2010 and twelve days in!

Only twelve days into the new year and what is not going awesome?! I'm sure there lurks hardships and obstacles close by, but that's apart of life and one must be ready to persevere and overcome. I encourage and empower you to do so!

By the way, I truly appreciate all of the readers of this blog. The amount of readers (that's YOU!) has doubled only over the past quarter, thank.you.so.much!!

Now, get to shooting, retouching, interacting, and infecting the world around yourself with positive and healthy energy!




MUA/Hair: Kate Carroll
Model: Miss Ashley
(Amazing team!)

Band Photography on Location

Last weekend I had the honor of shooting with a local Chicago band, "Lady Parasyte." (Shot in Chicago)

We called ahead several locations before coming to a two sided bar, one side that was open all day, and the other side didn't open until later at night. So, we asked to shoot for a few hours and they said yes. Totally awesome location and very generous of the owner to allow us to shoot for several hours at their place of business.

This was the first shot out of post. Here is a rundown of my thought process and the setup...


1: F-STOP Decision
I started by wanting to shoot at 2.8 for I could keep the subject and the background separated as much as possible. I found my exposure to be f/2.8 @ 1/50 ISO400. (17mm...with my 20D that is about 35mm) But, of course the lighting on the subjects wasn't that great. It was all from above them. So, I needed to use a strobe to throw light onto their faces.

2: Strobe Light
I placed a strobe on a stand way up high to the right of me and pointed it down towards the subjects. I put it high for the subjects shadows would be on the ground and not behind them. I metered it a bit higher that f/2.8 (f/3.5?) for it would show up in the image. It looked okay, but the light could be more focused.

3: Light Modification
I added a 20 degree grid to the strobe for it would focus tighter on the subjects and not spill too much around them. Perfect! It looked much better. *TEST SHOT* Okay, it's all looking good except that the bottom part of the image had lots of dark areas in it. I was loosing detail.

4: Fill Light
I added another strobe with a silver umbrella about 8 feet behind me for a fill light. This alleviated the shadows getting plugged up, but also made the entire image brighter. Since I was basing my exposure slightly to the left, that was okay by me. *CLICK* There's it is.

5: Post Production
I desaturated all colors except for red and strengthened the vignette my grid strobe was already making.

I'll be shooting in St. Pete, Florida for the weekend.
Happy Shooting!

Oops!! Missing Links!

I was reorganizing my images online the other day and created a few missing links on this blog. I went back and fixed all but one which I deleted and will have to re-upload once I'm back at the home base.

I hope no one got hurt and that everyone is OK!

:D

I've seen this picture before!

I was reading a photography post where there was an awesome image posted. It only took a few replies before someone pointed out "hey, isn't that idea getting old?"

Well, isn't the ideas of most photographers getting old? I mean, seriously, the image I posted on this post is pretty cool. (Well, I thought so or I wouldn't have posted it.) I'm definitely not breaking any barriers here. But, I wasn't trying to either. If photographers had to shoot something totally unique, there would be a lot less photographers in the world today. But, that is okay. Sometimes people put down another photographers work because it looks like some other photographers work they have seen before, but don't speak too soon, I'm sure your work looks just like someone else's. Maybe you only have not run into them yet. I'll assume I don't do anything special or different until it's widely accepted that it is. But, since I'm not going for that I'm guessing I'll never hear such a thing.

When I'm shooting I have a fairly clean slate in my mind. I know what the model looks like, and maybe saw some clothes she has, and know the relative location where we will be shooting, but beyond that I don't think too much about what I'm exactly going to be shooting. This works for me. It may not work for you.

I could image what a headache it would be for another photographer to be in my shoes. But, I couldn't really do that well in the shoes of a photographer who plans out too many specific details. Saying that I guess I'm sort of a go-with-the-flow sort of shooter. I'm a go-with-the-flow type of guy in general. So, I think that's probably a good thing that my personality and my shooting style match up. At least I'm not trying to be something I'm not. Wow, did I just blog a post of therapy for myself? Probably sounds like it, but what's more important is for you, the reader, to clear your mind and shoot with purpose and accuracy. If you want to claim the title of photographer, be the best photographer that you can be and nothing less!

