Production Paradise

Welcome to SHOWCASE LONDON - brought to you by Production Paradise.

Current Events in London: +++ Until 23 October, The National Portrait Gallery has an exhibition, "The World's Most Photographed", that includes icons such as Muhammad Ali, James Dean, Greta Garbo and Marilyn Monroe. +++ The David Bowie AKA photo exhibition, currently running until 13 August at Redferns Music Picture Gallery, 3 Bramley Road, London W10. +++  The AOP Open just closed its call for competition entries. Watch out for details about winners in the next edition of SHOWCASE LONDON.

Visit www.productionsparadise.com the online directory of London's best visual media companies.

Our cover picture shows David Bowie in Moscow 1976. Photo: Andrew Kent, represented by Redferns Music Picture Gallery.

Lon production/photo production: LEONORA

Based in London, Leonora works with an international client base.

Recent productions include images from the award-winning Vaillant campaign shot by Christian Schmidt. Campaigns for Bank of Scotland, Finlandia, Renault and Subaru are amongst other productions from this year.

See the web site for a full showcase of recent work. Leonora specialises in the locations and landscape of Great Britain. A comprehensive service of research, location-scouting and shoot production is offered to photographers from around the world.

Lon production/commercial production: TRIANGLE TELEVISION

Summer sees Triangle's flame artist Paul Dixon sprucing up BBC's Wimbledon title sequence. Chris Watson directed an international ad for Nescafe Express Drinks and producer Jamie Clark led the Triangle team on the latest Carlsberg campaign comprising 16 globally-viewed ads. Triangle also made ads for NSPCC, Lexus Hybrid‚ T Mobile‚ Olay, Wella Shockwaves, Cereal Partners and Estee Lauder.

For their contribution to music imagery, they gained five nominations at this year's CADs awards, and Russell Millard created the titles for Best Music Show, MTV Gonzo and the MTV NME.

Lon photography/photo agents: HORTON-STEPHENS

“Does smoking make you hard? Not if it means you can’t get it up.”
That's the slogan for the UK government anti-smoking campaign targeting the effects of the wicked weed on our sex life. Alan Mahon took the photo (Abbott Mead Vickers).

The Jesus photo is part of a series of bizarre images by Matthew Murray; Gary Salter did the Golfer shot for his new series.

Web site updates have been made to the galleries of Alan Mahon, Patrick Lichfield, Graham Tooby, Gary Salter and Matthew Murray.

Lon photography/photo agents: VUE

London-based Vue represents photographers throughout Europe, offering exceptional levels of coordination and production.

Photographers currently represented are: Tim Kent (studio cars and still life), Jonathan Minster (graphic still life), Alan Powdrill (people), Seamus Ryan (portraiture), Garry Simpson (landscapes and people & cars on location) and Penny Cottee (still life).

Between them they have worked with many world-class brands including Land Rover, Ford, Vodafone, Hewlett Packard, BT, AOL, Nokia, Nike and British Airways.

More details can be found at Vue’s web site (in English, French and German) where you can also subscribe to their e-newsletter, Vue News.

Lon photography/photo agents: WYATT-CLARKE

Peer Lindgreen has broken new ground with his photography for the eagerly-awaited 2005 Barnardo's campaign for BBH.

The work is shown here alongside Liam Kennedy's collaboration with Ayo for Twill Magazine and more of Nadege Meriau's Dark Fairytales.

Lon photography/photographers: LORENTZ GULLACHSEN

Lorentz has recently been busy shooting for Heart of England Tourism,
covering 140 locations, taking 8000 shots and producing 200 final images to promote the UK’s premier destinations.

He shot a DHL campaign for Ogilvy Primary in Dubai, Cape Town and Banbury.

He also made it to Barcelona to shoot Subaru cars for FOCUS Tokyo.

Lon photography/photographers: JONATHAN OAKES

Jonathan's style, which ranges from colourful and quirky to subtle and painterly, has been a magnet for financial institutions like Nat West, Barclays, Asda, CO-OP and Austria's Reifessen Bank.

