Recent Professional Works

[Abdulrahman Aljabri]

I dig this one from a recent interiors project.  Un-retouched, straight out of the camera.

Cheers,

CB

Wow very clean light and high contrast image with no blown highlights, that is impressive. I wish my files were that clean straight out of camera.

[Dick Roadnight]

MGC

Why would you want to illuminate the exhaust when it looks less than pristine?

Never too old to learn: didn't know here was an MGC; thought it ended with the MGB. Always thought the GT was so much nicer looking than the ordinary rag top. Had thought about one when I got the X1/9 but by then they had adopted the horrid US version black bumpers, as the Fiat did too, eventually...

Was the MGC the one with the big Rover engine, or was that called something else? Of them all, I think I liked the MGA best. In white.

Hope you're feeling fine now.

Rob C

Hi, Rob...

I like to get separation between the subject and background... he could have solve the problem by painting the exhaust, but I expect it should look shiny. I could have put a flash (and a reflector|diffuser) under the car. If a picture is of a car for sale, you are not supposed to re-chrome it in PS!

It was the MGB GT V8 that had the Aluminium Rover V8, from about 1973.

The MGC had an Austin steel straight 6, and was made up to 1969.

Both these models had a bulge in the bonnet, just visible in the pic.

My convalescence continues slowly... I am supposed to be fit for "heavy lifting" in a week or two (6 weeks after the open cholecystectomy (gall bladder removal)), but I still find it difficult to concentrate for more than half an hour.

[stewarthemley]

I dig this one from a recent interiors project.  Un-retouched, straight out of the camera.

Cheers,

CB

Great shot as usual, Chris. I notice that you have said you are slowly moving to a style with more natural lighting and I for one find it much more pleasing to look at. You haven't said whether or how much this was lit but it feels unlit and more natural. I know it's horses for courses, and some clients want the shadows brightened up, but most people I check with prefer images to look like the room does. Thanks for sharing.

[fredjeang]

I dig this one from a recent interiors project.  Un-retouched, straight out of the camera.

Cheers,

CB

What I really like in this image is the composition perfectly settled.

The sensastion of depth is really good with the light getting more intense to the reflected external view but with all the details preserved where there are important. Great DR control.

The blue balanced by the warm color touchs works well and personally I would not retouch that color balance that much.

As always, the precision in the IQ is visible right on the web with the kind of gear Chris is working with.

Beautiful.

[Rob C]

MGC


Hi, Rob...

I like to get separation between the subject and background... he could have solve the problem by painting the exhaust, but I expect it should look shiny. I could have put a flash (and a reflector|diffuser) under the car. If a picture is of a car for sale, you are not supposed to re-chrome it in PS!

It was the MGB GT V8 that had the Aluminium Rover V8, from about 1973.

The MGC had an Austin steel straight 6, and was made up to 1969.

Both these models had a bulge in the bonnet, just visible in the pic.

My convalescence continues slowly... I am supposed to be fit for "heavy lifting" in a week or two (6 weeks after the open cholecystectomy (gall bladder removal)), but I still find it difficult to concentrate for more than half an hour.

Hi Dick,

Glad things are going well - it's at times like this that I become aware of the vulnerability of the self-employed situation. Snag is, good insurance is so damned expensive. But then, what that's worth having is not?

I'm sort of stunned by the decline in my own mental prowess: I was really into cars during the 60s and 70s and for the life of me, I find it impossible to conjure up a genuine memory trace of that MGC! Not a spec! Are you sure that your concentration failures, like mine, are derived from the op table?

A good friend and his wife and myself were having lunch together a couple of weeks ago when we got onto the car topic and she said that she really liked the TR7. Before I could shut my mouth I exploded into a shocked denunciation of that thing: told her the Michelotti TR6 was king and the 7 but an apprentice design made in two different countries, the front half in China and the rear in Patagonia. Without consultation between the two. She wasn't amused. Oh well, such is friendship. But her husband did sort of save the day by saying he liked the 3...

Don't strain you body - cannot send out to the spares department these days - they stopped making the bits just after you were born!

Rob C

[CBarrett]

Thanks, Guys... yep that natural looking lighting with only like 6 lights up, mostly strobe.  The glass we're looking through on the right is actually heavily tinted with blue, which I think makes the space so interesting.  Can you believe this is a law firm?

