The journey…

The photography request

juniper berries

One of the great parts of being a photographer is getting to meet people from all walks of life, industries and working with them in their environment. This can range from photographing a little old lady for a leading health care company to a CEO of a major manufacturing group. Location photography can bring its own unique set of challenges.

Last year Lidl Ireland contacted me about shooting images of producers for their 2021 Christmas brochure, something I’d done on several occasions before. Now when Lidl gets in touch the one thing it normally means is a road trip over several weeks and many miles, which is fine by me!

The Photography Brief

An important part of a photographers shot preparation.

The brief

Briefs come in all shapes and sizes. If it’s a new client, I ask for detailed brief as it gives me a much clearer picture (no pun intended) of what the client is asking for. Who, what, where, when, deliverables, time scale and intended use are all important aspects to be included in a photographic brief.  The brief gives me a better appreciation of the brand, values and how best to represent those in the images. It also aids in the smooth flow of the project making sure everyone is headed in the same direction and ironing out any potential bumps in the road. Which takes me nicely onto the next part.  

Route planning

One of the main parts of a shoot like this with many locations is preparation and groundwork. Making contact with the producers and finding out their availability. Then there’s the route planning, which used to be a major headache when working in the Republic of Ireland. Then they introduced Eircodes, which now take you right to the door! In the UK we use a system called postcodes which take you to an area covering many addresses. That’s a win for Eircodes. The one thing I really dislike is backtracking over old ground, adding miles and costs that could be avoided. 

Preperation

Route planning with Google Maps

Arriving on Location

When arriving at a food producer it’s not a matter of taking pictures the moment you step out of the car, oh no. There are health & safety forms to complete, everything from; have you been abroad in the last two weeks (I wish) to where have you traveled from today and everything in-between and that’s before we get to the Covid-19 part. Which again ranges from forms to complete to lateral flow tests to one company having their own PCR lab. All very thorough and reassuring.

Picture from First Photoshoot, John O Connell Director at West Cork Distillers Ltd

Photography

Once all H&S procedures have been finalised it’s on to Photography. I like to have a walk around the facility/location to look for possible angles. As I said earlier one of the aspects of working for Lidl is the travel, you get to see all four corners of the island. In this case, it’s West Cork Distillers, Skibbereen. Suppliers of Whiskey and Gin to Lidl. I photographed the Whiskey side of the business a few years ago where I learnt terms like “angel’s share” which refers to the alcohol that escapes from the wooden barrels as it matures. 

One of Ireland's few female distillers - Deirdre Bohane

This time it was Gin! Rarely do I go into a shoot with too many preconceived ideas, but this one was the exception. My knowledge of Gin making is limited, but I hoped that large copper kettles were part of the process. I was in luck, they have three very large, beautiful Italian copper Kettles and one of Ireland's few female distillers, Deirdre Bohane. It was a great shoot and a fantastic project to be involved in.

 Oh and the miles covered, 2833.

A bottle of the finished product - Wild Burrow Irish Gin