In the Studio with Etienne Similien "Boss Shoot"

This week I had an incredible shoot with an up and coming model named Etienne Similien Model Mayhem Account. I rarely shoot male models but not by choice just because I haven't been contacted by a lot so I was super excited! Etieene had a great personality and was extremely easy to work with. We started out doing some basic head shots for his port. As always I shoot with 1 AlienBee B800 and 2 Neweer 180w strobes. 

I wanted to go into a little about this photo I got with him. Im still in the process of editing several photos but here is the 1st one from many. 

So the Etieene brought this cool vest and and bow tie and some sunglasses and boom immediately "Mafia Boss" came into my mind! Unfortunately I didn't have any cigars so I had him hold a flashlight and figured hey I'll go back in and composite in a cigar. 

So we shot this with the 2 Neweer Lights directly on the side with 1x1 softboxes. I had to take several shots just using the boxes  to make sure the light was where I wanted it to be. 

After several shots where the light was perfect on the sides giving me that edgy look and the middle of his face was completely in shadow I turned on the AlienBee which was above the camera about 8" from his face. I made a custom modifier by taking a 10 degree grid and using gaffer tape and taping it leaving about a 3/4"-1" gap where the light could come through. I like this modifier because it lets just a slit of light come through. 

The next step was to make sure that light wasnt overpowering the side lights. As you can see the reflection in this picture from the modifier. 

You have to keep the modifier close so the light will stay thin. I've learned the farther away it is the wider the light becomes so hes about 8-10 inches from the light which is still rather far.

The final image I decided to use was shot at 80mm with the Canon 6D 24-105mm lens. My setting, as they always are in studio, were ISO 100, F8, 1/160 shutter speed. I never change my setting I only change the output of the lights. The following are the original photo before editing and some behind the scenes photos to show the setup.

As always if you have any questions please contact me at Matt@PhotoDayography.com and visit my website www.PhotoDayography.com.

I will post a followup blog about the retouching on this and a couple other pictures from our shoot.

~Matt~

Light Painting ooo la la

So I'm on a new kick! And it's called light painting. It's really awesome. I saw some cool pictures done by some people and I started to think. My creative side came out and I pondered "could I do this as a portrait?" So I answered myself as I always do and started brain storming. I have this picture in my head of what I want to do. The downfall has been trying to convince a model to test it out with me but fear not! I've finally found a model and we are going out to shoot! I will post BTS photos and Final Images and do some post on the retouching part of it soon so stay tuned! In the meantime here are some light painting examples if you aren't familiar with it.

Is Photography Dead?

 One of the biggest questions amateur photographers ask everyday is, “is photography dead?”. Many believe that with the invention and lowering cost of technology and professional equipment is is easier now than ever to be a quote on quote photographer. The general population of clients see their friends and family members who have a DSLR cameras as being good enough to take their maternity photos or engagement photos and even sometimes even their wedding photos. This creates a deficiency and problem for the entire industry. These, what I call “friendly photographers” produce very low quality unedited images that may please the client at that time but in ten years when technology and editing styles change they will look horrible and the client will most likely regret their decision.

However a lot of the blame has to be placed on the ever growing “cheapness” of consumers. It's been proven in studies that consumers would rather pay a much lower price for something then a higher price for a better product. With this economy price is everything.

 So why not change your prices?

  I've been asked this several times and have been laughed at by clients when I give them a quote for my work which was way over what they were expecting to pay, sometimes hundreds of dollars over.  Even after I tried to explain to them what the cost is for. I do this because the majority of people see photography as a photographer coming out and spending 1-2 hours and taking pictures and that's all they do. Then you tell them this service is going to cost them $800 (just pulled that figure out of my head). To them that seems way overpriced and in their minds they're thinking who do they know that owns a camera that will do it for $50. These are what I call simply “cheap clients”. And you aren't going to fix their cheap ways unless you are really good.  You have to think outside the box on how to explain your price.

Ideas

  Make your original quotes 20-30% more. And when they say that's a little to expensive for them, shoot them a deal and take 15% off or 20% whatever, you have 30% to work with. General psychology of marketing and sales will tell you people love to feel like they won, they got one over on you! This is prevalent in car sales. Read books on marketing and sales and educate yourself. The more your educate yourself the better you'll be.

If you are unable to sell to clients with your work quality or with your sales tactics, then yes is the answer to your question.  Photography as a business just might be dead for you. As the saying is in golf, “driving is for show but putting is for doe”, the same could be said in photography, “shooting models is for show but general clients are for doe”. Don't restrict yourself to one thing. Branch out and work events, weddings, etc. and do some modeling work on the side. I can almost guarantee you will not have a successful career in photography just shooting models unless you work really hard and make your name known. 

This is part one of the “Is photography dead” series. Stay tuned for part 2.