Saturday, March 12, 2022
Call off the search, I’m alive and well. I realize that other than my recent Behind the Camera nearly two weeks ago, I have been radio silent for the most part during the last month or so. There have been a number of reasons that I haven’t been out much, some of which I can control, and others are far out of my control. Probably the biggest hurdle to get over would be having the time to do so. You see, I’ve been pretty busy behind the scenes over the last several weeks. I’ve had a workshop that I’ve done for the Wilkes Art Gallery that took some planning and then filled most of a Saturday for me. I’ve done some mentorship activities including quite a bit of email correspondence and a one-on-one session here at the studio. I’ve also been speaking with Hampton House Art and Framing about some future projects that they are doing which required me to put together a few tear sheets of my work to give to designers. That just left very little time to get out and do pictures for my own portfolio.
You may also be aware of the tragedy that has befallen Europe which we are watching unfold each day in the Ukraine. War is terrible and horrific, and my heart goes out to the Ukrainians as they fight for their country. Of course, the fallout from that war is being felt across the globe in many different ways. Here in the US, the gas prices have spiked beyond what inflation has dictated for so long now. With gas over $4.10/gal now, I’ve been hesitant to go out and just drive which is instrumental to my photography, especially with the rural subjects. I kind of skated around that problem by spending a day hiking at Stone Mountain at the end of February which I considered more of a scouting mission for an upcoming workshop. That workshop is just over a month away and had been sold out, but there are now two openings available due to scheduling conflicts with a couple of the participants. If you are interested in attending this workshop, please consider signing up for it as I don’t know how much longer the openings will last.
A couple of weeks ago I also did my first product shoot here in the studio. Since I don’t have the permission to share these images, I won’t be adding any examples of what I shot for that session. I will say that it was a total of 15 pieces that included ties, bowties, and pocket squares. You might think that was a pretty easy set of subjects to photograph, but I had the added difficulty to reverse engineer the lighting from the existing pieces on their website so that the new items would match the look. Not only did I have to work with the lighting, I had to get the items positioned in such a way that they fit in well with the entire group of products. It took me a little while to figure out, but I ended up using two studio flashes with gridded strip boxes. The product was placed on a white V-flat that I used for the table. For proper framing, I used the 70-200mm lens at between 85-135mm depending on the subject. It took me about two hours to get the 15 items photographed, and another two and a half to get the edits done. I was very happy with how they all turned out though. Guess I can add product photography to my list of skills now.
In addition to being busy and trying to avoid driving for the sake of driving, I was also approached for another headshot session by a local poet by the name of Dave Russo. I don’t normally make a habit of doing blog posts about my portraiture, but I figured that I would go ahead and mention Dave’s here since he as aspirations of becoming a published writer in the near future. I want to get my name in the hat of having known him before he was famous. It was also a unique session that I wanted to mention a few things about. First of all, this was one of those sessions that went so smoothly that it almost seemed too easy. What I mean was that when Dave contacted me, he already had examples of the types of photos that he was interested in getting. He knew what he needed them for, and was already leaning towards an outside location shoot. By the time I started talking with him to get the particulars, I already had a great understanding of what he was after. I was sold when I learned that he did Haiku poetry with a Wabi Sabi tone. Yep, this was meant to be and he was speaking my language.
To make a long story short, we decided on doing the session at the old train depot in North Wilkesboro because it would have the earth tones to represent the nature end of his work, and it would also have the aged textures to fall into the Wabi Sabi aspects as well. We talked about clothing choices to make sure that the color palette was right and he even sent me pictures of himself so that I could already get to work determining his best side and how I wanted to photograph him. I sent him a mood board which he signed off on, and we had a date set for the session. The session lasted right at an hour and I had about a dozen locations around the depot utilized in that time. I got the chance to use a new lens for the first time which was purchased specifically for these outside portrait shoots. The 85mm f/1.4L is one of my favorite focal lengths when it comes to people photography and it gives me the opportunity to really blur out the background when needed. I had thought about holding off on the purchase until such time as I upgraded to a mirrorless system, but the price point between the lens and a new camera system forced my hand. I’m glad that I have this lens and it works very well with my existing camera, not to mention cost me a fifth of what I was looking at spending to get a basic kit for a Canon R5. I’ll have to do a lot more portrait work before I can afford to make that move and except for the eye AF feature, I’m really not missing out on anything compared to my workhorse 5DS R. There comes a time when you must upgrade, but you should never rush that path until you have a specific need that is not being satisfied by your existing gear.
I ended up with a total of seven images for Dave which I liked for him to choose from. Normally, when approached for a headshot, it is a one and done kind of thing. Even looking at the back of the camera, he was feeling like there would be more than one that he was going to want from the session. He was right, and he ended up selecting four different headshots which he purchased licenses for. It was easily the best portrait shoot I had done to date, and it represented a lot of personal and creative growth for me. I was so thrilled at the outcome I asked Dave about signing a model release so that I could share the photos. He was gracious enough to give the ok and I was able to add a few more portfolio images to my portraiture page. I spent some time updating that page yesterday as a matter of fact with some new examples added in. I’ve also adjusted some of the narrative as I am getting a little more comfortable with how the portraits are actually going.
I would have never guessed in a million years that I would be enjoying people photography as much as I am right now. It might be that this is still new to me, but I think I’ve gotten to that stage in my life where I understand people better than I used to. I’m also much more comfortable with my photography in general, so I can spend more time focusing on the subject while the technical aspects just take care of themselves. I don’t know where this will lead to, but I’m excited for my next portrait session and hope that it is a creative one where I get to do more than just snap a quick picture. It might not look like it, but the session with Dave was very creative from the colors used down to the setting. I wanted it all to work for his particular story, and that is where I really get to have fun with photography. If you are ready for your portrait session, let’s start talking about our options and get some creative ideas flowing!
