Plastic

I had a good idea for another themed model photoshoot.  This time “Plastic”.  The idea was to use heavy makeup to create a skin effect that gave my model’s skin a plastic looking effect.  More out of science fiction than the freak-a-zoid looking robots from Sony or other Japanese manufacturers.

While researching for the shoot I came across the following image.  This is what I was going for.

The Original Idea

With my theme in hand I created a photo storyboard of looks I wanted.  Sasha Starz, the MUA I usually hire, was contacted to see if she wanted to help.  She was onboard.  Based on my main image I was leaning to hiring a model of color, but didn’t have anyone in mind, so as in the past Sasha was asked to help.  She identified Cory, a local model who goes under the model name of Amyle Leon.  

I checked images of Cory, and determined she was perfecto.  Tall, lean and straightened hair (more on this later).  We even had a chance to meet up before the shoot at a local Artist Meet-up get together.  Yep, she was what I was looking for, and seemed really interested in working with me.

Over the next week I was getting doubts how we were going to pull this off.  Do I  pull Cory’s hair back, what type of lighting, background color, clothes, etc.?  This theme wasn’t developing as easily as hoped. I decided to just go for it, and do lots of adjustments in studio.

Wanting maximum flexibility in lighting & backgrounds, I went to the studio the evening before and set up 3 backdrop and 2 lighting setups. I used Savage Seamless Background Paper brand fashion grey, pure white, and black.  Got all the lighting set up, so less time would be spent setting up when Cory arrived.

Day of the shoot and everything was ready to go.  We scheduled to shoot for 7’ish and everyone started to arrive at M10 Studio.  The second Sasha and Cory arrived I thought, “oh no”.  First, Cory didn’t have straight hair anymore, but a modified, loose afro.  Yikes, and secondly she brought her boyfriend.  Now, don’t get me wrong, I encourage models to bring a friend or escort, but the problem tonight, I hadn’t expected it.  More, on why this was an issue later.

Anyway, in her normal professional manner, Sasha got to work.  We talked about Cory’s hair and decided pulling it back in a ponytail wasn’t going to work.  No way to get her hair tight to her skull, so we decided to go a ‘natural.  A photographer has to be flexible.  We discussed makeup, making final decisions on several colors.  Off we go. 

While Cory and Sasha did their thing I wanted to do a final lighting setup and then chat up Cory a bit more to get to know her better and talk more of what I had in mind in terms of posing and lighting concepts.  That’s where Cory’s boyfriend changed the flow.  Don’t get me wrong, he is a really cool guy; the problem is I enjoyed talking to him so much I didn’t get a chance to focus on Cory or getting my lighting setup finalized.  I knew that was a bad move.

Anyway, Cory was ready, and honestly the makeup concept I had in mind just wasn’t going to be pulled off.  Cory’s hair was going to create too many shadows on her face if I put my studio lights directly above with minimal diffusion as planned.  We got started against the black backdrop and I did several test shots to get the camera settings down.  I used manual mode with shutter speed at 1/160 second, f/8 aperture setting and ISO at 200.  This is the normal setting I use to get started and adjust from there.  All photos were taken with a Nikon D300s mounted with my AF-S Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED.

Camera locked in, and off we went.  I moved Cory around, moved lighting, changed position, etc. and just didn’t get the “plastic” effect I wanted, and so I decided to focus on more of a standard portrait shoot.  I brought some bubble wrap so I thought I could use it to get a “plastic” effect by using it as clothing later in the shoot.  Lighting throughout the shoot consisted of 1 or 2 Elinchrom D-Lite studio strobes as my key lighting, and 2 Nikon SB-600 speedlights for fill lighting, and to add effect onto the background.  I used different modifiers on the Elinchrom studio lights, but later in the shoot found a 30 degree grid worked the best.

