Todays Shoot: Chelsea - Corpse Paint (selective grid usage)

I wanted to try something different... as I tend to do every now and again... and I had this idea for a while, but wasnt sure when or how I was going to implement it.

Basically I wanted it to be SUPER dark with VERY small selective lighting - and theres a few ways to do this - I wanted the lighting to be soft and to have hard shadows... I tried a few combos to get it right

I started using the 10 grid on a bare parabolic (to the right of the model up about 1-2 feet above her) pointed toward her face and a 1x4 soft box on the left - I didnt like the mix - the grid was too hot - but the soft box was PERFECT - however too large a light source

so I switched to the 5 grid - on the left, and the 10 grid on the right and shot at F5.6 with the ND4 filter on the 70-200 lens. - i had her make VERY small facial movements in order to get it the way I wanted it - and im stoked with the results - I will be doing more of this stuff in the near future.

check it (click for full size view)

Todays Shoot - Tony Laureano (sick drummer cover)

I got an email asking for me to get some live shots of Tony for Sick Drummer Magazine, which I quickly offered a shoot, which turned into being the magazines cover.

Tony was out with skeletonwitch, previously he had been with Dimmu Borgir, All That Remains, 1349, Nile and a slew of others, but thats where I had previously worked with or photographed him in the past.

SO! between shooting live and a hectic slew of photo shoots both before and after this one, I found a good time to shoot a few sets before having to run in for the next band while setting up for the next shoot. HECTIC DAY!

because it was on the verge of raining all day - it was pretty dismal, cold, windy, and basically crappy out. Theres so many vans, buses, cars, people - all walking around because its metalfest - so not only is there a limited area to shoot in, but its also difficult to cut out the background - so what I did was I went with strong directional lighting - I used a boomed dish boomed up as high as it could go - then used a bare parabolic pointed to the ground behind him then to enhance that even more, I shot at a 250th at F16 - ISO100 - using the 24-70. i was using the high speed to cut out light bleed, but still have the atmosphere bleed in just enough to create a solid image.

























































Next, to give it a different look and to do some vic Firth shots, I simply turned the dish from straight down - to more angled toward him then moved the bare parabolic camera right - brought it over our heads about 7 feet up - and pointed it downward and in so it would skim across his shoulder and give some glare lighting

here is the unedited shot with the light still in it (i cropped it for the final)













Next I found a big white box truck parked next to a bar with a similar colored white wall and I figured it would make a cool scene if shot wide angle - so I kept this one closer to the 24 range of the 24-70 - these are all 2.8 at a 250th - and are my favorite shots of the set - being a photographer you always want to look for cool environments to shoot in - and any other day - this one wont exist because that box truck wont be there.







































And here is the cover! - it was awesome getting to work with tony again, and shoot my first cover - hopefully more in the future - for this drum magazine.

Todays Shoot - Krista (NSFW)

Krista came out from the land of oh hi oh! she came up to shoot and holy shit will you guys be stoked when you see the corpse paint images we got! - they will be in the book - but again im not going to be posting many here - just a few to show you a taste of the awesomeness. Also, i will say its easier to shoot black metal photos with someone who is actually really into black metal and understands what im trying to do - as some models see corpse paint and go "oh like a zombie" ...oof. no! haha. Krista is one of the true, grim und kvlt!

Anyway

she rolled up and we started with a ton of awesome clothes she had - corsets, lingerie - then she took a pair of leggings and cut them up with a razor blade - she cut herself once or twice i believe - but gave for an awesome look. These are all shot with the 70-200 - the corset shots are F16 - then the lingerie shot was F14 - the leg shot was F11 - then the leggings shots were F14 - the reason for the change was I wanted to brighten it up for the shots that showed more skin tone and keep the corset shots a bit darker - these are again split light - but i kept the soft boxes at about 5 feet apart - maybe less to get some harsher shadows and give her a darker look.





































































































































Next up - she had this awesome pelt - look out peta! and an awesome old school bon jovi shirt she wanted to shoot in - same settings and lighting

























































Next up was CORPSE PAINT! and like i said - i wont be posting a bunch of them - but needless to say - this shoot was top 3 of the corpse paint shoots thus far - im sure probably 5 or 6 images from this shoot will be in the book

buuuuuuut you get two.

so!

heres one in studio - boomed dish - close to the model rather than far away for more selective lighting and contrast - shot at F13



















After shooting in studio we went outside and went on a journey!

we went down by the water - got some excellent shots there - then went to the bridge about a quarter mile away from the studio and found a bunch of awesome branches that looked creepy but framed her face PERFECTLY! while a homeless sketchy dude kinda looked on - walked away - we shot - then he came back as we were leaving and tried to talk to us about... dunno cause we walked fast haha. anyway - 3.5 - 24-70 ISO500 as the light was dying













This was THE BEST shoot ive done in a while for this - mostly because - SHE GETS IT! - im trying to get her back here before the book closes to get another day or two of shooting in with her - im so pumped on these shots - and when you see them in print - you will be stoked as well!

Todays Shoot - Cam Damage (NSFW)

Todays shoot was with a model you may recognize as I have worked with her before - miss Cam Damage

We were shooting more of the fasion/gothfetish stuff before going into corpse paint

This stuff is kind of like catalog shooting, the lighting generally remains the same, while the model changes poses and clothes, pretty simple.

