Style Guide: Muddy Fields to Mountain Tops with Tom Bunning
Tom Bunning is a British commercial photographer for Octopus Inc with over 15 years industry experience, specialising in advertising, landscape, portrait and automotive work. Tom’s studio is in London but he works all over the world for a large range of clients.
Tom works for clients of all sizes and a range of budgets. He is best known for his landscapes and craft projects and is often commissioned because of his unique sense of composition, use of natural light and colour creating strong textural images. Tom finds inspiration from the beauty of the outdoors, often camping on the side of a mountain to capture the perfect dawn.
His open and curious approach to projects results in a real authenticity within his images. Due to his extensive experience he is adept at working in challenging and fast paced situations.
LBB> How would you describe the work that you do?
Tom> My work is a really mixed bag and I love that. One day I can be ankle deep in mud in an English field facing up to a herd of cattle for Waitrose, the next in the mountains shooting a car for Aston Martin and then on to a windowless studio set-up for a top-secret product shoot.
I don’t want to be pigeon-holed as a particular type of photographer as I enjoy working on a broad range of subjects across both my commercial work and personal projects. It keeps things interesting and helps me to keep learning and evolving as a photographer.
Aston Martin - Commissioned by FMS Global. Art Direction by Deep London.
LBB> How did you gravitate towards the particular medium you work in?
Tom> I’ve always been drawn to photography. I embarked on an Art Foundation at Cambridge (the only formal studying I ever did) thinking I was going to become a painter but the alchemic magic of the dark room captured my imagination and I knew then that photography was it for me.
My first great love was music and I started combining this with my new passion for photography, shooting for fashion-design students by day and local bands in the evenings, all on film.
An opportunity to earn a pittance as a postboy at Universal Music gave me the jump I needed to get to London where, after a few months, I landed a job at the famed Abbey Road Studios as a QC engineer and spent a couple of years watching music videos by day and shooting gigs for free by night, trying to pull together enough work for a portfolio.
LBB> And when you started developing your creative skills and styles, what were your inspirations and influences?
Tom> Two of my colleagues at Abbey Road, Janet Penny and Mark Warner, were really into photography and we used to develop our negatives in the staff kitchen on our lunch break. I’ll always be grateful to them for introducing me to that cult-classic, the Holga. It’s made of plastic and basically held together with tape. Many people would think of it as a toy rather than a proper camera but I love the way the light leaks in and gives unexpected shape to developed images.
After a couple of years moonlighting as a music photographer, I started to pick up assisting work and began to hone my technical skills on the job - jumping from backstage reportage work at London Fashion Week to on-stage bands at festivals, learning the basics of studio lighting.
When I started getting commissions of my own, I switched from film to digital medium format cameras. They give such rich textures and detail and have forced me to slow down and really consider composition. My inspirations are ever-changing but I hope that there’s a mood or a style that carries across my work that makes it recognisable.
LBB> How has your style evolved over time - and can you talk to us about some of the stylistic experiments or avenues you’ve explored over the years?
Tom> My grandfather was a joiner and I have always had an interest in craft and the hand-made. My first ongoing personal project, that I still return to between commercial commissions, documents modern craftsmen and women - from globemakers and watchmakers to boat builders, charcoal burners, thatchers and ceramicists.
These subjects lend themselves to a mixture of deep rich black and white imagery that hones in on the detail: hands, tools, processes. These personal projects have since led to commercial work with Ralph Lauren, Rolls-Royce, David Beckham and Holland & Holland.
Haig Club - Commissioned by Proud Robinson for Haig Club & Diageo.
Ralph Lauren Burleigh - Commissioned by Ralph Lauren, Art direction by Lisa Curtiss, Styled by Quy Nguyen Assisted by Jack Gill & Danny Peace.
LBB> And was there any one particular moment or project that crystallised your understanding of what your style is or should be? If so, can you tell us about it?
Tom> Since my crafted series I’ve shot many more personal projects. One being ‘The Farmer’s Year’ focusing more on farming, growers and producers. I would say this series has allowed me to develop as a photographer. I love working in the outdoors with the weather, using natural light documenting people with stories and interesting lifestyles. It has pushed me to look more into telling stories through single images.
LBB> What sort of ideas shape your style today?
Tom> So much shapes my style and approach. I have lots of books and magazines that I return to again and again. Social media really helps as a source of inspiration. It’s not always a full scene that catches my eye, it could be a tiny corner of a shot, an angle of a subject, colour grade or crop that could help shape my approach to the next project or commission.
LBB> From NFTs to the metaverse, there are more spaces for your work to show up - what are your thoughts on the impact, challenges and opportunities brought up by these new spaces? And do they influence how you think about your style (ie. is there pressure to adapt or change your style to fit these new digital frontiers - or is it kind of exciting?)
Tom> I am a total luddite when it comes to understanding NFTs and the metaverse. If the metaverse takes over, you’ll find me clutching my record player and a book in despair. I guess all I can do is keep creating the work and hope it keeps appealing to people on the digital frontier.
LBB> Working in the commercial sphere, is it more important for an artist to have a distinct brand or style? What’s the balance having a distinctive voice and being able to accommodate the visual language of the brand/campaign?
Tom> Art buyers, producers and directors need to have the confidence that the photographer they’ve commissioned can deliver the brief and create work that’s perfect for their campaign. At a guess, I should think that most of the time, I’m commissioned based on work I’ve already shot that another creative team can see working for their product or brand - not necessarily subject-wise, perhaps just a mood, an angle or a sense of storytelling that they can see working for them too.
LBB> Typically, on a commercial project, how do you like to tackle a brief?
Tom> It depends on the project and how many people are involved. I love to work with mood boards - especially ones when the client has used plenty of your existing imagery to illustrate what they’re after … I like to shoot tethered where possible, to really bring the client and creative team in close as we shoot, adjusting as we go.
My main objective on commercial projects is to make sure I deliver the brief so I really like to hone in on that before we get to the shooting stage - really making sure I understand what they want. If the client is happy, I’m happy.
LBB> What projects have you worked on recently that you feel were a really satisfying marriage between a brand and your own style? What was it about these projects that made them really interesting to work on?
Tom> I’ve been lucky enough to work on some wonderful commercial projects recently that have pushed me creatively and been the perfect combination of style, brand, and brief. I’m unable to share this work as it’s embargoed but I hope that when the images are released, some will recognise that It was me who shot them.
With personal work, I have just shot a series with Alfie Nickerson of Burnt Fen Flowers. We’ve created a range of imagery that combines black and white landscapes and portraits - full of texture, mood and contrast - with almost hyper-real, super bright shots of flowers and other details. In the past I might have gone one way or another but it felt like fun for us all to dive into this project with a looser approach. More of that to come, perhaps.
Burnt Fen Flowers - A personal project, with thanks to Alfie Nickerson and everyone at Burnt Fen Flowers