The above is Dalida. She rocked this image a few weekends ago for me. Thanks Dalida!

It's like sooo 1985!

Tonight I went to see my cousin play high school football. Everywhere I looked kids were wearing 80's clothing. It totally freaking ROCKED! Girls wearing tight pink jeans with multi colored flourescent high tops and sweet haircuts! I was excited because this is the era I grew up in and I actually thought it was pretty sweet. ;D

I was in Atlanta last weekend and had to shoot the make up artist. She was a sheer bubble gum 80's rocker chic in this outfit...doesn't get much better that that!

I hope everyone is having a great week. Keep shooting!

New childrens book on digital retouching!

I have been extremely busy retouching and thought "isn't there a machine that could do this work for me?!" Then, I thought of Paul Bunyon. Then, I thought "maybe I could write and sell a childrens book! Here is the idea:

Animated adaptations about two legendary folk heroes. "The Legend of Joshua Bunyon" relates the adventures of the mighty retoucher, a man who, as legend has it, could stand in Illinois and cast a shadow all the way across Missouri to Kansas. "The Legend of John Henry" is the story of the greatest computer-programmer of all time. Joshua takes the challenge of retouching faster and cleaner than computer retouching software can, in an test of man against code.
[original here]


The lady posted today is Angel. She left me quite a positive comment on a photography website the other day and I wanted to share.

""Josh is a AMAZiNG PHOTOGRAPHER 2 Work with! One of my favorites!!!!
Just thought I would let everyone know that! And, once again thanks 4 the new images!!!
YOU FREAkiN ROCK!!!!****
Can't wait to work together again=)
Angelleigh""

...amazing AND freaking rock. Sweet!

Learning Photography Lighting

A person wrote me the other day asking for advice about learning lighting for photography. They said something to the effect of 'i'm looking into getting strobes and a softbox...' and I immediately thought 'Whoa! Slow down!'

When it comes to lighting it seems to makes sence to start with something simple and then work into more complex situations. So, what lighting is simple?

Well, lighting in general is fairly simple once you understand how it works. For this post I'm not going to go into any math or ratios, but I am going to go through a few steps in learning lighting.

First of all it's probably a good idea to start with natural light.  This is a great intro into seeing natural light the way god intended it. Go out and shoot natural light. Shoot in direct sunlight, shade, side lighting, back lighting, butterfly, etc...shoot until you get great dynamic images that get attention. Once you do, you have just mastered one light!

Now, pull out your reflectors and start bouncing the light around. Figure how to shoot great images with your reflector and natural light. Once you get the feel of controlling the given light, you will be ready to have a light source of your own!

Now, get one strobe and learn what heigth, angle and intensity you need to make good images indoors. Use the knowledge you learned in dealing with natural light and a reflector to your strobe. You will quickly learn how to use your one strobe.

Next, get a second strobe. This is the point where you will need to start measuring the light intensity with a light meter.

In my next post I will go over some basic ideas on using one strobe outdoors and two strobes indoors and outdoors. 

Until then, happy shooting! 
 

Photography Inspiration

Today I was thinking "what inspires people to shoot certain things?" Sometimes photographers will copy something they have already seen. Or, capture it in a slightly different way. Some simply guess and hope for the best. Others draw up every detail and create what was in their mind.

Although I have a folder on my computer that is also on synced to my PMP of images of other photographers that I really like, I have not once went to shoot and looked at them. I have ideas in my mind, but they are always foggy at best. Usually a generalization of an idea. I like this and it works for me. I believe it's because I have a small foundation for what I want to shoot, but I don't tie myself down with too many details for during the shoot things can move more naturally.

Just about every shoot I have done in the past few years feels very winged. I try and make the best with whatever situation, equipment, clothing, and weather was available at that time.

