Greene Family Music Christmas Card

I met a fellow colleague of mine Rob Greene shooting in the pit of a concert a few years ago. He's a jack of all trades doing both concert photography and promotion for local venues. He's helped me with access to local shows of acts I was interested in shooting and we've rubbed elbows in the pits of other shows as photographers more than once. He's a super nice guy and way into music than I will ever be.

Late last year he hit me up with a personal project of his that I could not refuse, to shoot his family's Christmas card. Now, this isn't something I normally lean toward, but Rob and his family aren't your normal family and they don't send out your normal Christmas card, because they are all big into music, they have started a tradition of basing their card off of classic album covers - how could I not jump on this?

Last year they based the card off of the Queen II album.

This year, they wanted one based off a Pretenders album.

Rob sent me the album image and it seemed pretty straight forward. Because it has a nice clean - white background, all we really needed to do is find a white wall and I could focus on the lighting while they focused on the wardrobe.

We bounced back and forth via email about a possible location. Since it was November, outdoor locations were not a good idea. When I told him all that I really needed, he came up with the local arts center in Clemson. We could do it one Sunday morning when it was not in use and it was right up the road from them.

So we arrived and I set up my stuff. I used three flashes for this setup. Two would be blasting the white cinderblock wall and one would be in my Paul C Buff PLM umbrella with diffusion fabric to light the subjects.

Dialing in the lights didn't take too long. I just needed a field behind them blown out. It didn't even need to fill the entire frame, just behind them to make editing really easy. I had to make sure they were the proper distance away from the wall because you can create a lot of reflective spill from the wall that you may not want. Since we were trying to reproduce a specific image that had no rim lighting, that took a little adjusting but it could mostly be done by increasing the distance between Rob and his family and the wall.

Here are a few test shots showing how it was dialed in.

Here you can see Rob (not so enthusiastically) posting for tests. There's a lot of light wrapping around the edges of his jacket. On the outer edges, you can see how the whole wall is not blown out, but around him, it's exactly how I wanted it.

Moving the background strobes a little and having Rob move forward (toward camera and away from the wall) reduced the amount of light hitting him from the wall.

Now we were ready to shoot. Rob's family were totally cool with what we were doing and everyone had done just enough to their wardrobe to convincingly imitate the Pretenders (pretending to be the Pretenders - why couldn't I think of that on set).

The only real challenge left was to set everyone just so to try to reproduce the original image: positions, body language expressions. We got seriously close right away and it just came down to chimping on the camera and comparing it with the original album image to make ever-so-slight tweaks. It happened scary-fast. So fast, just for insurance sake, I shot individuals in their respective poses just in case I felt the need to put this together as a composite image. But they nailed it so close in the last group shot, I never felt the need to go the composite route.

All I had to do is burn the corners in Lightroom to provide a clean canvas. Rob added the family name in the same font for the final result.

It all went so smoothly, I suggested some non-Pretender shots for their own use.

The great thing about a setup like this is that once you get the lights set up, it's very efficient. You can just shoot and shoot working on fine details and variety which is what studio-type setups are all about.

Elizabeth & Kyle Engagement

A few weeks ago I was contacted by this very cute couple Elizabeth and Kyle. We discussed their plans and they really wanted to get engagement images soon. Kyle was set on getting some images at the Pendleton Oil Mill, a local institution in my little town. I was excited about this not just because it's only a block from my house but it is a treasure trove of old-south rustic (in some areas a little too rustic) settings. We got started about two hours before sunset to give us plenty of time but also the best light.

The time was so great, I was able to shoot available light a lot more than I am accustomed. Within a small area of the Oil Mill you can get several different looks and if you are careful to stay in certain areas is perfectly safe.

After a few hours of great shooting, Elizabeth and Kyle never complained and seemed to just keep going and going, we were having a great time. (photographer's note, in the south near dark in the summer, bring bug spray for your clients - and yourself). Even after all this time, the shots two hours into it, they were just as fresh and fun as the first frame.

We took a quick wardrobe change and tried to go to Clemson's Walker Golf Course but it was nearly pitch dark. We did manage to get a dramatic shot that I actually liked.

We later moved over to the reflecting pond in front of the Clemson University Library and I used three off-camera flashes bare for this. There were some focusing issues but I was really happy with some of the shots we got.

