Tag Archive for: light

The best locations and the best light…. are what you do….

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We all know that a good shot consists of good lighting and a great location right?
However that doesn’t mean you have to travel for that great shot, actually the best shots can be right around the corner. The main problem is that we see the locations close to us way to often to actually register as something that could be interesting for a photoshoot. If we would see them just once they might seem much more interesting than they do in every day life.

 

When we changed locations for our studio I clearly told everyone that the area behind the studio (out of sight) could not be changed and I wanted to let “nature” just run it’s course, if we have something old and “rustic” we don’t throw it out, we store it there and just place it somewhere where we can use it as a location to shoot, we even have a sea container there to use.

 

The next shots were all done in a very fast outside session with just the sun as light source.
Editing is very minimal with just some tinting and a little bit of MacPhun Intensify.

 

So the next time you are looking for a location… make sure to also check your local area, and house area. And when you own a studio building…. why not make a “mess” outside (as long as people don’t see it from the road). Also remember that the sun will actually be a great light source with great contrast, if it’s a bit too harsh you can always use some diffusion material between the model and the sun, but in all honestly I often just shoot it as is, I just love those hard shadows and popping colors.

 

Model/Styling : Nadine

Nadine Juni 12 buiten 2015 0010

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Digital classroom EP1 (the test)

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Last week saw the release of a new series in our educational program.
I’ve done a lot of workshop and webinars and both are 100% different, a workshop is a real 1:1 experience (we always work with small groups), a webinar is more a “watch and learn” experience.

 

For a long time I wanted to do something in between and never had the chance to do it, setting this up costs a lot of money as you can imagine (different camera angles, assistants, fast internet etc) but thanks to our friends at BenQ, Rogue and of course Elinchrom we finally were able to pull it off.

 

We dubbed it the “try out episode” but as far as we could see everything went very smoothly and what we ended up doing was a 3 hour intense instructional video with interaction from you guys.

 

We did not promote it a lot because we didn’t want a lot of people online if it would go wrong 😀 but… don’t worry we recorded it and you see it via this blogpost (or on our YouTube channel of course).

 

Please feel free to share the link, watch it and comment on it here or on YouTube, the idea is to do these kind of sessions 10x a year and normally they will have a topic just like the workshops, so except some smoke, movement, masks, location work etc.

 

Is it the same as a workshop?
No of course not 😀
A workshop is much more intense and has way more interaction, but I think we bridged the gap between a webinar and a small group workshop.

 

Is it the same as your instructional videos?
No of course not 😀
The instructional videos and the KelbyOne videos I do are much more in depth and will have totally different topics. The idea of the digital classroom is to show you guys how we work, what we do to complete a photoshoot and you can interact and ask questions, it’s not meant to replace the instructional videos or our other videos like on KelbyOne, if this gives you the hunger for more…. there are actually those options… book a workshop or watch/buy the instructional videos.

Enjoy.

Many thanks to our friends at BenQ, Rogue and Elinchrom to make this possible.

Finding angles… maximizing the scene

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During workshops I always teach the attendees to maximize the scene by using different angles.
In this example, which was shot during the workshop in Castle Dussen, I walked around the model to get different angles from the set, different lighting effects, and even used the lens flare from the sun coming through the window to create totally different looks from the same set within seconds.

 

It’s a very simple technique that can really benefit you in situations where you are pressed for time and need to deliver a lot of different looks to your clients. But of course you should not only do it in those situations but always try to maximize your scene, and seeing the fact that’s it’s very easy to do…… don’t forget to do it 😀

 

By moving around you are not only creating different lighting effects (I always call this contrast control) but you are also showing different angles from your set/location, so do be careful that what you include in the shot should be there, if you see some cables it’s better to remove them before you take the shot than later in Photoshop.

 

Here are my samples.
Model : Nadine
MUA : Christa

 

 

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Between two walls and different lights

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In these shots you can see our model Anna Matthea between two walls……. you say what?

 

In our studio we use different kind of backgrounds, mostly the studio walls are painted in special structures and colors to function as backgrounds, but we also have several “movable” walls. In this shot we used two of these walls in a very steep angle and let Anna Matthea pose between them.

 

Lighting setup was very simple…. just a single 100W lightbulb, nothing more.

Anna Matthea February 14 2015 0366

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