April overview...

by Vicky Matthers

Here's a little taster of what we've been up to the last couple of months:

Some really lovely jobs that our clients have given us, from photographing the Leeds Rhinos to a dance performance at Queen Margarets School in York.

We can't wait to see what May and June bring, keep an eye on the blog for more updates :)

Happy Birthday Icon!

By Matt Gore owner and founder iconphotomedia

There we were 10 years ago in The Tramshead pub just outside Saltaire (the Victorian model village near Bradford http://www.saltairevillage.info/), Guzelian photographers Matt Gore and Robin Hammond were hatching a plan to launch a photographer's agency that was to become iconphotomedia.

If memory serves me rightly (we were in the pub) some of the company names being banded around included:

Photo Republic
Untitled (we just got a kick out of visualising this in print as a byline)
M6 Pictures
Magenta 

Eventually, we agreed on iconphotomedia and have been lucky to be so well supported by a core of great clients for the last decade.

Our very first job - by Matt Gore for the Times Educational Supplement, who went on to become one of our biggest clients - was shot in Harrogate as Matt packed up his rental flat to move to London to start icon with Robin.

Picture by Matt Gore/iconphotomedia 

Graham Hoyle, chief executive of the Association of Employment and Learning Providers (AELP) published in the Times Educational Supplement

Even on the drive down to London, Matt stopped off in Leeds to shoot a commission for Leeds Metropolitan University..

Picture by Matt Gore/iconphotomedia
University students dress up WW2 style to entertain a local school visiting for a history lesson

Of course, we had no idea then that icon would go on to become such an outstanding success. In the early years we applied a very simple principle - to provide eye catching broadsheet style photography for a wide range of editorial and commercial clients. 

Here are some interesting numbers....

Heartfelt thanks to everyone who has helped icon survive and thrive over the past decade; our lovely clients and suppliers, a lot of which have become good friends, and also to our friends and family who have put up with the sometimes crazy lifestyle choice that is Professional Photography. 

Matt Gore

Photoshop guru.....!

by Vicky Matthers



I had the opportunity recently to photograph some sporting scholars from York University.  The brief was to shoot individual portraits against a black background and then in post production to create a group shot of them all together.



There were 18 scholars in total and it was certainly a busy few hours with people turning up every 10 minutes or so, at one point there was a rather large queue down the corridor!!!



Below are a couple of the individual shots, I used a large metre square soft box to the front and slightly camera left and then two strip soft boxes on the left and right coming back towards the camera:

Then the really hard work began...!  I had to cut out 18 separate images of the athletes to drop in on a black background.  I am not photoshop illiterate but I needed some help from my photoshop guru Lee who showed me the best way to edit them using the wand tool.  I don't think that I have ever worked on an image with 18 layers before, certainly interesting trying to move them around on a small screen!

Amazing what you can do on a few cold winter evenings......!!!

2013 in Pictures!

by Iconphotomedia

To start our New Year we thought we would throw together a quick gallery slideshow featuring some of our favorite work from 2013...We thank all our clients for their support in 2013 and we are very much looking forward to working with you more in 2014. 

 If you aren't a client already then we very much hope to be working with you this year!

icon photographers shoot themselves

Most Photographers should shoot themselves...
It's a great way of learning, trying out kit and technique and also getting together example images.

Here's one from the Archives! Vicky Matthers first job for icon way back in 'nineteen hundred and frozen to death'

Matt on a video shoot for a well known Spanish bank!
He's laughing as he has just recorded a piece of audio 'Gold' ...Vicky Matthers singing a tuneful little song down the radio mic! 

Calling all Photographers!!
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you+icon+net=one2one photographer training!
click here to find out more

Vicky working at the rugby league challenge cup final, Wembley

"I am not a number"

"Hey Numbnuts he's to your left...no the other left!"
Matt Photographing in Bordeux.


Showing a sitter and example image of exactly what you would like to achieve in the shoot is such a powerful tool. Part of our job is getting people on side and manipulating the situation - to get people to do things they may not necessarily want to do (or think they want to do) 






In editorial work we may want to illustrate the story in a certain way - This example involves Lib Dem Politican Ed Davey. He's a big guy and given his role in the Liberal Demorcrats I wanted him to look like a bit of a bouncer guarding the door. 






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The Currency of Ideas

Our 2013 website revamp has just gone live...
by Matt Gore/iconphotomedia

Light It, Shoot It, Retouch It! Learn Photography and Photoshop Online with Scott Kelby!



www.iconphotomedia.com

Yep, I have been busying myself with editing, image selection, photoshop, html code and various vectors, buttons, textures and backgrounds. With a little help from a template and lots of midnight oil we have finished the revamp of our main website as part of our ongoing 2013 strategy. 

I'll post lots more visuals with a step by step on how I produced the website and created the visuals at a later date.
It's all part of our idea to evolve iconphotomedia and what we offer our clients in light of new technology and the changes in Visual Communications. Photography has changed along with the huge improvements in  communications. As a result Advertising has been flipped on it's head so traditional media outlets are rapidly changing to keep up. Rather than see all this as a negative (fitting pun) we Photographers should embrace the new opportunities. Ideas are our commodity - creativity is the currency of ideas and we are all wonderfully placed to realise this and use technology to expand those ideas. Think big as the World has just got a little smaller...

Here's a taster of some of the new look....









Hope you all like it...

www.iconphotomedia.com