October 2016

Elio was born and raised in Havana, Cuba, where he remembers saving all his pocket money to visit the ‘Cinecito’ – the local kids cinema – as often as he could. He has always been involved in the arts, whether it was working as a sound operator with some of Cuba’s most revered musicians, a DJ and MC at events and festivals, a dancer performing at the Millenium Dome before the Queen, an extra in several famous films and in several cases an actor in well known series Auf Wiedersein Pet. Surrounded by so much artistic talent, his desire to record and preserve the unique moments he was witnessing was the impetus for him to pick up his first camera.

Moving from in front to behind the lens he began to specialize in producing first class photography and videos for the Latino arts community in the UK and later branched out to weddings, portraiture and corporate events. His most treasured photography and film moments are working with Rebecca at WOMAD world music festival, where, with access to all areas “every act took me to a new level of inspiration and I relished the opportunity to find just the right angle to make the images transmit that feeling of hair raising energy”. Similarly, photographing and filming traditional weddings on a 3 month deployment in Africa with ImigCapture, the colours and vibrancy of the people, dress, customs and landscape had him awestruck. The majority of his learning has come from working on the job, but he likes to evolve his craft with online training courses and holds a Diploma in Video making from Morley College and Diploma in Advanced Photography from the Shaw Academy.

A self-proclaimed techno-geek, qualified electrician and all round handyman, he loves not only the artistic side of image making, but the machinery behind it and has built an impressive collection of equipment to support Firesoul Media’s technical department. He is often found tinkering with all sorts of equipment till the early hours, fixing, organizing and troubleshooting. He loves to laugh and brings an element of humour and fun to every shoot he does, making his clients feel at ease. When he’s not working he spends time with his fire soul partner, Rebecca, and their two sons, always with a camera at the ready!

Rebecca Radmore is a professional documentary photographer and visual story-teller. Her passion for image making came whilst traveling and working abroad – especially whilst working as an election observer in El Salvador, where she developed her first full photo essay. Having studied Latin American studies at University College London, she was awarded a scholarship to study documentary directing at the EICTV 
Film School in Cuba. Her film ‘Contrapunto’ was awarded best student film over the last ten years of the course.

Following a desire to work in community development and project management, she returned to image making via London College of Communication where she gained a Masters in Documentary Photography and Photojournalism. In 2012 she made a short film about the phenomenon of the ‘telenovela’ in Colombia, which was later screened at the London Latin American Film Festival. In 2013 she was invited to Singapore as artist in residence at Objectifs Centre for Film & Photography, where she developed her long-term visual research and multimedia project on beauty and skin tone in contemporary society, culminating in two well receieved exhibitions in Singapore and the UK. Here she also taught short courses and seminars in documentary film, ethics in photojournalism and participatory photography. Following this she met up with co–firesoul, Elio where they were invited to join the leading photographic and video agency in Botswana, capturing weddings, corporate events, product photography and portraits. As a side project they were commissioned by Flying Mission Services to rejuvenate their image bank with fresh material from their medical evacuation, aircraft maintenance, air tourism services and community development programmes. This work was recently featured in a book by The Other Hundred’ project, about education and empowerment around the globe.

One of her most exciting commissions since developing Firesoul Media came from the Prisoners Education Trust where she and Elio were employed to capture education projects in prisons across the UK. Combining her favourite genres –photojournalism, portraiture and charity PR- she and Elio produced images that have featured on national TV, newspapers and web articles. With her diverse working history, enthusiasm for developing projects, teamwork and communication, Rebecca knows how to get the best from you and your shoot from start to finish with a smile. When she is not behind the lens Rebecca enjoys travelling, yoga and bubble blowing with her co-firesoul, Elio and their two boys.