Ecommerce Launch

The final stage of the online launch is complete with the addition of an ecommerce system, allowing customers to buy prints online. It's powered by photobox so all the stressful logistics of taking orders, printing, shipping, invoicing etc is taken out of my hands, giving me more time to take the photos. It's also cheap. Crowd shots from all events will be posted on the site and print can be ordered from as little as £1.25 each and can be ordered in a range of sizes up to A4.
Just click on the basket icon below which takes you to the shop.

Past, Present, and Future

May 10th - Amidst some controversy over the Kate Kennedy club and their assocition with the university, the gents still managed to get the funds to throw an ambitious event. With live performances from The Brent Flood, Andy Knox, The Gentlemen, and The Audiobullys, outside the venue were funfair rides and inside the venue there were four free bars (the highlight of the night!). I went along on behalf of sound and lighting wizards EOSproductions (the same people ho rigged the FS09 show back in March).

So back to the present...Exams are over, most of the St Andrews population are packing up and clocking out for four months. I'm just tying up some loose ends here and there as the year's photography jobs dry up in St Andrews before I put myself up for hire in the increasingly competitive Edinburgh photography market.
The website's hit rates are doing well, drawing a world wide audience. I'll be putting up some more albums over the next few days.

And what about the future? Saturday morning, I decided I wanted to get out of the country and get some life experience. Sunday afternoon, flights to Hong Kong and Vietnam are booked for June.
The plan is to hit HK with friends then backpack around North Vietnam for 10 days. I'm flying to Hanoi and I want to make sure I spend a few days in Ha Long bay but other than that I'm going to spend some time as a drifter. Just me and my camera.

The new site is up and running!
A few tweaks needed here and there to ensure the galleries are accessible, but other than that the rebranding is going well.
A huge thank you to pretty klicks and clansman code for their unbelievable effort on the site. Thanks must also go to Hylton, my web hoster, who has been supporting the site and my photography from the word go.

As I said in my last post 2/3rds of the hits to my website so far has been from people looking up my site after I have watermarked images. Thank you for being so patient with the watermarks and I hope that with this new site the business aspect of my photography will continue to grow.

Mylo.tv

So a while back I was at an Erol Alkan and Mylo gig (hosted by destroy disco). Whilst there I got some snaps of Mylo and Erol, not really knowing what to do with the results I sent some unwatermarked high res versions to here there and everywhere, including Mylo's management.
Present day and as I tinker away trying to get ready for the new site I found a tool that monitors the hits on my site and where they come from, to my surprise I had hits from Russia, Bosnia, Japan, India, EU, Germany, Turkey. 2/3rds of the hits to my site come from watermarking my images the other 3rd comes from links on various networking sites amongst the sites that people were coming from was from Mylo's official web page (mylo.tv) which was using my image exclusively and had a link to my page at the bottom. It is quite an honour to have a world class DJ's web page built around an image you took.
Website coming soon. Watch this space....

The start of May in St Andrews for some reason is a sleepless affair.
At sunset on the 30th, the Kate Kennedy club host "The Gaudie" - a torchlit procession along the pier. It's bad that I can't remember why they do it, but it looks good.
After an all-nighter of drunken debauchery it's time to watch the sunrise at castle sands, accompanied by a dip in the tropical north sea. It is said to cleanse you of academic sins such as commiting academic incest and the like. Walking down to the beach is like stepping into a world war two beach landing; screaming, bonfires, figures flailing in the water or running onto land as quickly as possible.
After warming up around a bonfire, it's back to bed... for a few hours then off to lectures.

Fireworks in front of the castle in St Andrews. I hopped a fence to set up my tripod, so I was standing on top of a cliff with a camera in the middle of the night. Worth it.
The event was the finale of the St Andrews student film festival "On the Rocks". The event for me was a chance to put a new camera through it's paces.
At the moment the website has been replaced by a rather rudimentary "under construction message". This time it really is under construction - webdesigner "Pretty Klicks" in association with coding guru "Clansman Code" is rehauling my web presence which will provide an interactive way for clients to view my portfolio.

