Saturday, 6 November 2010
London Emigration Fund: H.T Fotography
London Emigration Fund: H.T Fotography: "Jana and I would like to say an enormous thank you to H.T. Fotography for their generosity. We are so thankful to have you supporting us! Ev..."
Friday, 24 September 2010
Can We Have Some More Powder Please?
Pictures from shoot in studio
Model Jana
Make-Up: Dee - Makeup 4 Art
Photographer: Henrik
Equipment : Canon 50D
Focal Length : 52mm
Aperture : F9
ISO : 100
Shutter speed : 1/160
Some times as a photographer we get so caught up in our craft of lighting, shooting, light placement, shutter speeds, aperture etc, that we can loose focus on some of the most important things. These important things can include things like the MODEL. I have noticed that when we start shooting one of the things that really help the confidence of a model is good make up and good hair. The rest of the parts that make the shoot are clothing selection from a models side. Get good hair and makeup and a killer dress even if the model lacks a bit of confidence normally they will feel confident and you the photographer will get great shots. Hair is important but even that can be fiddled in studio with some clips a hair straightener and hairspray in a pinch. Good makeup done by the Models themselves is a rarity. The model will do make up the way they feel is right and most times for the occasion as in shoot they will be wrong. Put good makeup on a good model you will have a fantastic combination. Just don't mess up the photography. I find giving the Make-up artist a detailed brief beforehand is a good way to start the ball of creativity rolling. Trust the make-up artist they are good at what they do. Hey they trust you to get good shots even more if it is a time for CD type thing.
here is a head and shoulders of our Model Jana. The make-up is pleasing not over the top and enhances our models face not detracts from it. Someone said to me the mark of good make-up should be when someone comments on how beautiful the subject looks today and not how wonderful the make up looks. The make-up should add not take attention away from the model. Little different if you doing one one of those over the top type shoots.On to the technical bits
We did this shoot in studio. OK First off the top shot very little has been done to this photo. I shot that photo using 3 lights. One in the suitcase one camera left and a background light gelled blue.
The flash in the suit case is a Canon 580exII speedlite set at 16th power and gelled Orange. It was triggered using a pocket wizard. It had no diffusion on it. The background light was a 200ws flash that was set at about 1/2 power and there was a 500ws flash in a large soft-box about 1metre away from the suit case set to about 30% power just to help define the outside of suit case. A friend asked me why i did not light the shoes I felt it would have distracted from the face which I felt was the main focus. Maybe I will try it both ways next time. As for Post well that was simple the gel was orange so pushed the white balance into the cool to correct for the orange. The background went even more blue and added a little bit of vignette just to seal the deal.
A big thanks to Dee from Make-up 4 Art these photos would not have looked as good with out her. If you are looking for a good professional and friendly make-up artist in the greater Durban area Dee I can Highly Recommend. Check out her Website here
Thats it from me
Tuesday, 4 May 2010
Food mmMMMMmm
Food
I like food. I really love good food. In another life I may have even been a restaurant critic. Creating things is something that I enjoy doing and I do that with the photography. Creating good food is not my calling but eating it is. I do have a friend though that is really good at creating really good food. His name is Noel and he is the head chef at a real nice restaurant here in SA in a suburb called Westville. The restaurant name is Salute they do Italian style food.
I like new projects and thought I would try do a bit of food photography. Who better to help me with my food project than Noel. Noel is as passionate about his food as I am about my photography. Noel studied to be a chef and is gaining some wonderful recognition and has been in the local papers a few times recently. The restaurant critics find his food wonderful. An interesting fact abut Noel his creativity is not just in food. He is the vocalist in a band called Cynical Origin just in case you are wondering they are a Metal band - Rock on. One of the things a chef will learn at chef school is the client must eat with their eyes first. So to do this the chefs are taught about colours and presentation. Noel is damn good at presentation - the part that's really important to photograph.
