That was 2018…

December 29, 2018 by Phil Kneen Photography

At the end of last year, one of my goals was to be less erratic and casual with the things I chose to photograph, to avoid flitting from one subject to another with no real consistency. I think, to a point, that I managed it – quality over quantity. The career highlights of 2018 were my white squatter camp project, ‘Plakkerskamp’, and a two-week autumn trip out into the North Atlantic on a fishing trawler – both projects took me […]

Categories: film photography, photojournalism, woman • Tags: 35mm, analog, analogue, black and white, colour, film photography, kodak portra 400, Olympus mju II, pentax 67, portrait, review 2018, trawler life, trawlermen, women

Sea state – moderate

December 5, 2018 by Phil Kneen Photography

For two weeks in November, I joined the fishing vessel, Ruel na Mara and her crew, working about 100km northwest off the Outer Hebrides. I don’t wish to romanticise something that these men do for work, all year round, but for me, it was an incredible experience. “A proper adventure”, as a friend dubbed it – two weeks on a 24 metre, wooden-hulled trawler, with two Scotsmen and four Filipinos somewhere in North Atlantic, wearing the same underwear for days […]

Categories: Photography, photojournalism • Tags: 35mm, 6x7, analogue, black and white, colour, film photography, fishermen, fuji pro 400H, I shoot film, Olympus mju II, personal project, portrait, scotland, trawlermen

The things i saw (south africa) #2

April 4, 2018 by Phil Kneen Photography

At the moment, I’m sorting through about 100 ‘final’ images, mostly portraits, whittled down from 400 photographs I made for the photo-essay ‘Plakkerskamp’. I’m itching to share more, but I can’t, at the moment. So here’s another entry from my visual notebook. I’ve also included an entry from my journal which I wrote on the evening of my first visit to the white squatters camp at Krugersdorp, situated about 20km northwest of Johannesburg. ‘Munsieville Camp, Krugersdorp – We sat outside […]

Categories: film photography, photojournalism • Tags: Johannesburg, kodak ektar 100, Krugersdorp, Olympus mju II, photojournalism, pretoria, south africa, travel, white squatter camps

The things I saw (South Africa) #1

April 2, 2018 by Phil Kneen Photography

‘The things I saw’ – my visual notetaking and mental meanderings with a 35mm compact camera – I’d like to say it’s a regular thing. However, I just checked, and the last one I did was nearly 18 months ago, documenting a weekend drinking session in Liverpool with a good friend. Before I departed for a weeks work in South Africa, to document white squatter camps, I was reunited with my favourite 35mm compact – the Olympus MjuII, which had […]

Categories: film photography, photojournalism • Tags: analogue, I shoot film, Johannesburg, kodak ektar 100, Olympus mju II, pretoria, south africa, white squatter camps

While you were sleeping…

January 28, 2017 by Phil Kneen Photography

At the end of last year, I began shooting a photo-essay based around the fishing industry on the Isle of Man. The project so far has concentrated on the crew members of the Port St Mary based scallop dredger, Sara Lena – skipper, Tony ‘Toad’ Watterson, his brother Juan, and Chris Overs – three of the kindest, most genuine and helpful men I’ve ever met. There’s been quite a bit of controversy surrounding the Isle of Man scallop industry of […]

Categories: film photography, photojournalism • Tags: analogue, film, fishing, hasselblad, isle of man, nikon, Olympus mju II, scallops

Just make it up.

January 25, 2017 by Phil Kneen Photography

My two primary fields as a photographer are portraiture and photojournalism; a lot of my images are straight, natural, environmental portraits, such as those I shot in the migrant camps of northern France and for my project last year in Spain. Other times I get an idea into my head as to how I’d like someone to look or a situation I’d like a person to inhabit. However, that person or place may not be available, or even exist. For […]

Categories: film photography, photojournalism • Tags: film camera, film photography, fine art, fuji film, fuji superia 400, makeup, negative, nikkor 35mm 1.4, Olympus mju II, personal project, portrait

5840 Days

January 2, 2017 by Phil Kneen Photography

I can’t believe our daughter is Sixteen! Jess can now join the armed forces, invest in a cash ISA, move out of the family home (but if under 17, social services may apply for a care order), give consent to medical, dental and surgical treatment, be detained in police custody and get married. Jess, fortunately, has inherited most of her good points off her Mum, Helen, so she’s already pretty well sorted for life, although she did inherit my poor […]

Categories: film photography, Photography • Tags: 35mm, analogue, film, fuji, fuji instax mini, isle of man, japan, kodak, Olympus mju II, pentax 67, portrait

The things I saw (Liverpool) #1

August 15, 2016 by Phil Kneen Photography

I like to think I have a pretty good built-in compass, an organic GPS that usually get’s me to where I’m supposed to be without too much hassle or head scratching. Unfortunately, this Magellan like homing skill goes out of the window with every visit to Liverpool – and I’ve spent a lot of time in the city. A couple of years ago, I left a party in Toxteth; it was 6 am, I’d lost my phone, and I was […]

Categories: film photography, Photography • Tags: analogue, film, liverpool, Olympus mju II

Norway Bonus Track

May 25, 2016 by Phil Kneen Photography

After every trip I go on, and shoot loads of film, there’s always at least one camera that still has half a roll in when I get back. So, it’s left for a week or two, then I finish the roll as part of another shoot and send the films off. Every time I get the scans back and I have a rush of excitement because there’s a handful of images I’d totally forgotten about – another of the many […]

Categories: film photography, Photography, travel • Tags: camper van, fuji superia 400, norway, Olympus mju II, road trip, sweden, vanlife

The things I saw (Norway)

May 4, 2016 by Phil Kneen Photography

The things I saw series – my personal snapshots of travels away from home normally come weeks, often months apart. This latest one from Norway comes almost back-to-back with Japan simply because I returned from Japan, stayed home for a day, then went to Norway (more accurately, England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Norway…). This latest trip was a 6000 road trip to shoot digital landscapes to sell as stock images, but as usual, I took my Olympus […]

Categories: film photography, Photography, travel • Tags: 35mm, film, I shoot film, norway, Olympus mju II, road trip