Alerted about the Leeds Slam 2010 at October’s Talk&Social session I was one of what seemed a limited group of photographers (there were only seven  in the time I was there) to get involved in this excellent event. Organised by Rachel Saunders and the Random Acts team based in York it was advertised as “a day of fashion, photography, make-up, hair and general glam”. Given that this was all free it seemed too good an opportunity to miss. For me was that it was even better as it was against the backdrop of my favourite building in Leeds – the Corn Exchange.

So you take a few models looking for experience and/or portfolio shots, add in a few make-up artists and photographers of varying experience and equipment and put them all in the magnificence of the Corn Exchange. What do you get? Well, for me it was hours of co-operative fun, sharing of tips and the chance to do shots that, in my case, I simply had no prior experience of. We explored not only the shopping area but also the empty upstairs units which had great light and features too. I should have checked out what was possible and taken more lights and stands but was keen to test out my newly acquired Orbis ring flash so I used both that and the available natural light for my shots but others were willing to share lights and set ups. With the shops open to the public on a Saturday there was interest from visitors and they did stray into backgrounds of some shots but at the end of the day I had more than 200 shots that I was pleased with. The objective is to share images with models and make-up artists for their portfolios and I have to say that Holly, Emma, Mandy and the rest of the team were just great and I thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience and would recommend the next one to anyone.

Paul Dishman shares his photography through his website