Bearded Warrior

Daniel came in for a early morning head shot session for his pest control business website. Obviously the first thing you see is the amazingly epic beard he sports.

While the job required some simple black & white shots to integrate with current marketing work, I couldn't help myself and had to make something a bit more epic as a beard of that length required.

BTS Info

As this needed something clean but with a bit of depth, I choose to use a Protek Softlighter as my primary light and a stripe-box to give a small amount of rim light to the opposite side. The backgrounds are white and black paper. I tethered my camera to Capture One 8. The editing was done in C1 for the business head shots, the styled headshot was finished in Alien Skin's Exposure 6.

The Call to Action

Do you need a head shot? Something clean or stylised? Business, social or just for fun. Hit me up on the .booking form. Packages start at $350 and include makeup artist, an hour of sitting plus one full resolution digital file ready for use in print or web. Groups attract discounts.

Let me create something really cool for you or your business.

Lucy & the Lyra - Part 3

The third image in the Lucy & the Lyra series. This one is much more acrobatic than the last 2.

This is a shot of the third costume that Lucy posed in. We don't have very specific information on this one except it's from USA and was manufactured somewhere between 1950 and 1970.

Model: Lucy Sky Diamond
Assistant: Reese Truscott
Location: Circ's'cool

Glass - Shooting Products.

Lately I have been working on a lot of product photography for different clients. All have been around unique artist work but for commercial reason. On of the clients is James Dodson at Tasmanian Glassblowers. James is one of the last of a breed that creates purely in glass. His work ranges from tumblers to animals and very unique vases. Each item is crafted in his Breadalbane studio and is top quality.

A few weeks ago I spent the day photographing a lot of his work, Above is an action shot of Dry Ginger Ale being poured into one of his tumblers. While the rest of the brief was more about a pure looking shot, I couldn't help myself in creating one action shot.

You will be able to buy James work from My Emporium in the near future.

Big thanks to Matt from Within One Moment for being my assistant for the day.

BTS (Behind the Scenes)

When I get a brief for something a little different than my normal work, I like to practice and really know the ins and outs of the shoot. As glassware is notoriously hard to work with, I spent a night at home practicing.

The trick with working with reflective materials is not to use direct light. Create light sources from refractive light. In the photo to the right I am using one strobe to light the background, the sides are black to give a black edge to the image and the "roof" is white to light the front of the glass.

The reflections are created by perspex, either white or black depending on the look you are going for.

Practice example. Notice the black edges.

Shooting on Location

To make sure that our work on the day was a sharp as possible, I used Capture One software to tether the camera. This gave us the ability to review the images and make adjustments. We also used a remote trigger so we didn't need to handle the camera to reduce shake.

The issue with shooting on location is that dust, dirt and other things can become part of the shot. Unfortunately there isn't a huge amount that can be done about this apart from being a careful as possible but there will always be some work needed in Photoshop to clean up those pesky spots.

Matt placing a glass into the capture zone!

Lucy & the Lyra - Part 2

The next image from Lucy & the Lyra series!

This one features a 1950s burlesque costume from NYC!

Model: Lucy Sky Diamond
Assistant: Reese Truscott
Location: Circ's'cool

A Glimpse - Songs of the Siren

woman-at-the-end-of-the-bar-050-Edit-Facebook-No-Watermark.jpg

Model: Eve Beauregard
Suit by: Neil Pitts
Assistant: Reese Truscott
Production: Anita Holloway, Chris Rattray, David Quinn
Venue: The Royal Oak

This is just a sample of a very constructed shoot for the upcoming book Songs of the Siren featuring Eve Beauregard.

While the above photo isn't what I call truly representative of the final product. It is glimpse of the siren part of the final image.

The shoot was the first time having a team around me with the specific goal of creating one very styled image. It features three characters, a bar and hopefully a feeling of things are just not quite right. You will need to wait until the book is out to see the final image.