EP138 Interview With Toastmaster Simon Shirley | Simple Steps For A Successful Client Business

EP138 Interview With Toastmaster Simon Shirley | Simple Steps For A Successful Client Business In this interview with an old friend of ours, Simon Shirley, Toastmaster extraordinaire, we end up chatting about some of the simple things that make for a successful client-facing business for responding quickly, to getting a crowd onside (even when the odds are stacked against you!) I mention a few workshops we'll be running, so here are the links: Sunday 10th September 2023 The Guild Of ...

EP137 Habit Hackers: Supercharging Your Studio with Good Habits

EP137 Habit Hackers: Supercharging Your Studio with Good Habits Pick up any book on business in your local bookstore, and it will almost certainly talk about processes. Yawn.  But what if we thought about processes as good habits? The things you do every day that you don't need to think about. As a business, you need good processes: doing the right things, at the right time in the right way is the foundation of any successful studio. And besides, it ...

EP136 Interview With Margaret And Peter Aldington OBE | On Creativity And Relationships

EP136 Interview With Margaret And Peter Aldington OBE | On Creativity And Relationships Peter Aldington OBE, world-renowned architect and garden designer, with his wife Margaret - whose energy and partnership have been as fundamental to his success as any other creative's, though she professes to not being a designer of any kind. I have wanted to record this interview for a long time. Peter is a world-renowned architect, having achieved no less than 9 (yes, you're reading that correctly, 9) ...

EP135 Winning (Or Not) And Finding Positives – Whatever The Outcome

EP135 Winning (Or Not) And Finding Positives - Whatever The Outcome Well, this weekend has two big events: Mother's Day and the Societies Of Photographers Annual Convention In London. Sadly I wasn't able to make the Convention this year - though I was there in spirit!  That didn't stop me entering the print competition though.  I didn't come away with any gongs this year and that always stings just a little.  Somehow, I have to convert the feeling of missing ...

EP134 The Power Of Thank You

EP134 The Power Of Thank You! Photographers are supremely visual, right?  Of course.  But have you ever wondered about the power of words?  Two words, in particular, can have a bigger impact than any image ever can (and I am speaking as someone whose entire life is living and breathing pictures).  The words? "Thank You".  These two words, when given or received, can bring a huge amount of joy.  Trust me. In the podcast, I mention the dates of our ...

EP130 Invest In Things That Benefit Your Client

EP130 Invest In Things That Benefit Your Client I recorded this podcast at 7am while sat in the studio, waiting for a new TV to be delivered.  Luckily it actually arrived when they said it would!  The TV is for our Client Reveal Room as we want our customers to have the best possible experience when they come back to see their pictures. But exactly how do you figure out where to spend your limited budget?  On things that benefit ...

EP123 Interview With Street Photographer Ross Grieve

EP123 Interview With Street Photographer Ross Grieve This episode was recorded in a bar - possibly my favourite but, in contrast to our studio garden - not the quietest place to record audio.  But it makes me happy.  It was at this year’s incredible Societies of Photographers Convention in London where I spent the week judging and, well, generally feeling liberated from the previous two years of lockdown! The interview is with one of the nicest guys in the industry ...

EP122 Fireworks and Finding Freedom In The Studio

EP121 Portraits Are Portraits, Even If They're Corporate! It's late and I'm driving back from a beautiful spring wedding, shot in uncharacteristic April sunshine.  I am, to put it mildly, hot and tired.  in spite of this, I thought it would be an idea to record a quick podcast on my way home, so here it is - various musings on finding freedom in the studio and the joy of using the Z9  as a wedding photographer. Oh, and I ...

EP121 Portraits Are Portraits, Even If They’re Corporate!

EP121 Portraits Are Portraits, Even If They're Corporate! I think I may have mentioned this before, but I LOVE creating portraits.  The past couple of days have been all about headshots - part corporate, part creative branding.  Either way, these are just portraits. And that is something that I cannot stress enough: if you're a portrait photographer, creating cool, engaging headshots is no different to creating fine-art portraits - and you get to meet some incredibly interesting people along the ...