Christmas Greetings

MERRY CHRISTMAS GUYYYS!!!!!!!!!!!!
(Or happy holidays for those of you who don't celebrate christmas!!)

I hope you've all finished your present buying and are having a wonderful holiday season.
I'm slowly looking forward to it, which is about time as christmas is only less then 2 days away (scary stuff.) It just doesn't seem to feel christmasy at all. Maybe it's coz it's still quite warm outside and there's no snow yet. :(
It's hard to think that this time last year we were knee deep in snow that was slowly turning to ice. This country is rubbish when it snows because everything seems to come to a complete stand still, anyone would think we weren't prepared for it.
Anyway's, I've finally finished my christmas shopping, minus getting my little sisters present, which I will be buying tomorrow. (thank god for payday.) There are soooo many things I'm looking forward to about the holidays is seeing my family. I have my older sister, brother-in-law and their 2 boys are all coming over tomorrow (christmas eve) and boxing day. My auntie, uncle, cousin, her husband, and possibly my other cousin are all coming down from london for the day tomorrow to exchange presents ect. Then my older brother and his fiance are spending christmas morning and lunchtime with us before heading else where. There's something special about spending christmas day with family. I also get to see my bestfriend tomorrow so we can do present swap, I honestly hope she likes the stuff I got her because it was a nightmare to wrap (even if it was a box.) I can't wait to see what goodies both her and her mum got me :D.
What are everyone's plans for the holidays?

A majority of the christmas functions at work are over now I think, thank god I don't think I would be able to cope doing yet another double shift and now that i'm older my wages have gone up too so more money for me yaaay.

So last weekend I did some photography work for a local gymnastics group. I didn't get as much work done as I would have liked but I'm going back in the new year to redo everything and make lot's of money from people buying my photo's of their younger relatives doing their best. Some of the performers were so cute dressed up as little elves and fairies. The older gymnasts were amazing and so talented too. If i'm honest it made me a little jealous lol.

We spent two days down there, neither of which went to plan. We spent the first day trying to put the studio, or what we had of it, together. Trying to put studio lights together with no instructions and after never having done it before was quite a challenge to say the least. It took us a whole day to work out the layout for the lights and also the settings we were going to need on one of our camera's. I had my Canon ISO 500D and the guy I was with had his Nikon with him, I'm not sure which series number it was I'm not great with Nikon's they're too confusing haha.



After finally working that all out I did get round to taking a few photo's of the performances during the second half. It was alot more tricky then I had anticipated. Out of the 300 or so photographs that I took, only 70 or so photo's were actually suitable enough to be able to upload onto my Facebook webpage.
After the first day didn't working out we had to try and complete a whole two days shoot in one day. Sadly we didn't complete, but as I said earlier we're going back in the New Year to redo all the posed portrait and group shots.

If you want to check out the rest of my photographs from the Extravaganza just check out my Facebook page at this link:- http://www.facebook.com/pages/Sarah-Thompson-Photography/145795518848615
I also have a twitter account which is connected to my page so if you want to follow me on there just click on one of my tweets. Don't forget to comment which photo's you like or if you have any questions just post them in the comments below and I shall answer as soon as I can.

I'm off to bed now to try and get some sleep before seeing all my family tomorrow and also to help get over this annoying and stupid infection.

I'll leave you with a little something to help you get into the Christmas spirit. Some of you may remember a singer called Tom Law. Well he supported the feeling in Brighton and Bath this past week which is sooooooo cool seeing as I love the feeling, I haven't listened to them in ages, and also Tom, he's pretty damn amazing too if you haven't checked him out already. He did a little Christmas song medley. And here it is....................
It amazes me how he managed to fit the songs together so well.




Goodnight guys and Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

P.S
I can't help but notice my posts get longer and longer each week. Oopsies. I'll try not to make the next one so long.

Old stuff and odd stuff

There seems to be a recurring feature of this blog and that is that I only seem to be able write anything late at night or whilst watching/waiting for something on T.V. At the moment I'm waiting for my latest fix of Bones to come on (mmmmmm David Boreanaz :P) He played Angle in Buffy for those of you who don't know.I love this show and seriously need to catch up on everything that's been happening. Even if I am watching series 7 weekly I still watch the rest of the episodes during the week, and would very much like all the series' on dvd. Hint Hint for my family if they are reading this, seeing as Christmas is coming up lol.
Also I want to just say hello to the rest of world that is reading this.

Anyways, you also may know that it was my birthday on Monday, I am officially 21 and legal to drink in any country (mwahahahaha). I actually can't believe it, I don't even feel another year older. It's so strange. Thank you to everybody who sent me birthday messages :). I got lots of lovely presents and had an amazing night out with a couple of friends.