"The Tunnel"

"Imagine a city where graffiti wasn't illegal, a city where everybody could draw wherever they liked. Where every street was awash with a million colours and little phrases. Where standing at a bus stop was never boring. A city that felt like a party where everyone was invited, not just the estate agents and barons of big business. Imagine a city like that and stop leaning against the wall - It's wet."
-Banksy (from his book "Wall and Piece")

I had heard rumours of this place so I thought I'd go check it out, it's a tunnel underneath Waterloo station. At the openings there are signs saying "Graffiti artists will not be prosecuted beyond this point". It was the venue for the "Cans" festival, where Banksy and a few other sreet artists were invited to come and go wild, then after three days they painted over it to leave a blank canvas for anyone, so long as they took their empty cans away with them.

London - Revisited

April 2009

"Despite what they say graffiti is not the lowest form of art. Although you might have to creep around at night and lie to your mum it's actually one of the more honest art forms available. There is no elitism or hype, it exhibits on the best walls a town has to offer and nobody is put off by the price of admission." - Banksy (extract from his book "Wall and Piece")

August 2008

Back in august I went to London, whilst there I stumbed across graffiti heaven (bottom). I went back down this easter break and went to see if the same picture this time would be different (top). To my delight it was.

Thank you Royal Mail

Cheers for that.

Refet Afrique

So, the juggernaut of fashion shows that was the £100000-budget FS09 was a month or so ago but I was invited along recently to another fashion show that I think humbly bitch slapped FS09 with it's audacity. Refet Afrique, an african themed fashion show, supported by the "Catwalk the world" foundation was a colourful and vibrant affair, showing there is room to squeeze in another fashion show into this town.

STAnza Poetry Festival

Like everyone in town, I get starry eyed when celebs come to town. We have the Dunhill Cup which attracts the likes of Hugh Grant and Samuel L. Jackson but there is another annual event that brings a more subtly famous bunch. The organisers of the poetry festival "STAnza" asked a team of photographers (including me) to go and get some snaps.

iWalk. iRun. iRide.

Yesterday was the photoshoot for the "iWalk. iRun. iRide." charity event.
The shoot went well, a beautifully sunny day provided limitless light and the shoot was quick and efficient and everyone got their sexiness on. Nice one chaps.

Rectorial Drag

Once every 3 years a new rector is installed at St Andrews university. As part of the installation process he is dragged around the town in a carriage (this year pulled by members of the athletic union) to various pubs, halls of residence, and the union. I skipped a lecture and went to take some snaps of this historic event.

FS09

Trust St Andrews to put on a spectacle like this! With a budget of £100,000 the FS commitee knew they would put on another sell out event. All in the name of "Pen" charity.
Cat walks are common place in the fashion concious bubble, but most shy into insignificance when the FS09 team invited the big corporate dogs out to play. IBM, Max Factor, Armani, DKNY, G.H. Mumm came to frolic in the sand pit of extravagance.
Hosted in what can only be described as a PVC palace on the Lower college lawn the night kicked off with an acrobatic display involving a white sheet accompanied by Justice - Stress.
Myself and 3 other photographers auditioned and were accepted for the role of "FS09 photographer" and were given one of the most coveted press passes in the St Andrews social calender.
The night was a huge success, and my new sigma 28-70mm f2.8 enjoyed every fraction of a second, which confirmed my decision to start saving up for more fast glass, telephoto next I think...

Last saturday night an events hosting company called "Destroy Disco" presented some world class DJs at Kinkell Byre near St Andrews.
AAA pass in hand I snapped away. Coming away with some gems of Mylo and Erol Alkan.
It was a truly epic night.

Last week was host to the St Andrews Charity Campaign's "RAG week".
With a week's worth of events to cover it was pretty busy.

Because I love to procrstinate I thought i'd upload these photos.
I have 1 blog follower and i'm sure he'll enjoy it.