Obviously, this blog entry isn’t about product photography, or even portraiture, but I felt that it deserved a little blurb about what has been going on lately, so you didn’t think that I was losing interest in photography again. It has happened in the past where I just drifted away from it. In one occurrence I actually sold all of my gear and put it all behind me. Of course, I ended up replacing all of the sold gear a couple of years later which was rather expensive, so I don’t recommend doing what I did there. No, I haven’t lost my interest in photography. Quite the opposite has happened actually. I’m finding myself in a situation where I’m loving more and more types of photography which makes me want to experiment with those different styles. I’m finding myself particularly interested in studio work where I have more control over the environment. On a day like today, that comes in really helpful. The winds have been howling all day long and the temperature has been at or below freezing all day. With Spring fever in the air, that is just not the kind of weather that I want to be out in.
I was wanting to get the camera out and play around a bit, so I figured that I could spend some time in the studio doing something creative. I had been talking about doing smoke photography recently and realized that it had been a while since I had done any of that. In fact, the last time I had messed with it, I was still in the infancy of my studio gear. I was using a speedlite and a homemade flag against a black blanket. It worked out really well, but I wanted to try it with some more dedicated gear to see how that would change things. I had a dedicated black backdrop now and honest grids to keep the light focused where I wanted it. I also had a much more capable lighting system which I was excited to use again.
The basic setup was the same as I had done before with the cone incense sitting on a candle lid which was placed on a posing table as opposed to a TV tray. Having the extra height was a nice feature using the posing table because I was able to get the whole scene up to eye level. Hey, I’m getting old, and these are real concerns for me these days. I still set the camera up on the tripod and used the 24-70mm lens which is the closest to a macro lens that I have. The black background was held up by a stand with a clamp at the top which was a lot more secure than the blanket that I had used before. The flash was the biggest change as I used the Indra 500LC for the lighting this time which was mounted to a boom stand. To control the light spill, I used a Westcott reflector with a 20 degree grid attached. The light was triggered with my Canon trigger.
Once I had everything set up and got things focused on the plane where the smoke would be traveling, I placed an incense cone on the table and lit it. Right after I started the burn, the heat came on and I could see that it was going to disrupt the smoke too much, so I ran upstairs and turned it off. When I came back down things were looking much better. I started to disrupt the smoke with gentle waves of my hand or shaking of the table. That caused the designs to appear in the smoke which was what I was looking to photograph. After about three shots, the cooling fan came on in the Indra 500LC which I didn’t think anything about. However, as it continued to stay on, I could see that the smoke was wafting to the left where the flash was stationed. That cooling fan was pulling air from the front of the flash which I hadn’t considered. It was pulling the smoke closer to the flash. I didn’t’ have enough time on the incense to swap out to a speedlite again, so I had to make due with what I had going on. It was a good learning experience that an actual speedlite is the better choice for this type of photography since there are no cooling fans involved. I do have a Bowens bracket for the speedlite so I can still attach the reflector with the grids for future attempts at this. It is all just a learning experience and I’m happy to learn what works and what doesn’t.
I ended up with just under 60 frames in the 20 minutes or so that the incense burned. This one seemed to go quicker than the one last time, but it was still enough time to get several examples that I wanted to work with in Lightroom. I had recalled the last time that I had started working dual colors for these images and I really liked the effect. It isn’t difficult to do as it is just a matter of doing linear gradients and adjusting the hue in that area. It is really nice to be able to mix those linear gradients with luminance filters to just adjust the smoke and not the background. This made things so much easier to work with in post. I didn’t have a specific formula in mind for these photos, I just did what felt right for each of them. In the end, I found four that I liked enough to really pursue through the edit process and share here.
I wish I hadn’t had the issue with the cooling fan on these as I think that really limited the number of keepers that I had and made it difficult to get good forms. However, the ones that I got still had unique qualities that I liked. I also opted to not go with the inverse look where I change the background to white and leave the smoke a vibrant color. For some reason, those are usually my least favorite images and I’ve found here recently that I much prefer shooting low key images in the studio. I guess I just like the clean look of the black background when it comes to colorful images. I think using high key is better for softer colors for a dreamier look. At least that is my current take on things right now. I would love to delve into that a bit more if I have any volunteers to step into my studio to play around with some concepts.
I’m serious here. If you are interested in having some creative portraiture done, I would love to talk with you. Of course, if you are needing headshots or maybe some senior photos, I would be happy to help with those as well. I’m still learning what I like to photograph when it comes to people so I’m open to just about anything except for weddings. I don’t want to do weddings on any level at all. All you have to do is contact me so we can talk about your vision and see if that is something that I can do.
I hope you enjoyed what really wasn’t a trek but was still some new photos. Hopefully the gas situation will get under control soon so I can start getting back out and exploring again. I’m still really enjoying the waterfalls and I have a couple more that I’m looking to visit in the near future before things get hot again. I’ll also be getting back into my landscape photography as the vegetation comes back to life again. I had hoped to visit the beach this Spring, but that is looking like it won’t happen. Maybe in the Fall it will be a little more cost effective to drive that far. Who knows, I might be booked with portrait clients by then and not have the time to do much traveling. I doubt that will happen, but I suppose it could. I would be happy as a lark if I could do one client shoot a week though. I think that would be just about perfect and would allow me time to do my own portfolio work as well.
Let’s see what happens, until next time….
