When I imagined myself as a photographer for an international news agency, I imagined the battle field situations I would find myself would be in distant and dusty locations, full of grizzled commandos avoiding sniper fire and shelling. Instead I found myself in the middle of a green park in leafy Sussex with 251 six to eleven year olds ready to unleash their few years of anger upon each other; and the weapon of choice was custard pies. Their cause, was to claim the Guinness World Records title for the largest custard pie fight ever.

It was tempting to stand on the sidelines and shoot with a long lens behind the barrier alongside the heckling parents. But with the immortalised words of war photographer Robert Capa burning in my head “”If your picture isn’t good enough, you’re not close enough.” I knew what I had to do. I needed to be where the action was happening, on the frontline amongst the battle hungry children and the ammunition of waiting custard pies.