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Future Presidents Photo Project by Matthew Jordan Smith

Posted by scottbourne on March 30, 2013
Posted in: Tips. Tagged: , , . 1 comment

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Guest Post and Photos by Matthew Jordan Smith

What impact will a photograph have in a hundred years? This question has been on my mind during the past few years. What if a photograph, created today, had the ability to impact lives and inspire people in the future?

A little over a year ago I started on a journey to create a project that would do just that, inspire parents and children to dream big. I call the project Future Presidents. I’ve been traveling the country, going state-by-state, photographing children and planting the idea that they can become a future president. It is my hope that the act of highlighting these children will impact them and other children to see themselves as possible presidents in the future.

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Today, I’d like to invite you to join me and be a part of the Future Presidents project via Kickstarter. I need your help and support. In return for your support I am offering several support packages that range from a public thank on Facebook to a celebrity-style photo-shoot in Hollywood California.

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Imagine an American President speaking one day and saying they read a book as a child that made them want to become the President. Imagine your family seeing your name printed in that book as one of the people who helped make the project possible. This book is for you and our future and I believe together we can make a positive impact on America’s future.

Always Dream Big

Matthew Jordan Smith

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Selecting The Right Light Modifier

Posted by scottbourne on June 4, 2012
Posted in: Technique & Tutorials. Tagged: , , , , , , .

Guest Post and Photos by Matthew Jordan Smith - Follow Matthew on Twitter

Recently I was asked how I decide which light source to use for photo shoots and which light modifiers are best in certain situations. The determining factors in making my decision on each shoot varies but I will attempt to describe a few situations here.

There are no fast rules that fit every situation on making my lighting decisions but some of the factors I consider before photographing people deal with color’s being used, male or female, subject weight, if they have deep set eyes, or a host of other factors.

When photographing women I always want to make them feel and look as beautiful as possible. Notice the first thing I mention is FEEL beautiful, because if someone doesn’t feel beautiful no light in the world will make them look beautiful, but I digress. In selecting the right light I am looking at a person’s skin texture first, then the symmetry of their face. Few of us have perfect faces and those who do can make a great living as a model. For the rest of us, one eye can be slightly bigger or lower or other features stand out. I don’t believe that only people with perceived perfect features make the best pictures. Actually I believe quite the opposite and no matter how we look we all have a unique beauty all our own. I want to find the most flattering angle and select the light modifier that helps me bring out the best in my subjects. Most models have very flattering features and you can use almost any light and get a great shot. When shooting portraits however I have to take other factors into consideration. Weight, deep eyes, small eyes, wrinkles, etc.

I like using a harder light sources on men at times because it gives a stronger, more masculine look. Sometimes this mean combining light sources, like an umbrella as a main light and a hard light, like the magnum reflector, coming from the side to give more shadow detail and impact to the shot. The image of Gordon Parks is shot in this manner.

On a recent cover shoot for NailPro Magazine, I had the idea of using a hard source, the magnum reflector made my Profoto, as my only light to shoot the cover. The female model had perfect skin so she could handle this type of light. I had my assistants set up and test the light and I was very happy with it. Then I went to check on the model, who was in hair and makeup, and I discovered the makeup was a softer color scheme with very subtle color variations. If I used the hard light I would loose the beauty of the color palette, so I instructed my assistants to change the light source to use the white beauty dish, or softlight reflector, which is also made by Profoto. The beauty dish gave me a softer light that enabled me to keep the beauty of the makeup and the soft colors used for the nails.

I shot a portrait recently of a good friend, Scott Bourne in Las Vegas. The portrait came about at the last moment and I didn’t have my strobe lights with me. I looked around and found an old fashion hot light, which is a hard source. I positioned Scott, with his guitar, in front of the background but turned away from me and toward the main light. I wanted a strong, powerful image so I positioned the light to Scott’s extreme left in profile. This manner of shaping the light helped to give an iconic image that captures the essence of Scott by using the light to enhance the mood . The beauty of using hot lights vs strobe lights is that you can see exactly how the image will look with the light. Using hot lights teaches you how to see light.

