We got together at a farm that one of the superstars had access to and we had our way with a pair of models who may or may not have been engaged. I couldn’t get their story straight. It was either that or they just met earlier that day…

Off on a tangent again…

Ok, here’s my most favoritist most superstar’ish photo of the day. The magnificent Canon 50 F1.4 lens wide open. The awesomely shining sun was to the left coming through a diffuser held by the most awesomest superstar I had nearest to me.

Two more shots from the bokeh-licious 50 F1.4.

And, here’s an open shade shot of our male model for the day. The same male model who did a great job at a James Dean shoot several months back.

Go check out that link… I’ll be here when you get back…

Ok, checked it out? Awesome. Good stuff, huh?

Anyway, here’s Chris again standing outside a barn. I applied a nice border from Polaroid Type 55 film and aged it a little bit. Either that or I drug out some Polaroid Type 55 for this, I forget…

I lugged out my 70-200 F2.8 IS for this shot. Racked it in to 70mm F2.8 and placed Chris to get some nice rim light from the sun behind him. The concrete below our feet and the lightly colored barn to our left provided plenty to light him up.

And, one final shot in somewhat of a Daniel Valente style with all that negative space above them. BTW, Daniel is one of the other superstar photographers. Go check out his site too!

But, we don’t have much of a wardrobe so, off to Goodwill we went! Our goal was to find the most obnoxious combinations and I think Jordan succeeded quite well. I mean, look at that tie! I’m not sure who would have bought that in the first place but I think the person who designed it must have been drunk and the guy who originally bought it did it on a bet. And then there’s his shirt. It’s something Detective Dan would wear…

On the other hand, I seem to have failed. Most people see my picture and actually like the wardrobe. Here’s the full crop below. For Facebook, I cropped my hands out to make it more of a headshot. At least we got some good shots out of it!! Not bad for about $15.

For lighting we used a single Einstein to the left behind a large bed sheet. The bed sheet I already had. Hey, we just spent $15 on clothing. Not like we’re going to go shell out even more money on a bed sheet. We just needed some really soft light and the bed sheet was perfect for that.

Notice the beautiful short lighting we used. It’s slimming, isn’t it? I love short lighting.

Here’s Jordan in his ravishing lightning bold tie and red blazer.

And, here’s me! I know, I can make anything look good. (Even bald… it’s a curse…)

You can see some behind the scenes photos from this shoot and others in my album here.

These first two shots are natural light. My assistants, Jordan and Joe, held reflectors for me while I stood further back with my 70-200. I placed Lisa to allow the sunlight to rim her hair and used the reflectors to light her face.

In this shot, I used a beauty dish boomed over head while standing next to Lisa and looking down with my 24-70.

This is an area of a dental school which is next to Sirens and who graciously allowed us to shoot in part of their facility. We have the sun coming in through windows on the right, a beauty dish to camera right and a bare strobe behind the hanging glass to add more effect.

These next two shots I shot using natural light with Jordan’s D3 and 135/2 DC lens.

These next 3 shots were done using a 64″ PLM with diffusion to the right and slightly in front of Lisa. I also used a beauty dish behind the PLM to light the background.

And one last one of Lisa and her cousin.

Normally I don’t like large group shooting events but this one was organized quite well. After getting signed in and listening to the initial talk by David Hamilton we were assigned a model or two to work with. We could take our time with the model and shoot them wherever we could like. The only stipulation was that each model you shot had to get 3 final images from you. Working in this way was a bit rushed since you didn’t have a lot of time to work with and develop a shot with a model. But, on the up side, you are able to build a diverse portfolio with a number of different models while maintaining a consistent look between the images. My style tends to evolve after each shoot and it was nice to be able to get so many models shot using a similar style for a nice coherent look in a set of portfolio images.

In this shot, I draped a piece of burlap fabric over a wood stand to use as backdrop. In one of the test shots I liked the edge so much I decided to use it for the final shot. We grabbed a couple A-clamps and clamped the right side of the fabric to give it some more character. For the processing I went with a surreal look to give the image an almost 3D effect.

