Indoor Beauty
March 30th, 2011
I’m so tired of this winter. I know…we all are. It’s been an awful one. And it just doesn’t seem to want to go away. It’s almost April, but March, after teasing us with a few warm days, is still doing its best to keep us cold and miserable. When I left home this morning to drive to the studio it was snowing hard. It didn’t stick and stopped in the afternoon, but still it just seemed like another affront, denying the approach of spring. But spring is here and soon I’ll be outside shooting the kind of photos I most love to shoot.
Meanwhile, I’ve been doing a few shoots in the studio. I’ve confessed to the models that I’m about out of inspiration and ideas for studio work. But when someone as beautiful as Artistic Physique comes around and poses, it’s hard to not pick up just a little bit of inspiration.
But I’m thinking about outdoor shoots…planning things for the coming warm months. There are some new models who have contacted me and want to work with me…and some that I’ve been working with, but haven’t taken out into the wilds yet to get them cold and wet and dirty. And, I’m talking with a couple of my long-time favorite models about some shoots this year…so it’s looking like a good year…if it ever stops snowing, that is.
Dance and the D7000
March 25th, 2011
One of my major motivations for getting the Nikon D7000 was the improvement I thought it would make in what I could do with dance photography. But I really had no idea how huge an improvement it would be over my D200. Now I know.
I’ve been shooting dance since the 1960s. Back when I started it was Tri-X developed in Acufine. We pretended that Acufine would give us an ISO (ASA back in those days) of 1600. What it really gave us was blocked up highlights and empty black shadows. But it gave us something on the negative that we could try to make a decent print from. Most of the prints were barely passable, but since there was nothing better, they were good enough.
The D200 was incredibly better than Tri-X in Acufine. But the D7000 is so much better it is almost as big a leap forward. The D7000 has made major changes in the way I can approach shooting dance.
Because 3200 and even 6400 ISO are completely usable speeds with the D7000…6400 is better than 1600 with the D200…I’m now able to shoot with my 35-70mm f/2.8 zoom lens instead of being limited to my 50mm f/1.4. That lets me do much more work at actually framing a photo while I’m shooting instead of just capturing what’s there and cropping later. That also means better quality on single dancers, duets and smaller groups because I can zoom in instead of cropping later.
That’s what I expected. But there were some surprises as I worked with the new camera and figured out what it could do. The autofocus system on the D7000 is amazing. I was able to leave it on auto and it found the right focus point and nailed the focus almost immediately. A big improvement over manually moving the focus point around on the D200 to match what the dancers were doing…and missing focus a lot because the D200 was just too slow to focus.
But the best surprise was the auto exposure system on the D7000. Always before I’ve shot dance with the exposure set manually. The contrast of the stage scene was just too much for the meter to manage in any auto setting. But not so with the D7000. I quickly learned that I could set the meter on Program (or, as some have noted, that “P” on the control dial might just stand for “Professional”). I found that if I dialed in 2 stops of underexposure compensation the meter would give me perfect exposures every time as the light changed throughout the dance pieces. That was a huge improvement over my past practice of noting each lighting change and making a note of the required f/stop and shutter speed and then manually making those changes while shooting the dance. Now I could just concentrate on capturing the action. The only exposure adjustments I needed to make were to move to 6400 ISO when the light was very dim and back to 3200 when it got brighter. I was able to shoot at 3200 ISO nearly all the time, with just occasional moves to the higher ISO at dark moments.
Once again I’m very happy with my new camera. It is making things possible that were not possible before.
These photos are from the concert I shot at Ohio University at the beginning of this month.
Variations
March 22nd, 2011
It seems that many of my favorite models are also talented photographers. I think that has more to do with my liking to work with models who understand what I’m trying to do than with anything else. Charlise is one of those “modelographers” and is very good on both sides of the camera.
One of the fun things about how I work with models is that they will sometimes do their own editing from our shoots. I share copyright with my models and they get all the photos we do together. They have full rights to do anything they want with the photos. So sometimes I get to see what photos they chose and how they edit them in PhotoShop.