For my CreativeLive fashion and beauty class I used the magnum reflector to shoot the fashion shoot. I wanted a strong light source to give more detail in the clothing and the magnum was a great modifier to achieve this look. The light was positioned very high and looks great in this situation. We used four white, standard umbrella’s in the background to make a white background. The background light was 3/4 stronger than the front light to make it white. For example is the light reading on the front was F16.0 @ 1/125 the reading on the white background needed to be F 16.7 @ 1/125 to give me a pure white background. You can see this entire three day shoot including the setup, shoot and concept at CreativeLive.

Another light modifier that I have grown fond of over the years is the Broncolor Para 220 umbrella. It’s a very expensive light but it’s also very beautiful. I don’t own this light but often rent it for assignments in New York or Los Angeles. On the image below I was hired by Brides Magazine to shoot a beauty story and used the Para as my main light source. The Para light is simply beautiful, and because of the size of this light source I can stand directly in front of it and get the feeling I want. This is a very large light source, and the bigger the light the softer the light. The shape and size of this large umbrella gives it its unique quality and it’s my favorite umbrella to use in studio.

Often there are times when I must use several lights to get the image I’m looking for. My most recent shoot required several lights to capture the image and feeling we were going for. To capture this image we used three lights on the set. The main light, used to illuminate the models face was the white beauty dish we discussed earlier. The modifier used to light her hair was the 7 inch Grid reflector made by Profoto, but we used it without a grid. Lastly a standard white umbrella was used on very low power to give a soft light to the background. On this shot we have three different lighting modifiers but all work together to give us the look. I used the grid reflector for the hair to give more detail in the hair. If I used a soft light I would loose the definition of the hair and the shot would loose its elegance.

If you are interested in learning more about lighting check out the following inexpensive, downloadable video’s created to help photographers become better with lighting.

Ten Ways To Use One Light Source

Ten Ways To Create Natural Light Portraits

How To Work With Complex Lighting Situations

Always Dream Big

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Sitting For An Icon – Having Your Portrait Made By A Real Pro

Posted by scottbourne on February 27, 2012
Posted in: Technique & Tutorials. Tagged: , .

Photo Copyright Matthew Jordan Smith - Used With Permission

Regular readers know that I am perhaps one of the luckiest people in the world. I am friends or associates with some of the finest photographers on the planet. I regularly get to shoot or teach or speak alongside the best.

Many of you also know I deeply respect and admire Matthew Jordan Smith. I happen to think he is an iconic photographer who will be remembered for his ability to capture raw emotion in anyone.

And….regular readers know that I am not pretty nor am I fond of having my photograph taken. In fact, 90% of the reason I became a photographer was to avoid having my picture made. Let’s face it, I have a face built for radio.

But every once in a while I get lucky and run into someone who is so good at their craft, so passionate about their art and so able to draw me out of my shell that I get an image of me that I think is passable.

This portrait made of me by Matthew is such a portrait. It’s amazing to see myself and think I don’t 100% suck! The only reason I don’t is that a real, genuine, talented, giving and patient photographer made the shot.

Matthew had VERY little to work with. He had an unattractive model, one beauty dish, two foam core boards on C-stands and no sync cord. So he made the shot using the modeling light from the beauty dish and we used this guitar that was sitting around the studio as a prop. (Hint – when photographing men – give them something – ANYTHING – to do with their hands and the shot will work much better.)

Since I am a guitar player, it was a perfect fit and the few people out there in the world who are close to me love the shot.

But wait – there’s more to the story.

There is another thing to talk about and that is what it is like to sit for a talented pro. I highly recommend all of you reading this seek out a gifted craftsperson to make your portrait. It’s good experience to sit on the other side of the lens and to feel what your clients feel when you ask THEM to pose. It’s an enlightening and educational experience.

I appreciate the fact that the great Matthew Jordan Smith – who is usually photographing beautiful movie stars or musicians like Oprah and Beyonce  – took the time to give me this gift.

