Tagged: model
MUSCLE UP !!!
I’ve had a few emails asking whether I’m still alive or not… Yes. I’m just massively involved in an exciting photographic project at the moment, which has taken alot of time away! But here’s a cool shot I took for ‘fitness industry promotion’ purposes of late. Steely determination, muscular definition, iconic stance, menacingly engaging eye-contact… simple yet effective! Thanks to Jay Revell, a consummate pro in front of the camera – follow him at his twitter here!
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 24-105mm lens at 88mm, f 7.1, ISO 160, 1/60 sec.
PORTRAIT IN LANDSCAPE ?!?
This weekend, I was working on a project for a fitness blog for which I’m chief photographic button-pusher (and on which I’ve based the design for this very blog – check Fitness On Toast out here!), and decided to take some shots in the studio for the occasion. The project itself involves ALOT of photoshop perspective-work, ‘visible darkness’ as I call it, and will resemble an iconic pop culture shot – exciting, can’t say more than that at present, partly because it’s not nearly complete! But between shots, I thought it was time to go portrait – in landscape orientation, which I find can really add to the dramatic width and perception of space, as well as focus the eye ever more on the subject. I loved the honest and vulnerable puzzlement in this shot – it just connected with me, so I thought I’d share it with the world. There you go world. Enjoy!
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 17-40mm lens at 105mm, f 6.3, ISO 100, 1/40 sec.
PARK IT UP !!!
Sun + London = Park. The beauty of shooting into the sun is the sharpness and contrast that can be carved out. Subtly filling the shadows with an EX430 flashgun (no diffusion required), with only a polarising filter to eliminate the glare and enrich the sky, I really like the effect of this one. I think it convincingly draws the eye to the subject – as if the eye needs help!
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 17-40mm lens at 17mm, f 20, ISO 320, 1/200 sec
BARRY SHOOT PHOTO ???
I recently did a few shoots for the hugely popular US fitness institution that is Barry’s Bootcamp, which has just landed on our shores from LA & New York. Based opposite Euston station, “the best workout in the world”s appeal is to burn 1000 calories in 60 minutes with a mix of cardio uphill sprints and dumbbell/resistance work, whilst you’re commanded by beautiful young superstar trainers, like Anya here (more images to follow of some of the others uber-trainers – this is just a first installment!). The class costs a mere £20, there’s no membership fee, and their ‘fuel’ smoothies are out of this world!
The above shots were taken at my studio with the Lastolite heavy duty vinyl backdrop, my 3-point strobe rig, and the ever trusty Canon EOS 5d mk iii, 24-105mm lens at 105 / 70mm, ISO 160, f 9.0, 1/60 sec.
THE VERY ANTITHESIS !!!
I recently did some work with a very cool east-London clothing brand, Antithesis, run jointly by Zahra Ash-Harper and Renée Lacroix. They’re big on their multi-functional and modular pieces and I had the pleasure of shooting the look-book for their second collection (entitled Globe-strutter), working with the awesome Kirsty-Anne Tritton, pictured above (you can check her out on her blog 5Feet10). The shoot also involved a tiny bit of ‘ghost mannequin’ photoshopping work, as per the screenshot from their e-store, below. Look out for these guys in the future – big things ahoy!
All shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 24-105mm lens at 70mm, at various F numbers, ISO 160, at various shutter speeds.
JUST GRIN AND BEAR IT !!!
Meet my test model, Bjorn. Whenever I get a new piece of equipment, this little guy gets to try it out first, from the other side of the camera! It might look like Bjorn is photographed here on an arctic snowdrift, but no, that’s actually just a white chair. And no, Bjorn can’t jump, so he’s not mid-air here, just resting himself on the top of the chair. This was just a test for a new strobe I got. No need for technical details, but in short, he did the job as ever 🙂
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 50mm lens at 50mm, f 1.2, ISO 500, 1/40 sec
WAKE UP AND SMELL THE BOUGANVILLA !!!
A visit to Ibiza is never mundane. I took this shot in the tranquil nature-Spa of Atzaro, where orange tree meets both Buddha and house music. I particularly like the vibrant lilac canopy of bouganvilla, the intense green of the reeds, and the intersecting diagonal path. Also there is a sense of humorously playing with proportions here; the flowers, their stems, their reach and projection of the branches, are all seriously outsized relative to the girl. It’s like a ‘glam-chic’ version of Alice Through the (Mediterranean) Looking Glass. If nothing else, it just makes me smile 🙂
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 24-105mm lens at 55mm, f 5.6, ISO 100, 1/250 sec.
