Luke's Blog

Kebab Shop

2011-03-30T23:18:00.003+01:00

O.K. so sometimes you find yourself in a kebab shop all alone at 2.30 in the morning............

Kinda gives new meaning to the phrase "mixed lighting".................

"The Fold"

2011-03-29T13:26:00.006+01:00

Shot the pilot for the feature "The Fold" with John Jencks directing through The Electric Shadow Co. in Cornwall last week. Used the all new Sony F3 on this one for the first time and was very impressed. The guys at Shoot Blue were very kind to give up their new baby for a week and let me shoot some pretty exhaustive tests at their new place in Finchley. We ended up recording to a Nano Flash at 180 m/bits and using my Zeiss ZF Primes on the camera with one of the first ever MTF Sony to Nikon mount adaptors (it was ROCK solid).

The weather and locations were amazing (thank you God & Carn) and the Cornish crew very welcoming. All in all an extremely pleasant week. The rushes looked great on the MacBook, can't wait to see the real deal........

X-Mas in India

2011-01-15T00:10:00.000Z

'Nuf said..........

New Arri Alexa on Greenscreen

2010-11-30T23:51:00.000Z

This week I shot the titles for the new Adrian Childs show with Tim Varlow from Liquid TV.

We shot on the new Arri Alexa straight to the SxS cards and it was great! Soo easy to deal with just drag and drop........

Cameras a dream to work with BUT this is the first time I've used it on a greenscreen job. Looks perfect for the job soo far......

Here's a couple of screen grabs to be going on with. Not the best quality BUT you get the idea.

"Not Now Pet"

2010-11-25T14:11:00.000Z

"Not Now Pet" is a short film Directed by John Jencks, written by Alexa Seligman and produced by Jay Taylor out of "The Electric Shadow Co." The three of them set up the company last year to develop and shoot feature films and this is the third short I have shot for them. We shot on the Arri's new Alexa and oh boy that was impressive! The Alexa really is 800 ASA and more! This thing is soo sensitive I was walking around turning on and off practicle table lamps on the other side of the room for fill! Haven't seen the film projected yet but it looked great on the BIG Panasonic monitor.
Shot to SxS cards while the editor was next door doing a rough/ assemble edit. Now I know producers are gonna love that post workflow.............
We also shot a couple of night car interiors on my Canon 1D kit. Will be intersting to see how the two cut in together.

Had a lot of fun with Alexa's script and working with John, Jay and Lawrence again.

Post Office Ads

2010-10-25T01:27:00.003+01:00

Spent most of July shooting a series of Post Office ads with Paul Gay (Hungry Man). Really pleasant job travelling around much of England doco stylie with a small tight crew. Big ups to Alex Reid and Ben Chads serving up some beautiful shots. They're out and on TV now

Post Office "Over 50's" from Luke palmer on Vimeo.

"Internaxx" Reto Salimbeni

2010-09-25T01:38:00.000+01:00

Just back from summer holidays and straight off to Mallorca for a shoot with Pathfinder (Palma Pictures) and Swiss director Reto Salimbeni. I gotta say Mallorca really was extremely pleasant this time of year. Most of the nasty tourists gone home and beautiful location!! I'm sure I could get used to spending more time over here...........

FireFlies 2010

2010-07-31T00:29:00.000+01:00

Well, I made it to the Villa! 1000Km over the Alps on "The Classico". I think maybe I like the steel between my thighs!!

A thousand thanks to everyone who sponsored me, it goes to a GREAT cause!

"Kissing" Times Style Magazine

2010-06-27T00:26:00.001+01:00

Just got hold of this beautiful film I shot for Robert Wyatt commissioned by Lucy Ewing and Times Style Magazine on my Canon 1D with the new Zeiss Primes. A day spent a Spring Studios, 1 Million pounds worth of jewelery, company reps tottering around in high heels and BIG old security guards.

1 x Breise Light, 1x 100watt clear lightbulb and a Dedo 650 really shows what the 1D is capable of in Lo-Light (this was shot at 1250 ASA)!!

Thanks to Andy Sauer who pushed Robert and I round and round and round and round and round..............

Style Magazine "Kissing" from Luke palmer on Vimeo.

"Paralympics" Mike Christie

2010-06-25T00:28:00.002+01:00

Have been shooting performance films for Ch4 and Mike Christie's (Jump London, Jump Britain) "Inside Incredible Athletes". Truly inspirational! All these guys are amazing. Blind Football in the Egyptian Gallery of The British Museum, Wheelchair Rugby on The Woolwich Ferry, and Dressage in The Royal Albert Hall with the English National Ballet (they have never had a horse in there before) to name but a few........

Eyjafjallajökull it's unpronouncable!!

2010-04-18T22:53:00.000+01:00

O.K. so I can't say the word BUT it got us stuck in Milan after Thom Bryant's shoot for the new Mini Countryman............

