Retro PhotoStudio – the Blog

This week started with shooting Collectif’s Spring and Summer collection. I was joined by Nicole Grzywok and Tara from the company, and the delightful models SINderella Rockafella and Cervena Fox.  There were a lot of stunning outfits in some great fabrics; I am sure this collection is destined for success.

It was quite a hectic day – over 1200 shots, so we were all kept very busy, but such experienced models made my life very straightforward.

Preparing the pictures for use online and on posters was a little time consuming.  Note to self for the future:  cover or remove labels from the soles of shoes…it will save a lot of retouching time later!

I thought you might like to see a little behind the scenes – the shots the girls would rather you not see!

Retro PhotoStudio dressing room

Tara, steaming outfits

Tara & Nicole - final adjustments for SINderella

“How long until I get the finished images?”

We finished shooting late on Monday.  By Tuesday the proof gallery was already posted and final image selections were being made by the company.  The first lists were sent over to me on Tuesday and by Wednesday the finished images, formatted both for web use and for poster or flyer use were already back with the company.  Within four days of the shoot they had 250 images and were posting them on their website!

Internet retailers need to know they can rely on getting quality images with minimal delay…time really is money.

You can already see the teaser shot below on the Collectif website.

SINderella, & fifties Zenith radio - one of our many studio props

Latex has come a long way…rubber has metamorphosed from being a niche fetish market into high fashion outfits,  often gracing the catwalks around the world.

Over the past couple of years I have been privileged to be invited to photograph outfits for a number of leading designers and suppliers, so for an interesting change, in place of a lots of text,  I decided to post the small gallery of latex images below.  I have included links at the end of the gallery.

The lovely model, singer and actress Esme Bianco modeling latex for Libidex

Aisling Gace (L) and Rayna Terror model Cathouse clothing

Juliette October models Ectomorph

Beau Rocks models Oooh La Latex

Fae Raven in Jane Doe Latex dress

Credits

(in order of images above)

Libidex modelled by Esme Bianco

Cathouse Latex modelled by Rayna Terror and Aisling Grace

Ectomorph modelled by Juliette October

Ooh La Latex modelled by Beau Rocks

Jane Doe Latex modelled by Fae Raven

Food photography – the art that conceals art

It seems deceptively simple , ‘just a picture of food’, yet there is a lot more going on ‘behind the scenes’ that poses interesting challenges for the photographer.

The brief is invariably to make the food look appetising, and that is a real team effort.

As a minimum, aside from the photographer, shoots invariably involve a food stylist, who is responsible for cooking the food and preparing it for the camera.

It used to be acceptable to cheat by using non-edible addatives, like varnish.  These days what you see should be the real food.

Take a look at this hamburger image.  Before any serious shooting took place a ‘dummy’ burger was positioned so I could set up the various lights and reflectors and judge depth of field, shadow detail etc.

Then the food stylist got busy; initially she cooked a dozen burgers, picking the best looking as her ‘hero’ to star in our picture.  However this was not quite a perfect specimen, so she used a scalpel to remove slivers of meat from the other burgers to fill in the slight irregularities in the surface.  Next she carefully cut a half dozen buns – and picked the one the had the cleanest cut edge with no crumble.

The same care now went into the assembly of the burger…specially chosen lettuce leaves were coaxed into position with tweezers.  The tomato slices were similarly painstakingly positioned, and a few tiny water droplets added to their skin just prior to shooting to enhance their ‘succulence’.

Next the chips were built up behind the burger, adding a chip here and there, repositioning, until the composition looked just right.  Test shots were being taken all along so the finished effect could be judged.

So in this ‘simple’ shot you are looking at over two hours work from food stylist, photographer…and in this instance a chef from the theme park plus a marketing manager!  And you would not believe the heated debate that took place over the positioning of a single chip, and whether the lettuce was in exactly the right position!

Oh, and if you are wondering about the where the technical information is about shooting food…I will leave that for another blog entry…just to keep you coming back!