Birmingham Portrait Photographer Alan Bremner | Children, Baby & Newborn Photography, Midlands, UK »

About

Here at Sprout we like to think we make pictures rather than just take them. Whether you come to us for a simple portrait of yourself, your children or even images for your business we always try to create something unique, something with a little style. We want all our pictures to look like they’ve just jumped straight from the pages of a glossy magazine and it’s this attention to detail on every single image that we believe really separates us from the pack. We hope that you can see this in our work.

Based in Birmingham, portrait photographer Alan Bremner caters to discerning clients throughout the UK. We’ll travel anywhere for your session but some of the areas we currently cover include Solihull, Knowle, Dorridge, Balsall Common, Warwick, Leamington Spa, Kenilworth, Sutton Coldfield, Lapworth, Hockley Heath, Dickens Heath, Stratford Upon Avon and Henley in Arden. Our kids photography, music and DJ portrait work has led to bookings nationwide including London, Manchester, Nottingham and Bristol.

Alan always has various personal projects that he works on during the evenings and weekends, which ultimately fuels his love of photography, design and music. Hopefully by sharing some of these things on this blog it will give you a better idea of who he is, what he does and more importantly, what really helps keep him excited.

Featured in Photo Pro Magazine!

February 5, 2010 Posted in Babies, Children, Newborns, News

I’m particularly pleased that my Newborn, Baby and Children photography has been featured in this months Photo Pro Magazine. I knew this was happening a few months ago but didn’t really want to say anything just in case I jinxed it. To be honest, I thought it would only end up being a page or two so was really happy when it ended up at five pages.

I’m a huge fan of Photo Pro Magazine and have always been a loyal subscriber so really couldn’t be happier that they wanted to feature my work. Although, it was ironic that my subscription ran out a month or two ago and I forgot to renew it for this issue. Kind of annoying when I started getting emails from subscribers last Saturday and I had to wait til Thursday to get my hands on a copy!

If you’re interested in photography at all I’d urge you to pick up a copy and give it read. Personally I always find their features really useful and get something from every issue. I just hope that this feature is interesting to some of the readers. Thanks to everybody at Photo Pro, especially Terry Hope. I hope to meet you guys at Focus in March.

If you fancy a read of the full article I’ve uploaded a PDF here.

by Alan

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Retouch Work, Feb 2010

March 10, 2010 Posted in Photographers, Retouching

Over the past few months I’ve been busy retouching images for a variety of incredibly talented photographers. There’s something I find quite liberating about working on images for other people, especially when the retouch brief is “do what you want”.

When working on my own photography I tend to get really hung up on the technical stuff like my camera settings, how I lit it, how I could have made it better etc. Obviously, this is a good thing as it helps me learn from any little mistakes I might have made but working on images from other photographers allows me to focus purely on the retouching. And as sad a it seems, I find the whole retouch process quite relaxing.

So I thought I’d post a few recent favourites. Thanks to Carlos Amoedo, Dan Reid and Mari Barlow who all very kindly allowed me to post the before and after images. I hope to get permission from a few others in the next few weeks. Plus, I thought this would be a good excuse to try out my blog’s new slideshow feature. You might need to let all the images play through once to get smooth transitions though…

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My (new) favourite lens for Newborn Photography

March 5, 2010 Posted in Babies, Newborns

I’ve had a 50mm f/1.4 on my ‘lenses to buy’ list for quite some time now. I’ve read plenty about how its a great lens for Newborn Photography but to be honest I’ve been really happy with my 24-70 f/2.8L and never really felt the need to buy one. However, I recently decided to take the plunge and I must admit I absolutely love this lens for newborns. It’s the perfect focal length (on a full frame DSLR) for shooting babies in clients houses and shooting wide open at f/1.4 creates some beautifully soft backgrounds.

I wouldn’t normally shoot at f/1.4 but its really nice having the option. This particular blanket has a relatively heavy texture to it but shooting wide open has thrown the majority of the texture out of focus. Apart from a little skin tone tweak and curves adjustment in Adobe Lightroom, the image below is as it came out of camera.

by Alan

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Milo’s first birthday!

December 22, 2009 Posted in Babies, News, Personal

It’s Milo’s first birthday today and as I’ve never posted an image of myself or Sara before I thought this would be an appropriate time to do so – no comments about the hospital ‘attire’ though please! These pictures were taken by Sara’s anesthetist just moments after Milo was born. The stupid grin on my face is more than likely a mixture of happiness, relief and terror. Sara just looks like she’s having a great time on all the drugs they pumped into her!

Neither myself or Sara can believe it’s been a year already and that the little chubby package in the first two pictures took his first unaided steps yesterday. So, I’d just like to say ‘Happy Birthday Milo’ and wish you all very merry Christmas.

Alan, Sara & Milo x

by Alan

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Charlie, Newborn Shoot in Solihull

December 15, 2009 Posted in Newborns

Well, I finally found someone willing to let me suspend their newborn in mid-air and I’m not sure who was more nervous, me or them! I think the only one who wasn’t nervous was 14 day old Charlie who was very patient with his fumbling photographer and slept through the entire experience.

As with every shoot there are things I wish I had done differently or tried, but I think this worked out pretty well for a first attempt and I’m looking forward to trying it again in the New Year…without the fumbling this time of course!

by Alan

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Olli & Lime & Milo…again!

December 11, 2009 Posted in Babies, Commercial

I know doesn’t look like it but this really wasn’t the easiest shot to get. Just as I set out to shoot some images of these great baby bath towels for our friends over at Olli & Lime, Milo started teething again…then he got a cold…then he got a bad ear infection…etc. I know, I’m making excuses but the poor thing was pretty miserable. Thankfully, Andy & Karen were very understanding and we finally managed to get the shots they needed for their website.

And here’s what we started out with. Suprisingly enough, they didn’t think this image would convey the appropriate message to their customers

olli & lime - commercial baby photography

Oh, I should also mention that they’re having a great christmas sale at the moment with 20% off their Egg range.

by Alan

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Where are you based?

I'm based just outside Birmingham but cater to clients throughout the UK.

I’ll travel anywhere for sessions but some of the areas I've recently covered include Solihull, Knowle, Edgbaston, Dorridge, Balsall Common, Warwick, Leamington Spa, Kenilworth, Sutton Coldfield, Lapworth, Hockley Heath, Dickens Heath, Stratford Upon Avon and Henley in Arden.

My commercial photography, musician and DJ portrait work has led to bookings all over the UK including London, Manchester, Leeds, Nottingham and Bristol.

Birmingham Portrait Photographer Alan Bremner | Children, Baby & Newborn Photography, Midlands, UK »

About

Featured in Photo Pro Magazine!

Retouch Work, Feb 2010

My (new) favourite lens for Newborn Photography

Milo’s first birthday!

Charlie, Newborn Shoot in Solihull

Olli & Lime & Milo…again!

Where are you based?

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