Back to what you guys came here for. I went out yesterday and took some photographs whilst trying not to get blown away by the wind. I first met up with my friend Cara, who I haven't seen in what seems like forever. I miss all my college friends. They're mostly all at Uni so they don't get to socialise very much.

Whilst she went off to take photographs for her Uni assignment (she's a fellow photographer just like me),  Her work is amazing, she takes such beautiful, natural portraits along with other things.

On my way back into town to do a few things, I came across an old bent up bike. I love finding stuff like this. Most people think I'm strange like that, but you guys can make of it what you will. 

The idea of objects being dumped and abandoned is something that has amazed me for quite some time. My final major project at college involved me taking photographs of old derelict buildings that were all boarded up or falling apart. Which reminds me I must sort out a photo shoot/ trip with my friend, there's alot more old buildings in my county then I realised.

Later yesterday afternoon I went back out into the cold wind to get some more photo's. Sadly I didn't get to take some of the images I had in my head, it gets dark so early now. This is just one of many reasons why I hate winter. Hopefully, I get to go out earlier in the day to take some shots.

One of the shots I did get was of this old letterbox. I walk past it all the time but finally got round to photographing it, after many occasions of putting it off due to the wrong conditions, or not having my camera with me. It's not as rusted as I would have liked but hey, you can't have it your way all the time. Sometimes nature or the council fight back.( haha )

There is also a little playground near me too and I just couldn't help myself, I had to get a photo of the hopscotch. I'm not really sure why, maybe it has something to do with this being one of my favourite playground games when I was little. Or maybe it's just the fact that there was something intriguing about a playground having moss spread pretty much everywhere. We might never know the true reason.

For those of you wondering, I do edit my digital photo's a little. I like to play with the contrast a little, and try to make the colours a little bit bolder. Sometimes it doesn't work but, it's a way of learning right?

Right I'm going to bed. Bones has finished (this means it's taken me over an hour to write this up,) and it's starting to drag a little. This might just be a record breaking world's longest blog. If your still reading this then CONGRATULATIONS!!!!! you have made it to the end. Sorry if I started to bore you a little.

Until next time goodbye and good night (don't forget to pass the link onto your friends and family.) I would also love it if you commented on things I could improve on, or just subsribe (if you can do that, I don't really know much about this blogger yet)

Sarah x

Films and Memories

To start off I just wanted to say a big thank you to everyone that has read my blog so far especially to people from across the pond (America), szia to Hungary, guten tag to Germany and 您好 to Hong Kong,(sorry if I got any of that wrong, I used google translater)
It's so cool that people from across the world are reading this even now as I'm writing this.

Anyway back to the blog. My photography work is mostly film. However, since I lent my camera to someone a couple of months ago, and have yet to get it back, I haven't been able to take any film photo's. It completely sucks, I miss being in the dark room and being able to see the photo appear on a blank piece of paper before my very eyes. It's like magic, which makes me sound like such a big kid but trust me, you won't believe it till you see it. 
The last set of photo's I got to take was at my Nan's in August or September I can't remember it was so long ago. My Nan's house is exactly the same as it was when I was growing up, I used to go there every Sunday or Saturday when I was a kid. So the last time we all visited I walked around her bungalow and garden taking photo's of everything I remembered from my childhood of being there.
One of which was this birdcage. She's had it for as long as I can remember, she also has one in her conservatory. Sadly though she now seems to believe that they're real and talks to them on a frequent basis. It's so sad because you can tell that she's longing for some company, but replaces this by talking to inanimate objects. I suppose I should say my Nan has dementia, so she doesn't really make a lot of sense most of the time and when she does she'll repeat herself only a couple of minutes later. She developed it when my grandad died about 14 years ago.

My Grandad used to do quite a lot of gardening, so whilst I was at my Nan's I went into his old greenhouse and took photo's of some of the tool's he used to use. If it wasn't for the mould on the glass and the cracked windows, I would say that the greenhouse was exactly the same as when he last went in there. I also found his wheel burrow, which has probably only been used by my dad and my uncle in the last 15 years. I wish that we could visit my Nan more often but since we live over an hour and a half away from her, it isn't always possible. I hate seeing my Nan the way she is now. 

Right I'm going to change the subject this blog seems to be getting a little depressing even if I do say so myself.

On an even lighter note my sister's friend got the 3 of us tickets to see Charlie Simpson live on tour in our home town in march next year. I can't wait, last time we saw him was in a different town, called Norwich, and we waited outside for almost 6 hours in the freezing cold. We didn't even get to meet him. However, we did get to meet the guy that plays the keyboard for him, and his backing vocals guy, Andrew and Nick. This time though we have VIP tickets, which means we get to go to his sound check, meet him and the other guys, get a photo with him. We also get signed copy of his set list and a guitar pick. I'm so excited and I can't wait to find out whose going to be his support act or acts.