Recently, he completed a major re-branding for Marks & Spencer Financial Services. He shot portraits for the Royal British Legion, raising over £1million for the D Day appeal. And he's also worked on a poster campaign for the anti-drugs charity FRANK, producing portraits in which the subjects appeared to have fishing hooks embedded in their flesh.

Lon photography/photographers: NIGEL HARNIMAN

Location photographer Nigel Harniman has been shooting cars on locations worldwide for most of the major automotive brands.

Recently for Bentley, he photographed the new Continental Flying Spur and Arnage around Southern Spain, Volvo S60 around Los Angeles and S80 in Malibu, Honda for Hakuhodo Paris and Virgin Trains for RKCR/ Y&R London to name a few.

Lon photography/photographers: DEAN BELCHER PHOTOGRAPHY

Dean is predominantly a people/portrait photographer who shoots features for editorials such as Grazia, You Magazine and FT, and for record companies, one of which, Global Underground, takes him round the world shooting iconic images for their dance brand.

He’s recently had commissions for annual and corporate reports from clients looking for a similar feel to his magazine work. These include: Legal & General, Cable & Wireless and the Yell Group, which was shot both in the UK and USA. He also worked on the award-winning Greene King ads

Dean is currently seeking representation in the UK/Europe and the US..

website dean belcher

Lon photography/photographers: ANDY WHALE

Working with Art Director Larry Osborne, Andy took a breathtaking shot of ballet dancer Darcey Bussell in black and white in the style of a 1950s Hollywood film poster. The forest set was actually built in the studio. The shoot was for Dewynters Advertising.
 
He also created three eerie and thought-provoking images for the National Missing Persons Helpline. They were done on spec for the charity with a team from ad agency Walsh Trott Chick Smith.

Lon photography/photographers: ANDY TOMMO

Tommo is going it alone! He parted company from Horton-Stephens at the end of last year and has launched a new website.

While continuing with his trademark use of colour and mood, Tommo can be bold, minimal and graphic. His images often have a very cinematic feel to them, and cover the categories: life, advertising, portrait and fashion. Selections of all of these can be viewed at the new site.  

He now has representation in the Middle East through Mundo: Beirut.

Lon photography/photographers: JULIE FISHER

Based in North London, Julie loves the freedom of shooting on location. She photographs all kinds of people, no matter their age, size or shape. She particularly enjoys working with street-cast people and the natural spontaneity they bring to the shoot.

Some of her recent clients include Sainsbury's, Pilkington Glass, First Choice Holidays, National Savings and Cow & Gate.

Passionate about her personal projects, as well as her commercial work, she's been working a lot with the medium of video, exploring its potential and versatility.

Lon photography/rental studios: HUNGRY TIGER

Hungry Tiger studio hire is an all-encompassing creative space that is practical, functional and inspiring. There are two interconnecting studios which are divided by a sliding acoustic partition, thus allowing the space to be expanded and hired as one spacious, serviceable area (2200 sq ft). The first studio is 1000sq ft and is dominated by an infinity cove, the second is 1200sq ft and is ideal for set building, lifestyle and fashion shoots.

Both studios have make-up and changing rooms and are fitted with informal, easy-to-use furniture, well-stocked bar fridges, music systems and ample surface space for layouts and designs.

The breakout area provides an additional space to escape from the charged creative energy of the studios. It is a stress-free space purely for your enjoyment with plasma screen, magazines and freshly-brewed coffee.

Lon photography/rental studios: THE DAYLIGHT STORE

The daylight store is an extremely economical 350 sq ft daylight studio in West London with all-white walls.

It has an amazing source of natural light supplied by large 3m high windows. These all have diffusion and light-stop blinds to control brightness.

It's an economical and compact space ideal for budgets that aren't sky high. It has a fully equipped kitchen, air conditioning and secure 24-hour access. No overtime is charged.

Off street parking is free, and it's only a short distance from E6 & C41 Lab.