I'm slowly getting better at looking around and seeing what would and wouldn't look great in an image. I'd imagine most things could look great in an image if it were captured in some interesting eye-catching way.

I think it would be fun to get a few photographers together and all shoot the same scene, like this old loading dock in the image above, and see how each person interprets it. Of course the other photographers couldn't watch what the others are doing because that would alter the natural creativity of each person during their time to shoot.

In the end everyone could compare and discuss their ideas during their shoot and what it looks like in the end. I believe this could quickly open doors for everyone into thinking about capturing/creating images in a different way.

Then, everyone go re-shoot the same scene together and see what comes of it. I don't have time for any of this, but it seemed like a great idea. If you do it, e-mail me results and I will blog it! :D

Why focusing and recomposing is a not-so-great habit in photography.

(Any image in this post that is hard to see...click on it. It will load a full resolution version that you can see much better.)

I see this done often and I still do it myself from time to time. When one tilts their camera upwards to focus on the eyes of the model then tilts the camera back down to compose the image. Seems harmless, and it may be harmless if you are shooting at f/8'ish to f/16 or more.

(remember shooting at apertures of around f/8 - f/16 and more results in a wide depth of field whereas shooting from f/5.6 - f/1.8 results in a shallow depth of field...click here for a visual example)

Now let's take a look at what happens if we are shooting between f/1.8 to f/5.6'ish.




















Imagine holding the camera in this diagram that I spent 20 minutes drew up real quick for reference. We point the camera up to the eyes of our subject, which are 6 feet away. Perfect, the eyes are in focus. Since we are shooting in open apertures, lets say for this example, f/2.8, we have the eyes in focus and about 2 or 3 inches on each side of the orange line going through our subject is in focus. Beyond those few inches things are out of focus. Now, let's keep that focus point and tilt our camera down for our three quarter shot.
























Now that we have tilted our camera, notice where the orange line of focus on our subject has moved to. It's not focused on the eyes anymore. Now our focus has moved several inches behind the eyes. Remember those few inches we had? Now the eyes are out of focus.



In the image of Tiffany above I did this very thing. Here is a close up of the focusing for you can see this error in action. CLICK on this image to load a bigger/clearer version!

The collective ideas of several are better than yours alone...sometimes.

I have talked with Tiffany for several months now and we finally got to meet up and shoot. Just like any first shoot things start off with typical cookie cutter type of shooting and then eases into an artistic blend of every one's ideas and expressions. This first shot I took about 15 shots and never felt like I totally got the pose right. I showed Tiffany the shot and she said "oh yes! it would look better if I moved this leg here." See, Tiffany saw what I was trying to do with this shot, picked up my slack saw my vision, and then added her valuable input to make it better than if I had done it solely on my own. Good work Tif!

In post I did some special steps for the feel of this image would be custom. I shot this using 4 stop bracketing and a tripod. Next I made two different HDR's and mixed the properties of those two HDR images. I then painted back in some parts from one of the original images. Last I did the typical retouching that most images receive. A lot of work, but not so bad with a new computer. I simply wanted to try something new.

Everyone is going to be a photographer!

I don't know how it is where you are at, but since the economy hasn't been looking good (I mean in the past year) I have heard more people say they want to be a photographer.

I'm not sure what pulls people into photography. Is it because they see pictures and have a desire to make them their selves? Maybe a self expression sort of thing? If they want to make money doing it they will not express too much into their work. And, if they fully express themselves chances are they will not make much money doing it. And, then probably stop. Or...OR OR OR ooooooOORR, they will become totally insane (like the rest of us shooters) and continue shooting in the industry without much pay BUT with a big smile on their heart and face!

