Results castle workshop

Because this was a glamour workshop, some images might be considered not safe for work.

On April 16th 2011 I taught a workshop in Duffel Belgium.
The idea behind the workshop to teach a small group of 12 students to see the options to change the available light to fit the idea you have in your mind. Because I love to teach in different locations than a standard studio the organizer Johnny arranged a nice castle in ruins close to his studio. (Johnny also arranged the El Paso workshops so I knew it would work out fine and there would be some great sandwiches).

We arrived a day early and stayed in a wonderful bed and breakfast called “hier en nu”.
If you are ever staying in that area make sure to book a room or studio with them, it’s a really positive experience. We stay a lot in hotels and although there is nothing wrong with hotels it was so relaxing to be welcomed by the “houselord” offered a nice drink they make themselves and getting told the story about the bed and breakfast. The studio we stayed in was brand new and very comfortable. Also breakfast was amazing with all kinds of home made bread, desert and some special eggs which were prepared in the home kitchen while we were enjoying the amazing bread.
I normally never blog about this but this experience was so positive I just have to 😀
So check them out at http://www.benbhierennu.be/

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The workshop
The location workshops are always different in approach and I try to keep it fresh for people that visit my workshops often. So this time I skipped the powerpoint presentation and decided to start with a combination of theory, FAQ and discussions, and I think I will do that more often because it was a success, the nice thing is that because there is no real guideline I can take more elaborate side steps and add some fun stuff to that part.

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First the studio
After the first part it was time to show a very simple trick with one striplight.
People that know my workshops know this trick. I place a striplight close to the wall aimed towards the model and show the changing quality of light when you move around the model, the fun part about this is that in fact it’s the basis for understanding what light does, and it gives you spectaculair results without too much effort.
This is one of the shots from that setup.

To the castle
After the studio shots it was time for some nice catering (thanks Johnny for the Samami and Smors :D) after which we all drove to the castle. You have to know that I have weak spot for castles and being able to shoot inside one is of course always something that gets the creative fluids going. The theme of the workshop was glamour and as always with me that doesn’t mean nudes….. some people always associate glamour with nudes, but for me glamour is making everything look better, and of course playing with something that fits the scene, and in this case it did involve some lingerie.

We used two models for the workshop and after the scouting of the location (the most important thing) we started inside in a very dark area with one window that let in available light. One more thing about the scouting, I think it’s the most important thing because during the scouting you sometimes find stunning locations you would normally miss, some photographers will start shooting and work their way through a location that way, sometimes to find out that they missed a stunning location and don’t have time left. I normally will first scout the area/building etc. and than make my decision where to shoot first. One could say start at the best location first but that’s wrong. The first location will often not be the best for the model and photographer, so I normally will start at the most simple location first, when I loose those images I don’t really care, after that I will go to my second favorite location, after that the most favorite and I will end with the other locations. I find (for me and most models) the third setup is always the best in performance and creativity. Although I have to add that this is on average.

Explaining E-TTL and measuring
The first setup was choose to show the group first the advantages of measuring the light.
I started out with doing simple shots on AV mode and playing with the exposure compensation until I had something I liked. As it soon was shown this took some time and when I changed my position I could start all over again. The next step is to show some simple measurement tricks and now I could move around my model and keep a constant exposure.

I did like the high contrast look on the model but of course we wanted something more.
So after the natural light shots I added one Canon 430EXII which was operated on E-TTL, as soon as I added the strobe the whole image changed, but not to what I wanted, so the play started from the beginning only now playing with the Flash exposure compensation. The end result needed to be just a little bit of fill in flash but not showing an obvious flash image. After getting the shot the way I wanted it (camera was still on manual of course) I also explained how you could have set this at once by understanding the way exposure works.
In the end we settled for this look.

And I also shot a little in between portrait also with the strobe and natural light.

Going outside
Playing inside is nice, but going outside is often so much more fun.
We had a nice day with bright sun so I was forced to shoot most images outside at f22 to get the result I wanted to show, now a GREAT tip for getting the most out of your batteries is using a modifier like the maxilight from Elinchrom. In this case I used it on the Elinchrom Ranger RX speed and this gives so much light that you won’t even be able to shoot on full power without being able to drop to ISO50 or using ND filters. And because I brought my Canon 5DMKII for this workshop I had to lower the output slightly to keep it at f22. One could argue that f22 gives diffraction, and it does don’t let there be any misunderstanding about this, but to get the effect I was after the only other option would have been using ND filters and in this case I choose to opt for f22 anyway.
The next shot was done with the maxilight with a selfmade grid taped in front of the modifier to steer the light even more.

Adding some smoke and color
For the next shot the idea was to place the model very near to a wall in one of the towers.
Right behind the model we placed a smoke machine (powered by a generator) and on the other side I placed an Elinchrom Quadra on the floor with a magenta gel on the strobe head. The first thing I let the students do is determine the amount of ambient light (yes measuring was again the fastest way), and determining in which ratio the wanted to shoot. In this case I decided (for myself) to make the model darker than she would normally be, so in fact I was lowering the exposure on the model to fit the vision I had with this shot. You know I always tell you to measure correctly and keep the skin tones correct (real life), well even when you don’t want to use that perfect exposure it’s very wise to measure anyway, by measuring you can very quickly, in your head, visualize how to set the camera to get the exposure you want, in this case we did this by changing the shutterspeed because the aperture was locked in for the background effect.
In the end I loved this shot.

The final setup
This has to be one of my favorite setups.
From one side I used the maxilight from Elinchrom on the Elinchrom Ranger RX speed, from the other side (acting as accent light) I placed an Elinchrom Quadra. The two together when placed correctly always create a nice effect on the images. In this case I decided to go for a more close up of our model and create a more intense portrait because of the castle being in the back.

After a workshop
After a workshop it’s always time to answer questions and give some more tips but I think I exhausted the group because there were not much questions :D, and usually that’s the thing I aim for, when you visit a workshop you should be completely drained of energy due to the amount of information you get, and often the questions will start to drip in a few days after the workshop.

From my side I would love to thank Johnny for arranging this workshop and again a wonderful location.
The two models Bo and Martien
The students
And last but actually she should be on top, my wife/assistant/coach etc. Annewiek (which also shot most of the video).

I already posted the video from the workshop, but here it is again.
We also shot some video with the Canon HF11 which will probably be uploaded later in time.

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