This is shot with two 3x4 soft boxes in split lighting - I shot these at F8 to get more of a depth of field than my normal F14-16 - but still at ISO100 at a 160th - using the 70-200 IS on the canon mark 2 1ds

when shooting with split lighting its really important not to have the subject be straight centered or the shadow will be dead center across their face and body - you want to really use the split and the shadow to highlight different things such as bring out faces, curves, clothing, whatever you are shooting - one thing i do often is have their body turned to one light with their face toward the other to really give a good fall in and fall out of light

anyway - heres some photos!































































































Next up we did in studio corpse paint - and as i said before - I wont be posting alot of the corpse paint photos on here anymore because why would anyone get a book if they could get the images here? right? - so heres a few - and judging from my past shoots - can you match the lighting with the shoot? - one is a boomed beauty dish shot at F18 - another is Triangular lighting - two rims/front facing dish at F14 - another is split lighting like above - can you tell which is which? :)

























































After finishing up in studio - we went on to shooting corpse paint outside - it was getting dark so i was shooting closer to iso400-800 at f2.8 - as the sun faded and the widn was blowing making it extra cold - but shes a trooper and we got what we could - again - only going to post a couple photos from this for now..


























It was awesome finally getting to work with Cam again - hopefully we will shoot again in the near future!

Todays Shoot - IWRESLTEDABEARONCE (BLACK METAL)

Now that the proverbial "jig is up" - I figured I would post the photo blog and everything that went behind turning IWABO into the most grim und kvlt black metal band for about 48 hours.

SO! as you all know, I am deeply rooted and brought up by the way of raw black metal (Darkthrone, Mayhem, Burzum, Immortal, etc.) and as you have seen - that has surfaced in my corpse paint, fine art project.

From seeing those images, and knowing our mutual affinity for black metal, steven and I said "we should do a corpse paint shoot... why the hell not!" and of course I am always down for some black metal imagery.

This quickly evolved from a "for the hell of it" shoot to a full "IWABO HAS GONE BLACK METAL!" campaign. Together we mapped out a pretty solid plan... but I'll put more details on that as we go on - for now - heres some prep photos in studio.

































































My buddy Laura helped with some of the corpse paint, I was very specific as to what their corpse paint should look like to keep it as true to the legendary black metal imagery as possible. I also brought a bunch of my own band shirts for them to wear as I figured they wouldnt exactly have Isenguard or Darkthrone shirts on hand.

I started with some solo shots - shooting with a single dish above the guys - shooting at F13 at a 125th at ISO100 using the 70-200 on the Mark 2 1ds. Rather than resetting the light lower, and higher as steven is about 35 feet taller than everyone else in the band, I simply had him bend at his knees a bit so his head wasnt being cut off the background paper and so he would have lighting even to what the other members of the band would have. - keep this trick in mind if you have one tall dude in any band - its an easy fix and looks completely natural if shooting above the knee.































































































Next up were the "clean" group photos - where we were going for a very simple, less expressive, more so of them posing with out using gestures or making metal faces - then I had them do a couple clean shots doing a more metal - scream at the camera - type of pose - same camera settings as before - except now im using the 24-70 2.8 L lens







































Now it was time to get dirty - I got a box of corn starch - which is heavily used to give clothing an older look, or just a more dusty contrast - used often by bands like dimmu, satyricon, immortal, etc. So I had them one by one step outside onto the fire escape while i nolan ryan'd them with some corn starch - because it was my first time doing this, some of it came out a bit blotchy while some others came out perfect - soooo there was a little evening out to do with two of the shirts but the rest were golden.


We went back into the studio under the same settings to get some more animated shots of the band - we did some with and with out props - i made sure all props used in the images were condusive to black metal - such as - swords - spiked gauntlets - no guns - no samurai swords - etc.

































































After finishing up in studio we went outside to get some natural light shots - which are pretty standard for black metal - I was shooting at 2.8 to get a very strong depth of field in the first set of shots - the idea was to have a shot with her hand in focus - and that to be a teaser image to post prior to the announcement - then post the next shot where they are in focus - but alas - it didnt happen - but heres a teaser i did up for it!




















































We went over to the hill where I actually had first shot IWABO years ago - you may have seen the image in a few magazines and their its all happening ads - with ricky photoshopped into the shot haha - but I figured it was a good spot to get brighter photos - get some sky and some greens in there - these were at F4.


























Lastly we found a spot with alot of dead trees - the prima black metal locale aside from going into a forest or burnt church in norway. - I shot these at F4 - at this point we were all shivering - it was very windy - so we finished up with these shots - going for both a serious and more animated look - then called it a shoot!




















































I shot all the outdoor stuff natural light because you wont really see a classic black metal image shot outdoors with lighting - ever, and I was trying to keep it as true to black metal as possible within our limitations. although it would have been cool to burn down a church and have them all peeing blood on it - I dont have that kind of clout! haha.

So as the weeks rolled on, Steven and I went back and fourth brainstorming exactly how this would play out - how we would elude to it - post about it - etc.

Basically the idea was to say they are sick of being called scene, and hated by internet shit talkers - so they will listen to reason, an stop playing all the "gay jazz and dance shit" and have decided to do a true kvlt black metal record. then post a song a few days later with a - hahahaha gotttcchaaaa! type of thing.

On top of this idea, IWABO got an epic black metal logo done and used it as "unreadable logo of the week" on the metal sucks page a few days before the announcement - check it out here - http://www.metalsucks.net/2011/05/10/completely-unreadable-band-logo-of-the-week-win-a-century-media-prize-pack/

and here is the announcement that they have gone black metal - http://www.metalsucks.net/2011/05/17/exclusive-black-metal-just-got-gay-iwrestledabear-once-change-genres/

needless to say - the comments alone - the THOUSANDS! of comments alone - were amaaaaazing to watch flood in - there were so many who believed it and were SO pissed.

this was probably the most fun I have had doing a campaign = even if it was just a short one and was a joke - it worked!







































I cant wait for the new record - which i can say - although it isnt black metal - it is fucking incredible!

-l- HAIL IWABO! -l-