My Very 1st Shoot

People ask me often how I got into fashion photography. It's funny as don't you suddenly wake up one morning and say, "Hey! I want to shoot beautiful models"

Like all things the beginnings were mundane, some would say even boring.

In May/June of 2003 I decided I wanted to go on a trip of a lifetime and fly 1st class around the world with the 100's of FF points I had built up. To mark this event I spent way too much money on my 1st DSLR, a Canon 10D with 28-135mm lens

That trip and about a 6000 photos later got me hooked on photography.

Fast Forward 4 years and in 2007, a friend of mine Danielle suggested I do a 4 hour workshop on fashion photography. Being inside a photography studio was a surreal experience and I didn't realize just how hard it was to take great photos of beautiful women.

Monoblocks, light meters, scrims, F stop this and ISO that made no sense to me at all. But it did give me a new calling and started my journey of shooting living objects

Oh and what was my 1st photo? Well see for yourself

Austin Powers Never Had It So Good

When I 1st started in model photography around 3-4 years ago I had experimented with the idea of using a projector to be the main light source.

Needless to say the result from an inexperienced photographer, compounded with a projector that would struggle to work in a pitch black room lead to less than ideal results

I wont post up that image but suffice to say it was not one of my finest moments

A thread on POTN made me revisit this idea and the thought of a stunning model with an interesting background and too much spare time lead to this interesting 70's inspired shot

Do you love it? Hate it? I'd be interested in your thoughts

Shooting with a single light

I am a regular reader of all sorts of photography forums such a dpreview, photo.net, POTN (even though I shoot with Nikon) and many others

One of the topics that gets mentioned often is "how many lights do i need to take a good studio shot". I've seen some of the most amazing setups for photos with 8-12 monoblocks, snoots, beauty dishes, etc etc and I think it only serves to turn off people from taking up photography

So how about we try a shoot in the studio with just one light source?

So a call to a model friend Esther, my office chair, a roll of black seamless and one 600W flashhead attached to a medium softbox and we get the image above.

Clean, simple and shot with equipment any GWC could muster up

As yes I know the Cigar wasn't lit. Zippo was out of gas :(

RetroGamer

RetroGamer is a UK based magazine that looks at old video games and computers from past.

The 1st edition was released back in 2004 and 80 odd issues later I am pleased to say that I would be one of the few people worldwide with a complete set of this magazine

Not that it will help me in in the slightest in getting laid....

During a shoot a couple of months ago one of my models Brooke was standing around waiting for me to setup lights for a set shot. As I looked up she was standing in front of my bookcase and the juxtaposition of Beauty and Geek screamed "shoot me!"

Using pretty much just natural light coming from the big bedroom window directly behind the camera. This setup is now one of the most requested shots for models that I work with

Note the Buzz Lightyear, Assassins Creed and if you look very closely, Mr Potatohead etc on the bottom between her legs

ps. And the Star Trek novels on the right and the Harry Potter books on the top left

The Girl With The 16" Waist

A few weeks ago I met a model online who had just put a portfolio up on oz-model.com

Natasha's most striking features are her amazing colored hair and fantastic eyes that mesmerize people when she looks at you. Though new to modeling, her attitude and willingness to learn is refreshing.

For this shoot she had mentioned that she collects corsets and one in particular stood out which was a green colored one that can be tied down to 16 inches

Nothing much more to say other than I plan to have Natasha back for followup shoots which will take advantage of her unique looks

A stunning model

Sweet like chocolate - You bring me so much joy

I just realized that there is no easy way to backdate the times of my posts to better reflect the dates on which my shoots occurred.

So people reading this blog (yes I think there is at least one of you besides my buddies) will get a distorted view of my shooting patterns.

Anyway onto the shoot.

Inspired by an episode of Britain's Next Top Model (Cycle 6) this shoot involved chocolate sauce being poured over the model


This seems easier than what it turned out to be as finding sauce that was liquid enough to pour and remain on the model as well as be the right color wasn't that simple a task. In the end I resorted to mixing 2 parts Coles Chocolate Sauce with 1 part Coles Thickened Cream to get the desired consistency and color.

This was a one off shoot. As it destroyed my white seamless.

The effect was quite nice however

Thinking on your feet

My brief was to shoot a model in her hotel room last week while she was in town visiting friends from interstate.

A simple enough task but two factors came into play that made the shoot way harder that what it should have been

Doing a shoot during Grand final weekend in Melbourne means that your choice of hotel rooms are restricted. Generally I would like 5 star hotels as the furnishings are generally nicer and you have more spots in the room to take nicely framed images.

Bed, couch, chaise lounge etc

For this hotel room, my only real option was to shoot on the bed

For lighting my plan was to shoot with a couple of shoot through umbrellas powered by my SB-900's. However I managed to leave them in the studio!

Looking around the room I noticed a balcony and curtains about 3 metres from the bed. This was one of those Eureka moments where you crave for in moments like this.

I ended up setting one SB-900 out on the Balcony and fired it back into the room through the white curtains.

Bang, one huge makeshift diffuser!

Lucky for me I did remember to pack the light meter so a couple of measurements to adjust for ambient lights in the room we have the final image

Job done!