“Show Notes”
Anthony is going to be talking about photography apprentices. He has been a photographer for many years but was recently approached to create a
photography apprenticeship. He says he has a learner who, four months in, is taking amazing photographs.
Anthony explains what the apprenticeship looks like from the point of view of a photographer and apprentice.
For the photographer, you have a full-time member of staff.
The staff have training once per month online. They also get skills coach learning and that involves the photographer and the apprentice.
From the apprenticeship point of view, you are with “real photographers” and learning from them. Sam asks if you are a photographer why do you want an apprentice. Anthony says it is pointless if you don’t have work for them and can’t afford them. Perfect for those with studios or perhaps wedding photographers who need multiple people taking shots at each wedding. The apprentice needs to be paid at least the apprentice minimum wage, which is around £7.40 an hour. Even if you take new staff on they always need training, even if they have a degree. An apprenticeship is an 18-month course and so usually the apprentice is trying to prove themselves over those 18 months so will always be working hard. At the end of 18 months, a photographer has a choice between moving the apprentice to being an employee or letting them go and moving on.
Marcus asks what the difference is between an assistant and an apprentice. Anthony says it is basically the same, but there is a training framework and an end exam with the apprenticeship.
Anthony says apprenticeships now are much better than they used to be for both the learner and photographer.
Anthony works for the JGA group in his apprentice work.
If you want to move forward with an apprentice contact the JGA group here. He says you can ask JGA to find an apprentice for you. But it often works better to find one yourself. His advice is to find a person who is passionate rather than qualified for this.
The 18 months is a commitment. There are ways out if there is a major difficulty but the business really needs to commit for the full 8 months.
Marcus asks how the apprenticeship works with portfolio building and if is there much cultural studies. Anthony says they have teamed up with the BIPP to help the apprentices build a portfolio. As part of the course, they must build a 20-photo portfolio. The portfolio also goes to the BIPP so that they can get an award there too.
Anthony says the cultural studies are not structured as they would be in university, but they end up being discussed as part of the learning days.
Sam asks what you should do if you want to become a photographer apprentice. He said to go to the government apprentice website you can find the documents available. You can also find employers that are looking for apprentices on indeed.com.
It is key for a new apprentice to find an employer to work with on the
apprenticeship. He says one of the simplest things you can do is pick up the phone and call a photographer.
Marcus asks what photographers get paid once they have done an apprenticeship. Anthony says it varies. The apprentice minimum wage is £7.50 an hour. That is the minimum. Some are salaried at a higher rate. After 12 months an apprentice then needs to move up to the national minimum wage. Most photographers will then be paid £18 to £20k as a starting salary.
Sam asks if the apprentices are taught how to run a business as that is so important for so many photographers.
“Show Transcription”
Marcus: Yeah, hi there Sam, how you doing?
Sam: Very good Marcus, and you?
Marcus: Yeah, I’m very well thank you, very well indeed, yeah, yeah. And we’ve got another guest on this week Sam, we’ve got Anthony Milner, um, and Anthony is going to be talking a very interesting subject indeed, it’s all about photography apprenticeships. But before we dive into that Anthony, maybe you tell us a little bit about yourself for our listeners.
Anthony: Yeah, absolutely, so I’ve been a real photographer for over 24 years now, um, had work in Vogue. A real photographer?
Sam: Yeah, I was going to say, I’m intrigued what a real photographer is, and what a pretend one, anyway, sorry.
Anthony: There’s many pretend ones out there, there’s many pretend ones out there.
Marcus: Yeah, there are, that is so true, that is so true, I love that.
Anthony: But I’ve had work in Vogue, House and Garden, Front Covers, Aston Martin, Tesco’s, and then, um, about three or four years ago, I got asked to join, well, create a photography apprenticeship. So we work with small businesses, large corporations, taking on young photographers to actually work directly in a studio, or with the business, directly with the photographer. So you’re learning those knowledge, skills and behaviours, and my learners amaze me. And at the whole end of the course, they become real photographers.
In many ways, you’ve got, I mean, I’ve got a young learner who works for Fraser’s, she’s been there for four months already, and she’s doing high-end stuff. So when you look at other ways of education, they come out and they don’t even know it, where my learners do. So we’re trying.