Something I noticed about people who love to take pictures, they are slightly crazy. Including myself. Hell, I'm probably totally insane at this point and don't even know it! ;D

But, I love photography. Come to think of it. Photography is similar to a religious cult due to it's ability to create a social group of slightly off kilter people that drive great distances to hang out and take more pictures. We shall name our god Canon! This is allllll a bad idea. But it's true. Photography changes how we see the world and it changes our lifestyle. If it doesn't for you then you are probably already totally insane with photography and forgot what non-photography life is like!!! Sooooo, come, lets hang out! :D

The above is the lovely Miss Ashley. She was doing make up for a shoot and decided to jump on stage for a few minutes. I think she did really rowr.

On the beach, 50's style!

I had the honor of working with Zairia from the St. Louis area recently on a pin up shoot. It was a really great time shooting. The models had the looks and great attitudes! All of them did a great job! The image posted here is of Sandra. It took her and I about 5 seconds before realizing that we worked together perfectly as photographer and model. Everything came easy. That doesn't happen all the time or even often.

I used one strobe with a 48 inch umbrella to camera left, up near the height of the models forehead, and slightly pointed down. I used warming filters/gels on the strobe to enable me to get a warm skin tone and pull the kelvin down on the camera to achieve the blue water. I spent only a few minutes in post. Wallah!

Saint Louis Graffiti Wall

I remember a long time ago I got to go up into the Saint Louis arch. That was a neat experience. What I didn't know then is that there is a huge wall, more than a mile, right below the arch that separates the water and land/railroad.


Graffiti artists from all around makes stops at the wall and 'battle' other artists work. Not sure how this all exactly works, but sounds like a fun thing to be aware of. I'm curious to what artists do this sort of thing and what other cities have such places to graffiti.

This image was shot with two strobes. The backlight had several 1/4 Cinegel (#3409) to give the wall a warmer feel. I wanted to use red or blue lights for the background, but I didn't have anything but the Cinegel's with me. The main light was a 42 inch silver umbrella. A flashlight was used for focusing since it was totally dark while shooting.

The model is Elise. She did a fantastic job of taking direction while also having fun! Props to Miss Ashley for doing the make up and hair with a half dead flashlight!

Photography Workshop - Hit The Lodge

The most profitable photography workshop I have attended is one that doesn't have rows of tables trying to sell me items. It isn't held in a huge hotel conference room with hundreds of people where you feel alone in a crowd. It doesn't even require you to have a fancy wrist band to get around the area. If you have not heard of such a workshop it's named "Hit The Lodge" and is only one amazing workshop out of many put on each year by Supershoots.

Here are some things you will be able to learn about at the Hit The Lodge event this year!

• Learn techniques in Fashion, Glamour, Commercial, Beauty,
  Photojournalism, Portraits, Fine Art Figure, and Swimwear.
• Outstanding instructors and mentors who are there to help you.
• Learn different lighting styles in Studio and on Natural Light
• Photograph beautiful models prepped with professional make up artistry!
• Enhance your portfolio, galleries, window display and self promotion pieces
• NEW for 2009 - Fine art figure seminars with dK

and...

• Light Room, Adobe Photoshop, and Retouching Seminars taught by...ME!

Yes, come see me teach on post production retouching techniques using Lightroom and Photoshop. It will be a great time to ask anything you are curious about with this software!

The duration of this event is 5 days. Plenty of time to fill the brain with all of the information you are looking for! The dates of the event is June 11-15 and is located in Pike County, Illinois.

If you can not make this event there are plenty of other events this year. Come to Supershoots.net (instead of .com) to be apart of the Supershoots community. Post images to your portfolio, post to the forum, write other users, take a walk on the runway. Come see what the hype is about! And, if you create an account, don't forget to add me and say hello! My portfolio is here!

---------------------------------------------------------------
Read a post I made about last years Hit The Lodge event here.

You can create great images with...

...whatever gear you currently have. If you are like me you have that small voice, usually around tax refund time, that says "If I get [new photography toy] I will have better images!"

I'm a firm believer that if one can not attain images they feel are great now, with their current equipment, purchasing more equipment will not solve that issue.

I believe the most powerful tool a photographer can have is the ability to create a great image with whatever is available.

I want to get your feet wet in how you can find out for yourself if you have this powerful tool.

