Nigel Shafran

Fact of the day… He once got deported

Nigel Shafran came in to talk to the first and second years doing the foundation degree in professional photography.
I’ll admit, none of us were expecting a lot from him after having first looked at his experimental work before the talk. But by the end of the day, most of our opinions were swayed in his favour.

Shafran initially talked us through how he started out as a photographer, which didn’t include college or university courses but did do an art course pre age 16. He never finished anything he started in art which led to one of his tutors suggesting he take up photography. He quickly became very passionate about this medium, creating work to please himself – not thinking about a career initially. He made a point that he doesn’t tend to use lighting in his work, only available light so that his work won’t look too commercial.

To get into photography as a career, Shafran started knocking on doors and making phone calls un till he scored a job as an assistant of a still life photographer working on 10×8 cameras. He didn’t have a glamourous job – only running film into the labs and carrying equipment, and occasionally having a quick game of space invaders in the arcade whilst running through Soho. Being an assistant gave him an insight into technique, cameras and lighting. “…its not so important if you have your own vision, but it is useful to know all that stuff like the alphabet. You choose what you want to use so that you can communicate in your own way…” He suggested that once you know all this ‘stuff’, you can throw it all away and discard it.

Shafran has assisted many well known photographers such as Robert Maplethorpe, Mario Testino and Annie Leibovitz (who sacked him after 1 day!) He has also had the chance to do fashion stories for i-D and the Face in the past. When Shafran shoots fashion stories he took to the streets and wouldn’t go for the typical ‘beautiful’ models. Sometimes he got published. Sometimes he didn’t.
You need to show your portfolio and get it out there, and either hope for commissions or that your own work gets published; Or approach those who you hope to be published by.

Shafran doesn’t get excited about glamour but is interested in the mundane and boring which is clear in his personal photography. Inspiration can’t be forced but when it’s arrived you need to act on it when it happens – be it food on a till conveyor belt, charity shops, your wife on the phone – all of which he has photographed. He is both subtle and observational in what he photographs. Shafran said of his own work that he can admit some of it is rubbish, but at the end of the day, most of it what he does, he does for himself.

Here is some of his work or see more on his site, Nigel Shafran

Guest speaker Paul Hartnett

PAUL HARTNETT PHOTOGRAPHER
‘RAW STYLE, REAL STYLE’

Guest speaker AT NEW COLLEGE, Swindon
Paul Hartnett is a photographer of Street culture and the club culture scene, his work can be viewed at http://www.paulhartnett.com

He describes himself as a ‘Cool Hunter’ a ‘Social History researcher photographer’. Paul Hartnett started his photographic career in 1976 taking pictures of the punk scene, although his fascination with the camera started at a very early age.

His style is a’ Disco Mix of Visuals’. Looking for the unusual within people, if you see something that at first you find shocking, you should not move away from it, you should move closer and take a closer look.

Paul Hartnett visiting Foundation Degree students at New College

Pauls motto is ‘Less is more’ strip down you image then strip it down again until you reach the bare minimal. Choose only one accessory be it a single earring, a tie laces on shoes. Too much information is distracting.

He also gave useful tips on how to take a street photograph.
Most street photographers take straight on shots. Paul suggested taking a full length, then the middle section then the head and also focuses on the back where at times a lot of information about a person is hidden. The back is often forgotten. And to take your shots at different angles, from up high or very close in, if you want to focus on footwear.

Paul does not believe in ‘tarting up image’ with Photoshop, it should be seen as it was taken, which is something I strongly agree with. He said a cheap £1.00 camera bought in a car boot sale and using out of date film is just as worthwhile as any expensive camera.
Thinking out of the box and using your creative side sets you apart from others, again something I would strongly agree with.

During his talk he gave a fascinating insight into his childhood, information about London Fashion week and how ruthless fellow photographers can be regarding model release forms.
And how to ‘blag’ and ‘wing it’ as much as you can to get to where you want to be. But always do it with respect and politeness, act in a professional manner.

He also gave helpful ideas on how to sell your work. Don’t publish on the internet unless you want to sell. And suggested selling on Ebay but consider the title as this will draw the attention to your work first.
He also suggested sending the work to magazine and newspaper picture editors in the post rather than by email.

Picture Editors get a lot of work through email and tend to ignore them but by sending an envelope they are taken by surprise.
Apparently Wednesday is the best day to have your work looked at; 1 in 10 may get to hear back from them.
There are 14 000 photography graduates leaving Universities each year, and want to make it as a professional photographer, this makes it incredibly hard to get noticed, so try and come up with new and unusual ways which may get you noticed.
You have to be resourceful both within your work and how to get work.
Find your own voice and keep listening to it. Also something I would strongly agree with.

I found the talk with Paul incredibly worthwhile, he gave a lot of useful insights and gave some worthwhile tips for our future careers
I found him to be funny and full of character. I enjoyed listening to tales of his personal life, and a joy to listen to someone with a ‘human factor’ rather than just a professional businessman.
I found the talk touching at times and could relate to some of the things, I guess we all could

Thank you to Paul for his lecture and for taking the time to look at our work and to give advice and suggestions.

By Niki Cannon 28.02. 2012

“The three things I am taking from the day with Paul Hartnett are the importance of choosing the right sitters (people that viewers want to look at and who carry the idea forward in a more intense way), paring an idea right down to its essentials and building an audience for one’s prints.”
Barbara Dixon

“Insight into a practical and competitive market as well as the brutal truths affiliated with it, knowing your audience and how to approach them and to have a niche demographic and a personal motif ready.

I think the main thing I took away is that bending the rules is sometimes the best way forward, in a world of ever changing consumer needs.”

Lee Heaven

“I found the talk very interesting, it was really great to get an insight into such a character’s life and his ways of seeing his subjects. The three things I have taken away from his talk are not to photograph the “expected”, push yourself to achieve the best of your ability and that selling your prints is the way to go!”

Dom Hunter

“Strip it down, strip it down and strip it down again” was a quote that Paul kept repeating through out the talk. I feel this is an interesting sentence, and will bare it in mind when producing further work. I learnt that the simple photographs challenge the viewer a lot more than busy ones”.

Suzie Mercer

“For God sake, F*CK IT UP” Is perhaps the one thing I took most from Paul. He repeated it so many times that I feel thats what I want to try out in my own work. Forget about typical conventions and the normal things done in photography, thats been done before. Why not screw around with angles, lighting and compositions – mess it all up and create something new and exciting.

Gemma Bird

I found the talk really interesting and inspiring as Paul had his own style, his own interests and I don’t think it bothered him about what others thought of it, as long as he thought it was working. He wasn’t all into the different professional camera kit and stuff but was all into the experienting with not so great equipment which I thought was very interesting. I really liked his work and how he presented it

Vicky Scipio

Was a good talk, and learnt a lot from it.

Jordy Day