Sam: Yeah, I love that.
Anthony: So it absolutely amazes me, and I love teaching it. And I’m here today to basically tell the world about it, that’s what I’m here for.
Sam: Amazing. So we can go into the detail in a minute, but I think it’d be really good if you just give us like a really quick succinct, like, you know, in a minute sort of thing. What does it look like, apprentice it from a person who’s the apprentice point of view, and what does it look like from the person who’s taking on an apprentice point of view? Just so people get, you know, at the start, an idea of what it is.
Anthony: Yeah, absolutely. So I’ll go from the employer’s point of view. The employer’s point of view is you’ve got a member of staff full-time. So between 30 to 37 hours a week, they’re a full-time member of staff and their class is a member of staff. So obviously, when you first get them on the course or onto the apprenticeship, you’re going to be training them up. And then over a short amount of time, they then start to learn the skills and the knowledge and the job role, and they become a real photographer. From a learning aspect, from the apprenticeship side, we have them for one day per month. That’s nothing. In the grand scheme of things, it’s nothing. So one day per month. And then they have, so that’s the knowledge aspect. And then we have learners all over the UK. So the teaching is actually online from that aspect. And then they have what we call a skills coach meeting. We’ll be, again, with a real photographer. And nine times out of ten, it’s myself or another colleague of mine called John Walden. And we then work directly with the learner and the employer to see what they’re doing in the job role, give them different teaching aspects, give them different ideas. And then we prepare them for the endpoint assessment, which is what we call the examination stage, where in other education forms, there’s not a proper examination stage where ours 100% is. And from the learner’s point of view, you’re actually working with a real photographer and you’re learning their knowledge and how they do things as a real photographer. And as we all know, being real photographers, we learn by doing and we learn in many ways by mistakes and also learning from other photographers. So you’re massively learning and then you’re hitting that industry head on and you can make a career for yourself, which is why spending a mass amount of other ways of doing it and then not get there.
Sam: Okay, that’s fantastic. So if you’re a photographer and I’m thinking, well, so why do I want an apprentice? Because I’m thinking I’m on my own, you know, I’m too long, okay. This is, I’ve got to think about, oh, employment. I’ve got, there’s loads of paperwork surely and there’s loads of faff and pay. You know, it’s suddenly a lot of complications. So why do I suddenly want all this complication in my life?
Anthony: So there’s no point taking on an apprentice if A, you can’t pay them and B, you don’t need them. But it’s perfect for studios, perfect for wedding photographers who want an extra wedding photographer, for instance, because a lot of people are now doing two photographers rather than one. It’s about basically creating your own team. So I used to own two studios in the southwest of the UK. I used to take young people on. They’ve been to university. If I’m honest, they didn’t really know anything, didn’t even know what their apertures were. But they came to me, I then taught them. Now I would take on the apprenticeship. I’ll take the apprentice on. You’ve got apprenticeship minimum wage, which I think is now, I’ll need to double check it, but I think it’s about £7.40. So a lot of it, even if you take new staff on, you’re having to train them up. But I think there’s a difference between, and I’m not criticising universities per se or the actual learner, but I think, and I did the same when I finished my university degree years ago. I came into the industry.
Marcus: Oh, you did a degree, that’s interesting.
Anthony: I did a degree at Derby and then I did a master’s at Hertfordshire University. So I kind of came out into the industry going, I’m brilliant, I know it all, I didn’t know it all.
And there was element, I kind of thought, well, now I should now be on £30,000 a year. I had lots of people knocking on my door. They thought they deserved a higher salary and they didn’t know anything. The apprentice, there’s an element of loyalty, I think. They’re working hard to prove themselves to get that end job at the end, because they want to be taken on at the end. So sorry, I forgot to mention, it’s an 18 month course. You don’t have to take them on at the end. You can say, look, at the end of the day, I’ve given you the opportunity, but I now want to start fresh. I want to take another apprentice on.
I did that at Wiltshire College years ago. I took another apprentice on. So I just wanted to give young people a chance. Or you’ll become a member of staff and you’ve proved yourself. And I don’t think, I mean, I’ve taught probably, I also teach marketing courses with the apprenticeships. And if I’m honest with you, probably 99% of them get employed by the employer at the end, because you’ve proved yourself and you’ve worked hard for it.
