Collaboration with Jaclynn Kate for a fashion shoot

         Back in March I had the chance to collaborate with Jackie Barry, an amazing make up and hair stylist, which is the owner of "Jaclynn Kate Hair & Makeup Artistry".  She had and idea of doing a very creative shoot with wild hear and make up and at a grungy fort with a ton of graffiti.  I really like what she had in mind so I told her "Get the models and lets shoot this thing!".

        While outside, I really wanted the models to not get lost in the location and stand out from the overwhelming amount of graffiti.  So I used my 24mm-105mm Canon L lens at 105mm to make the background soft and get the separation I wanted.  I also crated separation with color by placing a full CTO gel and a half CTO gel on the beauty dish I was using and setting the color balance to tungsten.  This made the color of the light on the models warm and the light on everything behind them blue, which made them stand out even more.

        Since it was March, it was really, really, I mean REALLY cold out so we head inside.  Inside I wanted to use a light with just a reflector to blast light through doors to crate direction of light and a bar-bulb light pointing at the ceiling as fill.  Then I placed the models in front of the shadow area of the wall behind them so the light and dark contrast would make them stand out in the scene.
 
       I'm happy with what we ended up with and I hope you enjoy the images too.  You can also read my buddy and assistant for the day, Rob's account of the shoot at his blog.

New gear test shoot(small strobes)

     Last week I ordered some new equipment from Midwest Photo Exchange and you all know as soon as it came in the mail I just had to play with my new toys.  I ordered a LumoPro Umbrella Swivel,  LumoPro Studio Clamp w/ Double Stud, and Cactus V4 Radio Slave Set.  I got all this equipment to use with my  Canon 580EX II Speedlites so I would have a smaller and lighter strobe kit to use when I'm just walking around the city or out with friends.  

    I went into my grandmothers room and set up my speedlite with a 1/2 CTO gel on the door with the clamp and umbrella swivel and pointed it toward my grandmother's face.  My grandmother has a lamp on her night stand I wanted to simulate that light with the angle the light was pointing at her from and the warmth of the gel. At the end of the post is a shot of the setup.

    I liked the look but I wanted to make the image more moody, more dramtic.  So I taped a Profoto 5° Grid on the speedlite to spot the light on to her face.
  

    I was losing to much of the detail in the shadows and to fix that I added another speedlite on camra as a fill light.  I also added another 1/2 CTO gel on the speelite on the door and set the color balance on my camra to tungsten.  This makes the light on the door have the warmth I want and the fill light turn blue, this simulate a lamp lighting her face and a tv filling in the rest of the room with light.

Set up