MJC Photography

04/09/2026

24/08/2026

Consider the casting director, a creature of boundless fatigue sitting before a flickering screen, scrolling through what must feel like several thousand nearly identical human faces. In the brutal, half second arithmetic of the industry, what actually stops the scroll isn’t a blindingly polished, teeth baring grin, the sort usually reserved for selling toothpaste or dodging awkward encounters on the high street. It is, rather surprisingly, a hint of genuine life behind the eyes.

To achieve this, a proper studio session cannot simply involve standing a chap or chapess against a grey wall and hoping for the best. It requires a bit of thoughtful tinkering with the apparatus, shifting the light to sculpt a sudden air of brooding drama, swapping backdrops to alter the mood entirely, and gently coaxing out those subtle, micro-shifts in expression that bridge the gap between "approachable neighbour" and "morally ambiguous antagonist." The goal is to furnish an actor with a portfolio that quietly does the heavy lifting, opening doors before they’ve even had the chance to knock.

23/08/2026

There is a particular brand of madness unique to professional landscape photography. It involves voluntarily hauling thirty pounds of metal and glass up a sheer, rain slickened English hill, all for the distinct privilege of standing in a gale while waiting for a sun that has no intention of showing its face. I have visited Great Staple Tor on Dartmoor more times than my cardiologist would care to know, and the location has rewarded me with little more than lung busting disappointment.
My most recent calamity occurred a few months back. Having wheezed, groaned, and dragged my protesting frame to the summit, I was prepared to capture the glorious, unspoiled majesty of Devon. Instead, I was greeted by Dartmoor’s answer to The Hangover. A small cluster of youth, and let us be honest, everyone looks unnervingly young to me these days, were enjoying a rather spirited evening. The scene was punctuated by a minor mountain of empty l***r cans and a single, surprisingly plump cigarette that was being passed around with communal enthusiasm. While a gritty urban photographer might have swooned at this tableau of rustic excess, it was not quite the sweeping, pristine wilderness I had envisioned for my portfolio.
Undeterred, or perhaps merely too foolish to know when I am beaten, I made the gruelling trudge up the Tor once again a few weeks later. As I crested the summit, my heart sank directly into my walking boots. Sprouting ominous and unmistakable above the ancient granite was the flexible fiberglass spine of a tent pole.
Thankfully, this episode proved less rural rave and more Carry On Camping (though without the legendary airborne bra, I should hasten to add). But with the sun slowly dipping toward the horizon and painting the cloud cover in remarkably promising shades of crimson, I was damned if I was going empty handed again.
Refusing to resort to digital trickery, I was forced into an extreme low angle composition to shoot past the campsite. This required assuming a crouch that I am reasonably certain violates several Geneva Conventions on cruel and unusual punishment. The sun, sensing my agony, seemed to slow its descent to a glacial crawl, apparently delighting in the spectacle of an overweight photographer squatted in a position that would make a seasoned yoga master wince.
Eventually, the shutter clicked, and the frame was secured. All that remained was the agonizingly undignified process of returning my spine to a vertical position. This was accompanied by a string of choice, industrial strength expletives, along with a cheery, apologetic wave to two thoroughly startled campers who had just unzipped their tent to witness a grown man cursing at a rock.

08/08/2026

The market is open this Monday, 10 August ...