After about 30 minutes we switched to the fashion grey background and changed the lighting.  This time I put a large Elinchrom beauty dish with a white diffuser on an Elinchrom D-Lite for the key light.  I set the power to the lowest setting, but very close to Cory.  I used another Elinchrom D-Lite with a grid at higher power.  My goal was to get much more dramatic shadowing.  Once set I shot multiple photos moving the lighting around.  On several shots I turned off the key light and simply used the gridded light.

After about 30 minutes Cory changed clothes replacing her clothes with bubble wrap.  That was interesting since I was still trying to get at least something along the Plastic theme.  I think we hit on a good idea by using bubble wrap as bikini styled top, and worked the shadows.  We played with this for about 30-45 minutes.  Cory, Sasha & Cory’s boyfriend all contributed to ideas how to get the right effect.  

Bubble Wrap

Overall it was fun, but I really didn’t get the themed effect I was looking for.  Ultimately, that’s OK, because I still was able to get some quality time in the studio, met a new cool guy that I'd like to hang out with, and walked away with some good images. 

OK, as always you get my daily dose of after action tips & thoughts.  Not to disappoint: 

·         Be very specific about the theme with the model, including how you expect them to prepare.  In this shoot it was specifically my model’s hair.  If I knew it was going to be changed up, I would have either changed my theme or rescheduled.

·         Escorts, boy/girlfriends, significant others are A-OK, but note to self, ask first if my model is going to bring someone.  At minimum I should have simply welcomed him, made him comfortable and went on with my business.

·         Have a backup plan for a shoot if for some reason you first theme just isn’t working.

·         Don’t do 2 model shoots in 1 day.  I did on this day, and I was feeling it around 10pm while cleaning up the studio.  The first one was before sunrise.  Yikes.

·         Meet your model in advance if possible.  I did and it really helped me get to know Cory a bit in advance.  She’s a good model and was fun to chat with.  I felt completely at ease with her and I think the earlier get together helped.

Before & After

I joined an online critique forum on Facebook to get comments on images from other photographers.  One of the challenges with any pursuit, whether it's photography, painting, being a lawyer, or whatever is to always find avenues to find out honestly how you can do better / improve.

Photographers have many options to get online feedback and post their images.  We have FB, Twitter, Instagram, Flickr just to name a few.  My experience is that whenever you post something online you may or may not get comments or feedback....even if you ask for it.  And almost all the time the feedback is something like: "great photo", "excellent lighting", "amazing", etc.  What is often missing is, "Wow Steve, that image really is dark, what gives..", or "how about if you crop the image down to put focus on your subject".  That is helpful, but I find that most people don't provide constructive comments online.

Well so far the local FB page that is a critique forum appears to be doing this.

I posted this image for comment.  This was a model shot done at the Spark Art Photo owned by Dave Fulton in Indianapolis during a model shoot / party.  The setup was pretty standard - black background, large softbox camera right, reflector camera left, manual mode.  This shot was taken about 6 months ago.  Model compliment of LModelz

Before - model from LModelz

I thought it pretty good, so posted it for comment on Flickr, etc.  Got lots of really positive feedback and comments.  However, I also posted it on the photographer critic group and got the following comments:

• My model's face is too cool
• There's lint on you model's shirt
• The eyes are way too blue (note the model had colored contacts)
• The image is too dark

There we go.  Solid feedback, and when I looked at the original I thought...you know my model's face is too cool, man, I didn't even see the lint, and yes too dark.  So I made a few adjustments in the image and here it is.

After - Model from LModelz

Honestly, there may not be much difference (I would suggest you view the image at full size since the small blog thumbnail doesn't provide full effect), but there are subtle changes that a photographer will pick out.  This is the type of feedback that all photographers need.  How can we be better.  Don't shy away from it, be bold and ask for constructive feedback.  I know I will.

Mystery Man

Another themed model shoot.  This time I had the idea called “Mystery Man”.  The theme was to have an attractive model doing her normal poses, however, with 2 differences.  First, the Mystery Man part of the shoot would be in the industrial parts of the Circle City Industrial Complex versus in Studio.  CCIC is the building housing our M10 Studio.  Secondly, I would get a guy to stand behind my model and “lurk” in the background.  The idea was to light the model and use a shallow depth of field.  The Mystery Man would be dark, in the background and out of focus.  Kind of a creeper look.  Sorry, strange things go on in my noggin sometimes.

