Catchlight Studios Photography

Shane and Trent

We had a great time on Friday evening photographing brothers Shane and Trent. We headed for one of our favorite locations - downtown Sanford, Florida - which has a bunch of cool walls and alleyways. I used a Nikon D3s camera thoughout - mainly with a 70-200 mm f/2.8 lens, although occasionally switching to the 24-70 or even the 14-24 mm f/2.8 for some wider shots.

Most images were taken using off-camera flash - either on a light stand, or mounted on our trusty Home Depot paint pole. The flash - a Nikon SB800 - was fired with a PocketWizard MiniTL/FlexTL combination, and either mounted inside a Lastolite EZbox softbox or used without modifier.

Both guys were awesome to photograph! I think we will be seeing more of them in our future classes and workshops!

Kendra

Yesterday, we had the pleasure of photographing Kendra, who at the age of 12 has aspirations of becoming a model. These images were designed to kick off her portfolio and while we would have preferred to shoot outside in a more natural setting, the blistering Florida heat made the studio a more attractive proposition.

We started out with a three or four light setup. A PCB Einstein in a medium softbox acted as main light, with on-axis fill provided by a second Einstein in an umbrella. An AB400 was placed overhead in a 1x3' stripbox as a hair light, and an AB800 with a standard reflector was used in some shots to add light to the background.

As you can see from the images, in one shot we added a blue gel to the background light, and in another, we turned the background light around to provide some rim lighting. Later in the session, we traded the softbox for a beauty dish and used this in conjunction with a Lastolite Triflector to provide beautiful, wrap-around light for a headshot. Finally, we used the beauty dish alone, fitted with a grid, for a more dramatic look without lighting the background.

We finished up the session by going to available light and shooting with the magnificent Nikon 200 mm f/2 lens. I used the lens wide open at f/2 and focused on Kendra's eyes to achieve a very shallow depth of field.

The Phenix Salon Suites

Earlier this week, we got a call to do some interior photography for the newly opened Phenix Salon Suites in Altamonte Springs. The images were needed for an upcoming article in Seminole Magazine. We went down there yesterday morning, not sure quite what to expect. As always on these sort of jobs, we carried an array of different equipment. Even though we were just a couple of miles from home, it is a royal pain to have to leave the job site to fetch a piece of equipment you didn't think you would need!

For example, we didn't know if the owner wanted any portraits of himself or others, so we packed a few Speedlights and a 24" Lastolite softbox, stands etc., just in case. We didn't know what the interior lighting would be like, so we brought a couple of Einstein studio strobes along to be on the safe side.

As it turned out, no portraits were needed on this job and the interior lighting was pretty good. We decided to go with the available light and shoot from a tripod. The combination of tungsten and fluorescent lighting meant that we needed to perform a custom white balance in every room using our trusty Expodisc. For good measure - and as a double check - we also photographed a grey card in each lighting situation.

The lighting was not overly contrasty - no very bright and very dark areas in the same shot - but we nevertheless elected to shoot bracketed exposures and combine these into single High Dynamic Range (HDR) images in post-processing. This was achieved using Lightroom and Nik HDR Efex Pro.

One of the challenges we faced was shooting in an environment with a lot of mirrors. Sometimes it was very hard to keep ourselves out of the shot. In the image shown at center left, I had to position myself exactly between the two mirrors and pull the tripod legs in tight to avoid them appearing in the image.

Anyway, it all worked out pretty well. The shoot took us only an hour and the images were in the hands of the magazine's Editor 2 or 3 hours later. And the client was very happy!

Erica and Ray's Engagement Session

This past weekend, we had the opportunity to do an engagement session with Erica and Ray who are getting married October 1st. We were worried about the weather as Florida had been getting its regular afternoon thunderstorms,  but as luck would have it, the rain held off, we got a cooling evening breeze and we got a great sunset also.

We had a relaxed and fun time, shooting for about 2 hours before adjourning for an adult beverage and some Italian food. Most of the images were shot with a Nikon D3s and an off-camera Nikon SB800 in a 24x24" Lastolite EZbox. The flash was triggered with a PocketWizard TT1 transmitter with AC3 Zone Controller; the off-camera flash was mounted on a PocketWizard TT5 Transceiver. The combination worked extremely well for the entire shoot.

Erica and Ray were awesome to work with - we are doing a second engagement shoot with them before their wedding - and we plan on doing a First Look portrait session on their wedding day. We can't wait!!

Katie and Brett's Wedding

Susan and I had the great pleasure of photographing Katie and Brett's wedding on Friday July 1st at Our Saviour's Catholic Church in Cocoa Beach, followed by a Reception at the Cocoa Beach Country Club. Amanda's Florist provided great floral arrangements and DJ Shane Entertainment rocked out at the reception.

The day started with some horrendous storms, but these had mercifully abated by the time the ceremony got underway. Katie and Brett were a great couple to work with - here are a few images from the day.