It was great to be back in New York, teaching my two-day Creative Portraiture workshop. Photo god Lindsay Adler graciously lent me her Manhattan studio while she was off killing it in Milan. We had a blast experimenting with light, color, and technique.
Read More
Creative Portraiture Workshop: Columbus
My sold out, two-day Creative Portraiture photography workshop took place a week ago and we had students travel from three other states to make art at my Columbus studio. We began by covering different qualities of light (soft vs. hard) and how to intentionally create different types of shadows. Next we covered a bit of color theory and how to use cookies (cucoloris) with gelled lights to create colorful shadows. For the rest of the weekend we covered a vsat range of techniques, such as making multiple exposures; creating prismatic effects with a broken mirror; shooting through different materials; photographing warped and colorful reflections with mylar and prismatic window film; using shutter drag; making custom shapes and images by way of projector. It was a jam-packed whirlwind of a weekend but we all came away feeling inspired and ready to go back into the world and create.
Read More
Gilding Lilies
I’ve never been especially fond of flowers. Don’t get me wrong— they’re pretty and everything, but I don’t stop to smell them, much less know their names. That said, flowers make wonderful subjects. They sit nice and still and always put on a great performance as I take my time fiddling around with lights, gels, and camera settings. Though I suppose any inanimate object would suffice for testing, I find flowers to have a human-like qualities to them. They have a face, a neck, and elegance for days. That’s not to say they’re an easy subject. They don’t bring anything to the table, save for their looks. They don’t have a range of dramatic poses or expressions or wardrobe changes. When working with flowers as a subject you only get out of a shoot what you put into it…
Read More