Once the idea was locked down I went to my go-to MUA, Sasha Starz.  She said sure.  Next line up a model. I wanted someone willing to work in an industrial space and had hard edges.  I turned to a model I had planned to shoot for some time.  Got the model lined up so everything was good to go.  Finally, I lined up my nephew (he’s uber cool) who was interested in playing the part of the mystery man.  Oh, BTW, I’ve got my own studio, so no problems with that important part!!

As an added bonus I was doing a set in studio against a black backdrop, and offered my nephew the opportunity to pick up one of my camera’s and shoot the first set with me.  He was a willing student.

The day of the shoot was here, and you know what?  You guessed it, my model went radio silent.  Couldn’t get ahold of her, so I asked Sasha to ping her.  Unfortunately, she told Sasha she couldn’t make it.  3 hours before the shoot, and I was sans model.  Argh!!

No dramas though.  Sasha worked her Rolodex and within an hour she had lined up the fresh model talents of Traci Muston.  Excellent.

I went to the studio and set up the lights, background & waited for everyone to arrive.  On time they arrived.  Traci was going to be good.  She had the looks, long hair, multiple changes of clothes, and a willingness to do something different.  Sasha immediately went to work on Traci.  And as I expected Sasha was uber.

While Traci was getting ready I walked my nephew through the model photographer’s paces.  I showed him that we were going to use a clamshell lighting setup with an Elinchrom D-Lite 4 with softbox as the top of the clamshell, and a reflector umbrella with a Nikon SB-600 speedlight as the bottom of the clamshell.  We set the lighting about 8 feet away from the backdrop.  This is the same setup used for my  Kabuki Girl shoot (see a previous blog post).  Our Nikons were set at manual mode, ISO 200, flash preset WB, 1/160 speed & f/8.  I was using my Nikkor AF-S 24-70mm f/2.8, and the other camera was set up with my Tamron 70-200mm f/2.8 Di LD.  The Tamron is A-OK for studio work, but like I’m mentioned previously not good for lower light shooting since it’s not VR equipped and it just doesn’t focus fast enough.

Traci was ready to go and we positioned here between the clamshell and fired away.  My nephew and I traded turns shooting with me directing Traci the entire time.  Although Traci was a new to the modeling game she had one great feature.  She’s the first model I’ve worked with that could hold a pose for as long as needed.  No kidding, you could get her into the right pose and POW, she locked it down.  This was EXTEMELY helpful when shooting with a second shooter.  Skills!

We worked Traci for about ½ hour, and then it was time to do the Mystery Man.  We loaded all of our camera gear, change of clothes, and 2 Nikon SB-600 speedlights, set up to be triggered with my Elinchrom Skyports and portable snoots and RPS Studio Softbox.  We headed into the bowels of the building.

Once in the industrial side of the building we positioned both Traci and my Mystery Man in different positions, distances apart and lighting in different locations.  Lots of the lighting was trial and error since the lighting was very mixed.  I also adjusted my camera speed and f/stop to get shallower DOF.  This is really the first time I probably could have used a light meter!  We did 2 sets in the Mystery Man series and got lots of really fun shots.  Everyone was into it.  My goal was to strive for a darker atmosphere.  

After about an hour we had Traci change out of a dress into jeans and top, and my Mystery Man had to head out.  We went into another section of the building and basically did the standard industrial pretty girl portrait works.  I had Traci up against a wall, mixing with industrial props, in a doorway, on a chair.  Basically, anything we could find.  Again, she was great, and took direction well.  

 3 hours were up, and we called it a day.  Got some really good images and we all had a good time.  

After action report:

·         Following experience from our Kabuki Girl I set up a separate makeup area in the back room with color corrected lights.  Much better.