07/08/2026

The last time I stood atop Brat Tor, winter was maintaining a positively medieval grip on the Dartmoor landscape. The ground was lightly dusted in snow, and every exhaled breath produced a cloud of vapour so dense it could have comfortably passed for an industrial effluent. With Jack Frost dutifully providing the ambience, I had the entire glorious expanse to myself. The scenery was breathtaking, the sort of majestic, sweeping vista that leaves one genuinely awestruck, or would have, had I not been reasonably convinced that opening my mouth for too long might permanently freeze my jaw shut.
Yet, for all the stark grandeur of those winter photographs, it turned out the good, sensible folk of Tavistock had remarkably little appetite for hanging them on their living room walls. Apparently, nobody wants a piece of fine art whose primary artistic function is to remind them to put on extra thermal underwear.
Enter the marvels of modern technology. A modest, cheerful ping from my smartphone alerted me to the distinct possibility of an incandescent sunset. What followed was a brief period of dignified panic, during which I careened through the house like a distracted squirrel, scooping up an absurd volume of camera equipment and consulting maps.
Unlike my usual aimless wanderings, however, I actually had a destination in mind. All that remained was the small, excruciating matter of ascending Brat Tor once more. As I trudged uphill, my so called "smart" watch began issuing increasingly hysterical health alerts to anyone within earshot, practically declaring it a medical miracle that a man with a heart rate this alarming was still standing upright.
Naturally, on a fine summer evening, one expects to share the moors with fellow nature lovers. What these unsuspecting souls clearly had not anticipated, however, was the sudden arrival of a lobster red, intensely wheezing gentleman of advancing years, lugging what felt like his own body weight in mechanical apparatus up the steepest possible incline.
Bent double with hands firmly planted on my knees, and managed to croak out a breathless "hello." This brief interaction was evidently so deeply unsettling that the onlookers concluded the sunset simply wasn't worth the existential hazard, and they beat a hasty retreat down the hill.
Thus, with the summit mercifully restored to total solitude, I sat back, caught my breath, and finally captured a scene that speaks less of hypothermia and rather more of glorious summer vibes.

05/08/2026

To drone or not to drone, that is the question.
As virtually anyone who has suffered the misfortune of encountering me in the flesh will freely attest, I am a man who thoroughly enjoys droning on. It is a source of mild personal irony, then, that I do not actually own a drone.
Now, I must confess that the ten year old boy who permanently resides somewhere behind my ribs would like nothing better than to send a motorized, whirring gadget swooping through the upper atmosphere, snapping pictures with frantic glee. Indeed, this inner child is entirely prepared to throw a world class, floor stamping tantrum to get one.
Unfortunately, standing firmly in the doorway between me and aerial glory is the thoroughly unromantic figure of my bank account. No amount of pouting, bargaining, or pitiful sighing seems to move the unyielding hearts at Lloyds Bank, and so the device remains indefinitely exiled to my Christmas list. (Whether Santa can successfully outmanoeuvre the institutional grumpiness of high street banking remains to be seen.)
By now, you are almost certainly wondering whether this particular ramble is headed anywhere at all. To be entirely honest with you, when I start waffling, even I am rarely privy to the final destination.
But there is a point, and it concerns Postbridge.
Postbridge has spent years languishing on my photographic bucket list, yet I have never quite managed to capture the scene I held in my mind’s eye. For me, the magic lies in framing both the ancient clapper bridge and its neighbouring road bridge together. The lay of the land, however, presents a devilish little topographical challenge, a challenge that could be instantly solved by gaining just a few extra feet of altitude. The very altitude, of course, that has been denied to me by a foolish social obligation to spend money on trivial luxuries like food and shelter, rather than vital, life sustaining camera equipment.
With the balance of my current account steadfastly refusing to perform a miracle, I was forced to resort to good old fashioned British ingenuity.
The solution, as it turned out, was standing right in front of me. I firmly attached my camera to the tripod, gripped it by the base, and hoisted the entire precarious contraption high above my head like a medieval standard bearer. And lo: there was the angle. Both bridges, framed beautifully at last.
Naturally, I felt compelled to make loud, throat rattling airplane noises while operating the shutter. It added a certain je ne sais quoi to the artistic process, with the delightful added bonus of causing nearby tourists to give me a very wide, very cautious berth.
So there you have it. Mission accomplished, inner child appeased, and a long sought photograph secured, all through the sophisticated technology of a six foot pole.