Sam: It’s a long time, isn’t it? But in terms of legally, if kind of it’s not working out, you’re an 18 months, you’re okay.
Anthony: Yeah, yeah. I’ve got an employer at the moment. He said, look, I just want to give young people a chance. So I’m going to bring someone else in. That learner has known that for month six. And then we’ve helped them. Okay, we can’t get you another job, but we help them, guide them. We talk about how you market yourself, how you get yourself on LinkedIn and connect, connect, connect as such. Get the word out there. And they get apprentices. And this is what I love about them. They get snapped up like that. And why is it? Because they’ve got the skills and the behaviours, because they’ve actually done it in the job role. I’m passionate on it myself.
Marcus: Yes, yeah. But you’re very passionate about it. So when I started my career, I went to university like yourself. And after that, I went to become, I was an assistant for about four years and became the first assistant for the photographer. So tell me, Anthony, what’s the difference between, if there is one, between an assistant and an apprentice?
Anthony: I would say generally, nothing. Because you are, you’re an assistant, you’re learning. Yeah, yeah. But from the apprenticeship itself, we’re called photographer apprenticeship. So the end game has to be you being a real photographer in the job role. So you need to be taking pictures. Because when you go through to that examination, you’ll have a real photographer asking you the KSBs. And they need to know that you know how to be a real photographer. So they need to know knowledge, skills and behaviours.
Sam: Thank you.
Anthony: So they need to know that you are able to use the camera. They need to know that you can change the lighting. You can work with the client. You can deal with a brief. But an assistant would do that as well. But they just need the opportunity to be partaking as a real photographer as well.
Sam: Yeah. So in some ways, it’s probably very similar. But there’s some kind of structure with the apprenticeship. So I can imagine, Marcus, that some people who do it your route have an amazing time while others are making a lot of tea while the apprenticeship puts in that structure. So they’re not just making tea. Would that be kind of a fair assessment?
Anthony: That’s exactly it. And if I could just make a point for other people who are listening at the moment, they might have taken on Apprentice about seven or eight years ago. And there’s a downer. They go, oh, no, it was awful. That was what we call frameworks. So you could be making tea and not doing anything. And then let’s say doing a little bit of photography on your mobile phone. And then you’d get a photography apprenticeship. In those days, it would have been the photography. The photography apprenticeship wasn’t around. But let’s say marketing, digital marketing apprenticeship now is called standards. The previous government changed how the structure of the apprenticeships was, which has benefited industry. So they’ve got that examination stage. And you can’t be making tea through the whole apprenticeship. You’ve got to be actually partaking of it. So it’s changed and it’s better, far, far better for you and for the learner and for us.
Marcus: I mean, I have noticed, excuse me, I have noticed over the years that there has been more and more roles or companies looking for in-house photographers. So I definitely can see how your apprenticeships can benefit those people and fill that sort of new vacancy that are coming up. I mean, you didn’t a few, you know, 10 years ago, you didn’t have those people weren’t in-house photographers.
Anthony: Well, if you look at all those clothing brands now, they’re doing so much more social media. It’s all massively web-based. So they’re, so pretty little thing and all the different brands.
Sam: So they just need endless media.
Anthony: Yeah, so they’re taking on photography apprentices because it’s a massive benefit for them. And young people, they know what looks good. And young businesses are taking on these young people because they’ve got that, well, they’ve got that mindset. They’re using digital every day, aren’t they? So, but from the photography point of view, they’re jumping on board and they’re becoming a massive and amazing member of staff very quickly.
Sam: Amazing. So let’s say you’re a photography business. You, well, let’s say there’s two scenarios. One, you think, oh yeah, maybe an apprentice is good for me. How do you do? And the second option is you’re a photography business and you’ve got a young person. You think this person would make a great apprentice. What do we do? What do they do next?
Anthony: So if you go to, I work for a company called JGA Group.
Sam: Okay, we’ll put the link in the show notes.
Anthony: Yeah, we’re award winning. We won the Queen’s Award a couple of years ago.
