Tag Archive for: creative

Using some simple props to make it work

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Sometimes the most simple solutions can be actually the best, well at least make a shoot a lot more interesting. During the workshop with Anna Matthea we were working with this snakeskin background and I wanted to make it a bit more interesting. Because we are building some sets we had these baseboards laying around so I thought it would be nice to use them as leading lines in this shot.

 

The connection to the background was very simple, use some ductape (I still agree that if all ductape in the world would disappear the world would collapse).

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I used one gridded strobe on the model from the left (image left) and one red gelled strobe from the right (image right), by including the strobe in the image I got a little bit of lens flare which I loved. Because I balanced my color (manually) around a middle point between red and neutral I got this beautiful blue hue in the skin of the model.

 

To make the shot more interesting I choose a lower angle to shoot from and let the model move her hair around to create some extra “slam” to the image.
As one of the students found out, it indeed looks a bit like an 80’s rock album cover.
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The bigger fight

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TIP:
yesterday I heard a very good motto:
“It’s not how big the man is in a fight, it’s how big the fight is inside the man”

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This is without a doubt a motto for almost everything but especially photography, often I hear people say “I can never do that”, or “I don’t have the gear for that”, but most of all “You shoot everything correct, I don’t”

 
Well let me first make a confession…. I shoot just as much junk as all of you, only I probably don’t show it, for me photography is a matter of going on till I get the shot.

 
Yesterday we did a session in Emmeloord I call “Fashion in Emmeloord” well ok not very creative, the model was surprised we were done in 10 minutes per locations, I told her very simply that if I get the shot I’m after I will continue for a few frames and then try a different angle or composition and continue to the next, there is no need to push through. I will use a maximum of 1-2 shots per location for my own portfolio so why shoot 10 killer shots while I can switch location.

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Building a solid foundation

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This weekend we had a nice discussion during one of the workshops about being creative and using all the tools like light meters and color checkers.

 

Somehow a lot of people now a days are only trusting their instant polaroid on the back on the camera, we have grown to know as the LCD display. This LCD display indeed shows you an image, and a histogram and of course shows you were the image clips in the blacks and whites, so what more would one need ? Well as mentioned some times before on this blog the histogram is highly inaccurate because it’s based on the JPEG tumbnail that is part of each RAW, but it’s also based on the settings like contrast and brightness which have no influence of the RAW files. Same goes for the color temperature. As explained in a previous blog post the use of the light meter is of vital importance to get the “diffused value” correct, or in more simple terms, make sure the “brightness/skin tone” of your model to be correct time after time and under different situations.
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