Daily Photographer – 3.34

Today marks the first day of Operation: On the Ball.

I looked at my calendar and realized that February (my “slow” month) is just about over. Thankfully there’s one extra day in it this year because I’m going to need it to make sure everything is ready for the rest of the year. At least up until June anyway. For the first time I’m actually debating closing off a couple of days in my calendar so I can crank out some new marketing pieces. My personal deadline is fast approaching.

Speaking of, the Arnold Fitness Expo is right around the corner! I will be wandering around at the event and have also decided to open up booking for 3 athletes/models that would like to shoot while we’re all in Ohio. If you’re interested in a session please let me know.

See you tomorrow,

D

Daily Photographer – 3.33

Had some internet issues today guys. Sorry for the super late post.

I think I have everything solved for now. Time to get some sleep.

See you tomorrow,

D

Daily Photographer – 3.32

The third and final workshop day brings a close to an experience I’ve been wanting to provide for quite some time. The goal was to raise the bar of photographer-run workshops in my area and I can safely say that I accomplished exactly what I set out to do. Rather than give the perspective of one professional, I brought my colleagues (and competition) in an effort to show the full range of thought without regard for industry secrets. Rather than an event where everyone shoots without direction, an environment was provided where the attendees could finally have one on one instruction with high-level professionals. Rather than a few hours to cram in whatever could be crammed, we had three days of seriously powerful learning. I know it wasn’t easy for my students. I know many lost sleep over their assignments. Yet I also know that the next time they pick up a camera, or stand in front of one, everything will be different…and that makes me so happy I can’t even describe it.

Today’s image comes from the same breakout session I mentioned for yesterday’s image. Often times people underestimate the power and versatility of a single light. Too many times photographers come to me talking about how many strobes are best to use in a situation. The same thing came up when I first told my students that they could only use one strobe for the whole weekend. People balked, then struggled, and then started to understand. This shot is another single strobe image, and the point was to show how we could use that one strobe to make three light sources. My stance is this: if a photographer can’t make one light look like 5, they aren’t ready to use 2 of them.

Anyway, it was a great time. I’m not sure when yet, but there will definitely be another one in the future. We’ve barely opened the bag o’ tricks.

Thank you to everyone that came, mentors and students both. I’m stupid proud of all of you.

See you tomorrow,

D

Daily Photographer – 3.31

Today’s image comes from a situation that arose at my workshop this morning. One of the students wanted their model to appear to be smoking but was struggling with lighting the smoke from the cigarette. See, when you light a scene from the front to show the models well, you lose the smoke against what ever background there is. It has to be done differently when you are only using one light (mean old me didn’t allow anyone to use more than one light at this event).

So we had a miniature breakout session after the assignment was done where I demonstrated how to achieve the effect. On top of that I further illustrated how casual yet precise direction can impact the ease of a shoot for the model and photographer…something that I bring up often on here. Obviously that’s a technique that’s much easier to show than to describe.

The video crew came in today and the plan is to have the cut workshop video at least through the first edit by next week. I’m pretty excited to see what we got. The videographer I brought in has some truly amazing work in her portfolio so I’m confident that we’ll come out with a great promo.

See you tomorrow,

D

Daily Photographer – 3.30

First day in the bag, and what a great first day at that. I’m so proud of everyone that came and gave their all. Way to go!

The point of this session was to lay the groundwork for the next two days. There was a ton of information to take in and everyone brought their notebooks! Tomorrow is even more intense and I’m beyond excited to see how their homework assignments turn out.

Have I mentioned lately that I love my job/life? Well I do, and it’s because of things like this. Awesome.

See you tomorrow,

D

Daily Photographer – 3.29

Man I’m excited for tomorrow. My friend and fellow photographer Noel Daganta flew in from LA this morning so we got to kick back and hang out for a while. It’s been pretty nice to actually be able to relax for a day. Especially since everything is completely ready for the weekend.

So all that’s left is a good solid night’s sleep. Except, when I’m excited about something sleep never really happens. I think the stomach full of sushi will help that though. Nothing like a food induced coma to get you through the night.

See you tomorrow,

D

Daily Photographer – 3.28

I can’t believe I overlooked this image.

It’s totally sticking it’s tongue out at me! When I noticed that I laughed for a good 10 minutes. That was a nice reprieve from an insane week.

See you tomorrow,

D

Daily Photographer – 3.27

Got to take over a pharmacy today. Ok, not really but it felt like it. I was brought in to create some new images for a local chain of pharmacies to use in their marketing efforts.

In the midst of all of that I spotted these super old medicine bottles up against a window so naturally I had to break from the action to snap a frame of them. I think people are used to this from me by now. Something glistens in my peripheral and I’m gone to photograph it. This should be an expected behavior out of any photographer. I can’t be unique here.

See you tomorrow,

D

Daily Photographer – 3.26

I wrote out today’s post, then re-read it as I always do only to realize that it was a full paragraph of complaining about my day.

You can’t pair a gorgeous model with a page of bitching. It’s against cosmic law. I will say though that I’m pretty excited that some time in the near future I get to go head-to-head with T-mobile in court. Maybe I sound a little twisted for looking forward to that but it’ll be great when I, a man with no legal background or even experience in a debate class, rains down a fire of irrefutable logic bullets and wins against the wireless giant.

I’m pumped.

See you tomorrow,

D

Daily Photographer – 3.25

Tomorrow marks the first day of workshop week!

If you haven’t registered yet we do still have some space for you. Head over to the workshop page and get to it!

Back to work for me.

See you tomorrow,

D