GOODBYE OLD FRIEND ???
When I say ‘Goodbye’, I am talking about losing that old friend, my 50mm f1.8 lens. Its cost effectiveness as a wide prime lens has long been revered, but it is time to move onward and upwards to something altogether more exciting. This headshot portrait, taken as part of a publicity shoot for an aspiring musician MC XTREME, is the last I will likely ever take with that lens.
I’m ‘over it’, because it has been replaced in the kit bag by an all-singing, all-dancing 50mm f1.2 L ‘hyper-prime’ (as i like to call it) contraption. The quality of the two is almost incomparable. I look forward to posting what it can yield, but in the meantime, this will do for today 🙂
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 50mm lens at 50mm, f 3.2, ISO 100, 1/50 sec.
ON THE TRAIN…
Just playing around with the camera in Primrose Hill on a wintery Saturday morning. When it’s this beautiful out, pleasant composition is hard to avoid (especially with that delicious fisheye barrel distortion), but the challenge in this shot was to balance the exposure from the glaring sun (which is doubled in intensity by the cool puddle reflection) and the activity of the two girls training. Canon 430 EX II Speed-light to the rescue! Exposure balanced, glare (relatively) neutralised, colour preserved… voila!
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 15mm fisheye lens at 15mm, f 20, ISO 250, 1/200 sec.
CORPORATE COUTURE !!!
I don’t know what it is about this shot, but it just connects with me. The old-school telephone handset, the retro rolodex in the background, the lead-out line of the long, empty desk… And the girl’s look is one of uncertain confidence. I didn’t have any lighting modifiers to hand ( 😦 ), so I just used the smallest F-number I could find, defined the foreground as much as possible, and figured that some tactical vignetting and adjustment-brushing would take care of the rest! A successful snapshot of the corporate day, if I do say so myself.
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 24-105mm lens at 105mm, f 4.0, ISO 2000, 1/100 sec.
WAIT FOR ME !!!
The snow continues in London, and so does my journey through the hard-disk to find shots that warm me up! This is one of my favourite photos I’ve taken, as it seems to scream ‘Travel’. Captured on the cliffs of Portugal’s Algarve coast under the harsh light of the midday sun, the aspirational qualities that I take from this photo are so indulgent! I like the contrast of the sun-kissed skin (slightly tinted rouge by the light reflecting off the red ferrous cliffs beneath) against the deep blue of the Atlantic Ocean, and the comparison of the delicately hanging earring vs the muscular and imposing yacht in the background! But I can’t quite figure out whether she’s clutching her head in despair that her ride home has just departed, or because she’s having a relaxing stretch / sunbathe !
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 24-105mm lens at 105mm, f 4.0, ISO 100, 1/1250 sec
TESTING GOSPEL…
This afternoon, I was at one of London’s best surviving jazz clubs, the legendary ‘606 Club‘ in deepest Chelsea (yah). Its stage has been graced by some of the genre’s finest since the late ’70s, so it’s always a pleasure to get close to the action in this very intimate venue. The subject of this shot is Tracey Campbell, the lead singer of the Gospel Jazz band that was playing, and the owner of an impossibly-accurate, tremendously powerful voice, captured in front of the club’s iconic backdrop, bisected by the piano’s brass-edged lid.
Apart from a chance to get some cool artistic shots of artists being artistic, I considered this my first proper road-test of the EOS 5D mk 3’s supposedly ‘exceptional light sensitivity’. Jazz clubs are dark at the best of times, but 606 has truly awful lighting – uneven, hot, patchy and ultimately unforgiving! With the proprietor preferring ‘no flash’, it was a tough ask! BUT I think the sensor has demonstrated why there’s a £1,000 step up between the mk 2 and the mk 3. Forgetting the autofocus upgrade and the video superiority, the just-invented ‘noise-to-light-sensitivity’ ratio looks awesome. Manageable noise, good contrast performance, no sensor blips, and a great preservation of detail. Victory – I will never again fear a venue for its lighting!
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 70-200mm lens at 118mm, f 4.0, ISO 6400, 1/50 sec.
CAN’T HELP BUT LOOK UP !!!
