Run with the Wild Fashion

Animals have been involved in Fashion Photography as long as I can remember. I've seen everything from polar bears to snakes and even lions implemented into ad campaigns for clothing lines and fragrances.

Robin came up with this concept when she met the owner and driver of a sled dog team. Arrangements were made and the concept of this shoot was born to where we could create a fashion motif with the dogs. Winter had already started and most the canyons/ mountains had already received several inches or feet of snow. This would work perfect for our theme since we associate Huskies with snow and winter.

We set out to Little Cottonwood Canyon and found a nice area which had some large standing rock formations, dead weeds, and enough forested area to block out whatever sky might creep in to my shots. It was vastly overcast. For you photographers out there, this is great for lighting since nature has provided its own natural "Soft Box" or diffusion from the sun's hard and harsh light. With that said, lighting was simple and straight forward, with only a single flash and umbrella needed to light the subjects appropriately.

I forgot my sandbags and needed help balancing my boom arm containing the flash and umbrella. Luckily, I brought my assistant Trevor in as a V.A.L. (voice activated ligthstand) to hold everything. Without him, we would have been in some real trouble.

The shoot went off without any deaths or accidents and I was pleased with the final images.

Fall Leaves

The Wasatch Front of the Rocky Mountains can produce some of most vibrant Fall Colors I've ever seen, given that the snow doesn't arrive first and the temperature doesn't freeze too soon. Unfortunately this year we had a vast cold front move in and "shock" all the leaves into their dead winter state, causing them to fall to the ground before their colors peaked or halting their chromatic change in a mix of a pale yellows and drab greens.

You now have clients running to get their family portraits taken with vibrant Fall Colors. What do you do?

Improvise. Scout, scout, scout, and scout some more. Move to lower altitudes to the wooded parks located in your backyard and valley suburbia. With luck, you'll find some trees with some color left. Utilize some camera magic and shoot with a large aperture and shallow depth of field to turn the background into a creamy, blurred bokeh of Fall color, avoiding the details the drab leaves are displaying.

Anthony is a paramedic / fire fighter I used to work with when I was still full time in EMS. Anthony is an outstanding medic with great skills and a genuine compassion for those who need help. I was excited to shoot his growing family. Their daughter, Claire was a natural in front of the camera and we captured some cute and fun images.

Photographing Children.. You can do it!

It is in our nature as nurturing parents to love love our offspring and get all googly eyed and joyous when we see them. Hence, taking images of children is a breeze when compared to getting that perfect image of the CEO of a major company that has given you less than 10 minutes of his or her time to get the shot.

From my experiences, keys to capturing amazing shots of children include the following:
-Shoot them when they are most awake, fed, and not in an unusual place
-Get down low... I mean really low... At their level or even lower. Our normal perspective of kids is from up high. Give the viewer a different angle. Get low and make the subject appear larger than life.
-Light the eyes. Make sure their eyes are lit.
-Again, nap time isn't a great time to take photos.
-Have the parent stand behind or next to the camera so the subject will look toward camera and not the parent that is standing 6 feet to the right.
-Do something different. Go in your backyard, school, or park. The same tin wash tub with the cute baby in it has been exhausted by nearly every crappy Box Store portrait studio there is. Do something original. Let kids roam around and be themselves in their natural environment is great place to start.

Beach Blanket Bingo?

The longer I live, the more I tend to believe I was born in the wrong decade. For this week's blog, I'm sharing the latest Pinup concept I photographed. I went back to Crystal for this one because she has the "look" and true form of what the vintage pinups used to be back in the day.

We headed out once again to the shores of the Great Salt Lake and started shooting away as the sun dropped behind the mountains and eastern shores of the lake. Lighting was minimal and included only a small Flash coupled to a silver reflective umbrella mounted to a boom arm and light stand. Some behind the scenes video was captured and another Strobist Lighting Tutorial should be done soon. As always, stay tuned.

-Ben

Trash the Dress

75 miles from my home in Provo, Utah there is a group of photographers, models, and makeup artists that get together monthly to share their knowledge, time, and have some fun.
This past meetup was a Trash the dress theme. We had nearly 30+ photographers show up and close to 10 or so models. It was a bit crowded with such a high photographer to model ratio, but most photographers utilize these shoots for networking and fun rather than building portfolios and getting one on one time with a model.

