Just rebuilding my website. Reviewing the photos I’ve taken over the last year has been fun.

August 16, 2014

My Dad at 70

August 12, 2014

When I was back in the UK recently we celebrated my Dad’s 70th birthday. I wanted to take a photo of him to remember the day.

He is devoted to his large garden and always has a project on the go: new flower bed, seating area etc. One project that lasted several years was the construction of a small folly. It was built entirely by him and is supposed to look like a medieval ruin! So I thought I’d snap him in front of it and added the sledgehammer in, as I suspect it played a part in breaking up some of those large stones.

The lighting was relatively simple with a snooted flash on a stand just out of frame left, directed at his face. A second flash was at ground level to light the folly. Both were gelled orange in an attempt to recreate the setting sun.

The three photos here show a bit of the progression of the 10 minute shoot…firstly I had him hold the sledgehammer over his shoulder.

I like this first shot but realised that you can’t see that he’s holding a sledgehammer. So I had him place the sledgehammer on the ground and rest his hands on it.

This made him look less ‘heroic’ but more thoughtful. I’m not sure how well this works as he looks a little hunched.

So I asked him to look into the distance which made for a better pose for this final shot.

The flash on the ground, which was supposed to light the folly, didn’t fire for this last shot and I think the photo in fact looks better as Dad stands out more.

We were manically packing up our car getting ready to leave that morning so I was pleased to be able to do this quick shoot with Dad. One of many happy memories of a great summer in the UK.

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Info:

- Nikon D800 on a tripod with Nikon 16-35mm f4 lens at 35mm

- Aperture Priority with -1EV

- f10, 1/125s, ISO100

- Snooted SB700 on a stand fired with Pocket Wizard. Flash power was dropped down by -1 to -2 EV

- SB900 on gorilla pod fired with Pocket Wizard

Been back in Singapore for 10 days and I’m already keen to travel again and see more of asia with my camera.

August 1, 2014

July 31, 2014

It’s great to see the photos I took for the school ‘What If…’ advertising campaign being used on these huge banners at United World College, Singapore.

Comedy Writer Portraits

July 30, 2014

I wanted to take a portrait of my brother-in-law who is a comedy writer. The set up is copied unashamedly from the great Joe McNally. I saw him use this technique at a recent Gulf Photo talk in Singapore.

Firstly I took a test shot with my sister-in-law (we were all having dinner together that evening) which looked pretty good. I had to turn the power of the flash down a little as in the first few shots she was really blown out. But I think the balance is quite good here.

The set up is pretty simple. The laptop is turned off and there is a sheet of white A4 paper on the screen. An SB700 Nikon flash (connected to a Pocket Wizard) rests on the keyboard and fires directly into the A4 paper. The light then bounces back onto the subject. It’s very simple and surprisingly effective.

Next I did the shots with my brother-in-law Tom Williams. He’s a freelance writer who tends to work late into the night, hence the night time feel to the photo. I wanted to shoot him in his garden as I can imagine him hammering away on the keyboard into the wee small hours losing track of time in his lovely recently redesigned garden.

I wasn’t sure that this set up really worked as his very long legs were too prominent. So I tried to use his legs to make the photo look more ‘comic’ to fit his occupation…

The closer crop and the legs tucked up make this look a little better but I’m still not happy with the pose. Also, you can see the flash gun which isn’t great!

So I moved the camera closer and turned Tom round in his chair to get this result, which I really like. But I wish I had asked him to put his hands on the keyboard.

Finally we did a couple of photos with Tom’s two sisters pretending to be shocked by his very rude comedy writing. I think these last two photos work really well and I’m pleased with the results.