For the last segment of the session, I wanted to get a studio look. We found a white concrete wall under a set of stairs. I set up two flashes to blast the background for a clean white background and one flash using my Paul C Buff PLM umbrella to light them. I could've shot this all night, and they would've let me they were so fun.

Congratulations to Elizabeth and Kyle. If they can handle a 4+ hour engagement shoot with this much fun and energy, then they will have a happy life together.

Also a big shout-out to the best assistant I ever had, Rhonda. She knows exactly what to do and never complains even after being bitten by every insect known to man (and I think one or two that haven't been identified) and just smiles and even has some awesome suggestions. I'm a better photographer than her but she just knows people and sees things. An extra set of eyes is so valuable.

Abby and Bryan Engagement

Recently, I was contacted by a couple Abby and Bryan from Erie Pennsylvania who is planning their wedding in Myrtle Beach. Both of them have spent several vacations here, going years back, and it has come to have a special meaning for them. As it turns out, I was going to be nearby during their current family trip and we wanted to get some engagement shots celebrating their planned commitment. 

Abby and Bryan were totally up for anything and wanted me to suggest a good venue. All we really knew was that it needed to be in a place that would express the feeling of the South Carolina coast and them as a couple. One of my favorite places that I have been to many, many times is Huntington Beach State Park just south of Murrell's Inlet. Abby and Bryan were staying where they will be getting married, at The Dunes Resort in Myrtle Beach. I figured a popular resort in June would probably prove difficult to find intimate locations without a lot of lookers-on. The trip to Huntington Beach was a bit of a hike for them but it was totally worth it.

While we were preparing for this session, I knew I wanted to shoot late in the day for the most favorable light and to have some relief from the heat. Based on my experience, the beach area is always  nice and breezy but only a few yards inland, this area can be oppressively humid with vulture-sized mosquitos and other fun things. Little did I know, nature had other plans. When we arrived, there was mild cloud cover, it was 77 degrees and breezy and no bugs - it was perfect. If this is what happens when people from Erie visit, we should pay them to come more often and in larger numbers.

We started out on the beach. One of Huntington Beach's best assets is a pristine beach with beachfront buildings only seen in the distance.

Walking on the dunes is strictly forbidden on any of the costal beaches in South Carolina, but there are a few places you can go to give the illusion that you are in them and surrounded by sea oats.

Just off the beach is the former studio for the artist Anna Hyatt called Atalaya. It's a bit of an odd structure consisting of several small rooms and a large open area in the middle. It was closed by the time we were shooting but the outside provides a great range of colors and textures.

The last thing I wanted to do is to use one of the other beach access paths which is almost completely a wooden boardwalk. Just as we got there (all that we did was within a comfortable walk - Abby was smart enough to bring comfortable shoes) the clouds opened up to provide some of the best golden hour light I've ever shot.

Technical Stuff

Once again I overpacked considering what I ended up using for this shoot. I was using my Nikon D700 and shot about 95% of everything with my Nikon 70-200mm f2.8. I just love how this lens can control the background, the sharpness and compress the composition when needed. 

I did use my Paul C Buff PLM umbrella again as my lighting modifier of choice but there are some warnings for other photographers to be learned here. 

While the conditions where, basically, ideal as far as South Carolina beach settings in June are concerned, there were regular/strong gusts of wind all the time. I'm used to battling wind with an umbrella on a light stand, but no amount of anchoring could prevent the stand not only blowing over but traveling down the beach. We estimated that it could easily reach 20 knots and reach the North Carolina  state line by midnight. I had my favorite assistant with me and she struggled constantly with the huge umbrella in the gusts. I could not have used it on my own, it would have just been to unpredictable and, in some cases, dangerous.

Another aspect is protecting your gear. With the wind blowing, that also meant that dry sand was constantly whipping around. Leaving my Think Tank bag on the ground for just a few minutes meant that it was nearly half-buried. You DO NOT want sand in any of your gear, the only thing worse is water (I guess fire is bad too but not a realistic concern). With my bag zipped, all my critical bits were kept safe, the only things that were exposed were items stored in the outside mesh pockets which were not susceptible to the ravages of sand.

Protect your gear.