If you haven’t heard of Matthew before now – well get busy studying his work. You’ll be better off for it and if you are lucky enough to run into him at a convention or workshop, try to get him to make your portrait. If he can do this for me, imagine what he can do for you!

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You Don’t Need A Big Studio Or Lots Of Gear To Make Beauty Portraits

Posted by scottbourne on February 24, 2012
Posted in: Tips. Tagged: , , , .

Photo By Scott Bourne - 2012

If you have 200 square feet of space, access to some white foam core, black foam core a few light stands or C-stands, and one single 150 watt or greater light in a reflector, beauty dish or soft box, you have everything you need to make pretty, dramatic portraits.

I recently had the honor, privilege and joy of teaching alongside my pal Matthew Jordan Smith at our local SMUG meeting here in Vegas. We worked in a local rental studio to accommodate our 40 students. We didn’t know what the studio had in the way of gear and we had originally scheduled a natural light, outdoor shoot. So we got to the studio, realized our gear was not compatible with the studio strobes and we did what all professional photographers should be able to do every day in any situation. We improvised.

We found a 150-watt head attached to a silver beauty dish on a C-stand with a boom arm. We weighted down the boom, extended the boom arm out to get the dish away from the stand and in position to illuminate our model(s) and went to work.

Here you see a photo of the set behind the scenes. This was using the black foam core and from this scene I made the following picture.

Photo by Scott Bourne 2012

What makes this work is that we’re using the beauty dish VERY close to the model – less then three feet away. It’s low power so in a dark room it’s just throwing a kiss of light on her face and creates a dramatic look. It may or may not be your cup of tea but it shows you what’s possible.

You can make incredible portraits with minimal gear.

Oh and you can go the other way too. If you want to go high key, bring the light a little closer to increase the intensity and use a white backdrop. Make sure to open up a bit if you don’t have lights on the background because if you don’t it will go gray. Proof is in the pudding - The shot opening this post was made in the same way, same location just using a white background.

Go out there and shoot some beauty shots. Don’t let lack of money stop you.

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Observations From WPPI

Posted by scottbourne on February 22, 2012
Posted in: Opinion, Reviews. Tagged: , , , , .

It’s WPPI week here in Vegas. Since I live here now, it’s no big deal for me to head over to the show. My pal Skip Cohen and I taught alongside Michele Celentano at the GoingPro bootcamp on Saturday at the same time WPPI was running their bootcamp. On Sunday, Matthew Jordan Smith and I taught a two hour class for SmugMug at the Vegas SMUG and on Monday I devoted myself to looking at the trade show and meeting with vendors, clients, sponsors and friends who in town for the event.

Here are a few observations.

The show is a bit smaller this year compared with last year but there seems to be no lack of enthusiasm. The trade show floor features all the same stuff it does every year, just a few new flavors. There were one or two items I saw that really did impress me and I’ll do some reviews on those items in another post.

As usual, there were quite a few photographers in line to look at and play with all the new recently-announced cameras. Nikon was actually showing some of their video-related stuff which is unusual because they have always been pretty subtle on that front compared with Canon.

Many of the photographers who spoke at the conference also spoke at the trade show floor. If you wanted to be cheap, you could get a ton of free education on the show floor with one of the free trade show passes offered by most of the vendors.

The remarkable things – good and bad that I saw were:

1. It’s still about the networking. In my opinion the ONLY reason to go to these big shows is to see and be seen by the movers and shakers in the industry. I was struck by how many new, and very young faces I saw. There are a TON of new people jumping into this industry and by chatting with them I learned a great deal about their needs. Back to that in a minute. The old friends I saw at the show made the trip really worthwhile. Those of us who have been at this a while now have all the gray hair we need, but we have the special memories to go with that gray hair. That part was really fun.

2. It’s also about the networking at the parties. WPPI has become a party show. There are “off the hook” parties every night. My pal Kevin Kubota throws a party every year at Roys. It’s always the most sought-out invitation in town and always a great time. Animoto rented an $8k a night SkyLoft at the MGM and had a small, relatively quiet affair where most of the industry thought leaders were involved. It was my favorite. The youngsters had parties at the various clubs and I’m sure they had a good time too.

