Behind the Scenes - The Movie Pirate

Here's a behind-the-scenes shot taken by Nicole at Saturday's movie theater shoot. The Movie Pirate image I was shooting was a great suggestion by Jeremy Hall to include in the set of audience pictures.

Theater Audience Photo Shoot: Thank You Everyone!

I'm back in the office after a busy morning with the movie theater photo shoot in Salt Lake City. We had over 90 people participate in it and after a quick look at the images I can say I am extremely pleased with what we created.

I will write a more detailed blog post about the outing in the coming days but I wanted to make a quick one today to say a huge THANK YOU to everyone who participated. From the check-in team to the lighting guys to the prop team to the audience members and everyone else, you all went above and beyond in making today a success.

Please accept a sincere thank you. I absolutely could not do what I do without help from great people like you!

Now go and have a great weekend :)

Milestone

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/320 second, f/4, ISO 100

Eyelash Salon Photo Shoot

I spent this afternoon capturing images for my stock photo portfolio in an eyelash salon. My desire in creating stock images is to capture real people in normal situations, and photographing a model getting eyelash extensions fit nicely with this goal.

I used my typical location lighting setup consisting of numerous softbox equipped monolights. Even though I brought along four lights, the combination of natural window light and small shooting space meant that I only used two of the lights. For the sample shot above, I have a 36" octabox just to the left of the camera and a 48" octabox placed to the right and away from the camera providing fill light. The window light is coming from behind the camera.

I've got a dozen or so images from today's session to edit and add to my portfolio. It will be interesting to see how much demand there is for eyelash extension photos.

Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/125 second, f/9, ISO 10

TV Time

Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/125 second, f/4.5, ISO 100

Intensity

in⋅ten⋅si⋅ty [in-ten-si-tee]
–noun, plural -ties.

1. the quality or condition of being intense.
2. great energy, strength, concentration, vehemence, etc., as of activity, thought, or feeling: He went at the job with great intensity.
3. a high or extreme degree, as of cold or heat.
4. the degree or extent to which something is intense.
5. a high degree of emotional excitement; depth of feeling: The poem lacked intensity and left me unmoved.
6. the strength or sharpness of a color due esp. to its degree of freedom from admixture with its complementary color.
7. Physics. magnitude, as of energy or a force per unit of area, volume, time, etc.

Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 70-200 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/5, ISO 100

Parka Girl

After posting yesterday's rather dreary image of Alyssa, I felt I owed it to her to post a cute one today. These images are from last week's stock session we did in the studio. As I said before, it is great to be working with her again.

Have a great weekend!

Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/8, ISO 100

Cabin Fever

Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/4, ISO 100

Image in Use: Davis Hospital and Medical Center

Had a friend spot this ad today on a local television station's website. Since this is the image that I featured on today's earlier post, I thought I'd share it here.

Changing Styles: Revising My Stock Images

One project I've added to my list this year is to spend some time re-photographing some of my successful older images in my stock portfolio. The reason I have been doing this is to have my images keep up with the ever-growing megapixels of images and changes in style.

The two images above are an example of this. The top image was shot in my studio back in January of 2008. Since it was shot with the original Canon 5D and cropped, it is only available at a maximum size of large on iStockphoto. The new image which was recently photographed, while still closely resembling the original, was shot with a Canon 5D Mark II and is available in sizes up to XXL.

Another thing about the difference in the images worth noting, is that while Alyssa's 2008 hair style is not quite out of style yet, her current look is more current with today's style.

Lastly and a bit embarrassing to admit, the post-processing of the new image is much better in my opinion (especially the isolation) compared to the original.

It will be interesting to compare how the new image fares in the sales department against the very successful original. Since it has already sold in the first few hours it was available, it is off to a great start.

Recommended Reading: NicolesyBlog.com

It's no secret to photographers in Utah (and many outside the state) that I'm good friends with Nicole Young. In fact, I'd like to think that my Canon 5D Mark II was influential in her recent switch from Nikon to Canon.

Last month Nicole began increasing the frequency of her blog posts at nicolesyblog.com, and I have been impressed with the quality of writing and instruction she has been providing. With that being said, I thought I'd take a moment and encourage my readers (whom I REALLY appreciate!!) to head on over there and check out what she has to say. I especially like today's post and comments about whether or not using Photoshop makes you less of a photographer.

P.S. I know her blog is good, but please don't forget about this one once you leave :)

Attitude

Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 70-200 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/4, ISO 100

Welcome Back Alyssa!

I spent this morning in the studio photographing one of my favorite models, Alyssa. I will forever hold a special place in my heart for her, since she was the very first model that Michelle and I paid to work with us on stock images back in '07. Her images have been very successful. In fact, as of right now she is featured in two of my top three selling images on iStockphoto.

Due to some geographic and life changes, we had not worked together since nearly a year ago. But things are different now and we are back creating stock images. We spent today's session revisiting some of our themes from '08 and shooting some new ones. While taking the pics was a lot of fun, what was even more enjoyable was catching up on life with a such a wonderful person.

Welcome back, Alyssa! I truly look forward to what we will create in 2010.

Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/8, ISO 100

Adjusting to the Beauty Dish

After spending years using mainly softboxes for my lighting, I recently added a 16" Beauty Dish to my kit. Even though the modified light is fairly similar to what I get with my small octabox, it is just enough different to require some adjustment to my shooting.

Over the past few days I have done two studio shoots using the dish as my main light source, and I am learning what results I can achieve. Yesterday's post of Julie was captured with the dish placed 3' above the camera position and aimed down at the model. A hair light was positioned to the right and behind Julie.

For today's image of new model Richard, I placed the dish at just below the model's shoulder height and to the right of the camera. The reasoning for the placement was two-fold, first was to create a little bit of 'sinister drama' in the image (think "flashlight-under-your-chin") and secondly to get the light under the cowboy hat he was wearing.

After my first two shoots with the dish, I like the initial results. I look forward to continuing to learn this modifier and work it into my regular shooting.

Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 70-200 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/5, ISO 100

She Moves in Mysterious Ways

Canon Powershot G11 - 1/125 second, f/5.6, ISO 100