Welcome back to me. Its been WAY too long since I have posted to my blog. You might be wondering, what have I been doing? Working. Paying bills. Living. Yet, I still try to manage to find time to be somewhat creative. I think it is important to step away from the prosperous aspects of the camera once in a while. Breathe. Take a long look at others work. Ingest it. Learn from it. Let it influence you. Lately, I have really been digging Zack Arias. I guess you could say he was the influence for what I have been doing creatively lately. His story is quite amazing and his “work with what you have” mentality is really inspirational. All too often, I think photographers get caught up in the name brand game. I have….”blah and blah.” You should buy….”blah and blah.” Your photography could go to another level if you just had “blah.” Zack could blow me away with sunpak flash and a point and shoot.
Yet, Zack is probably the furthest thing from that and still wholeheartedly transparent in the way he conducts his photography. No Voodoo, none of that tricks of the trade shit, and all that other astrological bullshit that really piss me off. I had a teacher at UT one time that really sucked ass. He is an AP professional photographer, who incidentally had a chip on his shoulder against the world because he has worked “oh so hard” to get where he is (and guess what asshole…so has everyone else, no one who has any skill just found it laying around on the side of the road), that pretended to teach the techniques of lighting. The first day of the class was really exciting. I looked forward to separating myself from others by being mentored in the aspects of painting with light. His exact words, “I am going to teach you inside and out how to correctly use a strobe .” I was naive enough to believe that could actually be learned in a 6 week course meeting once a week. Surprise. No such luck. We had a field exercise that consisted of literally going outside and taking shots with the flash on the shoe, photographing each other one flash exposure stop difference at a time from +3 to -3 in full stop increments. The point of that exercise was to LITERALLY show us how to correctly use a strobe inside and out (doors we figured out).
Take a look at Zack’s website. Transparent huh? He doesn’t give away every single strategy he knows, but far from the secret voodoo of what some photographers seem to try and make it. As it turns out, I am more like Zack and less like the dick instructor. I intend for this blog to be the first of many to come that you might actually learn something from. I am by no means a teacher. But I am open. I can document. I can attempt in my very best of attempts to show you how and what I did. As time goes on, I will get more and more detailed with the photos, as I realize how important that data is NOW. So let’s get it to it.
The photo above first and foremost is a combination of two photos merged together as one in photoshop. The photo on the left (me in the blue shirt) is a self portrait taken with two strobes. One above as a “hairlight” (I realize the irony of not having hair) but more importantly to fill out the back side of me and a 10 degree grid inside a strobe aimed directly in my face. By the time I got the shot I wanted to use, I really was pissed and annoyed by the light because it fired about 1700 times it seemed. Its pretty miraculous in fact that I am able to see to type now, even days after completing the shot. The overhead strobe was about f/14 based on the light meter and the strobe firing in my face was f/8 if I recall correctly.
The top right photo. Oh the top right photo. WOW! The top right photo was a REAL PAIN IN THE ASS. First, the lighting was bullshit. I couldn’t figure out a way to unique light me without setting of a boring “deer in the headlights look.” I wanted something unique. I realized two things immediately. In order for this shot to make sense, it was going to have to have a source of light aimed directionly correct for the other photo. Two, I was going to have to capture this light firing to create that look. I had two strobes at the time. One of which was going to be used to create an illusion of light firing. The illusion light was firing at lowest power to keep from blowing away the camera. The other strobe had to light me. To pull this off, I had to extend the light straight over the top of my head, insert a 20 degree grid, and fire away and away and away until I found a shot I could use. Unfortunately, I didn’t document the settings of the overhead strobe. Don’t kill me. I will next time.
What did I learn? Document EVERYTHING. If I am going to blog about it, you deserve the right to know how I did it. Use what you have. Be resourceful. Photography is not made in one shot. Sometimes you have to work for it. Had I sat down and thought this whole thing through, I might have came across the idea to use the reflector to bounce back a bit of light under my face, which would have been even more stimulating. However, I didn’t. Hindsight is 20/20. Another photo, another time.