Tag: People photography

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Adobe Lighting Nature People photography Phodigraphy Photography Photoshop Technology

Tech kids

Tech girl

While shooting portraits of her mom, this sweet 5-year-old wanted some camera attention. As soon as her Mom left to change for the next set, I asked her to come up to the set and pretend she’s Mommy, she knew exactly what to do.

After a few smiles at the camera she was drawn into the computer and didn’t mind the camera anymore.

Tech girl

Climbing trees and playing outdoors were my favorite activities when I was this kid’s age, My fascination with computers started when I was well into my 20’s. For the last 10 years, I build and keep up all my computers and love doing that.

I didn’t find computers very practical for myself until Photoshop 3 came out. Looking at these images made me think whose childhood is more fulfilling, the tree climbers or the tech kids? I don’t have an answer for that.

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People photography Photography

Something about people photography

Though directing my subjects is a part of the job, I really find it rewarding to make myself “invisible” and try to catch people when they are not aware. when shooting people who are not professional models/actors, of all ages, I always battle to capture a “not obviously posed image”. I’m not a hunter but it seems to me that shooting like that may be the closest thing to hunting, I try to be a part of the scenery and be aware where my main subjects are at all times, so when an opportunity arises, I’ll notice it and be ready. here’s a sweet girl I shot, on her Tea party style birthday.

Birthday Girl
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Adobe Before and after Photography Photoshop

Photoshop is not evil

Original is on the left
Original is on the left

I get annoyed when people see a picture of a pretty girl and automatically say: “eh, it’s all Photoshopped” as if Photoshop is the long version of a four-letter word, I say, thanks to Photoshop we can give the client a brilliant result without having to dip ourselves in chemicals under red lights (I do admit that the smell of a developer makes me a bit nostalgic still, but it’s because I don’t have to spend time with it anymore). Here is an image manipulation job I received from a Las Vegas client, where the shot she sent me looked nice but needed “something..”. on the right, is the before image. first, I cropped it just a bit to get Katie to be more dominant in the frame, the rest was mainly some perfecting of stubborn hair and a very careful dodge and burn process that is similar but a bit more precise than what I would be able to do in the darkroom.

Following, are a some more “dramatic” Before and after samples

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Lighting Los Angeles People photography Photography

Single light photography

Single light photography

Single light photography.

My most valuable learning experience was working as a photographer’s assistant back in the late 80’s, while starting my professional photography career.
One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned was using a single light source to set up an atmosphere.

In  nature we have only a single main light source (sun), the human brain is completely happy and can easily make sense of a scene that has a single light direction. practicing this method in the studio helped me advance and master this technique in the studio as well as out on location.

In this shot, You can see Tiffany dancing in front of a single light, In this case it is a window.