My blog, although I don’t see myself as a blogger but as a Photographer I will try to blog some interesting material during the weeks.
Expect at least 2 updates a week.

Stripdagen

/in /by

As you all know besides being a photographer I have a passion for guitars… and comics.
Now for people that are not familiar with strips, let me explain very quickly.

Strips are not comics, but also … well they are.
The format is different and comes close to trade paperbacks, but the “feeling” is different.
Most strips I grew up with were Donald Duck, De Generaal, OB Bommel, Kuifje, Suske en Wiske, Garfield, Lucky Luke etc. etc. there are a lot. Most strips are app 49-50 pages and are in a semi hard cover (flexibel, not like a comic, more like a trade paperback).

Now my personal favourites from my youth were Storm and Trigie, Both were awesome for their artwork but also for the insanely well written stories.

For the real difference between strips and comics is very hard to explain, expect for the size. Although most people think when they hear comics about Batman, Superman etc. my personal favourites are actually EC comics, which comes very close to strips because they contain several short stories and are not just aimed at super heroes. And comics can also be filled with Donald Duck, Garfield etc. And let’s be honest in the end it doesn’t really matter right?

Now that we have that out of the way, let’s show some images I shot during my visit at the stripdagen.
Normally I would probably not visit shows like this (books are way too expensive) but in this case I was there for our friends from Reboot Comics and Felisa (our model) to help with some interviews.

And let’s start with this.
Part of the interviews was shot in an empty room and I was sitting on the side, taking care of video and audio and I just couldn’t help but notice this amazing light. So after the interview I asked him to stay there to take a photo. His first response was “why….?” till he saw the shot…. sometimes you just have to be ready 😀

This is Willem Vleeschouwer.

And yes when you squeeze your eyes together he does resemble our friend Joe McNally just a bit.

 

Ok, let’s keep the blogpost a bit shorter and lets just share the images I shot during my time off during the day.
These were just shot for fun, so be gentle 😀

Click on one of the images to open up the gallery.
Enjoy

Bring some Hollywood in your images

/in , , /by

Sometimes you come across software that is truly unique.

Most software that you find online are variants of each other, eg Lightroom, Photoshop or they are focused on a specific part of the workflow such as tinting, skin processing, etc. But there is always a variant of a variant to be found. That’s why I was really surprised by BorisFX Optics.

As a big film lover I regularly see light effects of which you as a photographer know that it is as fake as can be… but oh how beautiful it is in the context of the film, think of the beautiful glow around street lighting in the fog on a warm summer evening, realize that there was no fog at all but it was added through special effects….

When we think of special effects we often think of space ships, talking mice, etc. but what we often don’t think about is that special effects are also used to add fog, glow, lens flares, smoke, etc. to a scene to increase the atmosphere. in a movie, and it’s just often easier to add it later than to fog up an entire street perfectly.

But also fire and particles are part of special effects, just think of a scene where someone walks into a burning house, all those small fire particles of burning paper/material… huge chance that these are all special effects.

The software that is used a lot for this could be labeled as the big brother of BorisFX Optics. And this is also very clear by the huge amount of options and very realistic looks.

There is a lot of software where you can work with overlays for smoke, for example, but I have never seen software where you can literally let the smoke pass by like a movie via a multitude of sliders and choose EXACTLY where you want the smoke, and even then you can still change a staggering amount of things building the perfect smoke. And believe it or not but almost every effect you choose has a similar slider choice, if you don’t get the desired effect with this I wouldn’t know what to do.

Anyway, isn’t this “cheating”?
Yes and no.
What I personally have trouble with is when people make no effort at all for correct lighting or styling and then try to make a photo interesting through all kinds of filters, and although sometimes you can get some very nice results, it is a completely different result if what I have in mind when I shoot a scene.

Of course you can always say that if it is not caught by the camera, it is not real… but…. then I wonder how do you see a black mist filter, which makes a lens flare clearly stronger?

And that’s basically how I see BorisFX Optics too.
I’m still trying to get the photo 100% correct in the camera, I build the whole set, put the lighting in the right places, use smoke etc. etc. But after the shoot I use BorisFX Optics to turn everything “on”, the lens flare is already in the photo, but in the retouch process you can enhance it with eg BorisFX Optics and really give it your look and feel. The same applies to turning on a spot just a little bit extra, it is there, but you make it just a bit clearer, or enhance the glow of an old tube amp…  I personally have no problem with that at all.

And let’s be honest, in the end we still made the photo ourselves and went through the entire process in the software and that is a completely creative process, only instead of just colors we now also add atmosphere in a photo which otherwise would not have been possible, and this makes it possible for me as a film enthusiast to give photos a much more film look.

In the coming months I will make several videos about BorisFX Optics, you can find them on our YouTube channel and of course from this site.

► Get 20% off Boris FX Optics via https://bit.ly/3zpQLzZ and use coupon code: doorhof-optics22

Adding loads of mood with light in light

/in , /by

Claudia against the “graffiti door” from #clickpropsbackdrops

I shot this with the new magnetic #rogue system on Nissin speedlights.
The system is designed for the popular round strobes, but it can also be used on most speedlights via a special adapter, which is available in both standard and small to fit 99% of the speedlights out there.

See www.rogueflash.nl for more information.

I quite like the harder shadows that a spot gives on the model, but this also means that the shadows can be quite dark/intense. By using a fill-in with, for example, a blue gel, you can give the scene just that little bit of extra spice and mood. The Rogue Dome is ideal for this because it spreads the light very nicely, vary the output of the fill in strobes to get the desired effect is the only thing you have to do.

And it doesn’t stop there, you can even place the dome behind the model and then point it at the camera for a cool lens flare effect.

If you work with round strobes or speedlights, the magnetic system from Rogue is definitely highly recommended.
In combination with the flashbender, I wouldn’t know what else you would be needing on location or in the studio, and it all fits easily in your camera bag, even if it is almost full.

If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask
Or check out our YouTube channel with loads of lighting examples.

Backup the easy way

/in , /by

Everyones nightmare is data loss.

With digital data, this almost always mean your work is gone, or when you can get it back it’s a dreadful task to rename everything and find out what’s what.

So the best way is to prevent it ever happens.
And the biggest problem is that people often always think making the backup tomorrow is also ok, but tomorrow is never today, so often backups are never really created the right way especially when on location/vacation.

So the workflow has to be as easy as possible, and that’s why I made this video about the Transcend drive, via a simple button push it will automatically start making an incremental backup, it’s easy as 1,2 done… Make sure you don’t experience data loss, make your workflow as easy as possible.