Well, I’ve gone and done it. I’ve bought myself a new 40D body for the trip to America (and far beyond hopefully!). It’s a bit of an extravagance, but I’ll definitely get the use out of it! I’m so excited – it looks so cool sat on top of my new tripod as well. The trusty 400D (which has served me well!) is going to live with my Dad now. I’m sure he’ll get as much enjoyment out of it as I have.
Roll on America!
Water Drops, originally uploaded by Ben Grubb.
It’s been raining again. It was doing so well, as well! It even (thankfully) stayed sunny for my BBQ! Hurrah. But now, it’s raining again. I did get out in the garden with the macro lens and grab some more shots of said rain on the plants again. I’m definitely going through a “macro phase” at the moment. This is probably my favourite of the bunch. I hope you like it.
Also, as something totally new, I have spent the day transferring (eventually) some of the many tapes of climbing footage we have amassed recently. There’s some great stuff in there! We’re hoping to put together a montage of us climbing at the Castle soon, but in the mean time, I made a (very) short film from one of the problems we spent some time working in Bas Cuvier in Fontainebleau.
Hier Encore Dyno (6b+) – Fontainebleau from B² Productions on Vimeo.
We’re hoping to have a lot more short films and video blogs up soon! Stay tuned.
Last week I spent a couple of days in the studio shooting Intraverse as part of their re-branding exercise. As always with those guys it was loads of fun, and I feel we got some excellent results from the process – certainly some of my best portraits I’ve taken to date. We’d had meetings and things before hand to discuss concepts and ideas, which was certainly a massive help as we managed to hit the ground running when we got into the studio! We were all fired up for the shoot and there was a really fun, creative buzz to the whole process.
Initially, we used the first session to try and iron out any initial teething problems and see what we had to work with. We managed to get some really good shots from that first session which was reassuring, as it meant the pressure was off slightly for the Saturday shoot. We even managed to source some reflective spheres (from Homebase of all places!) which were great, as the spheres pretty much formed the basis of what was a fairly minimal and clean concept. Tim also made some great boxes of varying sizes which were used to change the heights of the band members and create cool compositions with great effect. It definitely helped having these elements on hand to interact with, as it gave the guys something to do with their hands, which in turn helped them relax into the whole thing.
I really enjoyed the shoots – It was fun being in a studio for the first time, and the guys from the band made it easy for me by being so keen and devilishly handsome. All I had to do was hit the shutter button a few hundred times!
Last, but by no means least: massive thanks to Matt at West Kent who really went out of his way to help us by supplying the studio, lighting, support and even hanging around all day Saturday (when he didn’t need to be there!) while we tarted around in the other room. It was hugely appreciated and made the whole experience much more pleasant.
I’ve added some of my favourites from the sessions onto Flickr, and will add some here in due course…
Water Drops, originally uploaded by Ben Grubb.
Where’s the sun gone?! It’s been beautiful weather for the last couple of weeks and in one fell swoop it’s disappeared and been replaced with rain. Boo! There is one good thing that’s come from the rain though, and that is rain drops on leaves! Oh yes! Rain drops + leaves = Macro photography time. So, I took the opportunity to grab a couple of shots yesterday. I guess it is pretty big cliché, but it’s a very beautiful cliché so I don’t really mind.
Although, if anyone’s asking – I would prefer to have the sun back now please. Ta.
I’ve now finished editing the photos from our Fontainebleau trip. Considering how many there were, it didn’t actually take that long. Or at least, it didn’t seem to. As I say, there were an awful lot, but you can see the best of them in my Flickr set.
It seems that every time we go to Font, our number increases. This trend continued this year too, with the addition of Benny’s work mate, and fellow Castle climber Craig joining us (he’s the guy in the photo doing the crazy dyno!) It was nice to have a new person along, and his enthusiasm is infectious. He’s also fairly well versed with Fonts numerous locations, so we took some advice from him as for where to go.
On Saturday, we got a good, early start in and headed straight to Bas Cuvier. This area is holds a number of classic problems of various grades, as well as a few circuits and the Fontainebleau’s first ever 6a – Marie Rose. Ben and I gave Marie Rose a good go, but sadly both came away empty handed, both having struggled with the slopping, tenuous top out! It’s on the list for a future project (along with, what would be, many others!). After this, we regrouped and cherry picked a few problems from the Orange and Blue circuits, and had a play on a few of the Red problems. By this point, I was starting to get my eye in, and stopped feeling quite so nervy about topping out, and/or falling (images of the ankle busting trip last August were still haunting me in the back of my mind!). Ben and I even manged to flash a Red circuit problem La V1, which goes at a grade of 5. Not too impressive in the grand scheme of things, but reassuring that we’re making progress.
