Hello and Welcome dear friends! It is again time for another all night prowl in Paris, France This year’s itinerary as promised is already finished, you will need  the “guide book” which is printed by blurb and is included in the booking fee – I chose the black & white print so it is affordable. Check out the details below for more details….

When: 29th – 30th of May, 2010

Where: St Pancras International – EUROSTAR Terminal

Outbound time: 16:25 on the 29th from London

Return time: 9.13 on the 30th from Paris

Please note that you may choose to arrive earlier or later and just catch up with us along the way.

Cost: from £50 return trip

Itinerary: This year’s trip includes a stop to the Arc de Triomphe (group rate at 7€ pp),  stop Louvre (before it closes), riverside walk and sunrise at Trocadero.

Itinerary map, meeting point and food stops will be available on the guidebook.

3AM Food Stop: We will have PIZZA! on average, it is around €10 + drink.

Booking fee: £15.00 [+ shipping of £2 to cover for transaction fee and book group shipping]

This includes, metro tickets, arc de triomphe and guide book.

Please note:  The food allowance for our friends in Paris (or some of it) will be from my own pocket so a donation to help for this is very welcome).

Documentations:

Visitor information (pdf) Arc de Triomphe

One of the aims of the session will be to provide attendees with the inspiration to see the urban landscape in a new way in order to make more creative images.

Mysterious doorway by WPhoto

Topics discussed will include:
- A definition of abstract photography
- Basic building blocks for composing successful creative abstracts
- Tips for getting the shot – equipment and the importance of light

Later, you will be able to express your creativity by using London’s vibrant architectural backdrop as subject matter, followed by a review and critique.

This is a hands-on workshop, so please bring you camera and a couple of lenses with you.

When: January 30, 2010

Where: Jacobs Digital Photography & Video

74 New Oxford Street
London
WC1A 1EU

Workshop Fee: £10

Prize for best photo of the day:  Jacobs Gift Voucher

Please note: There will be a limited number of seats available, booking is first come first serve basis.

Registrations to this workshop is now closed.

For experience, it was a first time for me to use the bus from the airport to Antibes where the hotel is. We also walked a lot.

And yay! I forgot how charming some old French ladies (on the bus) are and I am glad I do have a rejoinder to tell them when they get a tad nasty. Apart from that, everyone were very nice.

Below are some of my images from the trip…

Whenever the weather is clear I do try to get take a couple of photographs from the airplane window. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. Lucky on this trip, I got excellent shots from the window.

Lac de Ste Croix

We got to the hotel late, checked in and went to have a stroll and take low light photos. Using 50mm f1.4 lenses, we managed without tripod.

The Antibes Rallye was still going and we got to to shoot the racing cars parked for the night.

We got up really early to capture the lovely sunrise and I got to take long exposure shots with the see and the old town of Antibes.

The port of Antibes is lined with private yachts of all sizes!

We arrived in Monaco and we immediately took pictures! With all the wonderfully arranged lights, I played with the manual focus of the Sigma 50mm f1.4 lens and mostly took “bokeh” shots

The Monaco Kart Cup was on as well so half the time in Monaco went to shooting the race.

We did go to the Monaco Oceanographic Museum which is located at the seafront on which is known as Le Rocher or the Rock where the Palais is located.

The aquariums are excellent, clear and full of active fish. It was well lit so we did not encounter any problem while photographing them.

We went to Cannes and got some curious looks from the people around us since we were mostly taking photographs of the scene. However, I whipped out my Olympus 35-100mm f2.0 telephoto lens which looked really intimidating. With that I receive a couple of scowls.

And up to the time we were waiting to board out plane back to London, we still took photographs (in the airport).

Conclusion:
Overall it was an excellent trip and yes, I will do it again. And it will be around the same time of the year when the hotel cost is more affordable. There were a lot of photo opportunities and without being hassled by the authorities. Also, I must say that the food was great.

