That Red Chair with Miss Sanaz

Posted on 16th March 2012 in fashion

Coal Harbour seems to be the land of white couches and amazing girls wearing pretty fashions. How can my camera and I complain!?

This time, it had the pleasure to work with the very sweet Miss Sanaz who was looking to have some fun in front of the camera. As an added bonus for me, she looked simply stunning while doing it!

For this shoot, I had hoped to explore what working with a diffuser was like, and try and explore the world of photograph with some heavier illumination. I wasn’t exactly successful with it, as I’m finding the off camera flash just doesn’t allow me to get a ambient enough lighting done. I’m suspecting I’m in need of an umbrella, and possibly a strobe. I have my eyes on an alien bee or two.

Anyways, I had my trusty steed, my Canon T1i, with an 18-55 lens and Yongnuo flash in my hand through a coil cable. I’m not happy having to use my 18-55 kit lens, for I don’t find it gives me the quality and clarity that I’m looking for in a lens, but when I’m working in such tight quarters as an apartment demands, it’s what must be done.

So, without further adieu..

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comments: 2 » tags: canon, coal harbour, fashion, flash, kit, style, t1i, yongnuo

Dance Studio with Lola Frost

Posted on 26th January 2012 in After Dark

Last weekend was busy. I had a fashion/style shoot with Christine Anne, as well I headed to Whistler to capture snowy trees. Both awesome, both a success.

To continue my creativity, I did this shoot.  Lola (@LolaFrost) is full of energy, charismatic, and ready to put her body in the most glorious of positions to create something very surreal. I like working with Lola (we did a shoot a few weeks ago as well); she is fun, and challenges me to match her own awesomeness and fast pace. She moves a lot. With the low lighting situations I usually have to pull the camera shutter pretty slow,  so this also amplifies the challenge!

Who is  Lola Frost ? Well, she is a “Rock’N’Roll Flapper, Burlesque Performer, Bad Ass Dance Instructor, Ninja, Make Out Artist, Sass Master, Rebel with a Cause. Director of Vancouver Burlesque Centre.” In essence, she rocks.

For this shoot I used a Canon EFS 18-55mm lens with a T1i body, and a Yongnuo flash to help bring a bit of light into the shots. I chose this particular lens because it offered me the ability to shoot the close up shots, and also get her full body in the photograph (this much should be obvious) since the space I had to stand back from Lola for some of the angles I wanted were fairly limited.

Using one flash, with such low lighting conditions, was pretty hard; it would throw huge shadows on the background. What I ended up doing was relying mostly on the overhead studio lighting. They were dimmer pot lights, that we used as a spot light. I also turned the flash down to about 1/64 or 1/32 power for most of the shots to add just a little bit of lighting onto some of the shots. It worked out pretty good, but I would have loved to have a diffuser on the flash.

Do you have any ideas I could try to help pop a bit of the model just enough but still keep the darkness to the photographs?

 

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comments: 8 » tags: 1/32, 1/64, 18-55mm, after dark, canon, dance studio, efs, flash, lola frost, t1i, yongnuo

Coal Harbor with Christine Anne

Posted on 22nd January 2012 in fashion

This weekend I had the pleasure to capture Christine Anne (@christinean) with my camera. We headed to a apartment in Coal Harbor, provided to us by the amazing Jill Sinclair (@hotrodrealtor), in an area pretty close to Stanley Park in downtown Vancouver. The view was amazing, but we weren’t there to observe the scenery, we were there to shoot.

Upon arriving, I was immediately impressed with the lighting in the place: very ambient. Also, I was very happy with the furniture, I loved the couch we were able to use.

Christine Anne hadn’t done much modeling before, but she was amazing to work with, smiled very nicely, and, well, you can see for yourself how stunning she is.

What I used for the shoot was my Canon T1i. I don’t like to use it, but because of close quarters of the apartment, I was forced to either use my wide-angle or my 18-55mm kit lens, so I chose the 18-55 to use because it would allow me to also get detail shots without having to change my lens. It turned out to work pretty good afterall. I also had my Yongnuo flash in hand, attached by a coil-cable to my hotshoe so I could have more freedom to place it wherever I wanted, since I didn’t have a stand for it. For the most part, I used the natural reflector built into the flash, with the flat surface of the reflector pointed at Miss C.

I’m trying to learn lighting, so if you have any suggestions as to what you would have done differently, I’d love to hear.

Hope you enjoy!

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comments: 6 » tags: 18-55mm, canon, coal harbor, fashion, kit lens, stanley park, style, t1i, vancouver, womens, yongnuo