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Headshots

Headshots

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Headshots

Nikon 105mm, ISO 125, 1/200sec at f/5.6

Just about a month ago, I had a gig to do some portraits and location shoot for a client in St. Louis area. During my initial conversation with the client, as they mentioned doing portraits my mind started fancying the idea of doing headshots. Then about a week before the shoot, I started doing my homework on taking decent headshots. Read a lot on doing headshots using a single/simple light setup and eventually settled on clamshell lighting which involves 2 lights setup – you set up the lights such that they look like a clamshell and you shoot in between the gap.

Then came the time to practice the setup and pose. Now, I am not the kind who likes to be photographed and did I mention I like hiding behind my camera. But for this trial shoot I was a willing model besides my lovely wife.

 

 

We used a muslin backdrop that I had dyed using Rit fabric dye about 2 years ago – I had a hunch that this gig was coming before then (right ?). Since I knew beforehand that my clients will be wearing black tops, I want to experiment with a black polo shirt for this trial headshots shoot. So, that’s how I ended up with a headshot with a wine red backdrop which I wasn’t a big fan of…

Fast forward, I am a long time user of Lightroom and it has been the post processing software – I religiously post process the pics before the whole world could see my pictures. Started with Photoshop (about 5+ years ago) but switched to Lightroom and never went back to Photoshop. Although I use Nik collection, and a couple of Topaz plugins – my workflow has always been around Lightroom. Now, I am not the one who spend hours on post processing or do composite images. I would spend about 30 minutes max (on extreme cases) on an image.

 

Headshots

Nikon 105mm, ISO 100, 1/200sec at f/5.6 with masked background

But lately, I do want to spend a bit more time on post processing – call it the effect of spending time on 500px and Pixoto. Further, if that’s what the client wants, it’s just about time to start learning new skill sets. So I’m on a quest to master layer/composite techniques. Here is where OnOne Perfect Photo Suite comes into picture – I have been reading quite a bit lately on Perfect Suite and started playing with this quite a bit. Masking is one area, where Perfect Photo Suite really shines.

As a part of learning and experimenting with Perfect mask, I picked my headshot with burgundy backdrop and played with it for a while and voila, I’ve a headshot picture that I really like. Still a lot more to learn but I’m heading on the right track!

Now, if you asked how did my headshot shoot for the client go – that never happened. Client was okay with just the portraits. Needless to say, I wasn’t disappointed 😉

Headshots
Headshots
Headshots
Headshots
Headshots
Headshots

w52.32.3: Geometric shapes

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Squares, half circle, cylinders, rectangles, lines, rhombus…Oh, my!

A shot dominated by geometric shapes , and shadows – shot this as I was heading to the Metro station to head home from work.

w52.31.1:Got Pez?

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Pez – who doesn’t like ’em?

My daughter has been wanting to buy her Pez candies and bought these just after Halloween. That’s the subject for this post.

One thing I didn’t get to explore much during my 365 project (last year) was flash photography and/or strobe photography. So I had ponied up money and bought couple of brollies (just a fancy word for lighting umbrellas), stands and CFL lighting.

Luckily had some time tonight  to play with the lighting and composition for this shot.

Used side lighting and diffused the light through a black umbrella – had the Pez candies seated on a black cardboard and used a black muslin as a backdrop for this setup.

Looks like a lot more to learn 😉

w52.30.1: Neglected

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I got the idea for this shot this evening when I found this withered mint in our kitchen – we had harvested these mint couple of weeks ago from our backyard..those looks neglected, doesn’t it?

It kind of goes with my blog (sadly). It’s been neglected these days too 🙁

I have gotten busy with other things and switched around my priorities – there are too many things to learn with too little time. I will leave it there!

One of these days I’ll try catching up on my fellow bloggers photo blogs. I apologize for not commenting on time – I still see ’em in my Google Reader though 😉

w52.29.1: Tree by the house at dusk

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Took my son for a walk this evening and shot this tree close to where we live just after sunset.

Winter and cold weather will be here soon and should be challenging to find subject(s) as we will be bundled up in our house – I might end up doing portraits of kids or perhaps work on my food photography. It’s been a long time now since I last posted a foodie shot in my blog 😉

w52.28.3: Swipe swipe swipe

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That’s my little one playing Angry Birds.

Aim, swipe, hit the pigs and the game continues..here is where it gets addictive 😉

w52.28.2: Triple berries

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Shot these triple berries during my recent visit to the park close home.

w52.28.1: Burning Bush

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Shot these leaves on a Burning Bush plant last evening when I took a much needed photowalk at a park close home. Looking at these make me think holidays are almost here 😉

w52.27.1: Mailbox

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Spotted this mailbox while I took a walk with my friend in a neighborhood close home. Though I don’t like the idea of taking pictures from someone’s yard, this was hard to resist 😉

w52.26.1: What you got?

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Time flies when you have good company. That was the case this past weekend. I had my school friends visiting us from Chicago and we were pretty busy entertaining friends.

Took the friend’s kids to a park close home and as we were getting ready to leave, one of the kid’s mom in the park stopped by and asked if she could offer the kids her Halloween themed cupcakes. As the kids settled down to enjoy their treat, I shot this – initially I thought this shot is going to be a snapshot but it ended to be narrative shot when I saw this in my desktop.

I like the way the kids are looking at other’s cupcake (although all are the same) and my little one trying to say something. Ah kids 😉