What About a Group Project for 2007

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Charles Twist
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Post by Charles Twist » Thu Jan 11, 2007 11:07 am Etc/GMT-1+01:00

What about a project to cover the coast of the UK?
How much of the coast do you reckon those committed to this project could photograph in a year? Phrased differently: how long would it take our small band of heroes to photograph the UK coast? Might be a good idea to say that we should have a pic every 30 miles or so: that would really reflect the way the coastline varies.
The UK is an island, which may be defined by its coast. We are the UK LFP group. I like the idea - that and the fact that it can be done slowly and systematically over a long period if need be.
Charles

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Post by MAGNAchrom » Thu Jan 11, 2007 2:06 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Just some marketing advise:

The ideal way to promote a body of work is to look for "synergy". My wife is a pastel artist and is very skillful at getting magazines and newspapers to come out with articles/reviews at the same time as her gallery shows.

In a similar vein, this group should aspire to the following:

- getting the commitment of a gallery willing to show the work
- a limited-edition book (to be available at the gallery and also available for sale on this website)
- a magazine article to come out at the same time as the opening (this is easy! ;) )
- naturally, this and other websites
- and of course, newspaper reviews before and after the opening


If you can pull off all the above, the success will be guaranteed. I think you should consider limiting it to 64-96 images -- which is a big show and more than enough for a limited edition book.

You already have the commitment of a magazine (MAGNAchrom) -- take that to the gallery and get them to commit. You will then yourselves have to commit to a specific date or it won't work.

Cheers
J Michael Sullivan
Editor/Publisher, MAGNAchrom
www.magnachrom.com

SteveH
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Post by SteveH » Thu Jan 11, 2007 2:07 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

A few thoughts....

How about "Great Britain - A Compass of The Seasons"

This leaves the choice of subject down to the photographer, spreads the load across the UK and gives the group a year to do it in. Perhaps...

.....1 photo for each season in each area - N,NE,E,SE,S,SW,W,NW

.....A short poem or quotation relevant to the area and/or season on the facing page.

.....Thumbnails, a description of how each was taken and what motivated the photographer at the back.

So 32 photos in total and if facing pages with the text perhaps 70 pages - a reasonable book size with UK and possibly world wide appeal.

Should also try and get a celebrity endosement at the front from a well known photographer (Joe Cornish?) and endorsement from the English, Scottish, and Welsh tourist boards? (Before you shout - this is in alphabetic order, not by importance!) :wink:

My contract ends next week, so with luck I should be able to put some photos in over the next year.


Or possibly "Great Britain - A Comapss of Classic Tea Rooms"?? :D

Steve
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Richard Childs
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Post by Richard Childs » Thu Jan 11, 2007 4:50 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Sorry I haven't contributed to this one yet. Moving house etc has taken over and I haven't been on for a few weeks.

I have my own gallery up here in Oban and while I would be happy to run an exhibition for UKLFP I reckon a central location would be better due to the diverse subject matter. Many galleries run exhibition programmes but these are often booked 2-3 years in advence ( I tried to get one at the Central Library in Nottingham a few years ago but moved up to Scotland long before anything happened).

The best idea would be to research venues, probably galleries specialising in photography, look for sponsorship from one of our current clutch. Or perhaps from someone like BPD or MPS who could promote themselves by printing our work. I will contact the editorial team at OP to find out how to approach them with an article like this. I have had quite a few articles published by them now but I don't know whether this will give me any more clout.

The event could be publicised in their News/events section with the promise of an article to follow. It would be a good idea to have the book idea well underway by then in order that there would be a 'product' to promote within the article.

I shall talk to OP and report back

Richard

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Post by DJ » Thu Jan 11, 2007 5:12 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

I was admittedly thinking fairly short term with regards this project, however if we're going for a long-term project with publishing/exhibiting in 2008, I have a different idea to offer.

It's not exactly original, but a "Four Seasons in Great Britain" or "Four Seasons from the Four Corners of Great Britain" exhibition, in which each contributing photographer presents four images, each of the same shot, from the same viewpoint, one for each season.