·         I’ve GOT to figure out a way to get hard commitments from my models.  Maybe this comes from experience, but this is the one variable I get most concerned with.  It either makes or breaks the shoot.  I really want to shoot different models, but man it’s risky shooting someone new.  Oh, BTW that’s why I like Sasha…rock solid with her commitments and help.

·         Pull my model farther away from the background.  I had Traci about 3 feet away from the background, and that was too close for my lighting.  I got light spill onto the background that showed up in post.  No problems correcting in post processing, but still.

·         Get a portable power pack for my Elinchrom.  I would have liked using the bigger softboxes with the mystery man section versus my speedlights and smaller softboxes. Oh well, any port in a storm.  It still worked well, but I would have liked the extra flexibility.

Shadow Play

Did a “themed” photoshoot with local model Amanda Veldkamp, and local photographer Faith Blackwell at the Stutz Building in Indianapolis.  Great times!  The theme was Shadows.  The idea was to use low light combined with single or multiple speedlights or monolights to create various shadow effects.

I spent hours researching ideas to shoot, lining up the model, planning the makeup (I know, I know sounds silly for a guy to worry about a model’s makeup, but hey got to get the right effect) and arranging the studio.  All came together smoothly, and we started up on time. 

I brought massive amounts of kit with the idea of covering everything.  Once again, as with other shoots I brought way too much equipment.  Oh well, I used to be a Boy Scout, so I wanted to be prepared.  Here was a condensed version of the kit I brought:

• 2 x Nikon SB-600 speedlights
• 2 x LumiQuest Softbox III
• 2 x Elinchrom D-Lite 400 monolights
• 2 x Elinchrom softboxes
• 1 x RPS Studio Softbox RS-4030
• Elinchrom Universal triggers & receivers
• 2 x Manfrotto 5001B lightstands  with the kit for the speedlights
• Various HonlPhoto snoots & flags for the speedlights
• 3 x DIY gobos for the softboxes
• Lastolite Professional TriGrip Reflector
• Nikon D300s
• AF-S Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED
• AF-S Nikkor 50mm f/1.4G prime
• AF-S Nikkor 35mm f/1.8G prime
• Tokina AF 12-24mm f/4 AT-X Pro DX
• AF Nikkor 85mm f/1.8D
• Assorted accessories

I know, I’m exhausted too.  You guessed it I used only a portion of the kit.  I ended up using the speedlights, the RPS Studio Softbox, the snoots & the Elinchrom triggers.  I used my Nikon D300s and the Nikkor 24-70mm almost exclusively.  Now get this people, I also brought an old school Nikon F50 SLR film camera mounted with the 85mm lens.  I shot a roll of B&W film with it.

All shots with the D300s were taken in manual setting.  I started off at 1/160 of a second shutter speed, ISO 400 and aperture set at F/8.  I also set my exposure compensation + 0.3 – 1.0 throughout the shoot.  I found I adjusted the shutter speed and aperture as needed, but kept the ISO fixed throughout the shoot.  We did 4 series, 3 in the studio and 1 in the hallway.  

The first shoot in studio consisted of 1 speedlight with the RPS softbox mounted and a snooted speedlight projecting a light circle behind Amanda against the background.  The background was made of fashion magazine pages taped to the wall.  We moved the softbox around camera right, front and left to get the shadows we liked.  Directing Amanda the entire time.

The next series was the same setup, only without the snooted speedlight but this time against a plain white background.  I won’t go into the details because the light was too bright (very large windows) and I couldn’t get usable shadowing that appealed.

Final studio setup was against a black background which blocked most of the windows.  I used the speedlight/RPS softbox setup camera left.  Again, no kicker or snooted strobe to add any lighting effects. 

The next setup was to move into the bowels of the building and shoot in a VERY dark, long hallway.  It was very industrial, but my type of place.  We had Amanda switch out of a tee-jeans combination into a black dress.  Good choice since it added to the atmosphere.  Also, I didn’t want a pretty girl look, so I asked Amanda to muss up her hair and give me a bit of attitude.  Jackpot people, she was picture perfecto.