This was done with beautiful soft light from a Paul Buff Parabolic Umbrella with white diffusion fabric. I placed the light on the right and used a white reflector to the left. We talked a lot between shots and tried to make the images as natural as possible.

This was a setup I wanted to try. It’s a variant of something I learned from Don Giannatti a few years ago. A white background behind the model with a bare light bounced off it. Then, two large white cards in front. The light bounces off the background and then off the cards and onto the model. This makes for a huge loss of contrast straight out of camera which has to be corrected for in Photoshop. It gives an effect that is hard to get with other setups and it only needs one light!

Here’s an edgy shot with a gridded beauty dish. I used a gridded 7″ reflector from the right to graze the background to create more interest and lit Madeline with the dish.

A more playful shot, with real emotion! Lit with a white beauty dish to camera left and a second light bouncing into a large reflector behind me.

For this shot I decided to try out my 35mm prime lens. I hadn’t used this on a model shoot yet and wanted to see how it would do. I decided to keep the lights in the shot because I loved how natural it looked and also placed a stock on the right of the frame to frame her in. The stick to the left, just under the beauty dish, was there and gave me the idea for the right stick.

For the last shot, I draped the burlap fabric on the back wall and had Madeline stretch out to play out the way it was draped. We added the necklace she brought from a designer and I had her look down to keep the focus on the necklace. In post I decided to add the texture and border to the image to play off the eclectic feel of the jewelry.

All of my images go through the same basic process. A full work over in Lightroom which includes an array of color adjustments, exposure adjustments, and adjustment brushing with my Wacom Intuos 3 tablet. The color adjustments I do help to guide the viewers eye to where I want them to look in the photo. They also help to tone the color of the photo. I always start with a color corrected file with a proper white balance and with my custom calibrated camera profile but true-to-life color isn’t what I’m after, I’m after a specific aesthetic based on the individual image and how I want it to look. Likewise, my exposure adjustments aren’t just to get the exposure “correct”. I use all of the controls Lightroom has to offer in order to fine tune not just the exposure of the image as a whole, but the whole tonality of the image as well. The adjustment brush, though, is where the power is. If you’re not using the adjustment brush or are uncertain how to use it then you will definitely get a lot out of this class. I use the adjustment brush on every image in a variety of different ways with different combinations of settings in order to come to my final vision.

If you’re on Facebook, you can view the event details here.

Straight Out Of CameraAfter LightroomAfter Photoshop

We shot using my new Einstein lighting from Paul Buff, which I love. With this shoot we worked hard to bring less of a posed look to quite a few of the images. It was a bit of an exercise, but I had the models continuously move to create a more natural look. Most models I’ve worked with are used to striking poses and waiting for a click or flash before moving but I try to keep my models moving so they think less about what I’m doing and more about what they are doing.

These first two shots have a very similar setup. One light behind and to the left with a grid spot for rim. A gridded Beauty Dish on a boom above and another flash bounced into a large white fill card for overall fill. I love the light from a gridded dish and wanted to maintain that look while lighting the clothing which the bounced light did perfectly.

This is the same setup, but I rotated around the subject to get some flare from the kicker. This reduces contrast in the image straight out of camera but it is easy to get back with processing and it gives a great look! This also gave me more intense shadows and notice how much stronger the kicker looks. This angle lets it bounce off the face more effectively and gives what looks like a stronger light without needing to adjust the power.

Here’s a look of reflection from Aurora. She did a great job moving through poses gracefully and made it very easy to catch this 2/3rds view.

Some intense looks from the wonderful Liz. Liz is also a highly skilled makeup artist and often does her own make up!

This was an experimental shot. I try to push outside of my box every time I shoot, at least once. In this image I wanted to add a feeling of movement while freezing a good portrait of Victoria. I wanted to make sure that I didn’t overpower the main shot with the movement. I set the ambient to be very slow and used a three second exposure along with manual flash pops at varying powers.

A nice group shot of the nights models together in Megan Hunt’s clothing.

Another great in-between moment, this time from Liz.

And, finally, a beautiful look from Aurora wearing clothing from Amanda Clark with her signature color!

