Fashion shoot

[sfaust]

I thought I would share some images from last week. The shoot went really well, even though we had a major lighting store rumble right past our location. There is also more information on the lighting and such on my blog in my signature.

 

[kirkman]

Very cool shots, what strobes were you using? the lighting set up?

 

[Alpha]

I'm not particularly a fan of #1. She's grimacing pretty strongly and I have no idea what her hand is doing. It's staged like an editorial fashion shoot but the polka-dotted swimsuit and low, wide angle tell otherwise. I know the type of shot you were going for, but this one is missing the context that makes editorial fashion editorial in the first place.

#2 is a nice exposure from a technical standpoint. It's hard to say much else at this size, but it does seem that the eyes are a bit off.

As for #3, I have no idea what the hell is going on. There's a guy in a suit wearing sunglasses standing in the middle of nowhere, with his palms open, and his eyes closed. He doesn't appear to be praying. What am I supposed to garner from that? Where's the story?

All in all, the technical stuff is good, though I could do without the vignetting. I don't see what it adds to these. I feel like you're trying too hard. Like you setup this shoot just for the sake of shooting some pretty people in the middle of nowhere, or simply as an exercise in overpowering the sun. I'd like to see more focus on context, and on the subjects themselves.

 

[kirkman]

I know the type of shot you were going for,

yet you don't know exactly what shot he/she was going for

maybe thats the exact facial expression and hand gesture they wanted.

 

[sfaust]

Alpha, I understand your point completely, and it's a very valid one. But the concept isn't important in this context without the accompanying text or ad/marketing concept. Throw a tag line on it and the image and concept becomes complete. Such as the way with commercial, stock, etc., where images aren't always self contained and rely on text, graphics, placement or context to complete the story.

On this shot, there was a definite concept and emotion at play. The woman lost in her own world, separate from the driver. A couple physically together, yet emotionally far apart. It was part of the same shoot.

Kirkman, I talk more about the lighting in detail in my blog entry from this shoot. Basically I was using a 1600ws strobe in a beauty dish on camera left, and balanced that with natural sunlight. It was running off a portable battery setup. For much of the shoot, my assistant also held a Canon 580EX or two to add accent/key lighting as appropriate. Such as the guy in a suit. The accent lighting was from the beauty dish, and the main lighting from the 580EX hand held.

 

[bigalbest]

Cool blog, and interesting light.

 

[Alpha]

Alpha, I understand your point completely, and it's a very valid one. But the concept isn't important in this context without the accompanying text or ad/marketing concept. Throw a tag line on it and the image and concept becomes complete. Such as the way with commercial, stock, etc., where images aren't always self contained and rely on text, graphics, placement or context to complete the story.

On this shot, there was a definite concept and emotion at play. The woman lost in her own world, separate from the driver. A couple physically together, yet emotionally far apart. It was part of the same shoot.

I understand what you mean in theory but I'm just not really seeing it here. The car shot is certainly the strongest, and does have a story. But as a series, I'm not so sure. I'll assume the car shot is the first in this sort of storyboard. He's presumably in the driver's seat and she's disinterested. But then what? I don't really see the other shots completing the storyline. So perhaps she leaves the car behind and tries to hitch a ride, but can't find one so she goes strolling through the field. Meanwhile she's miraculously changed outfits twice. Somewhere else, the boyfriend is...well, I still have no idea what exactly it is that he's doing. And I'm not saying all this to try to pick a fight or anything. I just don't quite see how it all comes together. The concept certainly isn't a bad one, but the execution seems a bit haphazard. Can I ask what the tag line or text accompaniment would be were you to publish this?

 

[kirkman]

Kirkman, I talk more about the lighting in detail in my blog entry from this shoot. Basically I was using a 1600ws strobe in a beauty dish on camera left, and balanced that with natural sunlight. It was running off a portable battery setup. For much of the shoot, my assistant also held a Canon 580EX or two to add accent/key lighting as appropriate. Such as the guy in a suit. The accent lighting was from the beauty dish, and the main lighting from the 580EX hand held.

thank you!