Yesterday, I went to the Natural History Museum to see dinosaurs with my nephew (yes, I’m sure a customary post of the roof will follow at some point). It was a series of vast chambers which reminded me somewhat of a less-pompous version of Le Louvre. And then, as I took in the majestic Brontosaurus skeleton in the main auditorium, natural light cascading down on it from on high, surrounded by ornate walls paved with countless ancient artefacts, I thought of this picture I shot at the Louvre itself. There are evident similarities, whilst only the direct subject matter differs. The one niggle that slightly disappoints me here is that I couldn’t capture the final corner of the roof pattern up top (and I was tucked right up in the edge of the chamber to maximise space); if only I’d spent a little more on the 16-35mm lens rather than my 17-40mm – the extra millimetre might just have been wide enough!!!
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk2, 17-40mm lens at 17mm, f 5.6, ISO 6400, 1/400 sec.
GONE SAILING…
Some have commented that my writing style is very prose-like, so to keep them guessing, I’m going to mix it up in this post.
In this shot, I have captured a girl on a boat. There is some rope, which is coiled – badly. The floor is white. The walls are white. Her trousers are almost white. Her shoes are not.
I have now run out of things to say about this post. Photo look nice.
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D, 24-105mm lens at 24mm, f 11, ISO 400, 1/250 sec.
LOOK OUT (TO SEA) !!!
Exactly a year ago today, I took this shot on the paradise-like beaches of the Caribbean. On this grey, murky day in London, a monochrome edit of this shot – which in no way detracts from the drama of the nimbo-stratus clouds (as I’m informed they are) in the background – seems an appropriate tribute. I am especially fond of the way this young lady cuts through the horizontals of the waves with a strong vertical stance that is slightly swept in the same direction that the wind has swept the clouds. Or something like that…
Nice swimwear too (Vitamin A by Amahlia Stevens)
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D, 24-105mm lens at 84mm, f 11.0, ISO 400, 1/500 sec.
SO MUCH WHITE SPACE …
OK. Tested out my heavy-duty Lastolite black studio backdrop in the previous post, SHOOTING (FUTURE) STARS. Unsurprisingly, here’s a test of the reverse side, the WHITE backdrop. To do this, I needed someone to stand in front of it – a photo merely of a white background, whilst abstract, is pretty boring. Fortunately, Ingrid here wandered into the shot, just in time!
As an experiment, I took these shots with perhaps the cheapest lens that Canon makes, the 50mm f1.8. No USM, no IS, no L-series optics, coatings or heavy glass; just 130g of ‘toy’ lens. The results show to me that whilst the cheapest, it is possibly their best value for money (c.£90 !!!) given the sharpness of image and decent low-light performance. Remarkable achievement Canon, bravo. I still dream of buying your 50mm f 1.2 one day though…
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk 3, with a 50mm lens, at f 3.0, ISO 200 for all, 1/200 sec.
SNOWY SWEDEN !!!
Took this early-morning shot out of my hotel window, looking back over towards the Swedish Royal Palace, surveying the Port area before the ferries took off for the day. If you’re wondering why there’s no sign of life, I shot this as a long-exposure HDR capture, +/-3EV, with an ND8 filter helping me block out some of the bright Swedish snow-reflection! Temperature was about -5c here, but the wind chill was far lower. Inspiring landscape, can’t wait to go back!
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk 3, 17-40mm ultra-wide angle lens at 22mm, f 22, ISO 100, 6.0 sec, HDR +/-3EV.
SNOWY SWEDEN…
Heading out to Stockholm on Friday – this is VERY exciting. Took this shot of the ‘old town’ there last summer, and massively looking forward to seeing what it looks like under 3 feet of snow (might play havoc with exposure settings)! Will be a huge novelty to see how public transport can still WORK with the right type / wrong type / ANY type of snow! Boris, please take note 🙂
Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk 2, 24-105mm lens at 24mm, f 11.0, ISO 400, 1/250 sec.
CRISPY IN LONDON !!!
This has been a gorgeous crisp day in sunny London – perfect opportunity to test-drive my new ‘superleggera’ 70-200mm f4.0 L-series USM. So, went for a wander with ‘the muse’, drank tea, people watched, and took some snaps. Here are the ‘results’.
All shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 70-200mm lens at various focal lengths, various apertures (usually f 4.0 to maximise bokeh), and various ISOs. Specific stuff!
OLI SHOOT PHOTO .com 