We work with large brands and government teams, government departments, as well as normal businesses, small businesses, let’s say, SMEs. Contact the JGA Group or if you go to the website www.photographyapprenticeship.com it’s all the information’s on there and you can contact myself. My telephone number is 07823 352029 or email us at antphotographyapprenticeship.com and it’s a simple setup, quite frankly. We just need to, there’s legal documents. We just need to get you to sign. We’ll just go through all the details with you. We can help you find a learner or if I’m quite honest with you, if you stick an advertisement on indeed.com you will be unindicted by young people and very often I work with the employers to try and find the best learner. But what I would say, it’s not always about trying to find the learner who’s got the best qualifications. I’ve got dyslexia folks. Probably 50 to 60% of my learners have dyslexia. They think a different way. They think a very good way. They’re very visual people. They haven’t got the best A to C GCSEs.
Find the learner who is passionate. If you find the learner who’s passionate, they are going to go far and they will work hard for you. If you find the learner who’s probably, and I’m not criticizing. If you’re very lucky and you’ve got those A to, my partner, you’re asking how many A to C GCSEs and A levels she’s got. Everything’s an A. But it’s, so I’m not criticizing in that sense, but it’s trying to find the learner who has the passion. And that’s what I, when I, when I just, I’ll make calls for it on the part, on behalf of the businesses, speak to a few learners for them and I’ll come back and say, look, that’s the learner you want. I can see it from experience. I have my own businesses. That’s the one who’s going to massively be the benefit of you.
Sam: And then are you committed for the 18 months once you take them on?
Anthony: Yes.
Anthony: Well, legally you’re not.
Sam: Obviously there’s going to be some stuff, isn’t there? If it goes horribly wrong, but you know, basically is it, you’re through the 18.
Anthony: Yeah. We need you to take the learner on for the full 18 months because it’s so hard for us to try and find another employer. But obviously if your business is struggling and you can’t afford to keep the learner on, obviously there’s legal issues. Obviously you can’t keep them on. But yeah, we don’t want business, I’ll be quite honest and blunt with it. We don’t want businesses who are going to go, I’ll give it a try, see what they’re like for three or four months and then we’ll get rid of them. Because A, it messes up our government figures and we can lose funding, which means we can’t take other learners on. But then in the other aspect, it’s so unfair for the learner because we then need to try and find them. We had an estate agent who did something similar. We couldn’t find the learner another job. And that learner had so many opportunities in their career.
Marcus: So tell me, I totally understand how it’s going to work with the vocational side of things and you’re teaching them techniques or teaching them how to work with people. Do these apprentices get an opportunity to build a portfolio or do you encourage portfolio building?
Anthony: Yeah.
Marcus: And do you do much cultural studies, history with them or anything like that, Anthony?
Anthony: So the portfolio side, yeah, absolutely. We’ve teamed up with the BIPP, which is the British Institute of Professional Photography and the SWPP.
Marcus: We’ve had Geoff Brown on the show talking about that.
Anthony: Oh yeah, absolutely. I met him last week actually at the BIPP award evening and we had apprentice of the year with the BIPP. Tell you what, they’re like a big family.
They’re such lovely people, the BIPP and the SWPP. So the learners on the apprenticeship through the trailblazer when we were creating the whole course, the learners have to create a portfolio of 20 images. And then they also go through to the BIPP or the SWPP licensorship awards. So the learners then get an extra qualification. So they get membership to the BIPP and the SWPP. They can help weave and work with them on that portfolio. Portfolio goes towards the apprenticeship but also goes through to the BIPP and the SWPP and then get the licensorship.
Sam: Excellent.
Marcus: And the cultural sort of studies, what aspect do you give much weight to that?
Anthony: It’s not structured in the sense of, let’s say you do history of art like I did every Monday morning. We do visual culture and on a Tuesday morning we’ll be doing history of art. It’s not kind of put that into the apprenticeship because the apprenticeship is all about learning how to be a real photographer. So when you hit the industry live, you’re actually being a real photographer. But from the teaching aspect, we do include it. So like for instance, the other day I was talking about Ansel Adams. I was talking about John Blakemore’s zone system. So we do add that kind of element into it but it’s not actually a part of the KSBs. It’s just naturally I had to add it in because I’ve spent years studying it on myself.
