Video and Photography

Sometimes we photographers get to shoot what we want to shoot. I had this concept of a surreal-type shoot in mind for several months. You know, when you get an idea in your head that won’t go away? I knew I wanted a set but I wanted to keep it simple. Also it took some time to find the right model to pull it off. Delaney is a high school student and has been into goth-type dress and look for some time. She also had that edge I was looking for in this particular shoot and was recruited quickly. THankS for your help Delaney! I found the old salmon-colored chair at an antique/thrift store for $65 and the old window cost me $10 minus the matching paint from Lowes. It was also an opportune time to test out my new hazer 1DX and new fogger, Mister Cool II. I began the shoot with my workhorse body Canon 7D Mark II with the nifty fifty attached. Its interesting to note that originally I was planning on a Savage seamless black paper sweep but ended up finding a great deal on the 10×20 used canvas background online which arrived only days before the shoot. I LOVE LARGE canvas backgrounds and even have a custom David Maheau but any pro can tell you that large canvas backgrounds can get very expensive. I threw a couple blue gels on some LED work-lights onto the far out background which seemed to help create that dark strange ambience I was aiming for. I utilized my S1 strobes. One as a key light on the right with a large rectangular soft-box attached. The other strobe had a snoot attached and was aimed directly at her fiery red hair. The modeling lamps on the S1’s (like many others) are not very bright so I turned on the IR focus assist on my 7D which I quickly learned only worked well if my subject was near the center of the frame. (Photographer see manual, LOL) We rolled the fog and the Mister Cool II worked fine. I made use of a Dracast LED video light with a Rosco gel over it camera left (for the fog) on the floor and my new and compact MC Aputure light, camera right, on the floor. I actually matched the color of the models green dress with this really cool light which has a color matching feature! (I really like this little light and can hardly wait to use it more) Studio 63 is in Florence, SC.

After striking the first set I pulled out a white Savage seamless sweep. I was in a hurry to get another session in (running out of time) so I put a Rosco pink gel over my old fresnal lens/light to illuminate the background. The hazer worked fine and seemed to give Delaney an ethereal quality as well as a softer quality. I also used my 24-70 mm Canon L lens but unfortunately didn’t have time to try some shots with my 24mm prime. (Maybe next time) Total shoot time was approximately 70-75 minutes. This was my first time using gels.