And... Now I Am Done...

This is it... I want to thank everyone for supporting my project... it was MUCH easier than I thought it would be.

So Many Shots... So Little Time...

Needed four shots to finish my 30 and had two lined up for today... which then turned into 11! Like I've said over and over... I work with awesome people. Here are a few from today... I will finish the rest tomorrow...

The Amazing Angle Trick

The other day... yesterday I think... I had mentioned something about how shooting from a different angle can make a huge difference in how your subject will appear in a photo. I am not talking a huge difference in angles, just something as simple as getting up slightly and shooting down instead of shooting straight on. I had my boy Jeff pose for me and I took a shot standing up one step on a step stool and one from straight on... the difference is jaw dropping...

Okay, he may have over done it bit on the straight on shot, but you can still see a difference. In the picture on the left, which was shot from the higher angle, he looks like a normal human being. The shot on the right is straight on and makes him look like that dwarf from Lord of the Rings... as a matter of fact...

Well, what do you know, he is a dwarf...

Anyway, shoot from a higher angle if you are shooting anyone but Brad Pitt or George Clooney...

Two More Makes 26

Knocked out two more today and have a couple lined up for tomorrow, so I am getting close. Today was a good one for me... got to take picture of my BFF on his birthday.He's the old guy...

 

Oh, since it was his birthday I let him take my picture, but it doesn't count towards the 30...

What I Have Learned So Far

In the very short time I have done this project I feel like I have actually learned a lot. The most important being that backlighting is the absolute key to making a portrait pop. I guess I probably knew this, but knowing it and actually taking the time to stop and make sure my lighting is set up properly are two different things. The first few shots I took for the project were done in the shade and I do like those, but once I started using the sun for a backlight I really noticed a significant difference in the overall impact of the shot. The depth added by the additional light can make the difference between a snapshot and a portrait, so make sure you take the time to set up if you have the ability to do so.

 

I don’t have two separate shots to compare, but if you look at this shot you will see how her hair is highlighted from the sun giving it separation from the background. Imagine if that light wasn’t there… her hair would blend right in with the background which would significantly change the depth and overall quality of the picture.

So... if you are out shooting portraits and you are have a flash I would suggest having your subject turn their back to the sun and using the flash to light the face. Aside from giving depth to the shot it will also reduce the squinting that is usually caused by staring directly into a giant ball of fire.

And The Rest....

Here are the last four I took today at lunch, so I am up to 24. Should be a pretty easy sprint to the finish... hopefully tomorrow.

I left the glasses on one because I loved the reflection. I have one without that I will post in my "outtakes", but I wanted to leave this one in because it kind of matches his Krazee personality...

And These Four Make 20

Here are four of the ones I shot at lunch today... I will try to post the others this evening...

I cannot begin to tell you how much I love this flash. I just love how it draws out the eyes. The third picture down of the Marine... those are his eyes... no digital enhancement other than the overall exposure adjustment of the image.

Eight More at Lunch

Just took eight more shots today at lunch to bring my count to 24. Like I said before, I work with some awesome people.

In an effort to make this a possible learning blog I wanted to try something a little different today. I have been using a step stool to get a slightly higher, more flattering, angle in all of my previous shots. I still did that today, but on a few of them I shot from an elevated angle and then from straight on. I wanted to show how big a difference a minor shift in lens angle can make in the way the subject of the shot looks. The difference can be significant in a lot of cases. After I process a few I will give some examples.

Anyhow, I hope to post a few tonight…

Thanks again to those who shot with me today…

Over Half Way There...

Shockingly, I am already over half way to my goal of 30 people. I work with some awesome people, but I didn't expect to get this far so fast. I have about eight or nine people set up for Monday, so I will be close to my goal with essentially only shooting for three days.

I do very much enjoy shooting with the ring flash, but I think in the future I won't limit myself to a specific lighting setup. I like having a little more freedom.

Here are 13-16... and yes, I do work with a pirate...

4 More...

And this makes twelve...

Good Day for Portraits

Had the opportunity to take a few shots today and had some surprise people volunteer to shoot with me so it was a good day! I'll have some more tomorrow, but here are a couple from today...

Before and After

One of my peeps wanted to see the before and after shot of his image, so I thought I would post it here and give an explanation of what I did to get it from start to finish. First, the original...

 Now the final product...
The most obvious change is the crop. I normally don't crop in this tight, but I generally test it out just to see what it looks like and when I cropped this shot I knew instantly that it was the way to go. His face tells a story to me and getting up close and personal really draws you in.

I use Adobe Lightroom for my initial processing, so after the crop I did some adjustments to brightness, contrast, clarity, and saturation. After that I did a little bit of dodge and burn in his eyes and around his chin to make his face pop. I then did vignetting to draw the viewer into the face. After that I popped it over to Photoshop and did some spot editing and a high pass filter to accentuate the detail.

Pretty simple...

Dead Battery

Well, had some shots set up for today at lunch, so I ran out to my car ahead of time just to make sure everything was good to go and discovered I had never shut off my vagabond battery pack from my shoot the day before. Needless to say it was dead. Can't begin to explain how bitter I was.

I work with some amazing people, so I set up some other shots for tomorrow which I will try to post tomorrow night. Have some great people to shoot tomorrow, so I am pretty excited.

When I got home I still felt the need to shoot, so I decided to practice some new lighting and post processing techniques. Sorry for the self portraits... 

30 Days - 30 People I Work With - 30 Portraits

I recently bought an Alien Bees Ring Flash (http://www.paulcbuff.com/abr800.php) with a Moon Unit and I am in love with this flash. I’m not sure if it is the overall softness of the lighting or the effect it has on the eyes, but something about it just makes me want to shoot with it every day. I used it for a football team shoot I did last week and took some headshots of the players which motivated me to do some type of portrait project with it. After some brainstorming I decided it would be cool to do 31 days of portraits in October. Then I decided I didn’t want to wait until October to start, so I decided to do a portrait a day for 30 days. Then, I decided that wouldn’t work for my schedule, so I decided that I would take 30 portraits of 30 people I work with in 30 days. We have busy schedules here, so I am going to take them when I can and post them as they happen. I took four yesterday, so I am off to a good start… only 26 left to go.

When I initially thought of the project I had planned on editing each one in the same style, but as I was editing the shots last night I realized that it just didn’t work for me. Each person has their own personality, so what works for one may not work for another. I want the picture to represent the person, not me and my “style”…

Here are the first four…

Thanks for looking...