorial on pages 52-61 either by following this link or clicking below.

I also put a few clips together from the shoot, you can follow the link or check it out below:

You can check out the behind the scenes from this shoot here. And you can see more of the shoot on my website at www.tomsimmonds.com/autumnafternoon. :)

Credits for the shoot:

Model: Annabel @ PRM
Styling: Christianne Lucianne
Make-up: Nazmeen Ak
Boutique: Gladrags Boutique
Photography: Thomas Cole Simmonds

The Skeleton Project

Over the past week I have been teaching myself how to use InDesign for some possible future projects and I thought the best way to really get to grips with it would be to actually create a publication of my own, and while I would love to publish my own multi-issue magazine at some point I thought a one off would be best! 

I wanted it to have more of a solid theme than just random shoots I had done so I decided to fill the pages with the images taken from my Skeleton Project! Here are a couple of little previews.

I am hoping to offer these for purchase if it turns out well! I will be ordering a proof soon so fingers crossed! :)

Hit Refresh

Portfolio

So as per usual with this time of year, absolutely bugger all is happening, and photoshoots are about as easy to arrange as is is to... do something quite difficult. So with that in mind I thought I'd give everything to do with my photography a bit of a make-over. Think scrapheap challenge meets photography websites and you'll have no idea what I'm talking about.

First thing to get done up was my portfolio! I was already pretty happy with it but it was somewhat repetitive with the imagery and I had some new work that I wanted to put in it. I made my way to Photobox.co.uk (I would highly recommend them) as per usual when ordering prints and as luck would have it their Christmas sale had 1 day remaining so I got to work sorting out all the images I needed and a couple of days later a huge tube arrived at the door brimming with photos!

And here we are, a little peek at my updated A4 and A3 portfolios! :)

Business Cards

The second thing to get an overhaul was my business cards! In the past I've had a favourite photo of mine on it but for this batch I thought I go with something a little more timeless!

I hopped on Photoshop... or more accurately stayed on photoshop as I never get of it haha. I thought going for an aperture design along with a simple drawing of a camera, after a few hours of buggering about I finally had something I was happy with, this is the design I finally decided on! 

Now I'm just waiting to see how they turn out when they arrive. I ordered them from Moo.com, another site I wholeheartedly recommend! 


Logo

The third thing to get an update was the logo for my website! This was pretty easy as all I had to do was take the aperture design my my new business cards and fill in the blanks with some photos. :P

Here is how it turned out!

Website

And the last thing to get an update was my website! I had been hesitant to change it for the longest time as it was as close as I could get it to how I wanted it to look. But 4ormat.com (the website provider I use) has had a lot of updates lately and a new theme that I could customise in the way I wanted was available so I took the plunge!

It's still slightly under construction as some shoots on there are unreleased at the moment! However it's pretty much done, you can check it out as always at this link! www.tomsimmonds.com

Fashion on Fashion Street and Quiescent Magazine

Fashion on Fashion Street

A few days ago I saw a tweet by stylist Anastasia Gheorghe, I wasn't sure what she was looking for in particular but as it had been a couple of months since I had done a shoot and everything I'm planning is still... being planned. So I thought I'd drop her an email and see what the project was about. 

As it turned out she was looking for a photographer to help out with a grunge style editorial set in front of some of the fantastic graffiti around the Brick Lane area for her university project, and for a magazine. So of course I agreed! :D

After a bunch of arranging with agencies we eventually got the team together along with the co-stylist, make-up artist and models. I made my way to London on Tuesday to our meeting place, Istituto Marangoni where Anastasia and Shirly (the other stylist) are studying. Being a big old nerd myself stepping into that place was like going to another planet solely inhabited by attractive 20-something women, a lovely place haha!

Photo by Anastasia

Once everyone had arrived the make-up artist Molly got to work getting our models Ariel and Faye ready for shooting! And Anastasia and Shirly started putting the looks together.

We shot four looks in all with the last being shot in the dark, which was a pretty new experience for me, and the results are really cool! I'm eager to get started on the editing! But for now here is a back of camera preview, some more behind the scenes snaps and a Polaroid of one of the looks. :)

Photo by Anastasia

Models: Ariel at Leni's Model Management | Faye at Body London

Styling: Anastasia Gheorghe and Shirly Piperno

Make-up: Mollie-Anne

Photography: Thomas Cole Simmonds

Quiescent Magazine

A couple of weeks back marked the release of Volume 2 Issue 2 of the fantastic Quiescent Magazine featuring a little selection of my photos that met with the issues theme. You can see me on pages 90-93. :)

You can read the issue online here, and purchase it here. :)

Day in the Park

Day in the Park

Back in May I had a shoot with the lovely Stephanie in London, you can see some behind the scenes in a previous blog post here. The shoot was meant for publication but as they do things fall though so they've been sitting on my hard drive all these months gathering virtual dust.

So I thought it was about time dust was blown off, here are a selection from the shoot. You can see more on my site here: www.tomsimmonds.com/dayinthepark

And here are a few I shot on film, it's been a while since I posted any analogue photos!