I received a PM on MM (that's Private Message on Model Mayhem) from Model Mary asking me if I would like to shoot. A little background first. Mary and Tonya went to school together and also work at HOOTERS. Mary mentioned that she ran into my son, C.J., at a restaurant and that C.J. stated that "Me and my Dad photograph models." After a few exchanges and several weeks we finally nailed down a date.
Anyway, she wanted to do a lingerie shoot for ... Hmmmm.... not sure if it was for her or her boyfriend. Oh well, I just finished shooting Tonya the other night and figured I would crank out another lingerie shoot.
Red Flag #1, when my shoots become repetitive then I need to take a break, or I'm getting burnt out, which makes sense. As we began to shoot Mary asked where was the bed. Bed? Mary said that we agreed to do a "White Sheets Session". I responded, "Really?"
Red Flag #2. Thankfully C.J. came by the house and set-up the bed while I changed the lighting. Mary was very patient, so we did a couple Head shots to pass the time. you guessed it "clamshell" lighting.
Once C.J. finished with the bed, we proceeded with the White Sheets. This time I moved my lighting closer to 75 degrees camera right and not left. Why? Based on Mary's facial structure, I needed to do short lighting, which is to move the light farther away from the camera to create more shadow on the side closer to the camera. This produces a more flattering and slimming effect to the face. I learned that from Don Mason (a.k.a. Old Pro at KPA) the first shot is using three monolights, two with softboxes to create the clamshell and the third as a background light but with barndoors to create a little rim lighting on Mary's backside.
After the white sheets, we Mary changed into another outfit and we did some more high-key shots. Mary was easily entertained with my dorky behavior and we had to stop at times from laughing. However there is one question she asked, which made me pause. Mary asked if she could smile in the pictures. I kinda looked at her and said, "Sure, if you want to treat this like Senior Portraits" I expressed to her that when I see a model smiling at he camera, Mommy and Daddy paid big bucks to fix that smile, so show them for the camera. However, not many Fashion magazines feature "Cheshire Cat" grinning models. I told her I prefer serious, sexy, sensuous, or emotive looks. I did take some of her smiling, but you can visit her MySpace or Facebook account to see those. I'm not posting them, well okay, just one.
What did I learn?
1) Models don't read my "About Me" section on MM - I'm pretty up front about how many pics I'll process and yet the models ask for more. How many pics of the same pose, wardrobe and hair do you need? Okay so you're smiling in one and not in the other. Seriously, you only need one awesome image not five similar ones.
2) Set expectations and review details of the shoot. - I totally spaced about the White sheets and wasted 20 minutes of our time
Well we're getting close to the end of the year and as a present to myself, I bought one Alien Bee 1600 with a 84" Parabolic Umbrella. It'll work with my RPS Monolights since they work as optical slaves. So look for some different looking lighting in the next couple of weeks. I have a shoot Dec. 27 with Missy Van Gore, a tattooed gal from Delano, and then a break. Yeah Right!!!
That's a Wrap!!!
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