Further exploration later revealed to us what would become one of my favourite projects of the whole weekend! We stumbled upon a sloping rail traverse, into a cool, but intimidating top out! It didn’t have any visible grade or number, but looked far too cool to pass up, so we jumped on nd gave it a go. It didn’t take too long for us to put the/a sequence together which felt very cool! I came close, linking all the way to the last couple of moves before arm pump and uncertainty got the better of me and I had to bail! So close! Maybe next time.
Benny on the Bas Cuvier Traverse project
From here we decided to head back to the main area, which was by this time, jam packed. Craig had his eye on making an attempt of Carnage (7b), and he assured us that there was a multitude of other classic problems for us all to try. Sure enough we all found plenty to play on, which kept us amused until we were all too tired, and more importantly, too hungry to continue. It was steak time!
Sunday morning was wet. It wasn’t raining as such when we woke up, but it certainly had been throughout the night. Undeterred, we made our way out and headed to the Franchard area. This proved to be a rather wet and mossy mistake. All the rain, coupled with dense tree cover meant that only a handful of boulders were dry, and even remotely climbable. Ashby and I had a token attempt at a Red problem, but none of us could really summon up much enthusiasm for anything else. We decided it would be a wise idea to head for somewhere more exposed and hopefully, a lot drier. Roche aux Sabots was the place we decided to head for, and sure enough it was just what we needed! It was dry as a bone, and busy! Craig disappeared off to try some things, Snoo and Speedie set about making short work of a range of Blue circuit problems, while Ben, Ashby and I found ourselves some Red and Blue circuit projects. Sabot is another little goldmine! After a while, we all ended up back in one spot which seemed to have a project for everyone, which was lucky. Ben, Craig and I were working on a sweet little arête problem while the other three worked a handful of blues. By this point, the skies had cleared and we were all back into the spirit of it! As our respective projects got dispatched, we moved further into the woods to find more problems. Craig noticed a group of people working a roof problem, which apparently, goes at 6a, so we joined in for a while. There was a cool, supportive atmosphere as about five or six people took it in turns to try the problem. After a while a Dutch guy managed to the tricky, high footed top out which then opened the flood gates for everyone. Ben and I sent the problem back-to-back! Our first Font 6a! Woohoo!
We then joined Craig to try the crazy, 7a+ dyno in the photo above. He came pretty close a few times, but couldn’t quite stick it. It was a really scrunchy start, off pretty questionable foot holds, but I gave it a try and came fairly close – no where near sticking it though. I need to work on my dyno technique for sure!
After all that, all that was left for a hardcore slackline session before heading back into town for a curry at the amusing named Raj Mahal. It was another excellent trip, and it felt nice to be climbing outdoors again – it’s been a while. I also feel that I’ve laid my Font demons to rest after the ankle incident last year. I’m so psyched for America now! It’s going to be amazing!
Bas Cuvier Traverse, originally uploaded by Ben Grubb.
We’ve just gotten back from (once again) spending the Easter weekend in Fontainebleau. What a great trip! That place is fantastic! I thoroughly enjoyed myself, mainly because I didn’t get injured again, but also because I got to hang out with some great friends, in the sunshine, climbing some amazing boulder problems and taking photos. All in all, it was pretty much perfect. Although, the ability to speak French would probably have made things run a bit smoother – but there you go.
Above is a photo of Ben on one of my favourite problems of the weekend, an almost Dreamcatcher-esque style Traverse at Bas Cuvier. I have no idea of the name or grade, but it was a lot of fun. None of the group managed to link the whole thing, but we came close! I’m looking forward to getting back there to (hopefully) finish it off.
I have a ton of photos to get through. I shall post more, and a more in depth review when they’re edited, and I’m a lot less tired…
So, that’s it then. I’m now officially redundant. I still don’t think it’s quite sunk in. It’s Thursday morning, and I’m sat at home desperately trying to sift through all the rubbish which I collected in the office, which now has to be rehoused here. I’ve been pretty ruthless, but there are still bags of stuff which, at the time of writing, remain untouched. Attached to this post is the back of my fantastic leaving card which I received from my lovely friends. It’s good, as it also doubles up as the first part of my biography! Excellent! Click on it to see the larger version, and have a read – honestly, it’s worth it. It’s scarily accurate as well. To everyone who signed it: Thanks for that! I really appreciate it, and it means a lot to me. It’ll be treasured.