2 days by train from Milan to London. I think we did pretty well!

Mini "Countryman"

2010-03-25T11:22:00.002Z

Off to Milan to film the new Mini Countryman with Thom Bryant from Flynn with Michele Branch. Shooting on the brand new Red MX sensor as there's gonna be loads of driving stuff to do around the streets of Milan with no way of lighting it. Lets see if this baby really is 800 asa! I feel some judicious recceing coming on...........

Toyota IQ

2009-12-23T00:40:00.014Z

Had a fun last week before Christmas filming the new Toyota IQ safely ensconced in the old, abandoned Gillette Wharehouse whilst it was -3 degrees outside and snowing (Red rads at the ready)!!! Cue precision driver screaming up and down doing do-nuts around "Amy Perfect".........

Mark Jenkinson directing and on his game (as ever)! More Kino's than you could shake a stick at. Thanks Peter B........

2009-09-28T01:53:00.002+01:00

Monica Pidgeon 1913-2009

Monica died last week at the age of 95, twelve days off her 96th birthday. I did not meet Monica until she was 92, I wish it had been earlier.

She had an amazing life, born in Chile in 1913 before the Great War and moving to England in the late 20's to study Architecture. She was the Editor of the highly influential Architecture Design for 3 decades where she championed post-war modernism and counted among her friends Le Corbusier, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Buckminster Fuller, Josep Lluís Sert, Louis Kahn and Walter Gropius.

She first asked me to finish off an image set of Richard Rogers by photographing 30 St Mary's Axe (The Gherkin) that she had been working on for Pidgeon Digital and then later the annual Serpentine Pavilions. I was lucky enough to be her "date" last summer for the gala opening of Frank Gehry's pavilion at the U.S. Ambassadors residence in Regents Park and then later onto a function at the Pavilion itself. For the entire night we were accosted by the great and good of the architectural world who just had to say hello and reminisce with "The Grande Dame of British Architecture"

Monica was an inspiration to everyone who knew her. She will be missed.

Her renowned illustrated interviews with world famous architects live on at: www.PidgeonDigital.com

Neurosonics Audiomedical Labs.

2009-09-15T14:52:00.007+01:00

Chris Cairns' "Neurosonic Audiomedical Labs" film is out and ready for human consumption!! We shot this a while back and since then The Mill have been lavishing post on it (for obvious reasons)

There was all sorts of giggery pokery with syncing audio up between the artistes who were spinning around at 33 rpm on turntables whilst trying desperately not to throw up and the DJ's who were mixing it up for real on the decks with Styrofoam heads spinning around as stand-ins.

I don't think I've seen that many people deep in concentration with laser pointers, protractors, inclinometers and alogorithmic calculations under one roof in a long time...............

Link to "Shots" article: http://www.shots.net/article_detail.asp?atype=1&id=9163

Egypt

2009-08-15T12:22:00.000+01:00

Just back to Blighty 100% fit and fully repaired after 4 months filming in Egypt! Quite fortuitous really being offered such a long job with an operator on board so that I could get the old leg back up to speed. I now know all Cairo's hotel pools intimately after spending every day off kicking my way up and down their swimming lanes.....

Here are some stills from the job. I have yet to see anything finished BUT feedback from Ghada and Khaled (the stars) is very positive!!!

Kap Bambino

2009-08-05T00:28:00.007+01:00

Shot a promo with Anthony Dickenson for mad, mad French band Kap Bambino. Shot on a blacked out stage at Shepperton using the new Canon 5-D and the Red Lake hi-speed with 2x T12's and a pair of "fuck-off" strobes!! Nothing else except super noisy wind machine chucking loads of dust, glitter and water at them and a treadmill........ All adds up (I think) to a pretty mental video

Hopping off to Egypt

2009-04-16T14:12:00.002+01:00

Me and my sorry arsed leg have been dragged out to Egypt for the next 3 months to shoot a film with two of their BIG stars, Khaled el Sawy and Ghada Abdel Razek. Not sure what to expect BUT should be very interesting AND they're making sure I have an operator so the old leg can recover!!!

See you on the flip side, as they say........

Dooohh!!!

2009-04-05T00:17:00.003+01:00

So broke my leg playing footie last week. Innocuous little challenge going for 50:50 ball. Ended up being driven to A&E in my own car by my mate Dave Quilley. Thought they were going to tell me to go home and stick it in the air with a bag of frozen peas BUT no.....
1 week in hospital, surgery and a metal plate and eight pins later I'm back!!! Must try and get hold of the x-rays. They make for pretty cool viewing.

Ferrari "Uomo"

2009-03-12T10:07:00.001Z

Here's the making of film from Ferrari "Uomo" shoot I did with fashion photographer Robert Wyatt. We filmed in the heel of Italy along the Ionian coast, in and around the "Costa Otranto Natural Park".
GORGEOUS!

I'll post the ad when I have it.