Miami Editorial Photographers
[dropcap]A[/dropcap]h yes… I get to put on my Miami Editorial Photographers hat today, and rock out a quick down and dirty shoot for Modern Luxury Brides Magazine! First of all… one of my past clients (bride) Julie was approached by the magazine to be featured in an article about fitness, glamour, wedding prep, etc. The specifics of the final publication will be a surprise to us all when it comes out in print.
My assignment was pretty straight forward.. goto the Exhale Spa at the Epic hotel.. and take some sexy images of Julie with the “bar”. No problem 🙂
[perfectpullquote align=”left” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Once I got to the Spa, and walked in.. I saw several “photo” issues right off the bat, and was thankful that the magazine had a very specific goal in mind AND that Julie was terrific at posing, and moving through the flashes.[/perfectpullquote]
What photo issues? Well, first of all there is a nasty green tint on all the glass in the hotel. It is great when your standing there looking at it.. but, on a camera sensor.. not so much LOL. The other issues were that the room was basically just a wide open space, with glass everywhere. This meant that regardless of the composition, I would have stray highlights somewhere in the frame.. and that (to me) is unacceptable. SO.. I needed to really focus on the composition, and determine where I was going to be, where Julie was going to need to stand, and pose etc. Once I determined the best shooting direction, I then began to build up my lighting setup. Like many Miami Editorial Photographers, I have an impressive lighting setup that I bring out on location to give all the control in the world and it takes a little time and some test shots to get everything locked down. Once my baseline exposure value is set in the camera, I then power up the lights one by one to determine what the power levels need to be, and set them accordingly. It’s important to note.. that because I knew the poses were going to be tricky, and that Julie was going to be able to move from pose to pose fast, I really needed a FAST recycle time on my lights. (this means that I am not waiting from shot to shot for them to be “ready”). So, when setting up the camera’s baseline exposure I paid extra close attention to this fact, so that I could use the lights on a very low power setting (well as low as possible), so that when I really wanted to shoot fast they would keep up. This is what I call “flash efficiency” and is really important on any shoot. But, for this kinda shoot it was most important.
So, this all becomes a balancing act of ambient light vs. flash hitting the camera sensor, distance of the light source, amount of diffusion, etc.. My brain chews on all this, and then spits out the final plan. Once I have all this sorted, then the shoot is dead easy. I just needed to give some basic instruction, and allow Julie to do her moves. I was then able to shoot as many shots as needed, and do them faster then what she could ever keep up with. So I was good, and the actual shoot only lasted a very short time. She was happy, the client was happy, and I was happy as I don’t think I could have stayed laying on the ground for too much longer LOL! (see the video below). At the end of the day (litterally 3 hours later) the client / magazine had ALL of the images processed and ready for final selection. Because of my workflow, use of lighting, and doing as much work in the field as possible I am rewarded with a very, very fast turnaround time.. and this is something that any editor will appreciate 😉
I was able to take just a little bit of behind the scenes video footage (see below), and gives you the basic idea on how this all went down 🙂 For more videos, please check out and subscribe to my YouTube channel!
Enjoy!
Because this was for a very specific “shot” and there was a goal in mind before we even started.. there were not many images to show. So, here are the three best that we all agreed on..
So, looking at this above image.. we really liked the strong stance, and the lines that were made with her body. The arms and legs are well defined, and it gives the viewer a good sense of her physical capabilities. The narrow “strip bank” camera left, along with my bare bulb light really show off her legs, shoes, and hair, not to mention the dress. Her face is the brightest part of the frame, and works really well for how this was intended. Excited to see this in print!
I did see, and try one other setup (above) before departing the shoot. It was not captured on the video, however we loved it so much that it was also a nice addition. Here, her pose, body, face etc.. all came together and the mirror effect was a nice touch if I do say so myself LOL. One special note on the lighting here, it was only two lights.. as when your working around glass the direction of light is most important, and in this case it had to come sharp from the sides. I simply made a “Julie sandwich” with a strip bank and bare blub flash.
A special thanks to Kara for working my video camera 🙂 Your the best! XOXO.
and… 6/23/16.. here is an update from this session.. check out the video below, and see what came in the mail today!