I thought I’d go back to my roots, so-to-speak, with this post and provide more detailed information on how the images were created. This first image was shot as one of the promotional images with Jamie sitting on a window-seat inside of one of the gorgeous rooms available to us in the castle wearing a dress made by Buf Reynolds. For lighting this shot I used a Paul Buff Einstein unit with a 20″ Beauty Dish to camera left. I was going for the Rembrandt lighting pattern on her face. I’m really starting to love adding shadows and am getting away flat face lighting. For a slight fill, I used a 42″ white reflector from below angled up. I wanted the window behind her to blow out and add some rim around her. Outside is a large stone overhang so I set my exposure to ISO-400 F3.2 1/125 to get the ambient light where I wanted it. I then added the light from the Einstein to expose the front of her.

This image of Brittany was taken toward the end of the day in a design by Jane Round. It was just before the show and we wanted to get as many of the models and clothing shot as we could. Because of the limited space I stuck with my Einstein and beauty dish. For the shots taken against this green wall and the red wall, which you’ll see later, I chose a mid-range aperture to give me more depth of field while still keeping the power from my light manageable.
ISO-100 F7.1 1/200

This image was also taken as part of the promotional images in September. I was there again with Anthony and Marlon. I ran up the stairs to look for a location to shoot in. Then, as I came back down the winding stair case I was watching my feet as I went so I didn’t trip and I saw the way the stairs wound and created lines. I grabbed the beauty dish with a diffusion sock and placed it as high as I could get it, just over the banister in the middle of the stair case. Anthony helped hold it at a slight angle to get it a little closer and I stood on the stairs as close to the banister as I could. I asked Jamie to come over to the stairs and to lay down on them. I placed her body, hands and feet where I wanted them to get the shot. In post, I flipped this first image upside down because I liked the way the lines worked better from that perspective. I was actually standing at what would be the top of the picture for this shot.
ISO-100 F6.3 1/200

This is a pure natural light shot taken outside the castle with Jamie in another dress by Buf Reynolds. I love the way the sun was coming up over the building and decided to remove my lens hood to play with the flare. The flare in this picture is straight-out-of-camera (SOOC).
ISO-100 F2.8 1/200

This shot of Jamie is also purely natural and was taken shortly after the last one. I repositioned Jamie to get the rim light and to let the open sky light her face. I just love light like this.
ISO-100 F2.8 1/160

This shot of Jamie in a dress by Sabrina Jones was done inside one of the bathrooms inside of the castle. I placed an Einstein light to Jamie’s right and bounced it off a white-tile wall. I stood to Jamie’s left and shot her in the mirror while keeping her back in the shot as an achor. I chose to shoot this at F8 to carry more focus through the shot.
ISO-100 F8 1/100

This is Nimoy. A wonderful model who recently moved to NYC. She has always struck me as a very strong and proud woman. This was to be a headshot as she hadn’t yet put on any of the designer’s clothing. So, I put a 7″ reflector on the Einstein and shot it from camera left to get a loop light pattern on her face with a lot of drama. I included the wall sconce in the shot and set my exposure in order to get it to expose properly. I added the flash power to match that exposure.
ISO-100 F6.3 1/60

These next two shots were taken at the same location but using different perspectives and focal lengths allows them each to have their own personality. This first shot of Dani in a dress by Sabrina Jones was taken at 50mm with the Einstein and Beauty dish. Which, I used quite a bit on this shoot primarily because I didn’t have an assistant to lug anything else around and also because it was very crowed inside the castle. Like all of my other on-location work, my first step here was to get my ambient exposure. To do that, I take my CyberSync off my camera and adjust the settings until the environment looks how I want. This is more “too taste” as typically I underexpose the ambient to some degree depending on what I am going for. After getting my exposure nailed down, I put the CyberSync back on and set up the flash. In this case, the beauty dish was placed to slight camera left.
ISO-100 F4 1/200

