Christmas Tree Trimming (with Off-Camera Lighting)
Just a little family-fun posting here, along with some nerdy technical lighting. Yes, that’s right, I bring joy to Christmas by hiding small flash units around the living room. My wife barely gave me a look this time…she’s used to this sort of thing by now. But hey, a little lighting takes even snapshots to a new level. For this impromptu group shot above, I even got the dog to look at the camera. A first!
A high-tech lighting diagram, and more family fun follows. And by the way, this is all out of the strobist handbook. I didn’t invent this. I just have a cuter family.
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Doppelganger
Last week I did a portfolio shoot with a model named Kerry. We shot at Gardens of the World, a place I had shot before for the first time a couple of weeks prior to this. Kerry is also an actress, and loved the idea of constructing a ’story’ for the shoot. It helped that she had an interesting wardrobe too…not one, but three Elizabethan dresses. And her own portable witch’s cauldron. Must be the years of theater…. One of the ideas we had was for a ‘doppelganger‘ shot. Good Sister/Bad Sister. The result is the lead shot above, with two versions of her combined to tell a little story.
Lighting for the above consisted of my Norman 200B in a 45″ shoot through umbrella, camera left. And a Sunpak 333 in a snoot as a hair light, hidden just behind the pillar at extreme camera right. The ‘evil’ version of Kerry was lit only by sunlight.
And then we took some more normal modern-day shots…
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Michael Ripoll (Studio Guitarist)
A few weeks ago I was asked by the music-media company Big Fish Audio to do a photo shoot for one of their upcoming releases. The company makes audio loops and samples that musicians can use in their own productions. Each product is a bit like a record company album release, although the content is more a tool for musicians…not something you’d put on your ipod. I did a shoot for them a few months back, featuring Hip Hop Producer Keith ‘Clizark’ Clark (blog link here).
This time around, the shoot was for an amazing studio guitarist named Michael Ripoll. He had just gotten back from touring in Japan with R&B artist/producer Kenny “Babyface” Edmonds when we did the shoot. He’s also played or recorded on projects with Carrie Underwood, Patti LaBelle, Stevie Wonder, India Arie, Vanessa Williams, Natalie Cole and The Pussycat Dolls, to name a few.
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Conejo Creek Park
This past weekend I had the pleasure of photographing a family of six in Thousand Oaks, CA. The location was Conejo Creek Park. It’s an interesting park…not huge, but it has some great trees, a big duck pond with a fountain, and an artificial stream with rocks and bridges. The actual Conejo Creek is almost an afterthought, hidden in the woods next to the park. I had scouted the location beforehand, as I hadn’t used it before. I’m pleased with the choice the client and I made, and I’d use it again!
The client had advised me that her four kids (including twins, age 2) were “active” and were going to be a challenge. So how’d it turn out?
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