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This is my Grandad, and part of my new personal project. I’m basing it on portraits, i do a lot of portrait work, but its usually commercial, so i thought i’d try something with some more meaning behind than just visual.

I’ve admired portrait photographers for some time, and decided its time to have a go myself. 

I’m not trying to make people look beautiful, or different, but i want to show people exactly as they are. 

This is the first image from a book i’m going to cover, shooting friends, family, and strangers, all with a story to tell. I want to get the story of the person, their life, and their emotions into an image.

This first image is of my Grandad, one of the most important people in my life. An absolute inspiration to me, and the thought of him being proud of me is what drives me on to continue. He’s a very intelligent man, who cared for his family so so much, he couldn’t do anymore for any of us. He’s always been a happy, jokey guy but he’s had a hard couple of years. My Nana, his wife, died a few years back, and it hit my whole family hard, especially my Grandad. 

They met when they were 14, and were together ever since, only being parted by death. His whole house is surrounded by pictures of her, he’s pretty much lost without her and spends his days by her grave every day, yet to miss a day since her death, and the rest of the day by the pictures of her in his home. His home is like a shrine to her, and its a place i love going, i feel like its a place i can go to connect with her again. 

In this image i wanted to get that connection, that look he always had when he was joking around with her while the family was there. I wanted to get him smiling, looking like his self, and capturing his personality, before his wife passed away. 

I feel quite happy in what i’ve produced, and hope its the start of something special.