If you are thinking of joining us next year, keep an eye on the blog for updates. One thing for sure we will have is a car to drive around. A vehicle will enable us to visit St Paul de Vence, Eze Village and Nice.

My number: 07910657409

UPCOMING : I saw only 24 RSVPs and received 27 forms?

Itinerary:
[googlemaps http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=112221851457122471552.00046b9a6ab86e072ee67&ll=51.506178,-0.102654&spn=0.037397,0.072956&z=13&output=embed&w=425&h=350]

We will meetup at the Festival pier area, if there are seats available at the bars in front, we will go there. If I can find a place, I will be overlooking the Festival Pier so don’t forget to look up At 6PM we will meet for drinks, introductions and Q&A and so on. It is informal, don’t be afraid

I know we did this last year (and twice!) but it just couldn’t be help. It promised to be a clear sky and I won’t miss that lovely sunset. Below is an image that indicated where the sun sets to give us all an idea where to look.

I will not put lines or anything in the map, just places where we should be at certain times. Keep up with the group and specially you equipment.

We will start from the Jubilee Gardens Area so those who want to go up to the Eye may do so without pressure. . I believe from one of the capsules overlooking London is the best spot. However for those not going up the Eye, Hungerford Bridge (side closest to the Eye), Royal Festival Hall (where the fountain is) and Southbank are great places to shoot.

Sunset: 21h21

After sunset, around 10PM will heap off towards Embankment station and take a District Line train to Tower Hill (trip takes 11 minutes), where the walk officially starts.

So we will be walking and taking photographs from Tower Hill via City Hall up to Tate Modern. I put 1h30mins between Tate Modern and China town, we will need to walk faster for this I am afraid so we won’t miss Chinatown at 3AM for our food stop. I do not have a particular place in mind any respectable place who have a table for 26 people will be fine (also they need to serve quick). We need to be out at 4AM and get a cab for London Bridge. I know there is the night bus but we do have time constraint and we need to be in place for the 4.41AM sunrise. If we leave at 4AM, we should have enough time in case there is traffic and of course if some of you want to shoot from another location.

Sunrise:4.41AM

Above is for information use only. The yellow line indicates where the sunrise is expected.

Reminders:

• Travel light. Carrying all your gear is way too much specially if you’ll end up using only a standard zoom and telephoto lenses.
• Bring your tripod. Lowlight without tripod doesn’t really work.
• Bring a small bottle of water.
• Wear comfy shoes, blisters at the early hours of the morning when you are already tired is really bad idea.
• Make sure you have £10 cash for the Black cab in the morning. Since we will be sharing one (between 5 of us), it will be affordable.
• Your photos taken in the More London property cannot be sold for profit. Our permit is for non-commercial photography only.
• No Tripod on the London Eye..

Acknowlegements

• Thank you Steve for pointing out this nifty gadget website for sunrise and sunset.
• More London, for permission to shoot in the area.
• Tower Bridge Authority

Notices:

There is no pub stop as we will be in a cafe/bar/pub/restaurant before we even start so having one a bit later is a bit overdone.

We will us the Black cabs to take us to the Sunrise meeting point, so we will not be too tired and late (hopefully).

This meetup involves a lot of walking, please do not join if you are not fit. Or if you really want to join us, make use of public transport to take you to meeting points especially the one between Tate Modern and China Town.

I received 27 signed forms for the City Hall area. Only these participant will be able to use their tripods and take photographs in that area. All others will be turned away by the security guard.

Ugh! I did put lines on the map

I might put PDFs for you to download tonight. We’ll see how I fare after school runs and lots of paperworks. (At least it does not involve a drive to Cambridge and back like yesterday).

This is a FREE event. However, if you wish to give something, you can make a donation. Click this link and look for a Make a Donation button.

Resources

Google Maps

Photographer’s Ephemeris

All rights reserved © 2008 Ghene Snowdon – www.gsnowdon.com
Please respect my copyright and do not use the photos without my permission

Thank you all for attending and if you are available on the 26th, we have Mayfair-St James photowalk.
See you there!