David Noton has a similar series halfway down page one of his gallery :

http://www.davidnoton.com/gallery0.htm

These kind of mini-series of shots are always quite interesting, and if everybody picked their own subject, and we had a multitude of different locations from different photographers, it would make for a very good exhibition IMHO.

Also, there would be no dates set in stone for the making of each shot, just that they must show each season, which gives a good deal of flexibility to each photographer to work more around their other commitments.

Setting up a web gallery would be no huge undertaking, a physical exhibition would be more so, but not impossible, and certainly I think we'd get something in more than one magazine for such a project.

Thoughts?

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Post by DJ » Thu Jan 11, 2007 5:21 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Sorry, my suggestion is quite similar to SteveH's earlier suggestion, guess I should read all the posts more clearly :? I swear I didn't copy, great minds must think alike eh? And apparently disturbed ones it would seem :wink:

I think it's definitely a feasible project, and it's appealing in that there is diversity and also a central theme.

Charles Twist
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Post by Charles Twist » Thu Jan 11, 2007 8:56 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

The four-season theme should give some scope for originality with a little thought, whether one shoots landscapes, architecture, portraits or intimate small-scale shots.
Do you want me to set up a temporary, unlinked page on the website to collate names and ideas? I think it's important to have an organising committee if we are going to go the route of all-out publicity. There are a dozen of us, spread throughout the country, who have spoken up so far. It's a manageable number. The spread also means we have excellent coverage and diversity. (Not sure about the compass point idea given the different nations within the Union, which each have their own NSE and W. Talking of which, what happened to Northern Ireland?)
We need to arrest some decisions. Marc, how do I set up a poll vote within this thread? Or do I have to start a thread just for that?
Thank you MagnaChrom for your kind offer. We'll be taking you up on that whatever we decide on.
Charles

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Post by SteveH » Fri Jan 12, 2007 10:13 am Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Hi Charles,

Northern Ireland not specifically omitted (it is NW of GB, after all, although some might contest the GB bit), just did not know if there was a tourist board.

I agree with the organising committee - we need to make sure that the number of Tea Room pictures is kept to a reasonable number......


Steve
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Charles Twist
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Post by Charles Twist » Fri Jan 12, 2007 8:00 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

We'll excuse you Steve... :wink:
Right the poll for the scale of the project is up and working. I suggest we now collate ideas for what we should do (then I'll set up another poll). The two ideas that have had the best press so far are (i) a day in Britain and (ii) four seasons in Britain. The first might need extending to a few days in order to accommodate the great British weather. The latter gives us plenty of time - a year - but is that too long a period?
Anybody have any other themes they care to throw into the arena for general consideration? Could be a style of shot, could be a subject, could be an abstract idea, could be a revision of some older work (is there a handy site with pics from Bill Brandt's 'Literary Britain' for us ignorants?).
There is nothing to say we can't run several projects, if we want to pursue different ideas and see which one holds the most promise. I have set up an unlinked page at http://www.lf-photo.org.uk/project_2007.htm . If anybody wants to take the lead, I'm happy to create content. For example, we can show the leader's name (and email) with a short description of the proposed project; I can then add pics as and when they get to me. The best project gets farmed out. Richard Childs: do you have suggestions as to what OP might like (without revealing your trade secrets)?
I look forward to hearing from you.
Charles

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Post by sandeha » Sat Jan 13, 2007 9:31 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

I've come late to the thread (still waiting for Satin Snow, grrr ...) but I'd like to make a couple of suggestions.

Magnachrom is quite right, IMHO, to point up the value of synergy. It can lead to considerable growth, but also, it's really the only way to avoid the main pitfalls of vanity publishing - the cost of quality reproductions, and low public diffusion. Photography requires good quality repro, but LF (correct me if I'm wrong) demands exceptional quality just to avoid disappointment.

However, I'd suggest that before marketing issues can be decided, one factor needs to be considered ... which should have prominence in the theme of the project, the subject matter, or the medium?

