So! if you remember I did a seminar in Jersey with Gage Young, which was at the syndicate building, which is also where Machine has his studio (hes a well known producer) - as I was walking in the hallway I ran into my good friend Nate Johnson! you might know him from since the flood, or turmoil.... or through the eyes of the dead... and now youll known him from fit for an autopsy! and god DAMN! do they rule. br00tul death metal! now, not only is Nate the vocalist of the band, but Will (who works with machine) is also in the band! so I asked them to come by and be a guest band at the seminar.
Below is the photo shoot I did with them that day, and please keep in mind this was not a legit shoot as much as it was different types of lighting, locations, and situations for the students to learn from.
I started in the hallway by an old freight elevator, using just a boomed beauty dish - I was shooting at F18 at a 160th at ISO100 - with the dynalite jackrabbit uni400 - canon 1ds mark 2 and the 24-70 2.8 - I really wanted to show the different things you could do with minimal lighting, such as one light, two lights, three lights... what most start off with
After that we rolled outside and I did some natural light shots in front of a silver drop gate garage. What I tend to do when shooting natural is to try to have a very solid background, one pattern, etc. because it doesnt take too much focus off of the band. these are 2.8 at 1000th - again iso100
We then hit under the bridge, where just a month or so earlier I was shooting Iron Thrones - I wouldnt have used this location in a real shoot because I had used it VERY recently, but again, this was to show students.. I shot these with alllmost split lighting - id say they were turned in just a bit more then split - and i shot this TOO SLOW! i was at a 10th-15th and should have really upped my ISO in order to get what I needed. but, i was in a bit of a rush as I had two more quick sets I wanted to do. Luckily i have extremely steady hands and for the two images with too much movement - i have 15 usable images
Next set we did was a big open shot with three lights - using the CAT that was in the lot across the street. I put two umbrellas up REAL high - and used a beauty dish in the middle trying to get solid light in all areas I needed - this was shot at F8 as the lights were spread so thin, I had to shoot at a 250th to make sure the sky didnt white out - and in all I have about 4 solid shots from this set (which is good cause all you really need is one!)
After this the group moved on to Gage but I decided to do some more photos of the guys, and in turn got my favorite little lighting trick of the day - I took them into a hallway - and shot with just the boomed beauty dish... I wasnt a fan, so I did this nifty trick... i used two bares behind them - one pointed toward them and down to give cast shadows underneath them, toward the lens, and the other pointed away from them, pointed up to add light to the hallway and give them more depth/seperation. - this was shot at a 10th at F18 to bring in the natural light as fill, even did some photos of pats new born baby with the same set. - i have two set up shots here - with and with out the lights going off so you can really see what it does - and no - the baby isnt crying - he was yawning - awwww.
After doing a bit of that - i did some photos of nate doing vocal tracking cause the dudes needed them for in studio reports and such - I shot these at 2.8 iso800 - and went between a 30th and 60th - i had to really aim and wait for steadiness and of the 40-50 images i took about 2 have blur in them, so sometimes its worth the risk to really get the natural lighting in there.
All in all jersey was a pretty big bust aside from getting to do this shoot with friends, see ray chaos, and teach a very small intimate group - the most weve ever taught anyone before.
The next seminar is back in Mass - sept 11/12 - should be good times!