That’s what you are seeing here. These two photos were edited by Charlise. It’s interesting that they are both photos that I also choose, independent of her, and had included in my first edit as what I label as ‘selects.’ But my editing was very different from hers, particularly when it comes to color. You can compare the photo below with my version which I posted a few posts back.
One thing I was freed from many years ago is the idea of ‘correct color.’ There simply is no such thing. The color in a photo is dependent on so many variables such as the viewing light, the materials used to make the print, the variations in the color vision of different individuals, that chasing ‘correct color’ will only make you crazy. Color is important to me…it is one of the major things I’m interested in as a photographer; the reason I work in color and not black and white. But I look for color that looks right to me…and that may have nothing to do with whatever the ‘correct color’ might be, if you could find a way to know that.
Clearly from these two photos, Charlise has a different idea of how she likes color to look. I find that interesting and enjoyable to look at and think about. I prefer my version of the color, but I also like what Charlise has done with these files. There is no correct, there is only the different artistic interpretations of the photos.
Thanks for sharing your vision (and your beautiful body) with us, Charlise.
Down on the Plantation
March 19th, 2011
The nature preserve where I shot with Charlise used to be a plantation…actually two plantations. The main buildings are long gone with just a few foundation stones remaining to show where they used to be. But a couple small buildings remain. And they gave us some protection from the bright sun for a few photos. Above is Charlise being beautiful in the door of the old carriage house. Pretty neat old gothic building.
And near the carriage house was the old gardener’s shed. It appeared to be made out of cement mixed with sea shells. Another neat old building for Charlise to decorate. And inside the gardener’s shed was an ancient wheel barrow. The walls with the sea shells visible sticking out of the cement and the light through the door and the holes in the roof along with that old wheel barrow created a setting that just required my new fisheye lens to come out of the bag.
Thanks again, Charlise, for a great shoot.
Thinking About Our Friends In Japan
March 16th, 2011
Like everyone else I’ve been following the horrifying news from Japan of the earthquake and tsunami. The scenes of the devastation are simply overwhelming. It makes one realize just how much we are all at the mercy of nature at any moment. Our feelings of safety and security are truly illusions.
Of course, as many have noted, photographers have a special connection to Japan and particularly to the area hardest hit by this disaster since so many of the skilled and talented people who make the cameras and lenses we use every day live and work in this area and are undoubtedly among those who have felt the brunt of this catastrophe. My heart goes out to them. Our connection as fellow humans who share this world is brought home by the knowledge that someone suffering in Japan right now may well have touched and assembled the photo equipment I use. We are all connected. We are all in this together.
I want to help, but I feel so helpless in the face of a disaster of this magnitude. But a friend of mine, Leo Lam, is better than I am at taking direct action to do something to help. He has several fund raising things going on right now. You can read more about what Leo is doing on his blog. I urge you to click on over there and see what Leo is doing. There are several ways you can participate and send some help to our friends in Japan.
Dawn at the Beach
March 14th, 2011
Here are a couple more photos of the lovely Charlise on the beach at dawn. The sun was unrelenting the whole time we were shooting, but at least it had some directional nature when if first arrived above the horizon. And thanks to Charlise for being such a trooper that she was there ready to go before the sun made its appearance. I love models who will do stuff like that. Of course Charlise is also a very talented photographer, so she truly does understand why unreasonable requests like arriving before dawn for a shoot really do make a difference. And, of course, along with being unreasonably early in the morning, it was also cold out there on the beach…and the wind was blowing to make it even more chilly.
Maybe the next time I get down to South Carolina I’ll be able to get Charlise out on this beach on a cloudy, or even rainy, day. That would provide much more interesting light and a whole new set of possibilities for photos.
Naked Chicks in Trees
March 11th, 2011
I don’t only take photos of naked chicks on rocks. Sometimes I do photos of naked chicks in trees. While I was down south I was blessed with the chance to work with a wonderful new (to me) model, Charlise. I had actually contacted Charlise on an earlier trip down to South Carolina, but it didn’t work out for us to shoot on that trip. But this time when I got back in touch she was available. Not only that, she was willing to drive out from Charleston to a nature preserve that I had hiked around in before wishing I had a model with me. And, of course, she had to make that drive in the pre-dawn darkness because I wanted to shoot the sunrise on the beach. We’ll get to those photos later.