As for the gear and IQ and all that, Cooter and I were having this conversation yesterday and talking about our responsibility as respected professionals.  This seems a perfect point to interject my thoughts that while I love the gadgets, and really don't enjoy working with the PC lenses on DSLR, I do reach for the 5d2 from time to time, am comfortable delivering both files to the clients and know that with my sense of lighting, vision and post production work, they'll never know the difference.

At the end of the day you gotta reach for the tool that's economically feasible for your business, get's the job done and helps maintain good client relations.  When I was ready to make the jump to the P65+ I wrote the check out of my bank account.  If you're billing can't support the purchase I would be loathe to recommend financing one, it just doesn't seem like a healthy business move, as the difference in image quality is not going to increase your business enough to pay the finance charges.  I happen to be fanatical about pushing my images beyond a level that the client will usually notice and I count myself fortunate to have enough work to support the neuroses.

I guess what I'm saying is, yeah, I love the German glass, the back is damn good stuff and the Arcas make composing a real pleasure, but don't think for a minute that I couldn't drop it all, move to the Canon and go out tomorrow and make pictures (I'd be grumpy as hell for a while, though).  In the end it's got to be about You, not the gear.

/Rant

-CB

[Dick Roadnight]

I'm sort of stunned by the decline in my own mental prowess: I was really into cars during the 60s and 70s and for the life of me, I find it impossible to conjure up a genuine memory trace of that MGC! Not a spec! Are you sure that your concentration failures, like mine, are derived from the op table?

Don't strain you body - cannot send out to the spares department these days - they stopped making the bits just after you were born!

Rob C

No... I had candida, ulcers, and helicobactor pylori before the Jaundice and pancreatitis... the cholecystectomy (and the gall flushes) seem to have cured the gluten allergy, which I have had for 25 or 30 years... are all these conditions related, and will they now all go away?

This is not a "recent professional work"... and I suppose I should have started a topic in the coffee corner.

[JoeKitchen]

I dig this one from a recent interiors project.  Un-retouched, straight out of the camera.

Cheers,

CB

And now it all makes sense, all this time I thought the blue was some kind of weird color shift from the sunlight and had no idea how you so sharply and crisply got the shift to end right at the glass.  Nice shot.  

BTW, Chris are there any must photograph buildings in Chicago?  I will be spending 4 days there next week and plan on spending a day shooting.

[HarperPhotos]

Hello,

Shoot a few weeks ago north of Auckland.

Stats:

Nikon D3x camera
Nikon 35mm lens
Processed in CS5
Photo retouching by Daniel Evans www.super-nz.com

Cheers

Simon

[Abdulrahman Aljabri]

Hello,

Shoot a few weeks ago north of Auckland.

Stats:

Nikon D3x camera
Nikon 35mm lens
Processed in CS5
Photo retouching by Daniel Evans www.super-nz.com

Cheers

Simon

Very nice Simon,

How was the effect created, with a rig or was it all post processing? The picture appears heavily edited by the way.

[Rob C]

I don't understand the picture of the car: mine has  a blue oval too, but the rest of it doesn't look remotely like the one in the pic - too much retouching in Photoshop, obviously, and it has been made to look much flatter and wider than a standard, classic, end-of-the-line Escort ever looked.

Shame on the snapper for producing such porn! No wonder normal, well brought up cars with natural body lines get upset and develop all manner of problems when given such false values to which they are expected to aspire.

Rob C (aka Shocked of Pollensa)

[Dick Roadnight]

I don't understand the picture of the car: mine has  a blue oval too, but the rest of it doesn't look remotely like the one in the pic - too much retouching in Photoshop, obviously, and it has been made to look much flatter and wider than a standard, classic, end-of-the-line Escort ever looked.

Rob C (aka Shocked of Pollensa)

Actually, Rob, is is taller than the original GT40, which was only 40 inches tall, and Jeromy Clarkson (BBC UK Top Gear) could not get in it. It would take a good retoucher to make an escort look like that!

[Dick Roadnight]

Ford GT

Nikon D3x camera
Simon

Looks good...
¿What is the picture for?
¿What seize will it be printed at?
¿Did you take other versions with a longer lens?
¿Would more separation from the background have made it a better picture?
¿Was the car in the tunnel?
¿Was the tunnel lighting Sodium (yellow)?

