I was recently fortunate enough to place in the final six of the Times Young Photographer of year competition. It was a great experience and I hope to try again next year, hopefully when I am not in the middle of my University finals! Here are two of the images I entered:

This picture of Mike Vine was the one published in The Times (UK). It was taken at Dinas Powys skatepark and I used 3 flashes to light the skater and freeze his motion. Mike took some nasty slams on this one, but I think it was worth it!

This photo was taken looking into the crowd at a Sum41 gig in the students union in Cardiff. The kids worshiping their heroes. No flash was used in this photo, just the light coming from the stage.

You can read more about the competition on the Times site. You can also view the images on Flickr by clicking on the images.

I took photos at the Cardiff University Summer ball last night, I will be putting galleries up in the next few days. There are a lot of photos so bare with me.

Dan le sac vs. Scroobius Pip shot to fame last year with their track Thou Shalt Always Kill, receiving NME praise despite denouncing it along with the Smiths and Nirvana mid song. They aren’t your average Barfly indie visitors, their first song dealt with why you shouldn’t slash your wrists. Why? It’s harsh on your sister. Their on stage furniture; including a TV and reading desk add to the feeling this isn’t just a group, but a statement. All this done in good humour with eyes half open and bottle of wine in hand of course.

Dan le Sac speaking his mind

The crowd knew exactly what to expect and couldn’t have been happier to indulge a 6 foot bearded man preaching to them about the darker points of life, electronic samples pumping out in the background. The tiny stage of Barfly was host to a TV broadcast from the reading desk, shown on the television whilst the show continued, both members taking breaks to relax in the armchair when it all got a bit too much to handle. A different take on UK hip-hop if that’s what it is, less guns and bitches, more home truths; a refreshing change! Their debut album Angles is out on May 12^th.

Scroobius Pip tuning in the TV

Photos and review from the Cardiff Barfly on 24th April 2008. More pictures below:

This article also appeared in Quench magazine, my first published review! First of many? Only time will tell…

Alongside taking photos of the Rugby action I thought I would also put up some other photos of the Varsity action which went on.

There are also photos of the Varsity Rugby match itself here.

The Cardiff snake charmers put on a good show, and there were hundreds of them!!

The Cardiff crowd was massive and loud. The biggest cheers of the night were given to the numerous streakers.

Cardiff celebrating a well deserved victory, lets hope they continue with the success into the future!

I had been looking forward to taking this shot, finally getting to put the fisheye to use on something other than BMX and skating… I have handed my dissertation in finally, so expect updates to be a little more regular.

There are more photos below, click on a thumbnail to see the rest of the gallery.

Cardiff Arms Park held host once again to the annual Cardiff versus Swansea rugby Varsity match. Cardiff had been thrashed 19-0 the previous year so there was a lot riding on them doing well this year. The match initially did not start well for Cardiff with Swansea looking to be the stronger side.

Cardiff soon found their form though and took the lead.

Some stunning penalties ensured that Cardiff stayed in the lead. The crowd turn out for Cardiff was massive!

Swansea put a great fight but Cardiff continued to dominate.

The end score was 19-9 to Cardiff, crowning them Varsity the Varsity winners. Cardiff also won overall in the others sports winning 17 games, drawing 1 and losing just two!

The pitch was invaded by celebrating Cardiff fans at the end… The score was up on the screen for all to see!

A few weeks ago, for two weekends in a row I took photos of Fun Runs. The course was exactly the same, but for different causes. Saturday’s run was for the Cardiff SVC (Student Volenteering Centre). Above is the winner of the race.

It was the first year it has run, and there was a great turn out, many opting for fancy dress! Always good to see people really putting the effort in to getting dressed up! The Welsh judges hearts were stolen by this outfit, and this was the winner of the fancy dress competition.

20th Feb 2008 was the night of the NME awards tour, the usual Indie music tour, not really my kind of thing but the lighting wasn’t too bad, makes it a lot more fun! The Cribs were headlining, but first up were Joe Lean & The Jing Jang Jong. Then Does It Offend You, Yeah?

What’s up with bands with such long names? Above singer from Does it offend

The headliners The Cribs the took to the stage.

Drummer shots rarely get into publications but I always like to get a couple, sometimes they work out. Perou originally gave me the inspiration to look beyond the lead singer and guitarists! It’s always a challenge to get focous on the drummer amongst the kit, but it worked out here.

Can’t remember too much of the gig, and forgot to write anything down at the time, hence the sparse wording! A couple of these appeared in Quench issue 64.

The Cribs are are actually quite listenable

The great thing about shooting gig photography is that exposes you to a lot of music that you would otherwise not listen to. I don’t tend to listen to the radio a whole bunch due to not wanting to listen to the rambling of most DJ’s and the lack of fresh, good music. Sometimes you can miss a band which you really like.

Saturday 16th February saw the Cardiff Athletic Union’s fund raising fun-run. Despite the nippy Spring weather around 250 fresh faced students turned up to run the 3.5 miles around Bute Park in Cardiff.

Capturing everyone as a group was quite a challenge, but with the help of a human step ladder (Cheers Scott!) it was was done! Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, high-lights from the run are below, there is also a more comprehensive gallery too. Money was also being raised for Sport Relief.

The runners in front of Cardiff Union

It was great to see so many people getting involved!

Pre-race

Start of the race

Some opted not to go for the standard issue t-shirt

To find out more The Invest In Sport program has a group on Facebook. More fun-run photos here.