For my setup this meetup, I took a simple one light setup with an old Nikon flash coupled to a convertible 43" reflective umbrella. I hung a sand bag from the light stand to keep from loosing a good flash and radio trigger to the murky depths. We were shooting at depths of knee deep water at times. A strong footing a trustworthy camera strap were a must.

In all, I had a great time and I am excited to join them next month as we head out to the Salt Flats for a shoot.

Shelly + Josh

I have been given the great honor of shooting one of my long-time friend's wedding. Josh and I met nearly 14 years ago in Jr. High School where we used to spend most our summers and weekends fishing the local suburban ponds and rivers in our backyard that makes up the Wasatch Front. While most young men were spending time at Lagoon or the mall making failed attempts at picking up ladies, Josh and I found our leisure hitting the rivers and making attempts of catching fish, all while being surrounded by the pristine backdrop of the Rockies in which we call home. Josh is an excellent sportsman although I've always given him crap about using bait and spin tackle while I pride myself as fly-fisherman and a "purest". However, it always played out that one method proved to be more successful than the other on any given day.-The fish were taking only Josh's lures or only my flies, never both. So usually one of us would get skunked while the other would gloat over their successful day's catch.

Enough of memory lane, lets delve into Josh's and Shelly's Engagement photos. From our consultations with the bride and groom, I found out they desired something a little less traditional than the flowers, greenery, and heavenly sunsets. We opted or a more modern and contemporary look in an urban street setting. We set out to the streets of Ogden one late afternoon. We found some cool walls and some great stairwells to utilize as backdrops. Lighting varied from On-Camera Fill to several umbrellas. I designed their invitation to match the same "feel" as the engagements as well as their wedding colors.

Getting Emotional

Hayley contacted me months ago while I was still working on the Disney film in southern Utah. We finally worked out a schedule to where we could take a few hours during mid-day and head out and shoot.
When I asked her what concepts she was interested in, she made mention of shooting something with emotion. I knew this would be a fun concept since it could potentially give us more latitude than setting up your typical glamor or fashion motif.

While being a Strobist has its perks and advantages, it also has its problems, one of them overpowering the sun in the middle of the day. We were shooting close to noon, and the sun was directly overhead and not a cloud was to be seen in the sky.... So our options were to shoot in some open shade or find some dark, sun-less areas where I would be free to sculpt and create my own light with my speedlights.

We traveled a short distance from the homestead to a pedestrian tunnel that runs under a bridge and went to work. Each frame was captured with the concept of conveying an emotion. I gave Hayley no coaching and told her to simply "feel" what she wanted to convey, which was mostly dark and dreary moods and emotions. This went well with the dark tunnel and the final images are some of my personal favorites of this year's sets.
Enjoy

NOTE: All images were shot with a single speed light coupled to a Beauty Dish.

One Light Can Work Wonders

A couple of weeks ago I set out to do some test shots of Emily, a lovely and outgoing local who is considering getting into modeling. I was asked to do some "test shots" too assist her in finding her own level of comfort while being in front of the lens as well as gauge what type of photography and modeling she would be most suited for.
We started the session in the studio with some simple head shots. We later ended up taking a short 10 minute drive to a small field and rural back-road for some more charismatic themed shots during the last minutes of daylight.
All that was used was a single speedlight coupled to an 43" relflective umbrella placed at various axis around the Emily and the camera. Once in post processing, I gave the images a bit of lomographic curve (which I tend to do lot) and crushed the blacks a tiny bit. Here are the results...

Happy Holidays....

Hope everyone had a great day... Here is my annual Christmas Card from our Kareoke Band, The Metric Ton.

Life's Turns

It has been a while since my last post. Things have been a bit crazy lately and the normal flow of life has led me through some crazy twists and turns. After working nearly 4 full time years as an EMT-I for Salt Lake City, my employer has not been able to secure financial stability and has made the decision to leave our great state, which will render me unemployed and laid off 4 day before Christmas. This is a first for me as I have had continual work since I was 13. I will miss serving the citizens of Salt Lake and running an ambulance on the street. Working within the 911 system of our capital city has been a life-changing experience.