 

[sfaust]

I think you are trying to read far too much into the images by trying to connect them somehow. It's not a story, there is no story line, and they are all unconnected. The only thing they have in common is that they were shot at the same time, using the same models. I didn't mean to post them in such a way that a story line was inferred. I apologize for the confusion I caused.

Some were shot for stock, some for my portfolio, some for the models portfolios, and some for use in my lighting workshops. The guy with is arms out could fit a dozen different tag lines as a stock image. A little use of the imagination on the creatives part will easily close the story with a clever tag line to complete an ad. The middle shot was done for the models portfolio. No need for any story line, other than to show an interesting image with the models likeness. The first shot was done for my lighting workshops and blog to demonstrate balancing sunlight and strobe, and we just used what we had to give the image some interest rather than have the model just standing there.

All different uses, not really connected. I can see how you are confused trying to put them all into a story line. I don't see the connection either

 

[kirkman]

Alpha do u not have PM enabled? i don't mean to hijack the thread. sfaust I just read your blog and it was very informative thank you so much for doing that.

 

[Alpha]

Well I tried to read them for exactly what they were, but you said that wasn't important without a tag line or equivalent. Given that you were acting as AD in this case, what was your mental tagline in these three shots?

In #1, how does the model's grimace and awkward gesturing contribute to the image's significance?

In #3, really, what is he doing?

 

[Alpha]

Alpha do u not have PM enabled? i don't mean to hijack the thread. sfaust I just read your blog and it was very informative thank you so much for doing that.

[Aside]You need to rack up 10 posts or so before you can PM IIRC[/Aside]

 

[kirkman]

[Aside]You need to rack up 10 posts or so before you can PM IIRC[/Aside]

ahh i did not know that, thanks. i'll pm when i get 10 posts up

 

[sfaust]

I entered another post, but decided to delete it and re-read this thread again to make sure I wasn't mis-understanding anything. So let me start over....

I am not trying to get across any concept in these images. I wasn't going for any story line, editorial spread, etc., and even agreed with you that trying to pull them together as a story is confusing at best. When I discussed tag lines and concepts, it was in reference to image 3 that you specifically asked about, and not all the images as a whole.

The only image I went for a concept was the car shot, since I had wanted to do that one for my portfolio for quite some time. So I made sure to work that into the shoot. The rest were for a variety of purposes as stated earlier, and none connected to the others. Those were to demonstrate lighting techniques for my workshops and blog, give the models some images for their portfolio, add to my own portfolio, use in stock, etc., all as appropriate to each individual image. But there was never a plan to make it a conceptual shoot. That each image is un-connected to the others. All this was stated clearly in my previous post.

So I just don't understand why you seem to have latched on the need to put tag line and wrap a story around the images. Perhaps I have mislead you, and again apologize if I have. But when reading back through the thread, it seems quite obvious to me. But the again, since I wrote it I can be as objective

 

[Alpha]

In my first post, I considered each image separately, but had a gripe with the fact that each one's context or storyline wasn't clearly or well executed enough.

So you responded by saying that the concept isn't important w/o accompanying text, graphics, or placement. This I mistakenly took to mean spread.

But to the real point. These images are not wholly commercial. You're clearly trying to step into editorial fashion territory here. And if you'll get out your editorial fashion handbook, you can see that rule number one is context. When Ralph Lauren's AD says he wants to shoot some guys in $3k suits surf-fishing w/ the pant-legs rolled, up, it isn't just for the hell of it. There's an entire lifestyle pitch at play. What I was trying to, and probably should have said explicitly in my first post, is that the shots are good but they look like a commercial photographer trying to shoot editorial fashion. And if you want to play the editorial game you have to play by the rules or else it'll look half-assed. If you had perfectly executed shot #1, there'd be no question what it was about. But in my mind, it looks like an internet model doing the robot.

Now I don't intent to start a fight because I know professionals alike can get their egos bruised. But It seems to me you should do one of the following:

a) Ignore me entirely
b) Own up to the fact that there has to be context independent of advertising.
c) Add me to your ignore list.
d) Tell me, please, what on earth that guy is doing in #3.
e) Get your genres straight. You're crossing your commercial and editorial fashion wires.