I park on the east side of Millennium Bridge in Hull. It’s a quid for 3 hours and a great location for a shoot. I’m here to meet Mark Storr. An ex-Morrisons Butcher made redundant and now pursuing a career as costumed character and purveyor of children’s entertainments.
He arrives with his wife and two young children and we have a look at the location. He loves it and gets changed. The costume is tricky to put on and Mark’s partner helps him with the finishing touches. We slowly head over from the car to the spot where we are making the image. In a few moments we have created this image.
If you are after an appearance by Iron Man or any of these characters Iron man, Thor, Captain America, Batman, Spider Man Mickey & Minnie, Peppa Pig, Spongebob, Pikachu. or a bouncy castle contact Mark at Party in a Box. He’s a top geezer!
hullywood icons
I hope you don’t mind…
Great to have Baz – Barry Weldon onboard with the Hullywood Icons helping me with some of the trickier photoshop compositing images. There are only so many hours in my day the day and his skills are ace so it’s a natural fit!
This is how it happened. Baz – Barry Weldon contacted me with the following email:
Hi Quentin
how does it all work, I mean say i wanted to recreate this scene from con-air with john malkovich.. i’ve got a brown shirt, and a white tshirt, um.. no gun, no rabbit.. does it have to be a hull iconic background? as i’m struggling to think where it could be set, somewhere i don’t need to get permission.. ? I was thinking saturday shoot..? (We’re working on this)
I hope you don’t mind but i touched up the other trainspotting pic as it was niggling at me, hope u don’t mind.. i’m a bit OCD like that.. just had to delete the legs and shrink the body down a little to make it look like the figure is coming out of the toilet..
Baz
I’m not precious, I thought that was a very kind offer and took him up on it. I’m a bugger for a bit of retouching and an outside eye on the work. Look out for appropriate credits on photoshopped images with additional input by Barry Weldon on the blog posts.
Here is Barry’s re working of the Sarah Jayne Curry Trainspotting image. With his suggestions included and my request for extra water in the spit.
Here is mine which I published a few weeks earlier.
Poltergeist
Jon Campling is a really nice man you may know him as The train stopping Deatheater in the Harry Potter blockbuster Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 and King Regis in Final Fantasy XV oh and the guy from those Specsaver ads.
I first met Jon at the premiere of The Hullywood Icons at the St John’s Hotel way back at the end of December. Sean McAllister had tried to get us together for a Hullywood shoot earlier that day. Preparations of the film for it’s premier that night had got in the way of us meeting.
Jon said he would be back in a few days time to see Made in Hull so we rescheduled. I was quite surprised when Jon said he would like to be Carol Ann from Poltergeist.I put a call out for a suitable location and Robert Jamieson featured in Trains, Planes and Automobiles, offered his flat and sourced the necessary rug. We just needed to find a special tv. Another call out on Facebook and Catherine Goble star of The Matrix, produced the hernia inducing 1980’s TV we were all set to go.
Arriving at Richard’s flat we set up quickly. Les Drake was there to video and everyone pitched in with arranging the room to resemble the scene.
Jon describes his Hull roots here:
‘I was born in Hull 1966 Eastfield Junior, Kingston High school, then an apprentice at Brough Bae. I also dj’d in Hull at the Newland Park Hotel amongs others. Though I was always a keen actor. I decided to go to drama school after joining Hull Truck Youth Theatre run by the Brilliant Actors from Remold Theatre Company.
Then many years later… I stopped the Hogwarts Express in Deathly Hallows 1.
When I asked Jon why Carol Ann he looked at me smiled and said
“I’ve always loved the film and that ‘they’re here’ TV static scene is a classic horror film moment, and I thought it would be reasonably easy to recreate at short notice and… I knew I had the hair for it. Oh and Sound of music had gone!”
Superman
It’s lunchtime on a very busy saturday photographing the Hullywood Icons. It’s my last shoot of the day. Later I have to hang a projection screen in St Mary’s Church and set up our indoor cinema screen with Lampie Tim and Sound man Chris Broadwell. I park up easily in the Minster car park. I phone Ellie Newton-Syms. She and her partner Mark who appears in Back to the Future are in the Minster. We meet and talk all things Hullywood on the way to the distinctive white telephone box.
The images have gone around the world on BuzzFeedNews. Mark was instrumental in the unprecedented 4 page spread in the Hull Daily Mail working in the paper and pitching the idea to his team. We arrive at the phonebox. It’s bright but bitterly cold Ellie takes her coat off. It’s a tricky shot we need the minster in it but the angles are wrong. We play with a few ideas and make this image.
Shaft
Kofi Smiles is a busy guy he’s presenting for the BBC as the face of Hull 2017 and plays with Hull band Bud Sugar. We’ve been exchanging texts FB messages and grabbing quick conversations in and around Hull City of Culture we finally got together to make this image early on saturday morning on a back street in uptown Hull near Queen Victoria Square. Kofi got tooled up with his Shaft props bought from the pound shop. A turtle neck jumper borrowed from his dad. A coat from the charity and a fake moustache origin unknown. Kofi busted some Shaft moves with great style. I have to choose which one I like the best. Here it is. I knew it the moment I pressed the shutter button.
Legally Blonde
I met Rachel Davenport on a bitterly cold but bright day outside Hull College. She was not alone her mum Elizabeth Davenport came along and also a lovely little chihuahua a rescue dog called Trevor. The front of Hull College is a windy spot. Rachel braved hyperthermia. We made this image
.
The Great Gatsby
Darren Squires has created a special cocktail for the Hullywood Icons Exhibition which is happening on the 17th of February at the Hip Gallery. He wanted to create a Hullywood Icons image to celebrate the occasion . Here he is starring in The Great Gatsby. The incredients of the Hullywood Icons cocktail called ‘The Iconoclast’ are a closely guarded secret which be revealed after the event.
Book your ticket for the opening event on the 17th Feb 2017 here
Cat Woman
I’m wandering around the C4DI building on the last day of the Made in Hull event with Darth Maul and Cat Woman, it’s dark and there are thousands of people watching the projections at the Deep (Arrivals and Departures) and in the C4DI building Car Park (Hullywood Icons).
We find a quiet spot and start to play Sue Caulfield is hilarious, probably one of the earthiest people I know. She is an artist and maker from Hull and has dressed up in fine style for the shoot, her shiny black PVC outfit and horse whip make her look more like a dominatrix than Cat Woman as she takes position. We put the horsewhip to one side and take this picture.
The Karate Kid
When my nephew James Lowe rang me up and said hey uncle Quentin I want to make one of those Hullywood pictures it made me smile. He was brought up in Hull and he is always good for a laugh. He teaches in China now. It was his last day in the UK before returning to work. We had to move quick we arranged a time to meet on a bitterly cold wet day during the Made in Hull event. The light had gone already and I was worried we wouldn’t get the shot. On the jetty near the Minerva Pub.
James stripped off we dried the top of the condensation covered bin and made this image.
I’ve shot a few family members for the Hullywood Icons series they are Amanda Lowe my ex wife and good friend as Mary Poppins, Amelia Budworth daughter number 1 as The Girl with a Pearl Earring , Zebedee Budworth as The Big Lebowski and Sarah Winn as Rocky.
Hullywood Icons 