Tony Pick Coastal Images

When SWPP member, Tony Pick is not behind a camera or in front of a computer he can, more often than not, be found in the local lifeboat station. A
volunteer member since 2001 he is currently one of the navigators for the all-weather boat. He allows the RNLI to use some of his shots for postcards and
promotional purposes.

 

Tony feels that the secret to becoming a successful photographer and gallery owner is that you really do have to diversify and use your local knowledge to your advantage. He started off imagining that his seascapes and landscapes would be all he wanted but has come to realise that he enjoys all aspects of the photography he does and that is the main reason he loves his work so much!

We opened our first gallery in 2001 having moved from Hertfordshire to Aldeburgh, in Suffolk, in order to realize this dream after a successful career as a press photographer. The original gallery was a quirky old boathouse on the beach which was great at the time, but it was soon too small, so we moved into the high street three years later, and a much more prominent position.

My initial idea was to make a living from selling my own seascapes and landscapes. We quickly realised that images of the surrounding area were much better sellers than generic shots of the coastline and so I began to concentrate on those. Whilst we were in the beach gallery I had a framed portrait of our eldest son on the wall (who was a baby at the time) and someone came in and asked if I would photograph their children. I did this and word spread that I was taking commissions for portraits on the beach. We were incredibly naive at the beginning and had a rather steep learning curve which meant that we learnt a lot, very quickly. We initially gave customers prints to look at in order to make their selection but due to the rural nature of Aldeburgh, each trip to the lab took about three hours! I was shooting on film in those days.

Whilst the portrait side of the business was quietly growing, the seascape and landscape side was flourishing and I was able to extend on my collection of images with the changing seasons. I converted to digital in 2002 and although I do miss the days of shooting sheet-film on my Ebony 5" x 4", it is amazing to see the results you can achieve now with the help a D2X (upgrading to the D3x?) and shooting RAW, processed through Lightroom and Photoshop.

Not long after I had started the portraits, a friend asked if I would take his wedding pictures (as a press photographer I always stayed clear of weddings). I was very nervous and had never done a wedding before, but, always up for a challenge, I agreed! Again word spread around the community that I was now offering a wedding service and I began to undertake more. I soon learnt that the style in which I shoot my portraits was ideally suited to wedding photography and have had some great results. So now I had a gallery selling my own work, a portrait business and a wedding business. The only small problem was that weddings would tie me up for a week with the actual day, editing and correction time, the client viewing, album design and production. I decided recently that I would offer a wedding service along the same lines as a portrait session. I now cover the ceremony before dropping down to the beach for an hour and spending some quality time getting really beautiful shots of the couple and their guests. It seems to be working well and it means that the couple do not have to spend hours having the photographs taken in the more traditional way. It obviously helps enormously that we are on the coast and have the most stunning stretch of beach for me to use.

A new and exciting addition is the ‘Digital Workshops’ that we run. We launched them earlier this year after many requests from people visiting the gallery. So far, we have completed 40 workshops with minimal local advertising.

The morning is spent out on location around the Aldeburgh area visiting some of my favourite portrait locations (beach – derelict house – woods – urban high key – environmental) teaching my portrait techniques (with a model) using both off-camera flash and available light. The later part of the morning is an introduction to landscapes/seascapes on the beach, using Neutral Density graduated filters. We then break for lunch before downloading the morning's pictures, back at the studio. The afternoon is an enlightening experience in Lightroom and Photoshop, teaching my workflow, covering all the points as described below.

An image made during a teaching session, local to Aldeburgh

Tony's best-selling scene is this one from his local area. LIke many other gallery owners, he finds local images out-sell more generic images

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