I need to change the site...

Been too lazy to update the page, need to change it to just a flickr feed... anyway.

Some recent work

I've been in a photographic lull for the last month, but I think I'm finally feeling enthusiastic about photography again. Either way, we're flying out to Vegas soon and doing a West coast road trip so I'm excited to have my photo-mojo back.

2 Strobe lighting setup... or closet "softbox" with a bedsheet

As an owner of cheap LumoPro 120's and some umbrellas I always admire and drool over work of people who have access to large, powerful, sun-battling monsterstrobes that costs thousands of dollars. This weekend I decided to stick a speedlight into a closet and cover the doorway with a blanket for a 5-minute ghetto softbox. That's right, stick it to the man.

Soft Directional Light

The problem with all of these small strobes is that their power output caresses donkey balls, so I had to setup my 580EX to blast @ full power since it was stuck deep inside the closet. I could have raised my ISO or opened up the aperture, but I wanted a deeper DOF and no natural light showing up (since the shots were taken close to north facing windows).

The left rim I had in an 8" snoot so I could only drop it on the left edge of myself and the oranges. Took a couple of tries to get the right ratio, I didn't want it to be overpowering the main softbox. Feathered it a little bit so it wouldn't spill on the wall behind me and I was ready to go

After I got myself posed up and the shot was done I kept throwing oranges into the air as if I were in a home production skittles commercial. Several minutes and three severely squished oranges later I was ready to go into post production.

Here's the original image before I started tweaking it.

A little curves to bump up the contrast.

Adjusting curves on a selection of the sweater to make the light a little more dramatic.

The fun part! I get to dodge, burn, multiply, overlay different types of layers on top to increase the contrast and separation on the face and hands... glow of yellow, etc.

A couple of final tweaks. Took down the left side a bit as it was distracting, got the oranges into the shot, and I'm ready to go!

Spring Cleaning / BMW 330CI ZHP

My wife had to run some errands in Evanston, IL - so I decided to clean the interior of the car and take pictures. I also have recently swapped my winter wheels for the stock M's with a new set of summer tires. It's is good to be back!

The Caribbean Adventures Edition

I'll let the images do the work.

Three speedlight lighting setup for edgy portraits

I really like Joel Grimes lighting technique of placing two kickers at 45 degree angles behind the subject to get a very cinematic feel. I’ve been following his work on flickr and he is truly a master of lighting people in a modern and edgy way. In these slow winter months, when venturing outside guarantees phlegm taking residence in ones bronchus, I have to rely on my living to craft images in.

The finished image

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ChicCanvas.com Canvas Printing Review

The proverb says that The shoemaker's son always goes barefoot and it is much the case with myself and photography prints. I have been researching canvas prints for a while and finally commited for a couple at ChicCanvas.com.

They are currently running a "buy one at full price and get the second one at 50% off" deal, which is very competitevily priced. I ordered two 24"x36" prints to hang in the bedroom and went with the run of the mill configuration for the print - 1.5" thick and gallery wrapped (the image wraps around the corners).

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