To raise my spirits, a good friend of mine contacted me on Face Book about Help Portrait, a growing national movement where photographers get together on a set date and take professional studio quality photos of those who cannot normally afford to have them done. This included everyone from families, single mothers, and the homeless.

The day was amazing and while the number of subjects was limited, I met some great new photogs and captured some great images. This was Help Portrait's first year here in Utah, so next year will only get better. During downtime when we were not shooting our designated clients, we spent our time shooting each other. It is very rare to find me in front of the camera...

My next post will highlight some of the great photographers I had the honor of meeting and include images and the stories behind them as well as some of our subjects that came in for their portraits... Stay tuned.
-Ben
http://www.help-portrait.com
KSL News Article

Seduction

I often shoot for Chic Elite Models and this is one of those shoots. These were shot on-location at the Circle Lounge in downtown Salt Lake. Because the very nature of any lounge, club, or bar, the lighting was nearly non existent with the exception of some small colored LED's around the walls and the ceiling. This is good and bad. The good is that I can very easily control the amount of light of the scene without needing a lot of power. I easily manipulate the scene utilizing several speedlights with modifiers. The bad is that is is so dark, it becomes difficult to direct, pose, and communicate with the subject. Not to mention that even as great as my Nikon is, it certainly struggled to obtain autofocus at times.

The lounge had large soft, curtains wrapping around each booth and seating area. A large white curtain particularly caught my attention and I decided to utilize it in shoot as a giant diffusion screen by firing a bare flash into it. It worked out perfectly, and I believe the end shots would have not have turned out as great as they did without it. As always, please click on the images to see the full-size.

THE GREAT FLOOD

I had built and moved into a new home about 2 months ago. It has a large and spacious unfinished basement which I have slowly converted into my new studio space. I acid washed the floors, painted the walls black , installed a sound system, and after a week's worth of labor, I had a pretty decent area for a "home studio"

I had noticed when I had moved in that the basement drain which catches the condensation from the central air unit and softener was draining slowly. I placed a call to the builder, and I was told that some the other homes in the area had slow drains and that I should remove the grate-cover and shove the drain lines from the water softener directly into the hole. I did as instructed and it seemed to not backup as much, but I felt it was still not draining appropriately. I placed a second call to the builder... I was immediately blown off and pretty much told to quit whining and to enjoy my new home.

We roll forward in time to 3 weeks ago. It was one of those triple-digit days and the air conditioning wasn't keeping up. I decided I'd better run downstairs to check on everything and low and behold, as I reach the bottom of the stairs, I step into 4 inches of water! Lightstands are floating, props are bumping around as if they were toys in a bathtub. Besides my studio space, I had used a separate area of the basement to store all my old stuff and seasonal goods. As I rushed over to that area, I knew that there was no way in hell that my diplomas, old electronics, and my late mother's Christmas ornaments would be spared.

What would casuse such a thing to occur in a new home? Get this... When they built the home, one of the subcontractors decided it would be okay to dump his excess concrete, stucco, or tile grout material down the drain and into the sewer.

Now 3 weeks later after a maxed out credit card, a newly poured driveway, and priceless heirlooms and sentiments ruined forever, I have realized that we can never prepare for the unknown, and that we have to take life as it is dealt, regardless of the hand you hold.

As for me, luckily the builder is going to take care of the cleanup and construction costs. But covering my lost setiments is another matter.

How high can your Boots be?

I had the opportunity to spend a late afternoon on the streets of downtown Salt Lake City shooting a Punk Theme with Brandy, an beautiful and amazing model. A lot of time had been placed into her attire, hair and make up. I must give kudos and a shout out to Denise (DC Makeup) for doing such an amazing job. We had a blast with this shoot. I kept lighting simple with one and two light setups. Our only complications were the interuptions from all the intoxicated homeless people trying to get at Brandy. Fortunately, it pays off to be a 300 pound photographer...

Fun with Friends

During the cold month of February, I met Lindsay during a meeting. She is an amazing make up artist and model who offered to help a starving photographer out. After doing a Test-Shot session, Lindsay was kind enough to plan a full day's event in which she gathered all her girlfriends and do several themed shoots.

It was a great day! I took over 1000 images and shot 5 models. We ended the day tired and exhausted, but captured some great shots and looks.

Cheers to my new found friends.