Imagine you have a well paid shoot. You are using three strobe/flashes. A main, a fill, and a hair light. So, you know what the lighting at this shoot is going to look like. You setup your lights and find out that one of your three lights is not functioning.

It's at this point where we can cross that line of amateur to professional. If you have fear and can't think what else to do, then you are lacking in your ability to create great images. But, if you let go of the idea of that third light and shift into two-light-mode, then you are on your way of becoming more successful [and useful] than the photographers around you.

It's tough to deal with these situations because we had an expectation of what our three light setup was going to look like. But, if we have used two or one light to create great images before, loosing this third light will only be an inconvenience rather then a disaster.

And,

that's what makes a professional.

One who can make the best out of a given situation. These are the people who get hired, who get noticed, who make a name for themselves.

I encourage you to learn how to use one, two, and three lights incredibly well. And of course so many other things could go wrong. Syncs, remotes, camera breaks, power cable wasn't packed, lens isn't working, etc...

Try not to rely on expectations. They will only let you down if not met. Go with the flow and make the best out of what you have. As you become flawless with little you will be able to become flawless with much.

The above image is Becky looking amazing!

Image Manipulation and its Effects

In the past few years there has been much hype in the subject of images being manipulated to show something that is not. From false global perceptions on war to personal self image. Image manipulation causes a false ripple in the minds of all who see.

Here are a few examples of exposed image retouching in the mass media.

2006
This subject hit pretty hard in 2006 when Dove released their video showing a model from a just-waking-up-look to the final image used in an advertisement. This video can been seen here.

2006
It's bad enough that images are manipulated so poorly, but adding cloned smoke clouds over a city to make it appear in worse condition that it really was. Wow, really? As if blowing up a city isn't bad enough we have to manipulate it to look even worse.

2008
An article was ran around the world displaying an image of four SAM's being shot into the air. The image was release first by Sepah News, the media arm of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard. Here is a clear cut manipulation of the image used. And, it's not the only thing they manipulated poorly.

2008
Sometimes manipulations attack a certain person(s) or business. In this case Fox and Friends news program decided to post some 'doctored' images of a few New York Times reporters for an article they wrote that wasn't in favor of Fox and Friends...well, friends. This manipulation game went back and forth. Childish, but still manipulated.

2009
Ad's in a Berlin subway get ad busted with Adobe Photoshop palette stickers. This is most interesting for printing all of these large stickers cost money. These are some fairly serious ad busters here!


• On a lighter note, to see the most in the world of image manipulation head on over to www.worth1000.com and flip though some of the contests like levitations or hair do nots. (where you can see Obama with a Mr. T hair do!)

• Photoshop Disasters Blog is also a great place to see current manipulated chop.

The above is Terrace.
Shot in a Nevada dry lake bed in 2008.
Don't be manipulated by the things in this image! ;D

Camera Firmware

I'm working on a children's book. This is the opening line...

"Once upon a time, camera's didn't have computer chips inside..."

*the kiddies eyes get really BIG*

"REEEEEALLY?!"

Okay, I'm not really working on a children's book. But, our cameras are now small computers with a shutter and lens. No longer just a regular dumb old donkey camera.

Our camera's are controlled by its Firmware. This is the code inside the camera that sets the rules of what the camera can do and how to do it.

After some time a new camera is released, a firmware upgrade will pop up. Sometimes the upgrade will fix color issues on the screen or maybe when you purchased your camera it didn't support high-capacity CF cards. That doesn't mean it CAN'T. It only means the firmware is not written to support such a card.

(For instance, with the Canon 5d you can upgrade the firmware to allow it to use high-capacity CF cards when it originally did not.)

Here are links to upgrade your firmware. Each camera model firmware corrects and/or changes different functions of that camera. It may be that some firmware updates are updates which are totally useless to you. Others may be very useful.

::READ ALL INSTRUCTIONS FIRST::
CANON
NIKON
MAMIYA
OLYMPUS


The above image is Maria looking awesome as usual! But, this time in front of an awesome car, which makes this image double awesome! Shot with one unmodified strobe to camera right.

