St Hilda’s College ball was on Saturday 8th May. Photos from the ball can be seen in our client area. This Oxford college was the last single sex college, and started accepting men for the first time this year. Although that makes little difference to the ball night, since men attend as guests anyway.

This ball must have been the first that we have attended where we were not pushed for space in one way or another. The room had high ceilings and decent amount of floor space. Unfortunately for the us, we were at the far end of the college from the majority of the ball venues, and less people ventured that far away from the beer tent. I know of at least one person that was unable to find us during the ball. We weren’t completely out of it, as we were right next to outdoor cinema which was screening “Romeo and Juliet” repeatedly.  I guess it gets the couples feeling romantic before their photos are taken.

As a benefit of our location within the college, while setting up for the ball we were treated to a lovely sunset behind Magdelen College tower.

For this ball shoot aCoolDryPlace Photography was assisted by Kate of Paperleaf Studio, maker of handmade stationery

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If you remember much about the film, I’m sure you’ll be aware that the second of those poses isn’t normally one you’d do at a college ball. Photos by Matt Hintsa & Erling A on flickr, reproduced under creative commons license.

If you are in Oxford and wanting more information about the ball please visit the Wolfson winter ball website

I’ve been rather busy lately with booking weddings and photographing St Hugh’s & Corpus Christi college ball. Although I was originally booked by Corpus, the ball merged with St Hugh’s Ball because ticket sales were low. The combined ball was a much better size. We were only able to use one studio because space was at a premium for the ball, meaning we were busy throughout the night. At this ball we used a new vinyl background and projected different coloured background to suit the client’s clothes (hopefully). I think the results were good, particularly for 3/4 length shots. The main problem with full length shots was that the vinyl kept rucking up as we were unable to secure it at the sides, and the flooring was fairly soft.

P.S. If you’re organising a ball and want our services – please give us room to work!

P.P.S. Photos from this event are available to buy here

Saturday morning was spent doing a publicity shoot for Corpus Chirsti College’s Ball in Oxford. The ball is themed “Heaven & Hell”. The ideas for the posters were intended to be pretty unoffensive to most people, and revolved around the stereotypical concept of a angel and a demon sat on each shoulder trying to persuade a person one way or another. Some shots were done of each of the models individually, so that they can be scaled and photoshopped (not my job!) later. We also did some photos, as above, with all the models together. I think everything turned out pretty well and I look forward to seeing the posters up around Oxford.

Details of my Oxford ball photography service can be found on my main website.