Steve Horne

Founding Partner, Stoneapple, London UK Conference Production Manager, News Xchange

I entered the production industry through the more traditional route, joining a publicist company in London as a runner straight from higher education. The daily routine of making coffee, delivering and collecting jobs from clients and assisting in the film lab led to a post as a photographic apprentice in a busy design and commercial photographic agency.

The agency had a great client base ranging from heavy industrial, cosmetics, fashion, commercial buildings as well as many of the upcoming technology companies. During the next three years I studied at Reading College of Art & Design as well as working in a very busy studio, where assignments took me across mainland Europe and North Africa, on a series of very active, enjoyable and diversified projects working in many different media for corporate clients. As well as traditional photography and print we shot 16mm film, processing, post production, multi-screen projection and as video became more portable and affordable, one inch tape and all the other formats through to the infamous VHS…

Moving on, an opportunity came for me to work for the UK division of Maritz Inc. based in St. Louis., The European office was a very active creative hub covering motivation, travel and communications.
Our clients included most of the major automotive manufacturers, heavy industry, commerce, banking, IT and oil.

At Maritz the range of events and diversity in their sheer size and complexity gained much applaud and success in live events, display and exhibition, print and video, and it is here that I discovered my love of live events!

Seeking a change and a desire to be in control of my own destiny, I went freelance, focussing on video production and presentation graphics, through my freelance work I had the great pleasure of working for an agency where I met Francesca Gray and Pavani Watt.

I am an active member of the Guild of Television Cameramen in the UK.

After a few years working closely together across a wide range of live events we decided to bring our talents and experiences together to form Stoneapple Productions.

The rests as they say is history… The agency is now in its 14 year and although we remain small we’ve deliberately kept this so, as we offer a very personal and creative service to all our clients. Our resources however are significant. We’ve invested in video production resources with our own cameras and post production facilities, large format printing, lighting, projection and sound as well as staging and 3D design for exhibition stands.

Looking to the future, our objective for NewsXchange is to work with the rest of the event team to build on the success of the past whilst ensuring sponsors gain new marketing and communications opportunities and attendees gain the most from their attendance at the event… simply put, to help build News Xchange into a “must attend” event for all those seeking to develop, shape and work in the industry.

My e-mail address is steve@stoneapple.co.uk and I look forward to hearing from you.