The reason I stress this is that Flickr does an excellent job of attracting mass viewing where the subject matter has public appeal ... and if you're not keeping an eye on public appeal, the viewership may turn out to be (unsurprisingly) low. Web-viewing has its limitations ... most evidently in the case of LF, but again, subject matter or medium?

The idea of four seasons is a beauty (there's an admirable example here: http://nelsonfoto.com/v/showthread.php?t=7811) ... but it takes a long time !! And in Britain, a one-day shoot is bound to be beset by weather issues in one quarter or another, if not all together. I like the idea of working the coast, but wonder if the distribution of LFers here is up to it. I also wonder if the geographic distribution of photographers here could suggest a theme ... setting up a Flickr group map (it can be private) would be a quick and easy way to test out commonly occuring interests across the UK, with images appended to the locations where they were shot. In other words, find a theme by analysing what we already do wherever we are - and then push it further with a deadline.

Another theme that crosses my mind is "Working Britain" - I think there was once a photo book by this title. Much as I enjoy doing landscapes and graveyards, I one day hope to get into serious environmental portraiture - can't say I know any novellists or poets, but I do know a few mechanics and farmers. Quite a challenge, but a group project could push me to it. Otherwise, there are all the common genres from flowers to architecture, from food to fashion, etc ...

At the end of the day, what each of us does well is probably what each of us would do best ... the diversity among large format photographers in the UK would be a theme all its own.

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Post by SteveH » Sun Jan 14, 2007 9:02 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Good points all - we certainly don't want to go into this without really understanding what we are trying to achieve, and how much we are willing to invest to get there. We also need to have decided how any profits wil be used 'for the avoidance of agro' later on.

I see this as taking 12 - 18 months, if we go for the 4 seasons approach, and that may be conservative.

Just so that you know I have not lost interest, I will not be able to reply to this thread after next Sunday, as will be travelling in foreign climes for 5 weeks. Luggage allowances don't allow me to carry LF gear unfortunately, but pictures should be good....more later.


Steve
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Post by gari » Sun Jan 14, 2007 9:44 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Maybe we should start a shorter term project as we may well be involved in this one for a long time as Steve says.
There is the danger that some people will be put off by such a long project, also there may be group members who would be interested in a project though not interested or maybe feel that there work/vision whatever is not ready for publishing in a book etc and/or may consider 12-18 months too long to be of interest.

I see no reason we cannot have a short term project/s ongoing as the larger one develops, it would also serve to be a platform for learning as we go with regard to galleries or mag publishing.

We could even have the projects escalate into the main project, for instance have the first project as a site gallery and a second as a gallery exhebition, third aimed at magazine publication etc. Main project being an amalgam of all three, synergy, as rightly pointed out by MAGNAchrom

This could also serve to give the group some history, showing a prospective publisher a standard of work and commitment to running group projects to fruition.

It may encourage more members of the group to get onboard too, we seem to be a core of maybe a dozen so far from a membership of over 100.

What subject did you have in mind for a short term project DJ? I say we get one on the go to provide some impetus.

Gari
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project 2007

Post by du a gwyn » Sun Jan 14, 2007 10:22 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

hello everybody,i like the idea of a book myself,similar to the best of friends books.then we can see everybody's taste and style in photography.with a theme project we may not get to see people's own style because they are governed by the theme,just a thought!
c.roberts

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Post by Richard Childs » Sun Jan 14, 2007 10:58 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

So maybe the plan should be for us to arrange the first date for members to make their first image; within the next two months to capture winter whereever they are with any subject matter. This would make for an interesting exercise anyway and before we spend too much time planning would give us a better idea as to how much support we would receive from the entire membership. We could then load the images up into a designated gallery here on the site. From this we can democratically make a selection with which to advertise/market the idea of an exhibition and book. I'm sure that OP or some other mag would run an article ( I will contact them this coming tuesday to run the idea by them) possibly once every three months as the project develops. Steve Lewis' book was serialised in OP prior to publication and Peter Watson's book appeared each month a couple of years ago so we should be able to do the same.

Any thoughts?

Richard

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Post by gari » Sun Jan 14, 2007 11:24 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

I will go for that, I am keen to get some movement.

Gari
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