Beauty Shots, Ghetto Style

August 13, 2010

Amy’s back!

This is my first (and possibly last) foray into the genre of beauty photography. I don’t necessarily own all the proper equipment to do “real” beauty shots, but I figured it was a fun challenge to see how far I could get with what I have.

Because I was travelling, I could only bring a minimum of gear with me. The three shots of Amy you see here were all lit the same way (see diagram below). I had Amy perch herself on the armrest of the couch in my hotel room, which was in a corner. The walls had a textured beige wallpaper but I needed that to be white, so I put a Nikon SB-800 flash (1/8th power) on a Cameron W-804 light stand behind Amy and aimed it directly into the corner. Next, I put a Nikon SB-900 on another stand to camera left with a Photoflex 30″ UM-RUT30 convertible white umbrella in shoot-through mode. I didn’t aim it directly at Amy, but rather just to her right, to feather the light slightly. The whole rig was fired wirelessly from the pop-up flash in my D300S.

The light stands and two umbrellas easily fit into a medium-sized suitcase for travelling.

Before I left Toronto to go to Halifax, I headed to Forever 21 to pick up some necklaces to use for the shoot. I found a cute owl and a neat peacock design — only $6.80 each, believe it or not!

I’m sure I’ve mentioned Amy’s ridiculous blue eyes before, but I’ll point them out again for fun. They’re fantastic.

Makeup was courtesy of the wonderful Kaily Grist, who you’ll hear more about when I post the next batch of Amy photos.

All in all, I think the whole team did a pretty tremendous job considering the limitations on our resources. Who needs a studio?

Madison

August 8, 2010

More from my hotel room at the Lord Nelson in Halifax, Nova Scotia. With the exception of the last photo, these were all lit with a bare SB-900 and a blue gel. Madison is visiting Toronto this week and I can’t wait to shoot her again.

The Blonde Bombshell

August 6, 2010

Meet Gillian.

Long story short: what you’re looking at here are two shots that were taken during a quickie ten minute photoshoot about 30 minutes before sunset on a super foggy evening in Nova Scotia. Despite the short shooting time, it took an epically long five hours to get to this point, during which we enjoyed not one but two ice cream cones, as well as insults from random passers-by on horseback.

I can’t make this stuff up if I tried.

For what it’s worth, Gillian told me before we met that she was out of shape and a bit rusty. If that’s the case, then I can’t imagine how good our photos will be when she’s in top form.

Swimwear from H&M.

The Last of Marietta (for now)

Shoot number two with Marietta was done at my hotel room at the Lord Nelson in Halifax. First, the bedroom:

Above shots were lit with an SB-900 via CLS through a white Photoflex 30″ umbrella to camera left. The flash was fired in TTL mode, but with a lot of negative compensation dialled in so it didn’t overwhelm the shot. It was all mounted on a small Cameron W-804 light stand that just barely fit into my suitcase. I can’t take my Alien Bees and huge light stands with me when I travel by air, but as you can see, the smaller solutions work out quite well.

On to the bathroom:

Precariously balancing on the edges of the tub as I’m wont to do, I lit these with the SB-900 on camera, paired with a Gary Fong Lightsphere Collapsible.

Dress was from Urban Planet in Toronto.

More Marietta

August 2, 2010

I can’t resist…

She’s Dutch-Indonesian, which is what gives her such an interesting look.

Amy at the Beach

August 1, 2010

I’m working through my Nova Scotia photos in chronological order. First up was Marietta and now it’s my old all-time favourite, Amy. Below you’ll find two of the four concepts that we did throughout my 10-day stay on the east coast. Still to come from my trip: more Marietta, more Amy, Gillian, Madison, and Christine!

I think this first photo is probably the best one we made, and it was so simple to set up. We just needed a few basic ingredients:

late evening sunlight
a beach (Silver Sands Beach in Cow Bay, Nova Scotia)
$20 Reebok swimsuit (from the Cookstown Outlet Mall)
statuesque pose

Amy is very bendy, as you can see. Years of cheerleading.

The next two photos were taken closer to sunset, in a $23 dress I found at Urban Planet.

And finally, a rare smile! I think I said something funny.