Flight Patterns

Really lovely fashion photography piece on Behance.

This is similar to the feel I wanted to use on my Tethered series, not sure I achieved it as well as these do, but it is an influence.

Really like fashion shoots that have good themes and you can see the conceptual thinking that goes in to the shots.

There's a real personality in these shots even though they have a very posed feel to them.

More info and furthetr shots can be found here:
http://www.behance.net/gallery/Flight-Patterns/3223155

Manga inspired make up shoot

Another collaboration with my friend Lara the make up artist.

Couldn't really go to town on this one and get a location shoot organised, as we're both obviously a bit pushed for time at the moment, but she asked me to do some headshots for this manga inspired shoot.

I was more than happy to do so, and fortunately having a Bowens kit at home at the moment allowed me to get further accustomed to it.

I decided to shoot with only one light positioned to the side of the subject so as to try to create a nice shadow behind her.

Not sure what to do about this shot?

I've been trying to do something with this shot since I took it a few weeks ago now.

The problem is that the boards that I use for my backdrops have really begun to bow (which apparently is a problem caused by putting wallpaper on them.

Also I struggled slightly with the composition of this shot, but as it is I really like the end result with the look on my Dads face and his stance etc.

SO I need to decide whether to re shoot or leave it and continue trying to fix it up with Photoshop.

My problem is that a re-shoot may be unfortunately logistically not possible at the moment, and certainly not before the assignment has to be completed, and also I'm concerned that by re shooting I won't be able to recreate the shot as I have it now, which I really like.

Any thoughts would be most welcome.

Unaltered Shot.

So as is evident here the left hand board has bowed quite badly, there is a slight gap at the top of the head as my dad was a little taller than I was expecting compared to the backdrop.and finally there isn't in my opinion enough space to the bottom of the pic.

After Photoshop edit

This is the shot after a bit of Photoshop magic, the bow is now visibly straighter and I've added more space to the top and bottom of the image.

There is a bit of finesse still required to make it print ready but I think it is now a much more usable shot.

Also would it have been noticeable if I had not drawn attention to it?

Self Negotiated Update

March was a very busy month for shoots in my series Tether.

I was shootinhg most weeks as well as having to paint my backdrops and find props etc. Logistically this project has been quite taxing as I have had to try to make sure that everything is ready before my shoot and that all the people sitting for me were available (this sometimes was quite difficult due to peoples works schedule etc).

However, I have now managed to get the series completed with possibly one re- shoot required (more on that later).

I've also added the definition I want to use as the blurb to accompany the series.

Anyway here's the finished results below:

The lighting diagram below shows the layout of how the shots were composed,  I wanted the lighting to be consistent throughout the series, with a few minor tweaks on each different shot.

Two beauty dishes were used to light the backgrounds to an exposure of f.11, the main light on each subject was provided by two soft boxes positioned on either side of the subject. These were also set to get an exposure of f.11 (although this did vary slightly from shot to shot depending on the position of each subject.

My camera was set to 1/125 shutter speed and I set the exposure to F.10 as I was using a polarizing filter on my 50mm lens which I found help to add vibrancy to the colours but did require the camera be set a stop under the required exposure.

Walter Pfeiffer for Dazed and Confused

Really love this series from Walter Pfeiffer for this months Dazed.

It really appeals to my sense of the bizarre and love how he captures the surreal by putting them in a very contemporary setting.

What I like about Pfeiffer is his preference to work with unknowns rather than models and try to bring out their character. This is, in my opinion, a very unique approach as most portrait photographers start out by working with unknowns but then move on to work with professional models, certainly when working for magazines etc.

This is why I really like Dazed's editorial fashion shoots as they are never afraid to play around with idea, which is pretty much their raison d'etre I suppose.

Really want to do something similar myself and will start thinking about who and how I can get this to happen.

More information:

http://www.dazeddigital.com/fashion/article/13138/1/exclusive-walter-pfeiffer-fashion-film

http://www.interviewmagazine.com/art/in-love-with-walter-pfeiffer

Negotiated study 2nd Shoot

Here's an image from my second shoot for my final negotiated study images.

I feel like I'm getting a much better handle on this series now and am working with a provisional title of "Tethered", as the running motif of the series is that each subject will be attached to something with reference to the subject or everyday life, hopefully in a more ambiguous nature.

My good friend Andy was really up for this shoot which I was quite happy about as he has quite a distinctive look and a lot of hair. I decided to use hair as the motif for the image and shot him in a hairy gorilla suit and as you can see is tethered to a hair dryer. I also had him sit on some tires, and there was a couple of reasons for this. Firstly Andy is quite tall and so logistically it would have been quite difficult to position him in the shot without seeing the top of my backdrop. I also felt that it would be a nice way of changing composition within the series so that it doesn't become too similar, and also as Apes and Monkeys sit on tires in the zoo, and we are all only shaved apes after all.

The shoot itself was really good and felt very collaborative with Andy suggesting different poses to try for the image. I also shot with my camera tethered to my laptop through Lightroom, so the images would show on the screen as I shot them which would mean that I could see them in more detail than on the back of my camera. This also meant that Andy could see the shots and helped me explain more about what I liked and didn't like about his poses.

The shoots are getting easier to set up as I am generally using the same lighting configuration for the shots and the backdrop and composition is an homage to the portrait work of Irving Penn (see below).

Recent work

Here's a few images from recent shoots I've been doing.

The first three are from a shoot I did for stylists at George's hair salon for competitions they were entering. I'm quite happy to say that the third shot has been selected to go through to the final.

I've really begun to enjoy doing this kind of work and is certainly an area where I am slowly but surely building up a network of contacts. Also the majority of the work is coming from word of mouth as people are recommending me, which is always good.

I shot these using a 50mm prime lens and a pair of Bowens heads. One was fitted with a large softbox for a nice spread of light and the other was fitted with a honeycomb grid that I used as a key light for the hair.

On reflection I think that when I do this kind of work again I will use a smaller aperture and also shoot with a longer focus of around 100mil or above to get more detail in to the shots.

This next shot is from a collaboration with Lara Giffard who is a make up student I have begun to work with quite a lot. It's based on the idea of Candy and is heavily influenced by the recent Victorias Secrets Autumn/ Winter catwalk show.

The venue for the shoot was the Americandi store in the High Cross, and had to be arranged out of trading hours. The shoot was an interesting one to say the least as we only had 40 minutes on site and so had to be pretty quick about turning shots around.

I decided to try and light the shoot with just one Bowens head and a reflective brolly as it would save me more time to turn shots around. Although it was quite a high intensity shoot I'm quite happy with the results I got and feel that this one is by far the stand out shot.