02/08/2026

Ah, July. That most treacherous of months when the British calendar conspires to drag innocent, peace loving individuals away from the god given right to a hot dinner and thrust them into the dimly lit, mildly frantic universe of amateur dramatics.
In the grand and inexplicably chaotic cosmic tapestry of MJC Photography, July is universally recognized as Show Month a time when sleep becomes an abstract theoretical concept and one’s camera gear begins to feel less like professional equipment and more like a set of heavy iron weights designed specifically to test a human being’s mental fortitude.
We kicked off this madness with West Side Story, a production that was, quite frankly, an absolute emotional rollercoaster. One minute you're marvelling at the choreography; the next, you're deeply concerned for the vocal cords of a teenager who is giving it their absolute all while wearing a remarkably convincing 1950s leather jacket.
The following week offered up an abundance of drama, though I regret to inform you that the most harrowing scene did not actually take place on stage.
There I was, floating merrily down the road in the soothing, bumper to bumper bliss of Plymouth rush hour traffic. My mind had comfortably uncoupled itself from reality and was happily floating toward a future that involved a magnificent, freshly cooked dinner. My mouth was literally watering. Life was good.
Then, the phone rang. It was Laura. ( LS Drama Workshops )
"How far away are you?" she asked.
Now, those five words delivered in a tone that suggests someone has either left the oven on or accidentally declared war on a small European nation, are guaranteed to make a driver's stomach drop directly into their socks. All thoughts of a delicious meal instantly vanished, replaced by the icy grip of sudden panic.
You see, in my innocent mind, I wasn't scheduled to shoot until Friday night. What I had critically failed to appreciate was that the universe (via the theater management) had concocted a completely different cast for Thursday night, and Laura, quite reasonably, though inconveniently for my digestive system, wanted both captured for posterity.
I am reasonably certain it violates several international treaties to make a person sprint through their own home, madly hoovering up camera lenses and tripods, while the glorious, taunting aroma of an unattended home cooked meal wafts through the hallway. It is a subtle form of psychological torture.
Consequently, the Thursday night cast were greeted by a photographer who was:
1. Unusually sweaty,
2. Decidedly hangry, and
3. Secretly calculating if it was socially acceptable to eat a granola bar during a dramatic monologue.
Miraculously, my visible distress did not derail the proceedings. The cast was utterly faultless, and the entire production was a visually stunning triumph ably abetted by the splendidly dramatic lighting provided by the good folks at MB Productions.
Having survived the pint sized thespians, I was promptly hurled into the breathtakingly athletic world of dance courtesy of The Linda Mortimore & Charlotte Smith School of Dance
People often ask me whether I prefer photographing theater or dance. To which I say: How does one choose between a lovely cup of tea and a brisk walk through a hurricane? They are entirely different beasts.
Photographing dance is fundamentally an exercise in defying the laws of physics. It’s about freezing a fleeting micro second of kinetic energy, capturing a leap at the exact moment gravity seems to take a short tea break.
Now, while once again provided stage lighting that was rich, dramatic, and intensely atmospheric, it was also the sort of lighting that makes a camera sensor weep quietly in the dark. In order to catch every flying kick and high speed spin without turning the kids into blurry streaks of colour, I had to dial my camera settings up to levels that would make the chief technicians at NASA tilt their heads in quiet awe.
When the dust settled and the high ISO noise cleared, I was genuinely thrilled with the results. It is a rare privilege to document so many remarkably agile, dexterous, and endlessly energetic teenagers doing what they love (even if it does occasionally interrupt my tea time).
So, that was July: sweat, missed meals, and sheer theatrical triumph.
Now then... what on earth is August planning to throw at me?

22/07/2026

✨ INTERS & SENIORS ✨
🎭 We're enrolling for the first time since January!

If you're passionate about performing, now's your chance to join LS Drama Workshops.

Our Inters & Seniors develop strong skills in acting, vocal technique, harmonies, characterisation, stagecraft & ensemble performance, all while building confidence and preparing for the stage 🎭💃🏽

Perform throughout the year in our:
✨ Christmas Showcase
✨ Public performances
✨ Full-scale Musical Theatre productions every July

⭐ Inters (Years 8 & 9)
📅 Thursdays | 5:00–6:30pm

⭐ Seniors (Years 10+)
📅 Thursdays | 6:00–7:30pm

📍 Plympton Academy

Book your FREE trial session today via the form below. Limited spaces available❗️
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfi-2j4fqIMStcL5__pqpT34F4Hqk3v_M-gejprcYbMLx8AGg/viewform?usp=header

21/07/2026

It was a very busy weekend! Now taking bookings for August.

21/07/2026