Tag Archive for: models

The change that a strobe can make

During the location workshops one of the things I always show is the difference between natural light and strobe.
Normally people think that the natural light shots will be much less interesting than the strobe ones, however the end result mostly surprises people.
in this blog post two examples of natural light shots followed by the strobe ones.

 

Enka workshops Augustus 20 2014    274

Enka workshops Augustus 20 2014    280

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Duo shoots

I always say :
“shooting one person is easy”
“shooting two people is terribly difficult”
“shooting three people is easier”
“shooting four people can be a disaster”
“shooting more get’s easier”

 

Now why is that?
When I shoot 2 people you very quickly get into the “boyfriend/girlfriend” kind of posing, now it’s not bad… but sometimes I think it’s just a bit “boring” and I want something more. When shooting three you can actually build something with balance, but with four I always feel like it’s easy to create two groups of two… Most of the times it will go ok but I always find that I love to work with three or five and more people if I do groups.

 

Now when shooting a duo shoot it always wise to plan ahead.
Let’s say you want a cool duo shoot in your portfolio but you don’t want that “boyfriend/girlfriend” kind of shoot, a good tip can be to shoot dancers, they are often way more flexible than the average run of the mill person, although I’m pretty flexible I have seen these two do things…. well it hurts me when I think about it. The fun part about shooting with dancers is that they are often very creative with poses, and they will actually pretty well interact with each other.

 

The following shots were taken during a workshop motion last week and feature models : Marvin and Sharda.
I also included some images you’ve already seen, just to give you and idea of the other crazy duo stuff we did, but I shared that during another blogpost about these two.

 

The idea of the shot was to give the images some “tension” but also a lot of power. I think they pretty much aced it.

Marvin en Sharda Maart 12 2014 (46 of 69)-Edit

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Dancers

If I had to choose one type of shoots I really like the most….. for me that would be working with dancers.
Now don’t get me wrong I love shooting celebrities for their character and models for their poses, good looks etc. but when working with dancers it just brings something completely new to the table, action, motion but most of all power and passion.

 

All the dancers I’ve worked with so far are passionate about what they do, when you ask them to jump they don’t say “but will I look good” but they just jump and give you the best performance they can, if you want a jump to look about the same twice… no problem (for most), but most of all…. most dancers (or performing artists) will also bring you creativity, they will not just jump but they will help you as a photographer to tell a story.

 

Photography is acting on a 1/5000 of a second, freezing an unique moment in time that will never come back the same way and with dancers this is all maximized in one shoot. So when I was looking for “models” for a 2 day 1:1 workshop with the theme motion, my first idea was of course “dancers”. Thanks to the power of social media I got into contact with this duo, Marvin and Sharda, two amazingly talented people and very enthusiastic. Today some of the images from that workshop.

 

Marvin en Sharda Maart 12 2014 (39 of 69)-Edit

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Posing models….

One of the questions that get asked a lot is about posing models, this seems to be the most difficult part in a photoshoot. And I know it can be very difficult especially when you are starting out with photography. It’s not everyday you get a beautiful model in front of your camera and you have to think about your camera, light, posing and of course how the image will look in the end… and that’s the first thing you have to realize…..

 

The less you have to think about other things than working with your model, the easier it will be to get good poses from your model.
So first make sure you know how you are gonna set your lights, know which theme you want to work on with your model, in fact this can all be done before the shoot, but most of all make sure that you know your gear, nothing is more “mood killing” for a shoot than a photographer that doesn’t know what he/she is doing, who is struggling to get the light the way he/she wants it, who doesn’t know how to set the camera etc. etc. these are real mood killers…. so let’s say we mastered all this will it than happen automatically…. well yes and no. Here are some pointers and a step by step plan to get “better” results in your photoshoots.

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