Fiona Chandler

and with my style, which is a documentary kind of style with story-telling, classic wedding photography and behind-the-scenes, it worked really well for the sporting events, so I gave it a go. The gyms that I worked for used the images for the community side and to give something back to them, they are always very focused on their community and we found it very popular with the Gym owners. It all really spiralled quite quickly as there was a real demand for it at the time.

I moved to Tunbridge Wells in June 2020, previously I built the business up in Gloucester so I’m starting again here, it’s a great opportunity because it really is a passion of mine, it’s really exciting to be able to start it up all over again. I learnt a lot when I started it the first time and things change so this time, I can approach it with a lot more confidence. I still work full-time as well, I work in marketing for a camera retailer, I do all their social media and test their lenses and cameras, so I quite often get a new bit of a kit to take on a shoot with me. It’s great because I get to write about the products in a blog or on the social media channels and listings, which helps me because I get access to great kit, plus it helps me learn about the new gear.

In the RAF I was an air cartographer, creating and updating the digital maps of the skies, I did that for nearly seven years which I absolutely loved, it also included lots of sport which was great for me. I ended up in a department where we were taking massive classic air charts, which were in huge formats and converting them so they could be used in the cockpits for low flying jets. We had to get them into a kind of tom-tom system where they were readable in the cockpit and navigate through it. I did the graphic side of it which involved a lot of work with images and graphic re-sizing etc which is where my creative side started to come through, it involved learning how Adobe, Illustrator and Photoshop worked which I knew would help me with the fun stuff that I’m doing now.

My speciality is behind-the-scenes and storytelling in a nutshell, I use that approach across all the content photography that I do, it works really well on social media, you need something different that really shows the human side of things and I really like the candid natural side of it. If I was to sum up the most enjoyment I get from what I do, it would be friendship, the clients and the businesses that I’ve worked with have become good friends, I’ve gone on to photograph their weddings or their events – I’m not just the hired help it’s like I’m a guest at the wedding or the event and that’s the best part of it.”