To view more photos from this photowalk, please click here.

All rights reserved © 2008 Ghene Snowdon – www.gsnowdon.com
Please respect my copyright and do not use the photos without my permission

The day went well and the weather is excellent.

Thank you all for joining the walk and the fun. I hope to see you again soon!

View photographs from participants here

All rights reserved © 2008 Ghene Snowdon – www.gsnowdon.com
Please respect my copyright and do not use the photos without my permission

Flower Carpet on the Grand Place… the place was packed full!

Waiting for our food….

The Tapas Bar in the city took more than an hour to serve us our food. It is dark, loud and we are hungry. To occupy ourselves, of course we took photos with and without flash. You can’t really tell 20 people with huge cameras who are hungry and must feed to sustain an all night walk. It was a lot more civilised when the food arrived. If you are in a hurry, I cannot recommend this restaurant.

Next we went to take photos of the Atomium. It is 28 minutes tram from the centre of town but it was worth it. It is here we accidentally left Adrian.

This is a very flashy building standing beside the Sheraton. Photo was taken handheld.

Mystical: very nicely decorated restaurant and we were the only ones this night! I highly recommend it, just do not order pasta coz they are a bit too salty.

We stopped by the little peeing boy and even posed for a group photo!

Thanks to all who participated and also for the yummy chocolates

All rights reserved © 2008 Ghene Snowdon – www.gsnowdon.com
Please respect my copyright and do not use the photos without my permission.

View photographs from the other photographers.

There were several events happening in Southwark cathedral but we got in and photographed it to our hearts delight

Check out other photographs from members

Some of my favourite photos

All rights reserved © 2008 Ghene Snowdon – www.gsnowdon.com
Please respect my copyright and do not use the photos without my permission.

These meetups are free, if you want to join, check out the upcoming post and RSVP there so I have some idea how many to expect.

To book your place, please click on the “add to cart” button under the meetup detail.

JUNE ALL NIGHT SHOOT | Upcoming Page

When: 21st of June
Meetup time: 7:30
Where: London Eye ticket office
Booking for the London Eye is £30, limit of 20 per capsule.

This summer all nighter shoot will start with photo opportunities to photograph London from to top We will be booking our own private capsule for more freedom of movement and use of tripods. Eye closes at 9PM, Sunset 9.22PM

Booking details will posted shortly, depending on our numbers. I’ve put a limit of 20 individuals on this and will increase it to 40 for the second capsule if necessary.

After this 30-45 minute experience, we will head off for our All Night stroll starting with the Westminster Palace, St James Park (open until midnight), Buckingham Palace, Trafalgar Square, Soho, food stop @2, then we down to Victoria Embankment and we walk on the riverside until sunrise @4.43AM (possibly on the Millennium Bridge). Since the tube will be open at 7AM… we have a choice of walking back to the Southbank, going somewhere else or stay there and rest.

Maps and meeting points available closer to date.

BOOK June All Nighter : Booking closed
JULY ALL NIGHT SHOOT | Upcoming Page

When: July 19, 2008
Meetup time: 7:30
Booking for the London Eye is £30, max limit of 20 per capsule. Booking detail to be announced later. Will increase and book a second capsule in case there is more participants. Please tick on Attend only when you are sure to do so. Once first 20 is achieved, I will set something up for booking.

We will be booking our own capsule so we can use our tripods (not allowed with other users). We will be booking (hopefully) an 8.45 PM flight so we are at the top at 9PM for the sunset (9.07PM). Last flight on at 9.30PM.

BOOK July All Nighter: Booking Closed

*Please note that if the required number of participants (20 per capsule) is not reached, your booking fee WILL BE REFUNDED. The £1 “Shipping” is to cover the Paypal transaction fee and cannot be refunded. (Paypal transaction fee is 1.25£)