All shots in the hall used either the single speedlight / RPS Studio softbox setup, or a single snooted speedlight.  All lighting was off camera with the speedlights mounted on the Manfrotto lightstands.  In ALL of the shots we manually set the speedlights adjusting the power up or down to taste.  We also moved the lighting around to get the desired effect.

The hall shots worked the best for me.  As you might have guessed from earlier posts I like the darker images.  I got a number of great shots in this series.  Also, for the last 30 minutes or so I asked Amanda to get on the floor and prop her legs up against the metal doors, or sit and do various poses.  The floor was cold, but she was a true pro and worked the set very well.  I really liked the shots on the floor.

All-in-all we ended up spending close to 3 ½ hours and took away approximately 500 images.  My shooting partner, Faith, did an equivalent amount.  The entire day was great fun and I ended up with really nice images.  I will definitely do this again.

My after action report:

·         Plan ahead and don’t bring unnecessary kit.  I knew I was going to move around and take different types of shots so I came prepared.  Honestly I could have left ½ of the kit at home

·         Plan your photo style and what you want in advance, but be very flexible.  I had a general idea what I wanted (I bought sketches and sample photos), but after about the 2^nd series I went off script which worked great.

·         Experiment with light.  We tried all types of shadows and I was surprised how hard it was to get the right look. 

·         Plan out the details with your model in advance including time, fee, makeup, clothes, etc.  I wanted to make sure Amanda was prepared.

·         If you don’t have a Nikkor 24-70 F/2.8, do yourself a favor and go get yourself one.  It will set you back, but you will thank me.

Oranje, Now That's a Party

A big party thrown every year in Indianapolis is called Oranje.  This is the 10^th year and it’s going strong.  Oranje describes itself as “an interactive experience of art and music.  All I can say is that it’s a fusion of rock, hip hop, dance, trance, art, colors, pretty people, sights and sounds.  A photo rich environment.

I went last night for the 3^rd year in a row.  I go with the intent of taking lots of low light photographs of the music venues, the people and the general vibe of the place.  It’s amazing.  This year I showed up at 9pm and stayed until about 1am.  Since there are so many people in the venue, an abandoned warehouse, and the action is constantly moving it is not a place to bring a tripod.  Therefore, it’s a night of my fastest lenses, wide open apertures, and very high ISO.  Also, for good measure I brought one of my speedlights, and I’m glad I did.

I started off outside in 2 of the music tents, the IndyMojo Electronic Music Tent and the Nuvo Main Stage.  The Nuvo stage was a bit easier to shoot because it had reasonable lighting that reflected off the white tent.  The Mojo tent was pitch black to go along with the pulsing electronic dance and trance music.  It was lasers and smoke machines.  Loved it.  The absolute best piece of kit I brought was ear plugs.  Believe me the music was so loud even with ear plugs I had no problems hearing it.  I spent about 1 hour shooting in those 2 tents, and of course listening to the music.

To minimize the amount of equipment I carried, since I didn’t want to bring a backpack, was my trusty Nikon D300s, my AF-S Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 G, and a Nikon SB-600 speedlight.  I brought extra rechargeable batteries and memory cards, and that was it.  I shot the entire event with that kit.  I could have brought my faster prime lenses, but again I wanted to somewhat blend in, and lugging a camera backpack defeats the purpose.

I later moved into the main building and walked around for about an hour looking at all the local artists’ work.  Good stuff, and I would love to pick up a few pieces, but wow the prices…Anyway, I really enjoy looking at other’s people’s creativity.  There were paintings, photography, sculptures, interactive art, body painting exhibits, hair and design work, etc. etc. It gave me plenty of opportunities to photograph the environment.

Next, I spent a couple of hours listening to music, watching dancers, and photographing in the Ketel One Lounge, Old Soul Stage & the MOKB Presents Stage.  For my $20 entry fee not only did I get to take lots of photographs but I got to listen to some really good musicians and DJs.  Man, I'm a cheap date.  I hung around the Ketel One Lounge for a good chunk of the time simply because there were so many people dancing.  I was able to get right up to the DJ’s and photograph them and also several times get to the front of several dance circles and watch the dancers do their thing. 