Now photography is all about truth and reality. Yea Right. Truth about food photography is this. Unless you are selling the food directly in the photograph you can do anything you want. Fast food outlets need to be photographing real food for their menus. In other words if it is a burger with onions etc on the menu then the photo had to be taken of actual beef pattie and real onions. But who said it has to be a cooked pattie or onions without food colouring. If the food on the menu looks really good is the lawful representation then chances are if you had to pick up that exact burger that was photographed on that menu and took a bite you would get a mouth full of tooth picks, chemicals and raw meat and if you are really lucky you wont die.
Real food is hard to get looking really good unless you name is Noel. I decided a while back that real food is what I would like to photograph. I did a bit of reading on how food stylists do the food you will see in publications etc. I may look good but that's it. Most of the food you see in those pictures are not even edible. Seems a bit like cheating to me. Its a little like this "Heres this car I want you to photograph but I don't want you photograph the car you drive away with you must photograph this car with these crazy modifications that we have done that makes it impossible to drive it ever".
The food you see here is real and what you see is as it would be served to the hungry client sitting at the table. Lucky for me as I got to sample one of the dishes. Well did it taste as good as it looked? You better believe it. Since taste-o-vision and smell-o-vision is not widely available yet pictures will have to do.
One thing that I can say working with restaurant staff is use their experience. They know the real deal how long until the next plate to photograph will arrive and what is the right accompaniments to go with the food. Wine, condiments etc. Approach them with a positive attitude and show them some of those pictures they even start coming up with some great ides some you can and some you cant use but get them on you side and it makes you life a lot more simple. Noel was also really accommodating he would ask "what would you like next more height different colours". When this is you first time photographing food seriously having someone helping you by plating the food in a photograph friendly way does really help.
Just remember that the really fancy food photographs you see have been styled by a food stylist. What is a food stylist? you maybe wondering well their job is to get the food looking good that's it. They not interested in the photography. Thats your job. The food stylist will correct something that's showing or not showing on the food. They are not interested in Ive got a hotspot etc. That is partly the reason I wanted to do this shoot. It was to get a bit of experience with how to light the food, looks to go for, background, settings etc. To add context to the food the background is as important as the food.
In these shots the restaurant was open and serving customers so I could not really light the whole place and kick customers out the way. The restaurant sorted out a nice spot away from the rest of the tables. I could work and do what I needed to do with out being disturbed which was nice of them.
The lighting was not overly complex 3 speedlites. 2 set about 45 degrees either side of the camera and one as a background light. The two either side of the camera were in soft boxes. The background light was in some of the pictures fired bare onto a red wall and others through a red glass candle holder. I used the ETTL functions on the flashes and the nice thing about it was I could just dial in a 2:1 ratio between my key and fill flash and done. The bonus is that I can even do it from the camera and I don't even need touch the flashes. The only flash I did need to touch was the background light as it was not the most stable in the round candle holder on the floor. The shutter speed was about 1/200 and the aperture ranged between 2.8 and 7.1. I was using my Canon EF 24-70 F2.8 lens and dialed into my camera a +1 stop on the flash compensation. the reason is the camera will see the white plates as a serious highlight and back the flashes a bit. Post was just a bit of a crop and levels and a touch of vibrance to bring out the lovely rich colours of the food.
There are a few things I will do different in future I will be pulling the table cloth very straight. The other thing is working on getting something cool in the background. When I look at the photographs they are good but Imagine if I could get some of the restaurant and decor in the background. If done properly it would give more interest and context to the food. If I put the food on a bar it would imply a pub lunch or if a forest was in the background it would imply a picnic or or or - as if you could lug this out there. But you get the idea. I am happy with the photos.The food is well represented and looks yummy.
I like food. I really love good food. In another life I may have even been a restaurant critic. Creating things is something that I enjoy doing and I do that with the photography. Creating good food is not my calling but eating it is. I do have a friend though that is really good at creating really good food. His name is Noel and he is the head chef at a real nice restaurant here in SA in a suburb called Westville. The restaurant name is Salute they do Italian style food.