There is no fine detail to resolve, so the D3X would give enough res for a large picture (even a bill-board) ...but I would have thought that 50 or 60 Mpx would have been standard kit for what looks as if it was a high-budget exercise, even if only to give the retoucher a better file to work with?

[CBarrett]

BTW, Chris are there any must photograph buildings in Chicago?  I will be spending 4 days there next week and plan on spending a day shooting.

Hmm.... must shoots...  there is certainly lots to shoot.  It depends on whether you're interested in the historical - the early skyscrapers, the FLW stuff abounds just north of me in Oak Park, the Miesian school of modernism or if you want to focus on the latest and not so greatest... I mean while there has been a lot of crap erected in Chicago of late there are some notable exceptions.  Goettsch's  111 South Wacker (a personal fave) stands across the street from the Hyatt Center which is also a great building.  Krueck and Sexton's Spertus Museum is wonderfully creative, Jeannie Gang's "Aqua" is fun, Renzo Piano's addition to the Art Institute of Chicago's Modern Wing is a must see (and Millenium Park while you're there) and oh the Rem Koolhaas Campus Center at IIT is very cool!  And... of course there is the Trump Tower, which is, well.... Trumpy

Below is a nicely notated Chicago Skyline...


and at the page where that lies, you can actually click each building for more info..... have fun!

Me, I'm off to South Carolina!

[HarperPhotos]

Hello,

Another shot from a few weeks ago. Just got permission from the ad agency to show it.

The shot of the set up was with my Nokia phone.

Cheers

Simon

[HarperPhotos]

Very nice Simon,

How was the effect created, with a rig or was it all post processing? The picture appears heavily edited by the way.

Hello,

I shot the car in my studio and shot the tunnel separately. It was the safest way to create the shoot.

Cheers

Simon

[Phil Indeblanc]

Hello,

I shot the car in my studio and shot the tunnel separately. It was the safest way to create the shoot.

Cheers

Simon

Hello,

I shot the car in my studio and shot the tunnel separately. It was the safest way to create the shoot.

Cheers

Simon

I was just going to ask if that was the case...Its an awsome pic, though I did sense a detachment... or some "seperation" between the car and road..perhaps how the car was lit vs the tunnels nature?
 I did sense it from the fisrt look.  It still makes a great impact image. It does bring up a question in mind....
with agencies these days lower the bar I can see it being used.  I hope you don't take this wrong, as I think you have some great work... it certainly cost less than the car cam rig and the permits, safety measures, and crew with different takes and driver to make this image... But I sometimes wonder what that means for the company's image/value for people seeing the ad and how they interprit things.  Although subconcious and likely in split seconds and hard to know why a viewer likes or dislike it, if asked, many people could break it to see that. but...maybe that level is just not all that important these days?  Was this for an agency with Ford?  Really good work for a solo shoot.  Again, don't get me wrong, I too work solo most of the time.

If there is anything that might help the image....I think if you lighten up the black; or get rid of some of it in front of the car around the lower bumper, it would help it to be more convincing.

I hope this post is taken constructively only. Maybe you too know exactly what I am saying, yet still thought it was cool enough to post it here...and it is.  Cheers!

[Phil Indeblanc]

Hello,

Another shot from a few weeks ago. Just got permission from the ad agency to show it.

The shot of the set up was with my Nokia phone.

Cheers

Simon

Well done!

[Phil Indeblanc]

Ford GT


Looks good...
¿What is the picture for?
¿What seize will it be printed at?
¿Did you take other versions with a longer lens?
¿Would more separation from the background have made it a better picture?
¿Was the car in the tunnel?
¿Was the tunnel lighting Sodium (yellow)?

There is no fine detail to resolve, so the D3X would give enough res for a large picture (even a bill-board) ...but I would have thought that 50 or 60 Mpx would have been standard kit for what looks as if it was a high-budget exercise, even if only to give the retoucher a better file to work with?

I have submitted work for billboard usage, all they asked for is a 8MB pdf file.  One of the larger billboards was over 100 feet long. ..If I remember right 80x120' ..viewing distance plays the key role.

[Dick Roadnight]

Camp fire

Hello,

Another shot from a few weeks ago. Just got permission from the ad agency to show it.

The shot of the set up was with my Nokia phone.

Cheers

Simon

There is more noise in the mid-tones in the Nokia phone-cam shot... what iso were you using?

Is there a risk of damaging the sensor if you shoot straight into the sun?

Do you know what caused the fringing on the horizon?