Most of the night was a real challenge balancing shutter speed, aperture and ISO.  Most of my shots were taken with ISO 3200, or 2000.  When I did use the flash I cranked my ISO down to 400.  I “tried” to keep the speed up to 1/50 of a second most of the night, but that was often hard.  Therefore, I came back with lots of motion blur, but in many shots that worked.  In this type of setting the speedlight helps but the stopped action really doesn’t work.  I also spent lots of time trying to get my white balance right.  I am proud to say I didn’t take a single shot in auto white-balance.  I found the cooler settings worked the best.  The lighting was REALLY mixed every few feet.

Bottomline, a really fun time AND a great opportunity to shoot.

Tips & After Action Thoughts:

·         I really need to purchase or rent a full frame Nikon for this type of event.  In post processing I have used the noise reduction slider in Lightroom 3 extensively, but I would like to minimize it with a bigger sensor.

·         In hindsight I should have brought in my AF-S Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 or AF-S Nikkor 50mm f/1.4 to get a wider aperture.  Again to lower noise and the speed up the shutter speed.  I actually brought both, but left them in my car.  I REALLY didn’t want to carry around a bunch of kit

·         A wider zoom might have been good in this setting.  I have a 12-24mm Tokina, but its f/4.  I had stopped into Roberts Camera earlier to see about renting a Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8, but it wasn’t available.  I complain, but honestly my 24-70 worked really well.

·         Note to self, remember to ALWAYS bring ear plugs to an event such as this.  I did, and my ears are thanking me.  I saw almost no-one with ear plugs and I bet they are regretting it today.

·         Don’t be afraid to mix in with the setting.  At first I shot standing back, but after about an hour you could tell the alcohol was starting to loosen people up.  After about an hour no one cared that I was shooting photographs of them or getting up close to the action.  This is a lesson I learned from my San Francisco workshop.  Get close, not the part about photographing lubricated people.

·         Bring business cards.  Argh, I forgot them and several people asked me for my contact information. 

·         Take video.  I took possibly 20 segments throughout the night.  If I have time I’m going to put a short video together of the party. 

White Out

I recently organized a photo-shoot at Faith Blackwell’s studio in the Stutz Building with model Olivia Ogden. Shooting with me were local Indianapolis photographers Faith Blackwell & Laura Poland. The theme for this shoot was High Key. This is a technique that I wanted to try, for no other reason than I hadn’t tried it and it looked kind of cool. After reviewing multiple High Key images, reading up and organizing the location and model, I gave it a go.

Photographer Faith Blackwell & Laura Poland with Model Olivia Ogden

The effect to be achieved in high key is to overexpose the background so it’s completely white. There are several ways to get this effect but I planned to accomplish this effect using multiple studio and speedlights to throw as much light as I needed on a white background to over-expose it to the point of where there were no pixels at all.

Faith’s studio has one wall completely white. Since there is a dark grey floor I simply taped with white tape a 6 foot piece of background paper against the lower part of the wall and swept it out over the floor about 4 feet. I then used 2 Nikon SB-600 speedlights on light stands with a white umbrella. The setup faced the wall set back about 3 feet. Both speedlights were triggered with Elinchrom Skyport universal triggers. Speedlights were set at ¼ power. The goal was to use the umbrellas to broadly throw a diffused light against the white wall.

Model Olivia Ogden

I then set up 2 Elinchrom D-Lite 4 strobes with softboxes set at approximately 1/3 power 45 degrees both sides of the background approximately 6 feet back. The D-Lite 4’s were triggered with internal Elinchrom Skyports.

During the shoot I varied the power of the softboxes mainly to backoff the fill lighting. The goal of these lights was to provide an even focused light to be thrown on Olivia. I was thinking originally using just ambient light or just one softbox to get move shadow, but I went with the wrap-around lighting. In hindsight I should have used less light on my model. We also used a hand held diffuser in several shots to eliminate glare from the ambient light coming from the window.