The big question now is, where does all this leave me. It’s been two and half years at my “first proper job”, so I think it was about time to move on. It was a huge shock, but sometimes you need your hand forced to make a change. But what will that change be? That’s the big question, and to be honest, I really don’t know at the moment.
There’s only one way to deal with this problem. And that is a big ass roadtrip round America for a couple of months. Obviously. On May 8th I’ll be flying off to America with my wonderful, and very understanding girlfriend and two other friends for the first part of what was initially meant to be a mere two weak jaunt stateside. As situations and feelings have changed, this has now morphed into a mega-holiday! Oh yes! This trip, unsurprisingly is a largely weighted as a climbing trip (with a healthy dose of Photography thrown in) which’ll be taking in the big name bouldering spots in the American west: Yosemite, Bishop and Hueco Tanks to name a few. At the end of the first two weeks, myself and fellow B2 producer (other) Ben will continue on an epic 3,000+ mile trip covering Colorado, Moab, Las Vegas and the coast road back to San Francisco where we’ll fly to Boston and drive to NYC. It’s going to be pretty intense, and I CAN. NOT. WAIT. Below is a map of the bulk of the trip. It’s pretty much a huge figure of 8.
As well as an insane amount of climbing, I’m also hoping to develop my photography portfolio with the addition of some more climbing photos, and no doubt some new landscapes as well. I’ve been toying with the idea of upgrading my camera body to a 40 or 50D. I’ve been looking at the difference in image quality between that and the 400D which I’m currently running, and it certainly is significant. I’m sure it’d be a wise investment, and one which I could recoup in enjoyment and hopefully money, relatively easily. He says. I just don’t know if my budget can extend to another big layout before the trip. Gah! I hate these decisions.
This brings me back to my original question: What will I do with myself when I get back? I have made initial progress into finding a new, full time job, but opportunities are fairly thin on the ground currently. Plus, other than knowing that I don’t particularly want to work for an Architects again, I don’t really know what’s available. I’d like to continue the design route, but more geared towards the publishing/magazine fields. I guess I just need to see what jobs are around (and indeed, what positions even exist) before deciding whether it’s an avenue worth pursuing. I may have to take a leap into the dirty world of cold calling…
Also, I’m wondering if I could market myself as a photographer (or perhaps, a photographer-come-illustrator-come-designer if such a thing exists. I’d probably need a snappier title than that as well). Since living in London, I’ve definitely found the passion and drive for photography that I hadn’t really had since I was studying it at A-level. I definitely have some strong shots, but I’m not entirely convinced I could cut it as a professional as its always felt like a hobby. It’s worked well for Amy though, and she’s definitely not looked back. Her recent successes certainly give me confidence that it can be done.
I’m thinking that perhaps freelancing is the way forward. I’m really inspired at the moment to try and further my illustration work. I feel I’m in a situation where I can explore more, and I think that my work has finally reached a level which I’d be happy to put on show, and hopefully, get paid for. Working full time where I was definitely had its advantages. I learned and awful lot, and feel I have a lot more to offer now. The nine-to-five was nice for a while as well, but I’m not sure I want to continue in that routine again straight away. Ideally, I’d be able to get some semi-regular, possibly in-house agency freelance work which I could supplement with some personal work as well. Again, I stress “Ideally”. I don’t see why it couldn’t work though. The work must be out there somewhere, surely.
I’m hoping the trip away will help clear my head and help me decide (although, I am worried that I’ll just return wanting to be a climbing gypsy for the rest of my life – we can only dream, eh?). Sorry for the long, self indulgent post. I felt I needed to get this off my chest, and this felt like the logical place. If anyone could shed some light and or opinion on this they’d be gratefully received. Anyway, in the mean time prepare yourselves for (hopefully, internetz permitting) a wealth of climbing related posts in the near future coupled with photos from some of the most beautiful locations the US has to offer! You’re excited aren’t you? I thought so. I can tell. Ohh, I’m so excited I think I need a lie down…
I recently created a banner for my friend Matt Merritt‘s music review/blog site, Call Upon The Author. Matt wasn’t too specific about what he wanted which was nice as it gave me free rein – All I knew was the name of the site, the rough dimensions and that it was a blog about music. Right from the start I felt that the name conjoured up quite a classic, retro feel which pretty much defined the look and style of the banner, hence the gramophone, typewriter and the general colouring. Obviously, I attacked it with a multitude of other elements and layers until I had the finished banner that you see above. I was happy, Matt seemed happy, and fits snuggly into the site. Yay!
All that is left to say is, go check out the site and say hi from me!
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