Recent Professional Works

[marc gerritsen]

a few from the shanghai expo
a bit off topic as it was shot on a nikon D3
just did not want to carry my heavy gear in the more then sweltering heat
masses and masses of people waiting in line sometimes up to 4 hours to get into a pavillion and have 20 min of fun
if you call that fun! i just walked around but got a vip pass to avoid the lines to get into the brittish pavilion
cheers
m
 

[Dick Roadnight]

PS, I want to use just one of the living room shots on my website (and the other in a promo mailer), which do you think should go on the web?

I like the shot towards the kitchen (bottom left) as it looks natural... is looks as if you had to nothing to it to produce a good photo, which might not be a good advert for you... but it is, perhaps the easiest scene, as the light floor gives fill.

IMHO the conservatory picture is too shadowy. Light coloured flooring in this room would have made it easier,,, but I appreciate that, with the dark floor, it would be extremely difficult to get the sort of result that I would like.

You asked us which picture we like rather than advice on how to take photographs, but this type of shot is an interesting technical challenge, and, if it was decided that more fill was desirable, then how could this be achieved?

 ... addition light from above would have over-lit the furniture, so, one could use several lights at ground level.

An extreme solution might be to take out all the furniture, photograph the floor, put the furniture back on a light white or blue (for select colour range) paper, re-photograph, and you could then mask and merge to produce any desired effect... would it be possible to blend in the floor so that the shadows on the floor looked OK?

...but it would be better to leave the furniture in place and place fill reflector sheets on the floor where needed to fill-light the furniture (so that the pictures and the furniture would line up in the different shots), but a photo of the empty floor might still help for blending in.

My wife's Cornish fisherman's cottage has a slate floor, so I should try this technique myself.

[JoeKitchen]

I like this one much more, the interior and background match with each other better now.

What do you mean by a third stop higher, you were trying to use fill in the interior to match lighting outside and you set it three stops higher than ambient light? That's what did not work?

When working with strong natural light, which I like doing, I usually do a couple test shots to get a exposure for the outside and sunlight, then build my lighting around that.  In the bedroom shot I used one strobe bouncing off of the ceiling and one tungsten fresnel hitting the bed.  In a situation like this, since both the amount of light I use and the exposure time will have an effect on the contrast of the image, I bracketed by adjusting the strobe power and the shutter speed.   I took nine exposures with shutter speeds at a 25th, 30th, and 40th with strobe power over a one stop range moving in third stops for each shutter speed.  This one I liked the best, it gave the most detail and fill lighting while still making the image look natural with contrast.  And I think the adjusted version is the better version too.  

Marc very interesting photographs and architecture.  Must have been an neat project to photograph.

[Dick Roadnight]

In the bedroom shot I used one strobe bouncing off of the ceiling and one tungsten fresnel hitting the bed.

In a slightly similar shot, with the sun lower in the sky, I used a reflector on the floor as fill... here a reflector on the floor might have filled the far right corner from the ceiling fill... of course, you cannot use too much ceiling fill if the ceiling is in the picture... do you use reflectors?

[Craig Lamson]

Thanks for the opinion.  I see your point with the bedroom shot, but disagree.  I did take an exposure with the strobe a third stop higher, but it appeared flat with no contrast and looked like it was lit.

I am very conflicted on the living room shots though, the second one is a formal and traditional shot, whereas the first is not and you really get a better sense of the sunlight entering the room.  Hard to decide the better of the two.

I pulled the curve a little in PS with the bed shot, not sure which looks better.

Joe, nice stuff.  Have you ever used Topaz Detail?  It a great program, not for every image but it can do some cool things.  Hope you dont mind but I did a comparison for you, your original bedroom (pre curves) left and the same shot using Topaz Detail in a selective fashion....

Please note I used a pretty heavy setting to show the differences.  I usually do this on a second layer and fade it back to taste (a bit less th at Ihave shown here).  In this insstance and as part of my regular workflow I erase ways areas to reveal the unfiltered bass layer as needed.

[JoeKitchen]

Joe, nice stuff.  Have you ever used Topaz Detail?  It a great program, not for every image but it can do some cool things.  Hope you dont mind but I did a comparison for you, your original bedroom (pre curves) left and the same shot using Topaz Detail in a selective fashion....

Please note I used a pretty heavy setting to show the differences.  I usually do this on a second layer and fade it back to taste (a bit less th at Ihave shown here).  In this insstance and as part of my regular workflow I erase ways areas to reveal the unfiltered bass layer as needed.

Thanks, and that looks like it could be a cool program to check out.

[JoeKitchen]

In a slightly similar shot, with the sun lower in the sky, I used a reflector on the floor as fill... here a reflector on the floor might have filled the far right corner from the ceiling fill... of course, you cannot use too much ceiling fill if the ceiling is in the picture... do you use reflectors?

Depends on the shot, some times I will use reflectors and grids, other times ceiling bounces, or white umbrellas, sometime silver umbrellas.  I have used lighting how you described to avoid glares, but will have to try it for fill now.

[Dick Roadnight]

In a slightly similar shot, with the sun lower in the sky, I used a reflector on the floor as fill... here a reflector on the floor might have filled the far right corner from the ceiling fill... of course, you cannot use too much ceiling fill if the ceiling is in the picture... do you use reflectors?

Depends on the shot, some times I will use reflectors and grids, other times ceiling bounces, or white umbrellas, sometime silver umbrellas.  I have used lighting how you described to avoid glares, but will have to try it for fill now.