All shots were taken with a Nikon D300s in manual mode. White balance was set to flash although I was shooting in RAW. Initial settings were shutter speed at 1/200, aperture set at f/5.6, and ISO at 400. I varied all settings throughout the shoot. All shots were with a Nikkor AF-S 24-70mm f/2.8 G. I varied the aperture throughout the shoot.

I had asked Olivia to bring several changes of tight fitting clothes one with a dark top and one with a light top. Minimal makeup. The 3 of us then took turns shooting away for about 1 ½ hours. As always Olivia made our work simple by easily transitioning from pose to pose.

Near the end just to switch things up we asked Olivia to run a series of poses infront of a large south facing window. This provided sufficient ambient light as the sun had moved well overhead. We added fill light with one Elinchrom D-Lite 4 set as ¼ power and bounced some sunlight using a piece of white foamcore board.

Overall, it was a fun shoot doing both full body and headshots. We easily achieved the desired high key effect with minimal issues. The speedlights did the trick providing a very even exposure against the white background. Personally, I like the full body shots the best. However, if I do this effect again I would definitely back down the light being thrown on the model or vary the power of the light on one side so I can get shadowing and therefore more depth to the model’s face. Of course I could do the shadowing post processing, but it’s not the same.

Tip and after-thoughts:

• Build the light. For my shoot I set up all 4 lights in addition to the ambient light in advance and did test shots using all 4 lights. Next time I would start with the lights on the background, shoot some test shots of the model, add 1 strobe for the key light, take test shots, and then add a second strobe for fill light. I would then vary the power of the strobes to get different shadowing.

• For high key your histogram is important but a bit misleading. Because you have the background overexposed you will have a large peak on the right side of the histogram. Therefore, about ½ way through the shoot I switched the “blinkies” on and this gave me better visibility if I was blowing out the models face which I didn’t want to do.

• If possible shoot tethered. I think I could have locked down my setting much quicker if I had a bigger visual image as soon as I shot. I’ve shot tethered before, but didn’t think about it during this shoot.

Zombies and Beauties Were Everywhere

Playing around today with my camera.  Went to the annual 4-day gamer fest in Indianapolis called Gencon.  Gencon is billed as the largest "gaming" convention in the United States.  It takes over the Indiana Convention Center, and all the hotels, bars and restaurants in downtown Indianapolis.  It's 4 days of non-stop gaming, role playing and dressing up.  It's 24/7 game time.

This year I went to shoot everything in site. Not to worry, zombies, the only weapon I was carrying was my camera.  The good thing about this type of shoot is that it's just for fun.  No thinking, just put your camera to P, mount an on camera flash and shoot away.  I simply wanted to capture the sites of the fun-fest.  Now if only I could get some of these characters to participate in a real photo session...

Enjoy

Stutz Model Session

One of the areas I’m spending time is model photography.  I’ve combined this with my increasing interest in flash / strobe lighting.  One place to give this interest a workout is through a local Flickr meet-up group, Indianapolis Strobist.  A group of 7 local photographers, including myself, got together yesterday evening for a model shoot I arranged.

The photographers that showed up were: Lora Olive at www.livepixlive.com, Ashley Adcox at www.koruimage.com, Steve Griffey, Dave Olive, Faith Blackwell at www.faithblackwellphotography.com , and Paul D’Andrea at www.pdaphotography.com

 The meet-up took place at the Stutz Building in Indianapolis.  I’d been to the Stutz a few times in the past as it houses many local artist studios, and they have an annual Stutz Artist Association Open House.  I thought this would be a perfect location because the building has old-style industrial windows, lots of dark halls, industrial fixtures, etc.  On top of this one of the photographers in the group, Faith Blackwell, has a studio in the Stutz.  This was perfect as it allowed us to have a base of operation for our equipment.

