Playground
I was hired by a company called RecWest to shoot some images of a playground they had just installed, at Oxnard Beach Park in the city of Oxnard. Originally they had envisioned hiring a lift truck to get me up high, so I could shoot the entire playground from above. However as we planned for the shoot, it became apparent that the city was going to ask too much in terms of permits and insurance. It quickly became impractical to use heavy machinery. The company was about to give up and cancel the shoot, when I hit upon an idea. Ever the DIY guy, I remembered reading about “pole-cams”…stick your camera on a pole and shoot from on high. Sure you can buy or rent super fancy versions of these, but that would have been as bad as the lift truck. So instead I set about making my own pole-cam based on this DIY version (link).
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Sunset, California Style
For awhile now I’ve known that sunset photographs are a dime a dozen. Heck, the sun sets just about every day around these parts. Sunsets are wonderful to experience in person. But to make a really good photograph, you need to put people in front of them.
Last weekend was a great opportunity for just that! I had taken this family’s Christmas portraits last year around this time, and we had a similar experience. Perhaps they’re lucky? This family didn’t bring their two australian shepherds this time, but that’s ok. Nice dogs…convinced me to get one of my own in fact! It’s great when wonderful people, nice light, and the right timing come together. And that’s what we had!
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Small-Strobe Lighting Seminar
Well I’m no David Hobby, but a couple of weekends ago I conducted a small-strobe off-camera lighting seminar for a professional organization I belong to, Channel Islands Professional Photographers Association (CIPPA). I had originally planned to conduct it in a city park, so that I could demonstrate the use of ambient sunlight and balancing flash. But it rained that weekend, so at the last minute we moved it to the Mystique Studio. Thanks Leanne and Brenda for letting us use your space! I don’t remember the exact number, but we had roughly 10–12 attendees.
We also had two models help us out for the seminar. Cassie and Laura were very gracious and professional, even though there was a fair amount of sitting around while I talked. Much thanks to them as well!
All of the shooting was done with one or two lights. I started out with a single hard light (below). Hard light like this gives a very 40’s movie-star portrait look.
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Four Girls at Home
Last week was a busy week! Three shoots in three days, and I also taught a lighting seminar. I’ve been working nonstop to get everyone’s images ready, and then it’s back to more shoots starting tomorrow. It is that time of year after all, and it’s exhausting…but a lot of fun. Last Thursday I had the distinct pleasure of photographing four very charming little girls (and their mother) in their backyard.
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Goodbye Darkroom.
Shot in Carpinteria, CA.
Oh this is sad.
My wife insisted we clean out the laundry room. Why is that sad? Well it’s a really big laundry room, and it has also functioned as my darkroom for the past few years. Except, well…the darkroom hasn’t gone dark very often lately. Maybe once in the last year have I actually done any ‘old school’ photographic printing, or even ‘older school’ alternative printing such as kallitypes.
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Model Portfolio: Guerrilla Style!
Things come together sometimes in ways you can’t predict ahead of time. I had read and/or seen videos of a few photographers shooting ‘guerrilla style’ (Mentioned on the David Hobby’s ‘Strobist’ site here and Bert Stefani’s blog video here), which is just a fancy way of saying that you’re traveling light, finding locations as you go, and seeing what you can come up with on the spot. Jazz improvisation for photography, basically. Meanwhile, I’ve really enjoyed the commercial shoots I’ve done recently (here and here), and wanted to do more. So I finally decided it was time to actively pursue it. I sent out some inquiries to local models on modelmayhem.com, and Sharylyn responded and liked the idea. And here are some of the results of our adventure in downtown Ventura, CA.
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Film! Square! Medium!
It’s been awhile since I developed my own black and white film in the laundry room. I used to do it a lot more when photography was just a hobby (albeit all-consuming). But since I’ve been a professional portrait photographer, well…the fun little things like film development just fall by the wayside. I’ll usually shoot a little color film on a client shoot, but it gets developed by the lab. So I finally got around to developing some rolls I’ve had sitting for a few months.
It’s not the developing of the film that takes up so much time.
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The Kindness of Strangers
People give me things. For free. Mostly camera-related stuff.
I’m not sure why this is.
Early this week, I went to the local craft-supply store to get some picture-hanging stuff. I almost went to the other one in town, but I’m glad I didn’t!
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Six at Sunset
Sunset is one of those mysterious things in life. It happens every day, and yet—when the sky is clear—it’s magical every time.
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Tutorial: ‘Degrunge’ Skin Retouching
While I’m sure all of you would prefer to look at a beautiful model for this tutorial, you’re going to have to put up with my ugly mug again. After all, none of my clients need skin retouching. 
But I certainly could use a little.
This is a skin retouching technique called “degrunge”. I think I first read about it on retouchpro.com, and am elaborating on that technique. I did not invent this, but this is how I use it.
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