11th November 2009

Finally got round to updating the website, including a complete overhaul of the dairy system and I will be changing a lot of the portfolio pages as well. The key problem with having an online portfolio relating to presentation graphics is that most clients prefer to keep their presented material quiet and away from the prying eyes of the internet - understandable, and as such, I am able to showcase an offline portfolio of non-sensitive data to anyone wishing to view examples of my skills.

Looking at the industry as a whole, it appears to be getting better and the signs are there that maybe the recession is starting to subside. We're not out of the woods quite yet, but early indicators are there to hopefully boost optimism for 2010 - let's hope so as 2009 has been a bit of a messy year in general.

4th February 2009

Well for all the warnings, Credit Crunch has finally bit the conference industry hard! its not that people aren't doing conferences any more, its just that their suppliers have to fight even harder to pick up the projects. Couple that to the fact that those reliant on heavy credit with banks for massive 2008 kit purchases, and you get a picture of desperation.

My approach to this economy situation is simple. Just try to survive - its not about making profits or becomng rich, its about breaking even and anything else is nice to have, I know what I need to turn over each month and those are my simple goals... so check the online diary and book me! ;-)

8th December 2008

It is quite likely that this is the last update of 2008 before I head of to the Caribbean on a 15 day cruise around the islands: St Kitts, Antigua, St Lucia, Barbados, Martinique, Dominica, St Vincent, Tobago and Trinidad. I am sure people do conferences in those locations, but as I have never seen it myself I thought it was high time to make my own way there... see you in 2009!

18th November 2008

Midway through November and I already have client's looking to book dates for 2009 - I can't tell you how positive that is when you consider the turmoil in the financial markets at the moment. It's funny in a way that conference industry does get hit by recession, but not as bad as most industries. why? well it's actually quite simple:

• If a company does well, they need to tell people about it.
• If a company doesn't do well, they need to tell people about it, or run a conference to inform people how they will do something about it.

Something else also popped into my head recently, and that is the location and infrastructure around the London ExCeL... what a strange place! I recently worked on the World Travel Markets conference for a client and the chaos a daily footprint of 50,000 people caused to the DLR and tubes is mindboggling. The biggest conference/exhibition venue in London has poor access via trains, minimal food/entertainment options in the surrounding area and extortionate costs inside the building. Why is it so popular? and why haven't business owners cottoned onto this fact?

10th October 2008

For those of you who don't already know, I have been reporting on and photographing the sport of Mixed Martial Arts for close to 5 years now and have amassed close to 300,000 images covering the sport. I now find myself undertaking a project that will hopefully see light of day in the spring 2009: A coffee table sized art/photo book covering the subject with supporting text for the images.

The curious thing about having researched the sport for as long as I have and captured some spectacularly emotive moments during that period, is that I have been witness to the evolution of several fighters, from dynamic upstarts to world title challengers.

If anyone is interested in being kept informed of the project progress, drop me a quick email...

18th September 2008

The busy period is underway and I am finally noticing some change in the markets. I have had a run of jobs pulled from a supplier due to cutbacks - but thankfully have managed to still fill the days with other projects, although the european jobs still appear to be unaffected it seems mainly UK based events that suffer.

23rd August 2008

Final quarter rush is coming into view, and the most obvious thing I have noticed is that clients are having a boom in international jobs again - for the last 18 months things have been mainly centered around national level shows, but so far between now and the end of the year, I have bookings and enquiries for projects that will take me to Lunt (Sweden), Rhodes (Greece), Florence & Venice (Italy), San Francisco (Potentially) and Barcelona (One of my favourite cities) - can't complain huh?

I have also noticed a tendency for clients to book freelancers for the actual rehearsal and show days, with programming increasingly undertaken in house but the end client production team / PA's... obviously these projects wont have the visual impact of something that has been pre-produced by a dedicated graphics programmer, but it is interesting that the market conditions in the UK are dictating the budget strings and the early saving is evident in production budgets, not end locations!?!

Anyway, those are my thoughts going into September! ;-)