I wanted to keep the effort organizing this shoot simple as I have a day job that makes WAY more money than my photo gig. With the help of uber portrait & event photographer, Paul D’Andrea we put a call out for local models.  Good thing Paul has good contacts because I came up blank.  I pinged several models I’ve worked with previously, and reached out to several models through ModelMayhem but came up dry.  Either the models were booked / busy or I received no feedback from anyone on ModelMayhem.  Oh well, since I don’t have a reputation as a model photographer I’m not surprised at my results.  However, with Paul’s help we lined up 2 models we’ve worked with before, and 2 models new to many of us.

Models Bovary & Diablo (MM # 720400) are dynamite together.  They know several of the photographers in the shoot so the chemistry was there. Amanda Jo Welch (MM # 18955491 & 1069732) joined us and had major skills, and Olivia Ogden (MM # 365545) was amazing.

As we’ve done before we broke off into groups and photographed in groups of 2-3.  Since I had an extra Elinchrom Skyport trigger it was easy for me to have a couple of photographers join me.  We took turns with a series of shots and then traded off the triggers.  I started off with Ashley & Steve along with model Amanda.  Later Ashley moved to another group and Faith joined the Steve’s.  We worked Amanda in about 5 locations.  One on a bench, against a set of industrial windows with the sun to her back, another location with the sun to her face and natural lighting to her back, one series in a dark hall, and finally a set with a speedlight directly behind her hair.  We shot for about 2 hours.

In almost all shots I used my standard 2 speedlight setups that I’ve discussed in a previous post.  This time however, I switched out one of my LumiQuest Softbox III with an RPS Studio Softbox RS-4030 set up for a speedlight.  This setup as previously blogged makes for a speedy setup and easy to move around.  We also mixed in a red gel on one of the speedlights which created interesting effects. 

Finally, we headed back to Faith’s studio to cool off (it was uber hot in most of the Stutz) and to try our hand with the other models.  I shot about 15 minutes with Bo and Diablo with the amazing lighting setup that Paul had arranged. 

Finally, Lora and Dave joined me and model Olivia to work some of the hallways.  This time I replaced the RPS Studio Softbox with a standard umbrella (I know, old school).  However, it was so hot in the Stutz the adhesive backed velcro on the Softbox delaminated and the softbox kept falling off the holder…no kidding.  I could have used my LumiQuest Softbox III, but I wanted to try for more diffused light.  In one series the hall was so tight that I could only fit one umbrella in.  I simply set it high and shot below it.  Worked great to add diffused light.

Finally, Steve joined me and we moved Olivia in-front of an old freight elevator.  After a number of normal shots using the umbrella setup, I put a second speedlight behind Olivia and aimed it at the elevator.  This gave some really interesting backlighting effect.  Also we then turned it forward and did a number of shots with the flash firing forward.  Overall, some interesting effects.

In all of my shots tonight I was shooting with a Nikkor AF-S 24-70mm f/2.8 lens and set my camera to manual.  Manual settings were 500 ISO, exposure at 1/100 to 1/160 of a second and f/stop at 6.3.  The speedlights mentioned are my Nikon SB-600's.

Bottomline, we had a great time doing our strobist thing.  As always, can’t leave a post without a few tips: 

·         If you are going to shoot in a group with paid models and plan to split the cost, make sure you get the number of shooters tied down ASAP.  Without it you can’t determine the number of models to hire and $$$ each photographer has to pay without knowing the numbers.

·         Make sure everyone knows the location, route and timing to meet.  We spent about 30 minutes of our 3 hour shoot getting people together and organized.  Remember the meter is running on the models

·         Bring nametags – this may sound really silly but for meetups like this not everyone knows each other

·         Make sure everything, triggers, camera & rechargeable batteries on your speedlights are charged.  If not bring extra batteries.  I did this and was happy I did.  I went through all my batteries.

·         Experiment with lighting and model poses.  Some of our setups worked and some didn’t.  But you know what?  The shots that I didn’t think would work actually came out really well.

·         On hot days like yesterday make sure everyone has water and gets a chance to take lots of breaks.  This includes the models as well.