Mmmm, RED!

Guess where this backdrop is located?!

I'm not telling, but it does involve a hotel and a wall. (again)

Okay, it's apparent I don't mind hotel walls on occasion. But this is only because I'm not paying much attention to the background. Or am I? Yes, of course I am.

I figured I would share my thoughts during the creation of this shot, and also after wards in post production/retouching.

Candee walked into the room with this killer red dress on that was totally awesome. It's perfect because she has green eyes which compliments the red dress. Our backdrop was an off white, eggshell as 'they' call it, color with a bit of a plaster/stucko embossing. This backdrop is totally uninteresting, especially since we are working with a strong red reflective material.

The first thing I need to think about is where I need my single soft box strobe to be for the wall doesn't look flat and/or blown out. But, it also has to light up Candee in a way that matches her beautiful bold look.

Light Placement
I placed my soft box directly behind me which will light up Candee well. I put it up high and point the center of the light to Candee's chest. My head will be infront of the soft box's hottest spot, (sometimes they can have a hot spot) so it won't make her chest brighter than her face. Also, and more importantly, with the soft box up a ways it will create a shadow underneath Candee's chin. The same effect is shared by the dress folds, and chest. This setup works also because I need the light to skip over the embossing of the wall a bit to show it's detail.

Post Production
In post I added texture to the wall to intensify its effect and also added red to the off-white color. Did I know I was going to make the wall red while I was shooting the image? Nope. But, I did know I was going to change it in some way to fit the clothing we were using.

Magazine Covers

Most magazine covers have the same general lighting setup. There are several variations, but for the most part it's all the same. Put the model in front of the camera, set up 1 to 5 (or more) lights, or however many you feel like metering, up all around you and your camera lens and shoot. Fairly simple process.

If you would like to understand this lighting better, go to any magazine rack and look at the catch lights in the models eyes. You will see 1-4 little white circles in most cases. Compare one magazine cover with 1 or 2 lights to another cover with 3 or 4 and look at the overall difference in how the shadows are laying on the model. It will start to sink in better the most you do this. (Yes, I do this and have for years!) Chances are a few covers won't make much since due to all of the retouching going on. Dang those retouchers! :D

Where are these magazine cover type of shots taken anyway? Well, I don't know. But, I'd imagine some big awesome studio with lots of rad toys that I would waste too much time playing with!

As in my last post this image was also shot on a hotel wall, with a single strobe, and a soft box. Obviously the light positioning and posing was much different due to different models, different clothing, and my ability to become bored quickly and change things up!

This image is of Summer Taylor. She has fantastic features and amazing curves! When she came out in her dress it screamed magazine cover to me!

Locations

Ever get stuck on where to do your next shoot? It's easy to get lost thinking about all of the cool alley ways and old junk cars setting about. We can easily have big ideas for great shoots, but sometimes they involve too many lights, portable power, assistants, and time ...all of which we may not have much of.

Me and Jessica Vaugn finally got in some shooting time after meeting and working on other shoots and workshops for over a year! Here was the setup... one strobe, a soft box, and a hotel conference room wall.

Yep.

The PERFECT setting for finally getting to shoot a model you have wanted to shoot for a long time, right? I'm pretty sure you can feel the sarcasm in my typing!

I had all of these ideas and cool lighting setups, make up, hair, and, and, and....none of my thoughts mattered at that point. If I would have continued to think about the things I wanted to setup, I would not of been able to focus properly on what was in front of me.

What I also found out is that even though I have big ideas in my head, it's not the way I actually shoot. I'm usually simplistic and make the best of what I have at the shoot. Learning to accept how I naturally photograph models helps me shoot even better in these situations.

I was very much pleased with the results. Our shoot went smooth and it was a whole lot of fun! I was so excited about how this shot came out due to all of the laughing we were doing! Like I always say, you only need to capture 1/125th of a second to create the image you want!