I like new projects and thought I would try do a bit of food photography. Who better to help me with my food project than Noel. Noel is as passionate about his food as I am about my photography. Noel studied to be a chef and is gaining some wonderful recognition and has been in the local papers a few times recently. The restaurant critics find his food wonderful. An interesting fact abut Noel his creativity is not just in food. He is the vocalist in a band called Cynical Origin just in case you are wondering they are a Metal band - Rock on. One of the things a chef will learn at chef school is the client must eat with their eyes first. So to do this the chefs are taught about colours and presentation. Noel is damn good at presentation - the part that's really important to photograph.
Now photography is all about truth and reality. Yea Right. Truth about food photography is this. Unless you are selling the food directly in the photograph you can do anything you want. Fast food outlets need to be photographing real food for their menus. In other words if it is a burger with onions etc on the menu then the photo had to be taken of actual beef pattie and real onions. But who said it has to be a cooked pattie or onions without food colouring. If the food on the menu looks really good is the lawful representation then chances are if you had to pick up that exact burger that was photographed on that menu and took a bite you would get a mouth full of tooth picks, chemicals and raw meat and if you are really lucky you wont die.
Real food is hard to get looking really good unless you name is Noel. I decided a while back that real food is what I would like to photograph. I did a bit of reading on how food stylists do the food you will see in publications etc. I may look good but that's it. Most of the food you see in those pictures are not even edible. Seems a bit like cheating to me. Its a little like this "Heres this car I want you to photograph but I don't want you photograph the car you drive away with you must photograph this car with these crazy modifications that we have done that makes it impossible to drive it ever".
The food you see here is real and what you see is as it would be served to the hungry client sitting at the table. Lucky for me as I got to sample one of the dishes. Well did it taste as good as it looked? You better believe it. Since taste-o-vision and smell-o-vision is not widely available yet pictures will have to do.
One thing that I can say working with restaurant staff is use their experience. They know the real deal how long until the next plate to photograph will arrive and what is the right accompaniments to go with the food. Wine, condiments etc. Approach them with a positive attitude and show them some of those pictures they even start coming up with some great ides some you can and some you cant use but get them on you side and it makes you life a lot more simple. Noel was also really accommodating he would ask "what would you like next more height different colours". When this is you first time photographing food seriously having someone helping you by plating the food in a photograph friendly way does really help.
Just remember that the really fancy food photographs you see have been styled by a food stylist. What is a food stylist? you maybe wondering well their job is to get the food looking good that's it. They not interested in the photography. Thats your job. The food stylist will correct something that's showing or not showing on the food. They are not interested in Ive got a hotspot etc. That is partly the reason I wanted to do this shoot. It was to get a bit of experience with how to light the food, looks to go for, background, settings etc. To add context to the food the background is as important as the food.
In these shots the restaurant was open and serving customers so I could not really light the whole place and kick customers out the way. The restaurant sorted out a nice spot away from the rest of the tables. I could work and do what I needed to do with out being disturbed which was nice of them.
The lighting was not overly complex 3 speedlites. 2 set about 45 degrees either side of the camera and one as a background light. The two either side of the camera were in soft boxes. The background light was in some of the pictures fired bare onto a red wall and others through a red glass candle holder. I used the ETTL functions on the flashes and the nice thing about it was I could just dial in a 2:1 ratio between my key and fill flash and done. The bonus is that I can even do it from the camera and I don't even need touch the flashes. The only flash I did need to touch was the background light as it was not the most stable in the round candle holder on the floor. The shutter speed was about 1/200 and the aperture ranged between 2.8 and 7.1. I was using my Canon EF 24-70 F2.8 lens and dialed into my camera a +1 stop on the flash compensation. the reason is the camera will see the white plates as a serious highlight and back the flashes a bit. Post was just a bit of a crop and levels and a touch of vibrance to bring out the lovely rich colours of the food.
There are a few things I will do different in future I will be pulling the table cloth very straight. The other thing is working on getting something cool in the background. When I look at the photographs they are good but Imagine if I could get some of the restaurant and decor in the background. If done properly it would give more interest and context to the food. If I put the food on a bar it would imply a pub lunch or if a forest was in the background it would imply a picnic or or or - as if you could lug this out there. But you get the idea. I am happy with the photos.The food is well represented and looks yummy.
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