Sam: Okay, excellent. And so we talked a lot, if you’re a business and you think of taking on apprentice, if you’re a young person or I mean, you don’t necessarily have to be young, I suppose. And you’re thinking of, well, actually I wanna, you know, either young person, you wanna get into photography or you’re old and you think, right, I wanna complete change.
This is something I wanna do. So what’s your route in there to become an apprentice?
Anthony: If you go onto the government website, just Google, sorry, I don’t know the name of it. If you Google apprenticeships and the government on Google, it’ll pop up and it’ll say, and there’s a website you can go onto and it will tell you where all the UK apprenticeships are. Other aspects, if you go to indeed.com, type in whatever, let’s say marketing apprenticeship, content, there’s so many different apprenticeships now. And then type in where you are, it will literally bring you up every employer that is looking for an apprenticeship and apprentice at that time.
Sam: So as a potential apprentice, you approach the company that would take you on rather than the kind of the apprenticeship provider.
Anthony: Well, the apprenticeship providers, I mean, if you go on the JGA group, we have a list of businesses that are looking at the moment, but generally the job offers, the job advertisements are on the likes of Indeed and so on.
Sam: So it’s almost like you’re going for a job, you need to find a business to take you on. That’s the kind of route to go.
Anthony: Absolutely in that sense. Yeah, you’ve got to have an employer because the other thing is, the other aspect is you’re going into full-time employment. It’s just you’re doing the course on the side. So the employers will go through the CVs, the employers will then offer you an interview. But one thing I do say, learners, young people, and I’m talking to a lot of photographers, call them, pick up the telephone and call them. I used to get loads of people coming into my studios and calling me and this is what, six, seven years ago. I’m not saying, I think there’s a difference as in how people react nowadays because of mobile phones and so on. All photographers are saying the same thing now. No one picks up the phone and introduces themselves.
Sam: Young people do not. I mean, I get in my studios with my daughters. They use constant, all sorts on the phone, but they don’t actually put it to the rear and talk to anybody.
Anthony: And that bit, like we’re having a conversation now, you can see that I’m passionate, you can see that I’m knowledgeable just by having a 20-minute conversation. So when you pick up the telephone and have that conversation, the photographer can then get that instinct straight away and go, do you know what? I like this person. And or I can train them up. So they’re well-mannered, they’re easy to get on with by the sounds on the telephone, they’ll invite you in for an interview. And I spoke to a photographer from an amazing studio in the Midlands and they do stuff from big car companies. He said he probably gets one call a year. And he said, you know what? And that learner always gets the role. He doesn’t go through the CDs. He hasn’t got time, but he just wants the passionate learner.
Sam: Yeah, yeah, that’s crazy. And then, so I presume the other approach is if you’re applying for a job as a photographer, you could apply and say, look, you know, I’m starting out. Could you take me on as an apprentice and kind of introduce the business to the idea of an apprentice? And you know, it works both ways, doesn’t it? It saves the business some money, but also they need to put in some time. So it’s definitely a conversation you could have with them.
Anthony: I have, so I teach at the moment, I’ve probably got about 40 learners from the marketing courses that I teach and then the photography apprenticeship. Probably 20% of them are mature learners. And that’s because from a mature learner’s point of view, they want to learn stuff. And also businesses, it keeps your member of staff in the job role for 18 months because they’re kind of locked into the apprenticeship and they want to learn. So that’s a massive benefit. As they say, it’s harder to bring someone else in. It costs you more to bring a new member of staff in than get them onto a course and then they stay. And then they’ve got that extra qualification and they can move up in their careers in your team.
Sam: Yeah, that does. I hadn’t thought it from that angle, but it definitely gives you that stability, doesn’t it? They’re probably over there longer if you want, but definitely you’ve got that 18 month period.
Anthony: Yeah, and I’ve probably taught about 400 learners now, maybe even more. I think I’ve only had two learners actually cancel not finished the apprenticeship. And that’s, if you think about other courses and other ways of keeping members of staff in, two out of 400. Statistically, that’s amazing.