I would feel a miss if i had not posted a cliche photo of a red bauble with some out of focus fairy lights behind it before the season is officially out, xmas tree has been taken down, and the attic begins it's boxed festive season. so here you go: festiveness

Studio Flash flashes into life

Jacinta Goulter, the first proper mess around with the flashes

Follow the yellow brick road.

Recenty been working on a new student publication called "The Andrean".
In addition to getting photos from other photographers (a good chance to see what is on offer in St Andrews) I contributed some stuff myself.
Here's one that accompanied the article it is running at the moment on the Libraries of St Andrews.
I'll do another post when the magazine is out.

Flash! Ah aaah...

The studio flash kit has arrived, now all I need is some models to test it out on then it will be ready for commercial use!

Life on the links has published a set of photos from the Christmas Ball 2008 (look here) and a photo shoot for Pride and Prejudice (look here)

So that brings everything up to speed on where I am at the moment, I have plans for next semester but right now it's time for festive fun and a lot of work for exams.

Recently i have been doing a lot of event photography, there are loads of balls and events happening here and they're all wanting photographers to grab some snaps for promotional use, I was more than happy to oblige.
After sending the results to "The Saint" I was taken on as a "Halo!" photographer.

Through Halo i got a press pass to the christmas ball, one of the most prestigeous events on the St Andrews calender.

If i were to advise anyone on how to get into the photography scene, the simple answer would be to apply for everything, attach a few photos on an email and ask if they need somebody. That's pretty much how the naked calender happened. Another charity endeavour with the residents of McIntosh Halls of residence, it was a good laugh.

First to reply was "The Saint" the St Andrews student newspaper who welcomed me aboard their team. Then somebody said i should run for St Andrews Charity Campaign photographer, so i had a few drinks and merrily gave my speech at one of their weekly meetings and got the job. My job with them is to follow around the mascot "Rory McLion" and take photos wherever he goes.

My summer was slowly drawing to a close when exam results came out. I was accepted to study medicine at St Andrews Univeristy and when i got there i was greeted with sunshine and a photographers playground. After a few weeks of drunken debauchery all in the name of settling in with new people my camera resurfaced and i snapped on the zoom lens for the Dunhill cup and for a few birds that flapped my way. Wasting not a minute of sunshine i took walks with friends on the beach in bettween lectures. The photo of Mr Jackson got me onto the St Andrews photography scene. I sent the photo off to several local newspapers and awaited a reply.

August, and I decided to take a break from work and go to sunny London town (which wasn't sunny) to visit my sister. She was working during the day so i grabbed my camera and went wondering, by far the best photo from the trip was this one. This underpass type thing by the river was covered in graffiti and these two were just finishing off their contribution. I managed to fire off a few exposures before i was no longer welcome, this is an example where a little bit of level adjustment in photoshop salvaged the image from the cruel smack of the delete button.

After returning from Canada i decided it was time to raise some money for University, so i got myself a job in a local bar, in a local coffee shop, as a car parker with a event management company (SEPevents), and a mystery shopper (which is awesome!).
In my spare time i went into the big wide world and took some photos of this that and the other.

Another Canada Photo, A sunken ship. Taken with a circular polarizer to cut out water reflection. No Photoshop required.

Went to on tour to Canada in July with my school (at the time) Merchiston Castle School.
It was another chance to hone my skills and have a laugh with some lads from school before i left for university.

Kit?

Currently I am using a Sony Alpha, fantastic piece of kit and worth the money.
I'm constantly on the equipment binge, punishing my student loan.

Blog?

Ok, so to begin...

You have been sent to this blog or have stumbled upon it's wordy goodness by accident, either way your are now thinking "what the fudge?". So i'll start by telling you who i am anyway as it's pretty important for the whole thing anyway.

My name is Ben Goulter and i live just outside Edinburgh. I study medicine at St Andrews university and six months ago tommorow i started photography.

Which leads me onto the next question...Why Blog? i can't afford a website so this is as close as it gets for now. So take a snoop, have a read, email me.