This shot of Jennifer in a design by Shawntelle Kullman taken at the same location as Dani, was shot at 24mm. Because I had sky and more of the building in this shot I reset my ambient exposure and flash power in order to get the look I was going after. In post, I removed another white bench that was towards the right-end of the frame. Whenever I edit I always look for any distractions from my subject and remove anything necessary. If I can do it in-camera then I will, and I always advocate getting it as close to perfect in camera. Post processing shouldn’t be a crutch.
ISO-100 F6.3 1/200

Another shot of Nimoy, this time in a dress by Jennifer Pool. This dress was yellow, the stairs were red, and the wood was brown with a red tint to it. The colors just didn’t go together very well so black and white as the perfect option. I used the color sliders in Lightroom in order to adjust the luminance of the various color channels to produce the final image to draw the eye through it as I wanted.
ISO-200 F3.5 1/100

I absolutely love this shot of Sydnee in a dress by Sabrina Jones, it has a beautiful classic look to it. I asked Sydnee to stand on the edge of the window frame and exposed for the ambient light coming in from the outside to light the sheer curtains. I used the beauty dish from high camera left as the key light. I wanted sharp focus so I shot it at a relatively tight aperture.
ISO-200 1/200 F9

In this shot I placed her in a position to be framed by the stained glass behind her and started with a large aperture in order to blur the background. I set the ambient exposure to allow a good illumination from both the existing lighting and the window. I then set the flash at the exposure necessary to light the model.
ISO-400 F3.2 1/100.

Another shot of the beautiful Dani shot under a tree just outside the castle. For this shot I chose to shoot wide open with just a kiss of flash from my beauty dish to camera right.
ISO-100 F2.8 1/100

This very playful shot of MinDee was inspired by her playing around with a friend of her’s who was to my left. While I was reviewing a shot I had taken she took on a similar pose while she was joking with her friend. I asked her to stop and go back to it then we worked it into this be adjusting it slightly. Most often, the best shots come from relaxing and just having fun.
ISO-100 F5 1/200

I love the intensity of Katie’s eyes in this shot. She is wearing a dress by Jennifer Pool. I love the way the colors in the dress play against the colors in the background, her lips, and her eyes.
ISO-100 F4.5 1/200

This shot of Julie in a dress by Jane Round came out beautifully with a great shadow from the beauty dish.
ISO-100 F5 1/200

This is another pure natural light shot of Jamie wearing Buf Reynolds at the front door of the castle.
ISO-100 F2.8 1/160

The girls arrived at Seven Salon between noon and 2 PM to get their hair and makeup done. Seven did a fantastic job giving them a look that would fit well with the clothing and the outdoor concept for the shoot. The girls arrived on location around 4:30 and we all talked for a little while and got to know each other a bit before the clothing arrived a little bit later. We went through the clothing that we had available and I selected the items that would look best at the location I chose. Jackie from Roots & Wings brought a big bag of scarves so I went through it to match a scarf with each outfit. I really like giving a model something to hold on to or mess with so it helps them forget about the camera and become more natural and spontaneous.

After we had the clothing selected the girls changed into their first outfits and we headed out a few blocks from my place to the field I had selected. We shot from roughly 5:30 to 8 which gave us a variety of lighting options throughout the evening.

The only lighting I had with me was the Einstein 640 with a 20″ Beauty Dish that I had used on my shoot earlier that evening. AJ had some extra lights he offered me to use but I decided I’d see what I could do with the one light. Quite a while ago AJ told me that less is more, and he definitely was right! With AJ’s suggestion I setup the dish a good distance away from the subject. Using a dish this far away more-or-less loses the liquid like light quality of a dish as when used up close, but it makes it a small source that is perfect for dynamic shadows cast against white seamless! Using it so far away also allows the light to spread out to cover the background and the distance allows the light fall off from one side to another to remain relatively consistent.

The models we had were absolutely fantastic. Each one offered a different personality and style and I had a blast photographing them. One of my favorite shots from the night came when Sara Larson told me she used to be a dancer. I love dancers! I asked her what she could do with a jump. And, with her first jump we caught this image below. On the first try! That happens so rarely! We took several more frames after this but decided that the first was the best and moved on to different setups.

The clothing came from designers Jennie Mason and Buf Reynolds. The jacket was loaned from Bellwether Boutique.