But, for years I’ve wanted to do something with live oak trees and Spanish moss. I’ve tried it a number of times, but finding just the right tree in just the right location, just the right model and just the right light has been elusive. This time I came pretty close as you can see in the photo up top. I’d be happier if we had had an overcast sky to work with, but the backlighting works pretty well here. I hope to do another shoot with Charlise in this same location sometime in the future on an overcast day.
Despite the bright sun presenting challenges for me, Charlise did a great job modeling and I was able to come up with a number of photos that I’m happy with. I’m still learning all the features of my new Nikon D7000 and I suspect that as I get to know more about the options to control contrast in the camera I may be able to do a better job working in this kind of light.
Lots more to come from this shoot, but for now enjoy a closer view of the lovely Charlise in a tree below. Not every tree in South Carolina has Spanish moss, but they can still make some nice photos.
One Man Show (With Lots of Ladies)
March 8th, 2011
I share my studio with a very fine photographer, GaryM. I just learned that Gary is going to have his first one-man show at the Zaum gallery in Newport, Kentucky. I’m astonished that Gary hasn’t had his own one-man show before this…he’s been doing outstanding work and getting it published and shown all over the place for quite a while. As you can see in the announcement above, the opening reception is Saturday March 19 from 7 to 11 p.m. I’ll be going down to Newport, the town that puts the “sin” in Cincinnati, for the opening. Hope to see you there.
A Lovely Pair
March 6th, 2011
As expected, this past week has been exceptionally busy. Getting tax stuff ready. Trip to Athens for two days to photograph the winter concert at the Ohio University School of Dance. Appointment with my accountant. And a quick visit from my daughter who flew up from Tampa to do an interview for grad school. I drove my daughter to the airport last night and came back home to relax a bit. I’ll have more to say and show about the dance concert in a few days. I’ll just say for now that I was very, very pleased with the performance of the Nikon D7000 in that application of my new photo tool.
But meanwhile, one more post of photos from my Savannah visit with Bill Ballard and the two lovely ladies who posed for us there. I was quickly obvious that both Christa and Sarah were both of similar build and almost exactly the same height. So I just couldn’t pass up having the two of them pose together for some photos. You see a couple of the results here. What a great pair of beautiful ladies they were. Thanks ladies. I hope I get to work with both of them again sometime soon.
Back In The North
February 28th, 2011
I returned home over the weekend. There was snow on the ground when we arrived back in Ohio, but it melted yesterday. Today it rained, but the temperature is dropping and it looks like we will be getting another taste of winter. But it’s March tomorrow, so the end is near.
That’s another photo of the lovely Christa up at the top, taken in Savannah where the temperature was 79 degrees. Below is another photo of Sarah in the great location that Bill Ballard arranged for us. Thanks again, Bill. And great thanks and praise to both Christa and Sarah for a wonderful shoot. I’ll have some more of them to share soon.
This is a busy week for me. I’ll be going to Athens, Ohio, for a couple days to photograph a dance concert at the Ohio University School of Dance. That’s always a fun trip back to my alma mater. And I’m looking forward to using the high ISO capabilities of my new D7000 for the performance photos. Of course, this will be my first time using the new camera in that environment, so it will be a learning experience. As soon as I get back from Athens I have to go visit my accountant for the annual income tax ordeal. So getting all that paperwork together will occupy the remainder of this week.
Here is one final photo of Bill at work, taken with the fisheye lens. The model is Christa. The location is fantastic. One important trick that must be mastered when using a fisheye is keeping the photographer’s feet out of the photo. The lens takes in 180 degrees, so if you tip the lens down just a little, there are your feet at the bottom of the frame. I’ve pretty much got the hang of that skill…no, I didn’t have to crop this one to get my feet out.
