Harriet Morris Make Up

Harriet Morris is an up and coming local Make Up Artist and I recently shot some portfolio pictures for her.

The first set we shot was just a couple of models and was only headshots and detail images. This meant we could shoot in my small studio. Recently, I've been really enjoying shooting directly into the light. I love the flare and low contrast effects generated when you scatter light into a lens. You never quite know what you're going to end up with, and that uncertainty really excites me as a photographer. I shot two sets in this session, one lit with a reflective umbrella behind the models and a large bounce card behind me. The other with one large light softbox lighting the models in front of a grey background for a more traditional set of images.

For the second shoot there were more models and Harriet wanted full length shots as well. I knew things would get cramped quite quickly in my studio so I hired a local Community Hall, where I could set up a full length backdrop for the wide shots and have space for the girls to get ready (there's a picture of the set-up at the end of the slideshow). Harriet wanted different backdrops for each model so we decided on a greenscreen set-up to give us lots of options in post.

Lighting wise, this was a bit more involved than the first shoot. The main light was provided by a 6x3ft silk, giving a big softlight from one side. This was augmented by a small softbox boomed overhead to give a slightly more directional light to the models face and provide a nice crisp catchlight in the eye. A rim light was added with a bare flash behind the model. I threw a couple of spare flashguns on the background to even out the greenscreen to help with keying.

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Posted via email from Andrew Gale Photography

Resolution Studio

Last week I put up some pictures of the band Subtheme. The rehearsal shots were taken in Ant Dickinson's Resolution Studio.

Ant has spent the best part of the last year putting this space together and now that it's finished he asked me to come and take some pictures.

This building holds a special place in my heart. Ant and I spent countless hours in these rooms recording foley sound and mixing the final audio for my feature film Dark Waters. Over the months I spent in the studio, it was really interesting seeing the space become more complete on each visit, and now it's finished I jumped at the chance to take the photographs.

For the images of the band, I was really throwing a lot of light around, burning out the background so I could focus on the people. For these images we needed to be a lot more precise and technical, we wanted to show off the space in it's best light. In most of these images I'm using three lights; one behind the camera, bounced either off a ceiling or wall - this provides a good base level of light - getting the exposure up to a workable level and letting us see all the details of the room; to provide the interest and a bit of drama I use one very directional light, this casts some interesting shadows about and draws the focus to the part of the image we want the viewer to be looking at; the third light is usually a troubleshooter - there is almost always one tricky area of a room that simply refuses to be lit, that's why it's always useful to pack more lights than you think you'll need - in these images, that third light is under the desk and behind the drumkit - providing a little bit of lift to the dark areas.

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Posted via email from Andrew Gale Photography

Subtheme in the Studio

I recently had the pleasure of shooting the band Subtheme again for some publicity shots. (this is the band formally known as The Drop).

Having shot the band before, and knowing the time constraints of getting all the members together and the much harder task of directing a group to all pull a rock star face and keep their eyes open all at the same time, I decided to shoot the band members individually an create a composite group shot later on. This also gave us a lot of options for locations for the shot.

I lit the greenscreen shots with a softbox directly above camera and quite close to the band. This gave us some strong directional light, but still soft. This main light was then augmented with a pair of bare flashguns behind to give us some srong rim lights and also separation from the greenscreen. I also threw a couple of other flashes onto the background to get a more even tone to the greenscreen (anything that makes your life easier in post is worth spending the time on when setting up the shoot).

The whole shoot took about 30 minutes. Couple of different outfits for each member, close shots an wides. About 130 usable images in total. Lots of options.

After the studio shoot, I went with the band to a practice at Resolution Studio (a post on that is coming soon). Resolution is a nice space, but gets quite cramped with a whole band an all the gear a whole band needs. I also wanted this shoot to have a very different feel to the previous practice shoot I'd done with the band. To make my life easier - I set up 2 remote flashes, one at each end of the room, bounced off the far walls. Then from the camera, using an SU800, I could dial in the power settings for each. Ti way I could decide as I framed the shot which would be my key and which would be my fill. I wanted these shots to be bright so in general I threw most of the power to the backlight on the far wall, while the flash behind me provided enough light to lift the details in the shadow areas.

All in all, I'm very happy with both of the shoots we did that night. We've still got options for new shots to be composed from the studio session (especially if there are any future line-up changes) and the practice shots have come out almost exactly as I envisioned them.

See the full gallery on Posterous

Posted via email from Andrew Gale Photography