Lon photography/photo galleries: PEELED EYE SHOP

Peeled Eye Shop is a great new online resource for anyone looking for the best in contemporary fine art photography for their walls.

Peeled Eye's philosophy is simple: why buy a mass produced poster when you could own your own unique signed original prints and become a collector of serious photography? They are offering some original prints that are surprisingly affordable to get started.

Their galleries contain a wide spectrum of both colour and black & white photography, including people, landscapes, still life, nudes and abstracts.

Lon creativity/web design: PORTFOLIO MAINTENANCE

At last, a company specifically designed to keep your online portfolio looking at it's best all year round. According to them "if you're putting yourself out there, you should make sure you always look right".

Portfolio Maintenance dot com is the brainchild of a team consisting of experienced designers and sales professionals in consultation with top advertising photographers. They provide quality website maintenance services that are reliable, portable and easy to use.

With prices from £25 per month for whole gallery updates and some really useful ideas to help you expand your site, they really are worth bookmarking at the very least.

Lon talent/model agencies: NEXT LONDON

Founded in 1999 by Lorenzo Pedrini, Next London is part of a global network, which has offices worldwide. Including New York, Paris, LA and Milan.

Next’s vision is to provide the best possible service to their models and clients within the UK market under the expertise of some of London’s most respected agents.

Next provides high-calibre models within the London market and claims to help raise the standard within both the UK fashion and advertising industries. They have successfully drawn the attention of top designers, photographers, magazines and commercial clients within the UK fashion market.

They represent some of the world's most famous models such as Petra Nemcova, Jessica Miller, Rachel Kirby and Filippa Hamilton as well as rising stars like Anja Rubik, Solange and Anna J.

Lon talent/artists & stylists: HERS AGENCY

HERS Agency represents Food Stylists/Home Economists, Stylists and Hair & Make-up Artists.

Food stylists cover all areas of the industry, pretty much wherever you see pictures of food – from Harry Potter Films to advertising for major food clients, or supermarket packaging, brochures, magazines & books. They provide food consultancy for leading supermarkets and food manufacturers, product and recipe development, as well as all aspects of food writing. They are equally experienced in detailed work with tricky product, or modern, creative editorial-style work.

Their stylists work across the board too: table-top/still-life, interiors, low fashion, people, life-style and food for commercials and stills.

All aspects of production undertaken, including casting and locations. They say they will even work with children and animals!

HERS hair & make-up artists cover all types of work; fashion & beauty, advertising, corporate and character work, such as body-painting, traditional make-up and theatrical.

Lon creativity/branding: COMUNICAN

Comúnican are creative problem-solvers who can help you increase your sales, reduce your marketing costs and keep your customer for longer.

Comúnican can help you develop a new sales campaign, a new web site, new marketing materials, or whatever it is that your particular business needs. They have offices in London and Barcelona and are offering SHOWCASE readers 30% off their normal fees until the end of August.

Lon hotel/hotels: SANDERSON

Summer production rates from £175.
 
Sanderson's guest rooms are unique and groundbreaking. Designed without interior walls, the bathroom and dressing room are instead encased in a glowing floor-to-ceiling glass box that is wrapped in layers of sheer curtains.

"Romantic, sensual and dreamlike", the 150 guestrooms, some with private gardens, feature silver-leafed sleigh beds, a rug inspired by Voltaire's handwriting and oil paintings of soothing landscape scene that are hung, unexpectedly, on the ceiling.

Lon hotel/hotels: ST MARTINS LANE

Summer production rates from £155.
 
St Martins Lane Hotel, in Covent Garden, offers both luxury penthouse and apartment suites. Spacious and well-located, they feature open loft-like layouts, custom-built Phillipe Starck-designed furniture, separate pantries, large plasma screen televisions, and great views of London.

204 rooms in total, many equipped with a unique interactive light installation, allowing guests to "light their mood" The special Garden Rooms have private patios replete with camellia trees, clematis and climbing ivy.

The hotel also has a rum bar, a light bar, a restaurant, and meeting rooms and that makes the hotel suitable for both business and pleasure.