A reflector lit with sunlight or a flash gives a nice soft fill... good for small areas where you have insufficient room for an umbrella, and a naked flash would be too hot spotty or contrasty.

I have now retrieved the shot from my PC..., and it is only very slightly similar...

[attachment=22480:sit_shad...20081004.jpg]

Leica D-Lux 3 (£500, my only digital camera at the time)... looks really rough @ 100 %

The Leica has no flash socket, and so cannot easily be used with external flash. (You cannot turn off the pre-flash)

I drew the curtain on the right of the picture for this shot, and lit the room with a reflector on the floor lit from another window (you can see the light from it in the middle of the bottom of the picture)...

This picture is over-filled, but it illustrates the technique... but this is an easy room to photo without shadows to fill.
This is how it came out of the camera.
Some light comes directly from the reflector, but a lot of the light from the reflector is reflected off the ceiling.

(It is, technically a pro photo, as it was for an Estate Agent's brochure)

[haefnerphoto]

Here's an unretouched capture of one of the rig shots.  If you looked at the link to the rig company you'll see that for the most part they are similar in design and construction.  Retouching these out is not a big deal at all, I'm sure it's more difficult on a motion shoot but the results must be worth it.  Jim
[attachment=22483:Rear_Rig_2_030.jpg]

[JoeKitchen]

Here's an unretouched capture of one of the rig shots.  If you looked at the link to the rig company you'll see that for the most part they are similar in design and construction.  Retouching these out is not a big deal at all, I'm sure it's more difficult on a motion shoot but the results must be worth it.  Jim
[attachment=22483:Rear_Rig_2_030.jpg]

That is cool.  

Say, has anyone tried using a toy helicopter to do aerial shots of buildings?

[fredjeang]

Joe, nice stuff.  Have you ever used Topaz Detail?  It a great program, not for every image but it can do some cool things.  Hope you dont mind but I did a comparison for you, your original bedroom (pre curves) left and the same shot using Topaz Detail in a selective fashion....

Please note I used a pretty heavy setting to show the differences.  I usually do this on a second layer and fade it back to taste (a bit less th at Ihave shown here).  In this insstance and as part of my regular workflow I erase ways areas to reveal the unfiltered bass layer as needed.

Hi,

I've been checking the Topaz lab, and it looks indeed interesting.
But according to you, as you are currently using it, is it not possible to acheive the same directly in our favorite dev like C1, Phocus etc...?
For what I see, it automatize the sharpening to kind of create different DOF plans, wich would be a Photoshop task.
Is that correct?

I'm surprise of the price too, in a world where good means expensive, my first reaction was:  
could it be   ?

Thanks.

[Rob C]

Here's an unretouched capture of one of the rig shots.  If you looked at the link to the rig company you'll see that for the most part they are similar in design and construction.  Retouching these out is not a big deal at all, I'm sure it's more difficult on a motion shoot but the results must be worth it.  Jim
[attachment=22483:Rear_Rig_2_030.jpg]

Hate to say it, but I think your driver is picking his nose!

;-)

Rob C

[Craig Lamson]

Hi,

I've been checking the Topaz lab, and it looks indeed interesting.
But according to you, as you are currently using it, is it not possible to acheive the same directly in our favorite dev like C1, Phocus etc...?
For what I see, it automatize the sharpening to kind of create different DOF plans, wich would be a Photoshop task.
Is that correct?

I'm surprise of the price too, in a world where good means expensive, my first reaction was:  
could it be   ?

Thanks.

I use to have a number of process variations in using both filters and actions (PS)  as well as using components of C1 to try and acheive these same results.  

Quite frankly I'm finding Topaz detail to do a better job.  Of course YMMV.  Much quicker as well.  $40 seems reasonable to me

[K.C.]

Here's an unretouched capture of one of the rig shots.  If you looked at the link to the rig company you'll see that for the most part they are similar in design and construction.  Retouching these out is not a big deal at all, I'm sure it's more difficult on a motion shoot but the results must be worth it.  Jim
[attachment=22483:Rear_Rig_2_030.jpg]

Would this be an example of your 4 sec exposure with the car just being pushed ?

[haefnerphoto]

Would this be an example of your 4 sec exposure with the car just being pushed ?

K.C., I just checked the file info and this particular shot was exposed for 3 seconds.  Also, since it is an electric vehicle and there is minimal engine vibration (if any), the car was idling in drive.  Jim

[fredjeang]

I use to have a number of process variations in using both filters and actions (PS)  as well as using components of C1 to try and acheive these same results.  

Quite frankly I'm finding Topaz detail to do a better job.  Of course YMMV.  Much quicker as well.  $40 seems reasonable to me

Thank you.
Yes, price is really reasonable. If you find a better job is done in details, that is worth.

Cheers.

[Frank Doorhof]

In between the rain we had some time to do some outside work.

[Adina]

where is tarzan ?  ;-)

[Dick Roadnight]

In between the rain we had some time to do some outside work.

Did you do these with a couple of battery flashes?

Did you use the built-in master/slave function of the flashes or a pocket wizard?

Was it dark, or did you use a fast shutter speed to get the dark background?

[Frank Doorhof]

Tarzan had to stay home :-)

It was rather dark so I did not need a lot of power for the look.
In fact the mainlight is an Elinchrom Quadra and in the back an Elinchrom Ranger RX speed.
The Ranger is on full power but is placed far away, the quadra was I think app on half power on the A channel.