Edinburgh

Waterfront Private Hospital

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Lifestyle Photography for Waterfront Private Hospital

Waterfront Private Hospital is a modern, consultant-led private healthcare facility located in Granton, Edinburgh, overlooking the Firth of Forth. Established in September 2023 by renowned plastic surgeons Dr. Awf and Dr. Omar Quaba, the hospital specializes in aesthetic and reconstructive plastic surgery, dermatology, hand surgery, urology, and non-surgical cosmetic treatments.

I was approached by Holyrood PR last year to produce a series of lifestyle image for the hospital, showcasing their facilities as well as staff. The brief asked for warm, friendly, bright, professional. We shot over 2 days in Edinburgh and you can see a selection of these images below:

GEAR
Nikon Z8
Nikkor Z 14-24mm f2.8
Nikkor Z MC 105mm f2.8
Nikkor Z 85mm f1.2
Nikkor Z 35mm f1.8
Tiffen Black Pro-mist 1/4 Filters
Tripod
Reflector

Songs From The Last Page

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Photography, Video & Artwork for Gareth Williams’
“Songs From The Last Page” project

“Songs from the Last Page” is an ongoing project by an acclaimed composer/songwriter Gareth Williams where he lyrically transforms iconic final pages from Scottish fiction into brand-new 'literary chamber pop' songs. I’ve worked with Gareth on various ventures throughout the years (such as “Navigate the Blood”) but “Songs from the Last Page” has been really special. It’s been growing and developing for the past 2 years and I’ve been fortunate to be involved from the beginning: taking photos, filming, and eventually working on promotional artwork and CD packaging. For someone who thrives on creative control, this has been a dream. We shot at Edinburgh College of Art, recording studios, and even travelled to the Scottish Highlands to photograph the album cover at Loch Glass. You can check all of that and more below and you can catch Gareth performing some of these songs live at this year’s Fringe Festival. The album is out now.

2021

2022
with Deirdre Graham.

2023
with Aisling O Dea (violin) and Justyna Jablonska (cello) at GloWormRecording studio.

“Song from the Last Page of Lanark” Single Cover.

Fringe promo poster

Fringe promo poster.

Justyna Jablonska's Lost & Found

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LOST & FOUND: A CELLIST’S JOURNEY

This was probably one of my favourite projects last year. Performed at the Edinburgh Fringe in August, Lost & Found: A Cellist’s Journey, was a rumination on Justyna Jablonska’s personal and musical journey from Poland to Scotland after finishing high school in her hometown of Łódź. It mixed cello, electronica and video projections to tell the artist’s story.

Justyna and I have worked together on several projects in recent years and it’s always a joy and a challenge. For Lost & Found, my task was to take promotional images, design the artwork and produce a trailer for the show. Justyna wanted everything to have a vintage, analog feel so most of the images were shot on film and I tried to incorporate that aesthetic in the promo artwork and video.

While Justyna is based in Edinburgh, we took the main promo images in Glasgow as its industrial history and vibe are closer to Łódź, where Justyna is originally from. Have a look below:

Promo Poster for the Edinburgh Fringe

GEAR PHOTO
Nikon FM + Nikkor 100mm f1.8
Kodak 400TX

Nikon D850 + Nikkor 85mm f1.4
Tiffen Black Pro-mist 1/4 Filter

Sony A7III + Sony 85mm f1.8
Tiffen Black Pro-mist 1/4 Filter

GEAR VIDEO
Sony A7III + DJI RS 2
Sony 35mm f1.8
Sony 85mm f1.8
Tiffen Black Pro-mist 1/4 FilterS

Best of 2021

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2021 was the year where everything went back to normal. Oh, no, hold on… Yeah, perhaps not so much. I shouldn’t complain really cause, all in all, it was a full and interesting year for me work-wise - I started doing more and more video work (even got a drone despite my earlier proclamations of never going near one), got to collaborate with some interesting people and lined up a few exciting projects for 2022 (Covid have mercy). Still, have to admit, I’m feeling pretty done in by 2021. I look at, say, an image of Kathleen MacInnes taken in June (see below), and feel like years - not merely months - have passed since that session. Is it just me? Anyway, here are 12 of my personal favourites taken in the past 12 months. Hope you like them too and I hope 2022 is kind to you.

Oh, and in May, I had an absolute blast in Brighton filming this music video for Allan Jay. You don’t know what chaos can look like until you’ve got 14 drag queens, 4 dancers and 2 dogs to deal with on set!

And here’s music I enjoyed this past year:

ALBUMS OF 2021
Prioritise Pleasure Self Esteem
Magic Still Exists Agnes
Stand For Myself Yola
Deacon serpentwithfeet
Crooked Machine Róisín Murphy
Pink Noise Laura Mvula
star-crossed Kacey Musgraves
We Are Jon Batiste
Collapsed in Sunbeams Arlo Parks
30 Adele

SONGS OF 2021
I Do This All The Time Self Esteem
24 Hours Agnes
Hot N Heavy Jessie Ware
breadwinner Kacey Musgraves
Dancing Away In Tears Yola
Got Me Laura Mvula
Right On Time Brandi Carlile
Fellowship serpentwithfeet
Too Good Arlo Parks
Love and Hate in a Different Time Gabriels

FujiFilm x100v

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Thoughts on FujiFilm X100v Camera

My name is Kris and I am a lazy photographer. What I mean by that is that I’ve never been the type of photographer who carries a camera everywhere they go, taking pictures of anything and everything. I’ve always admired such people, I’m just not one of them. I value comfort and practicality above all else. See? Lazy. When I started taking photos, it was with a Zenit 11 and that camera is built like a Soviet tank, not exactly a “throw-in-your-pocket” type of equipment (although it could certainly double as a weapon if one had to defend themselves). In recent years, with photography becoming my full-time job, I’ve worked with various Nikon DSLRs - D700, D4, D850 - but these are expensive cameras to be carrying around and not exactly light or compact either. I’ve realised, however, that I missed taking snaps of my friends or of places I was visiting. I’d usually use my iPhone for that but it never feels right for me, no matter how great the phone cameras are these days. And this is what brought me to the FujiFilm x100 series.

I’d been watching various YouTube videos about these cameras, reading reviews, checking prices on eBay, and last year I eventually bit the bullet and bought the then recently released x100v model. First of all, it’s beautiful. I often feel that in the digital age the aesthetics of a camera are the last to be considered. I realise that what a camera looks like isn’t of utmost importance for most, and I’m not too bothered about it either when it comes to the equipment I use for work (the Nikons aren’t exactly ugly but they won’t be winning beauty contests anytime soon). However, if I’m going to carry a camera with me every day, I want it to be compact, practical, and, yes - pretty. And the old-school, analog-borrowed look of the whole x100 series is really lovely (I went for the silver model). As for the performance, I’ve been shooting with x100v for almost a year now, always have it in my bag, and I really love it - it definitely exceeded my expectations when it comes to image quality and it also brought back the joy of taking photos just for fun, without overthinking. I’ve got it set on Aperture priority and don’t worry about much else. I mainly use it for personal things: meeting friends, traveling, behind the scenes, etc, but I’ve also occasionally taken it out on work shoots and ended up with decent results. All in all, I’m super happy with it, and here are some examples of snaps I’ve taken with the FujiFilm x100v so far: