Editorial shoots can be lots of fun.  Especially when your subjects are willing to have fun with the process.  Because time and budgets are generally limited, I try to go in with as little gear as possible and get as many different shots as I can in 15-30 mins.

One assignment was to photograph Randall and Donya Stockton in Austin, the husband and wife proprietors of two or three nightclubs in the area.  We decided to meet at their Beerland club on Red River just off Austin’s famous 6th Street.

When I got there, I quickly identified two areas I wanted to pose the couple against.  The first was at the corner of the main bar.  I loved the cluttery atmosphere behind the bar and felt that the signs, bottles and lights would help tell the story.

Instead of just showing you the final selections, I thought it would be more instructive to use some fun outtakes as examples.  It’s often during the first few “test” shots, when I tell the subject(s) to just settle in and relax, that I get some great images to work with.  I really like the image above because the Stocktons are just being themselves here.  Getting a feel for who they are helped me know how to approach the rest of the shoot to capture their personalities.

In this image I’m using a variation on my favorite two-light setup.  I have a 42″ shoot-thru umbrella as my main, and a bare Speedlite as my kicker.  I’m using a 17-40mm lens at 24mm.  I adjusted down to f/7.1 in order to get enough sharpness for eventual cropping (I never know how my images are going to be cropped by the layout designer).  ISO was 200.  1/40 sec. on the shutter gave me what I needed to bring out the ambient in the background.

Two problem areas were encountered, and they both had to do with light reflections:  the shiny poster, and the eyeglasses.  What to do?  I liked the main light and subjects, and everything else, just where they were.  So, I could have pulled the poster, changed it out with another less shiny one, angled it somehow, or shot the same scene from the same angle later, with a different angle on the main light.  In post, just replace the bad poster with the good!

I was working quickly, figured I wouldn’t worry about it because it would probably be cropped out anyway in favor of a tighter shot/crop.  I was right.  All was good.

Moving on to the next shot, I had the couple sit at the edge of the stage where the bands perform.  I wanted to get the club’s nameplate as the backdrop.  Of course, they loved that idea, too.

Again, the 42″ shoot-thru as the main, but this time I used my bare Speedlite to illuminate the wall that the nameplate was painted on.  The stage lights at some of the smaller clubs are rather low-tech and randomly gelled, so just controlling the background with my own light was the best, fastest way to go.   As you can probably tell by the image, I had that light positioned to feather across the wall from right-to-left.

Eyeglasses still posed a challenge, but you know, take a few shots, chimp, and you’ll know how to avoid the reflections in a given shot.  Sometimes all it takes is to ask the subject to turn this way or that just a tiny bit.  Other times, you can adjust your angle.  Don’t mess with the position of the light because that just takes too long.  Have fun and it will work.

This was from an editorial assignment in Austin, TX. The idea was to get a shot of Root Design Company’s partners on location in front of one of their projects. The challenge was to make it all work under some very intense Texas sunlight. Flash for fill light was a given. I’d be using a flash unit on a stand, with shoot-thru, triggered by Pocketwizard.

For this shot, it only made sense to get the hilltop view with the pool they had designed in the foreground . I used my 17-40mm for the wide angle I needed to capture the scene. Since I was using manual flash my shutter speed would be locked in at no faster than 1/250 sec.

The ambient called for f/11 at ISO 200, which would also give me an appropriate depth of field for this shot. The small aperture meant I’d have to use a lot of flash power (1/2 – 1/1 power setting).

If you look closely, you can see that I didn’t place my light all the way over to the shadow side opposite the sun angle. The reason for this is I wanted the light to fall in a more natural direction to place the shadows where you might expect to see them. It’s not a completely natural light look, but it’s way better than what the real light was doing out there.

Why ISO 200? It’s all a balancing act, and sometimes it’s not about the best possible decision, but about the best one you can think of quickly to just make it work. Still, the choice made sense. Shutter speed was not going to move. So, going to ISO 100 would have me at f/8 (less DOF, flash settings would remain the same). Going to ISO 400 would have me at f/16 (unnecessary extra noise and DOF, no change in flash settings).

There was no upside to doing anything different that I could see at the time. Over-thinking a shot while you’re trying to keep your subjects with you is not a good idea. Sometimes the best thing you can do is rely on your standard settings for a given situation, and just make a slight adjustment if you have to. The “right” settings are the ones that do the job.

This originally appeared in a recent issue of my newsletter.  If you’d like to receive my free newsletter, just sign-up for it by using the form on the sidebar

Today I’m releasing my second eBook, 100% Reliable Flash Photography!  In it, I cover a variety of topics and techniques designed to help photographers consistently create high-quality images with minimal gear.  There are over 60 pages of information, shooting strategies, diagrammed techniques, and examples.

I wrote the book to provide pro and semi-pro photographers with a fast, no-nonsense guide for getting amazing light just about anywhere, anytime.  This book is about gaining the skill and confidence you need to create great images with the most basic and available lighting sources.  The idea is to completely eliminate the stress of not being sure of what to do in a new or fast-moving environment.  That makes it a perfect read for wedding, event, editorial, and portrait photographers.

100% Reliable Flash Photography centers on a strategy of standardization.  The first part of the book covers relevant lighting and gear knowledge mostly focusing on how to do some really good work with a simple on-camera flash, or even basic household lighting.  There are also off-camera flash techniques including detailed instructions for a basic two-light manual setup that I almost always use for editorial work.  This leads into the core chapter, Standardization, where I talk about how to make your gear easier to use and eventually master.  The book continues with techniques,  examples and diagrams for indoor and outdoor lighting, then several “backstories” quickly detailing shoots with several of the portrait subjects featured in the book.

If you’re looking for a way to make your portrait, editorial, or event photography easier, then you should get a copy of 100% Reliable Flash Photography.  

Click for more info >>

Suzanna Choffel.  2AM or whatever it was.  Super-beautiful as always.  Photo shoot last night for InSite Magazine’s style section.  Then we just freestyled it and made some cool portraits like these.

From the Rare Magazine shoot (March 2010 issue).

Rare Magazine has done a great job with their new website.  I like this page, where you can see lots of my recent work for the publication.  Bonus:  the format of the site allows more of my photos from each shoot to be displayed.  The staff at Rare has really stepped it up!

In TRIBEZA this month, some photos in the Wedding Treats piece.  Mine are the Cupcake Bar, top-right and bottom left.  Stacey Bridges for the Austin Cake Ball shots.  Hey, I got to sample the Cupcakes.  Check out more of my shots all over Lori’s site –>  The Cupcake Bar!

Being interviewed.