Charlies friend Andrew is also a solo artist, so check him out. Yes I know I'm doing another promo but seriously these guys are amazing, and they deserve all the recognition they can get. We're trying to persuade both Andrew and Tom (you'll remember him from last weeks blog post) to do a gig in my town. I'm hoping it will be soon, I've yet to see Tom live. Anyways, Andrew has an E.P out, all you have to do is go over to his website http://www.andrewbalkwill.com/ and download his CD, he also has:

Twitter- https://twitter.com/#!/andrewbalkwill

Facebook-http://www.facebook.com/andrewbalkwill

And for a taster of his music here's the video of my favourite song (which makes me convinced he lives in black cabs because he always seems to be in one) called Bad Bad Luck:

He also seems to let a lot of very random people into his taxi (haha).


And on that note I am off to bed I have a 12 hour shift tomorrow and need to be awake and ready for work by half past 10. I'll fill you in on the drunken shinanigans of the costumers in my next post. Its scary to think that the next time I write on this I'll be 21, I have sworn not to use technology on monday night when I'm drunk, seeing as last time I did this was Wednesday when I went out for a friends birthday. I ended up sending a tweet that included very VERY bad spelling. (once again sorry about that Tom) If you wish to send me birthday messages head over to my twitter https://twitter.com/#!/SarahClickk and send me a lovely message (my birthday is on monday by the way)
Anyway good bye and goodnight
Sarah x

P.S Don't be afraid to send me cards and presents mwahahaha :P Love you guys

This Summer

I'm sat here writing this whilst watching Happy Feet(There's something about a bunch of penguins singing and dancing that seems, well, right). I never seem to manage to watch the whole movie so once I'm finished typing this i'll be going downstairs to watch it on the family tv.

Anyways, This Summer I got myself a job selling icecream for a local icecream company, and even though the weather wasn't exactly great or warm enough for anyone to even want to buy any( the price didnt help, £1.40 for an icecream with a flake is just ridiculous) I got enough work to be able to still go out and do what I love doing, which is photography.

On one particular day I decided to take my camera. Simply because I didn't know how busy I would be and also that on the off chance I may just get to take some shots.

 The town I was working in was pretty dead as usual so I got a few photo's taken these are just a couple of my best shot's. I loved the colours of everything that was around me, and with the sun shining I couldn't ask for better conditions. No need to use my flash :D (that's a smiley face for anyone asking)

Right I'm off to watch the rest of this film (it's so weird hearing penguins talk with spanish accents haha)

I'll upload some more soon, I have a facebook page where you can checkout the rest of my work, http://www.facebook.com/pages/Sarah-Thompson-Photography/145795518848615

Byeeeee x

Being awake and other things

Right I'm hoping this is second time lucky posting this, don't seem to be having much luck with technology lately.

So, I've finally decided to set up my own blog after my website decided to stop letting me post anything on there(boo!) Before you say anything yes it is 20 to 2 in the morning (and why am I still awake I hear you ask) well to be honest I've not been home long after finishing a 13 and a half hour shift, which involved many, MANY drunk full grown adults dancing to the YMCA(and other such party classics) a man crying in the corner (because simply no party is complete without one) and many middle aged woman dancing round there handbugs glass of wine in hand. Oh and to top it all of I got told that a man loved me, simply because I told him where his raffle ticket was. Although, I did later see him running around with his shirt ripped open :/
It seems to be that after being awake for about 16 hours or so I still seem to be pretty wide awake (I blame the can of relentless) and also the fact that insomnia seems to have started kicking in(fun times!)

I will gradually get round to posting photography work, and the such like up on here. I do have an old blog which I started in college which I must admit is a bit crap and seriously needs to be put out of its misery but I really can't be bother right at this very moment, not that I'm too tired its just simply because I'm lazy like that.
Anyway I won't bore you any longer I'm off to jump into bed (bag of snack-a-jacks in hand) and listen to some Tom Law :D Check him out:
-Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/TomLawMusic
-Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/tomlawmusic
and don't forget...........
-Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/tomlawmusic

He's cool, an amazing singer living in bath (always wanted to go there, for a photography trip) and he's trying to get his music out there. (he deserves it promise) His song 'We Never Sleep' seems to be quite an appropriate song choice at the moment.(simply for the title) My sister got me listening to him after she saw him at boardmasters in cornwall this summer (and to think I turned down the chance to go on that holiday, dammit)
I'm hoping I will fall asleep sometime before 3 am but I generally can't see that happening.
Anyway good night, and I promise I will post some pictures next time :)
xx

P.s One last thing I wanted to leave you with
Look Up
Look Down
Look All Around
Up In The Air, Or On The Ground.                I dare you not to have that song in your head now, it's been stuck in mine for the last 2 days (Please tell me people know where this is from)