Sam: Yeah, yeah. And then at the end…
Marcus: So, sorry, can I just get a question here, please? Thank you.
Sam: Come on, Marcus.
Marcus: See the enthusiasm on the go. Yeah, well, so you’ve had 400 people going through your apprenticeship, which is an incredible amount of people. What happens afterwards? I mean, I see, as I said earlier in one of my questions, I see these jobs advertised, but I never really see how much money is involved in it. How much do these apprentices get paid after they have done their apprenticeship by these companies? Do you know? Have you had any figures in that, Anthony?
Anthony: That’s a great question. Every business is a little bit different. And obviously it depends on, from a commercial point of view, let’s say a big studio to a small family portrait. So, but if we go from the apprentice, first of all, the apprenticeship minimum wage, I believe, I have to double check it, is going to be £7.50, I think, or £7.60, I think. So that’s what the learner can get as a minimum by the employer. Other employers, I mean, I’ve had employers who’ve straight away offered the apprentice from the day they go in £25,000.
But it depends what business they’re in. I’ve got one learner at the moment, we were chatting the other day, he’s on £45,000 and he’s doing a level three. He’s doing the content apprenticeship. So he’s already in the employment, he’s been there for about three or four years. So there’s different salaries. But if we were going to say you’re a young person, you’re new, you go through the whole process of the apprenticeship being on the £7.50. Oh, once you get to 12 months, you’ve then got to go on national minimum wage, as in normal minimum wage, okay? So 12 months, let’s say £7.50, then you go through to 12 months, you then have to go on to national minimum wage. And then up until the 18 months. Yeah. Probably £18,000, £20,000. So an 18-year-old, 20-year-old, which I think for hitting, just to kind of hit that industry, I don’t think that’s a bad salary to start off with. I’d have jumped to that when I was 20.
Marcus: It’s not, yeah, definitely at that age, it’s definitely not, it’s a good salary. And I say that’s ongoing every year. There’s no peaks and troughs to that as well. I do wonder though, if it might just be, as a long-term thing, it just might be reducing the value or what companies spend on image-making or on photographers. I don’t know. I mean, you know much more about this than I do, and that’s why I’m sort of asking the question really.
Anthony: I think in any, all businesses now have to create content and have to create imagery. In order to market.
Marcus: And a content creator is getting about £35,000, £40,000 a year, isn’t it, as a sort of regular? That’s what I see advertised. I mean, why is the photographer half the value of that?
Anthony: But remember, that’s just when they’ve finished the course.
Marcus: Yeah, yeah. And you said somebody that made £45,000, yeah.
Anthony: Yeah, so it’s in any business. If a member of staff came and worked in my studio, I would then start to give them a higher salary after they’ve proved things that they can actually do. But again, it depends what business you’re in. And again, I’ve got learners who earn far more. So it’s the entry level. You’re not going to put somebody on straight away after they’ve done the apprenticeship on the 40K. Because they’ve only probably been there for, again, 18 months and they’ve got to work their way up.
Sam: That makes sense. And then as part of the apprenticeship, do they learn business skills? Obviously, a lot of photographers, they might be being employed, but obviously a lot of photographers are self-employed. So is the kind of, I mean, they might pick things up because they’re in a business. But is there some kind of training about part of that apprenticeship about running your own business?
Anthony: Yeah, yeah. My learners probably get sick of it too much. I’m talking about what I do, how I do things, what I do, how I market myself. I mean, the first thing, every lesson we talk about, we talk about LinkedIn, I’m pestering them, connect, connect, connect, market yourselves. Because quite frankly, as we all know, gents, if you don’t network, if you don’t market yourself, who knows you’re out there? I mean, everyone kind of thinks, oh, I’ve got an Instagram page, I’ll make a million. No, no, no, you’ve got to get out there. You’ve got to connect. And yeah, we talk business all the time. Because again, it’s a commercial photography apprenticeship. That’s one thing I say, if you want to be an artist, this course isn’t for you. This course is commercial, it’s business, it’s a real photographer. We want you to be able to… Well, as I always say, I want to meet my learners in 10 years time and they’re saying they’re working for big brands and they’re racing it. It’s the whole point of this apprenticeship.
Sam: Amazing, cool. We are unfortunately running out of time a little bit. Marcus, do you have some… You have your quick fire questions to go, I think.
Marcus: I do indeed. So, gird your loins and get ready for these.
Anthony: I’ve got to be quick then, okay, there we go.
Marcus: Yeah, okay, here we go. First one, DSLR, film or mirrorless?
Anthony: I’ve recently got mirrorless. I’ve got the Nikon Z8.
Marcus: Oh, okay, very nice, Canberra. You’re very lucky.
Anthony: I’m a little unsure about it. I’m still a little bit…
Marcus: Are you? Okay, we won’t go there. That could be another chat. I think I know the answer to this one. LinkedIn or Instagram?
Anthony: I get 95% of my work from LinkedIn and that’s because I connect, connect, connect and show loads of content. So, please add me, Anthony Milner.
Marcus: Okay, good one. Whiskey or gin?
Anthony: I had a bad night on whiskey at university. I’ve never touched it since. My partner loves a whiskey. So, yeah, sorry, loves gin. So, yeah, I’m more of a gin drinker. But actually, I’m from the Southwest, folks. I’m a cider drinker.
Marcus: But yeah, go on. Oh, of course, of course. Run or fun? I don’t know what that means.
Anthony: Yeah, run or fun.
Sam: It’s your question, Marcus.
Anthony: That’s an interesting one.
Marcus: Okay, well, that basically is exercise or hobby. You know, would you go and do exercise or would you go and do a hobby?
Anthony: Well, one thing I’d say, as a photographer, my life is my hobby. So, I love it in that aspect. I’ve hit 42. So, I’m now doing more fitness to keep myself healthy. And as a photographer, you’re moving your back all the time. So, you’ve got to keep those muscles good.
Marcus: Yeah. So, a bit of fitness as well. Yes. Smart shoe or casual tee? Sorry, smart… Suit. Sorry, it’s my… Oh, smart suit.
Anthony: Suit or casual tee?
Marcus: Do you like getting dressed up or do you like going casual?
Anthony: I like a bit of both. Depends on what you’re going with. But I mean, as a photographer, shirt like today. And then jeans and t-shirt, jeans and shoes.
Marcus: Yeah, nice. Okay, this is a crap one. Football or golf?
Anthony: Oh, football. I’m a massive Newcastle United fan. Oh.
Marcus: There you go. Oh, there you go then. Pen and paper or notes on phone? So, I’ve got my notepad right here.
Anthony: I’m dyslexic. So, I’ve got a short-term memory like a chimp. So, notepad.
But I also use my phone as well for different elements. I need to keep myself organized. You’re going straight down the middle.
Marcus: All these questions. Last one. Last one. Gardening or decorating?
Anthony: Again, I’ve moved into a new house. So, I’m doing both. I spent the whole summer doing the garden. And then tomorrow, on Saturday, I’m painting. And I’ve turned my garage into a proper studio. So, where the door’s been fitted, I can paint it.
So, there you go. Again, I’m meeting you in the middle every time, aren’t I?
Marcus: So, that’s fine, mate. They’re crap questions. We’re still trading markets in the meaning of rapid fire. Yeah, sorry. Okay, Sam, over to you.
Sam: Right. Yeah. So, thank you. That was really interesting, Anthony. All of the links. There’s loads and loads of links and more information. We’ll put all of that in the show notes. So, listeners, you can go and find all of that information. And listeners, if you want to sign up for the newsletter, which, of course, you do because it means you won’t miss a show. You sign up for the newsletter, it comes to your inbox. It reminds you to listen. So, every show won’t get missed. You also get extra information from Marcus and I, a chance to be a guest, all sorts of things. So, please sign up. Go to the website, shootstothetop.com, and you can sign up there. Anthony, thank you very much.
Anthony: Been a really interesting show. Really different topic. We’ve not talked about anything like that before. So, yeah, really nice to have something completely different. Very good.
Sam: And Marcus, I’ll let you get a word in edgeways next week. And I will see you then.
Marcus: Thanks, Sam. Cheers, mate. Cheers, Anthony. Thank you very much.
Anthony: Take care.
