Since my little boy's birth back in August '11, I've nearly disappeared from the photography world. Being a parent is tougher than one can think, you don't realise it until you are actually experiencing it, but what a joy!

As mentioned in my previous post, I've, in the meantime, move to Australia, taking my little family to the sunshine and closer to the family (New Caledonia). A bit before the move I've restarted shooting again with Andy & Jane's family and then in Sydney with Tahnee a model from ModelMayhem and for Golfers in IT.

Hopefully, I will be posting more shots and blog about my Aussie's experience.

I just came back from a fantastic workshop with the LPMG, for some it was their first go with flash photography and more practice will be needed but they have good potential. Would like to see how far these guys will go. As already mentioned in another post, joining a camera club of a photographic society can really help you improve your photographic skills.

My friend SnapperJack has put up for me a really great showreel video of my photography work. He's shooting and editing video so if you need a videographer then pop down to his website and blog (see below).

Have a wonderful Sunday and see you soon.

Thank you to all for your comments and feedbacks on both this blog and my Flickr stream, much appreciated!

In exchange, I will share with you the secrets behind these photographs. What you will find inside today's post:

• three terrific video footages of the photoshoot in Micheldever Wood. These were filmed by SnapperJack and edited with the help of Event DV.
• analysis of the shots in the wood
• analysis of the shots in the field

Here comes the "Micheldever Wood - Part III" with a series of photographs of model Amaya Jayne. Amaya has been modelling since she was younger and got back into it professionally after winning a catwalk competition: "I love everything about modelling my goals are to get as many shoots as possible to keep me occupied, I'd love to work with some amazing photographer to get the best out of my style".

Amaya's pictures have a different feel. And for the ones in the wood I played with the flashes to create a summery feel to this cold weather.

In "Micheldever Wood - Part I" I've introduce you to Lyvia one of the models the went on the shoot with photographer Dwiko Arie and I in Winchester. In this part II is all about her shots taken that day. Lyvia is an experienced London based model, she's blonde, 5' 4", blue eyes and medium length hair. She is shooting full time accepting paid work and limited TFP/TFCD.

Twitter, what a great invention! Updating the world with what's is going on in your life, networking with talented people, promoting your business, you name it!

DwikoArie is a wedding photographer I've first met on Twitter. We have tweeted a few times but never actually met in real life. I've invited him to join the London Strobists and LPMG groups but never had the chance to meet yet. Two of my mates from the London Strobists group told me about Dwiko and having a look at his blog I was quite impressed of the quality of his wedding shots. One day Dwiko suggested that we should do a shoot together which I of course accepted.

It's only after couple of months that we managed to get a date where we were both available. After few selections, we finally chose to shoot in Micheldever Wood, Winchester.

I went to a London Strobist meetup recently, it was really cool as usual with lots of great photographers and models.

The weather was quite freezing so shooting outside was a bit tough but OK though.

Light wise I tried different things:

- for Murphy Thomas (top left), I've tested a new setup, one flash bounced into an umbrella and another flash clamped on the same stand pointing in the other direction to create a hard and soft single light source.

- for Rachel-Claire, the shoot was done in a student room so in order to re-create a night club ambiance I used three speedlights: the key light was gridded and clamped on a rail and pointing to R-C's face, a blue gelled flash on the desk in front of the model pointing towards the shelf, and a double full CTO gelled flash hand held by a fellow photographer behind R-C and pointing to the background.

- The light for _La is rather simple, an overcast day...

Sorry for the long radio silence. After our holidays in Montpellier (France) that has started with a 4 days of nightmare trying to get into a plane: 3 flight cancellations, 12 tickets! I got sick with a very long and painful cough. But it seems to go away slowly now.

Back in September last year, I went to Paris for some training and to meet the Strobist@Paris meetup group. After the meetup, when all other photographers have gone home for dinner, I stayed around and waited for the sunset to see if there would be any photographic opportunity. I wasn't disappointed.

As I was wandering around I met a group of teenagers and proposed to take their pictures. They were over-excited and accepted the offer. They are a group of friends that live in the same town, dancing and doing music together. They are now a little association that regularly meetup in a room in their school and around Paris, especially here at "La Defence"

I've recently been contacted by several photographers, including Tony Kieu, my cousin in Australia, wanting to start taking photograph of models but just don't know where to start with. As most of us at the beginning, they started to take portraits asking their wife or a family members to pose for them, then, after a little (or big) while both parties can sometimes start to loose interest and the photographer just wants to get into something more challenging: photographing a model.

Taking pictures of a friend, of your wife or of a family member is something easy. It's a person you're going on well with so it's easier to be open and do some crazy things. Meeting and photographing a stranger is something else. For a lot of photographers it can be a really big challenge which can get worse with the time if they don't make the jump and try it.

Hopefully, with the help of the Internet, you can prepare and liaise with models online which makes it easier to arrange a meetup for a photo session.