Architectural photography for Cranford House School.

I have been doing photography work for Cranford House school for quite a few years.

This year, they had built a beautiful, new, state of the art six form building and I was asked to photograph it.

The first session was early morning, so I waited for the right moment weather wise and got to work. The shots were mainly on my 35mm and 14-24mm, all shot at f8 for front to back sharpness. It's a beautifully modern curved structure, that complements the traditional old building attached to it. I set up my composition, locked it in on the tripod and waited for the right light. I didn't want harsh sunlight or complete shade, but somewhere in between, and the softness of early morning light gave the best of both worlds.

The evening shot was a lot more complicated, as I wanted to incorporate students and movement. I shot the image around 6.30pm in September, which gave Me about an hour of that perfect blue light. As I had to move fast, a tripod was essential. I actually had to use the roof of a school bus to give height and a stable floor for my tripod. So again, I locked in the composition and with all the buildings lights on, waited until the light was just right. Then I took the first base photo, and everything else will later be blended into it, using Photoshop. With the help of two students, I was able to photograph them in four different parts of the building, to give the impression of occupied rooms in the school. Two of the outer shots were long exposures, so while they walked, it would give the sense of movement. All images were then edited in Lightroom and Photoshop, and using layers and blending tools, the finished image was created.

Here's the completed photograph..