3. The print competition – while less relevant than it used to be is still a good place to see what the current trends and standards are in the industry. I saw some amazing stuff from the usual suspects like Jerry Ghionis. The man could make a picture of cow poo into a work of art. He’s probably the most artistic wedding/portrait photographer working in the business right now.

4. The overall attitude of the crowd was upbeat and positive, but the younger photographers have a great deal of false bravado and I worry for the future if this doesn’t change course. I overheard too many conversations that went something like: “Well I saw that new XXX camera in the XXX booth and all I need is that and the marketing course from XXX and I’ll be ready to start booking $10,000 weddings next week.” Umm, might want to rethink that one.

5. The truly great photographers, photographs, teachers and speakers along with the truly great vendors at the show all had one thing in common. Passion. And I mean oodles of it. You could easily sort the wannabes from the folks who are winning simply by judging their passion. I continue to know and grow more and more on this subject of passion in photography and I am starting to think it means more to the industry than ever. The most important weapon any photographer has is his/her heart. If you can’t shoot from the heart your images won’t matter.

My conclusion is that these giant trade shows are a little less relevant than they used to be because of online and social media. But the shows still matter when it comes to seeing who’s passionate and who’s not and who’s a true craftsman or woman and who’s not. These shows still matter from a networking perspective and there’s no reason NOT to go if you’re serious about making a living as a photographer.

Overall, I am upbeat about the future of the professional side of the photography world, but I hope younger photographers don’t loose site of the fact that to really be a success in this business you need to have love and passion for the work and the clients. If you don’t, you’re in the wrong place.

Thanks to everyone who was so nice to me at WPPI. I had the pleasure of meeting many of the folks wbo regularly listen to the podcast or read this site and I really appreciated it.

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Photofocus Podcast Episode #69

Posted by scottbourne on March 15, 2011
Posted in: Audio Podcast. Tagged: , .

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NOTE: We apologize the audio is a bit hot in places because we used a new field recorder and broke our normal workflow. All should be normal next episode.

Photofocus Episode 69

Host: Scott Bourne (www.scottbourne.com or www.twitter.com/scottbourne) and special guest Matthew Jordan Smith (http://matthewjordansmith.blogspot.com/)

Show notes by Bruce Clarke (www.momentsindigital.com or www.twitter.com/bruceclarke)

Welcome to Episode Number 69 of Photofocus with Scott Bourne and special guest Matthew Jodan Smith. Photofocus is the show devoted to your questions about anything photography related including gear, technique, locations, etc. Your questions will shape the direction of this show so be sure to send your questions to photofocus@me.com. We will try to answer as many as we can but we get a lot of questions so we’ll try to take a collection of questions that represent a particular topic and present them together.

This week we kick things off with a listener looking for thoughts on selecting lenses based on crop factors:

Question One – Selecting Lenses Based on Crop Factors

Should photographers with a cropped sensor DSLRs follow the same “guidelines or pro recommendations” as full frames DSLR photographers when choosing a lens? Should we convert focal length using the crop factor then make our decision regarding what focal length suits our needs? Merci, Marc Archambault Montreal Canada

Matthew: Yes you should as it gives you somewhat of a guide. It will put you in the ballpark but it’s not exact. I will shoot based on what I feel.

Scott: The main thing is what are you trying to accomplish. These rules don’t really apply anymore. If I want to shoot with an 85 and I throw it on a crop sensor camera, I don’t worry about it too much.

Question Two – Shooting Landscapes with a Fisheye

I have just ordered a Fisheye lens and was wondering if you had any tips for good landscape or interesting shots. I understand the basic formula, that if you have the horizon in the centre of the frame, it will remain relatively straight. And shoot at F8 ish and almost everything will be in focus. David Wingate from Wimbledon Uk

Scott: Those are two great beginning tips. The wider angle the lens, the less depth of field matters. If you have a super wide angle lens you’d be surprised at what is in focus. Fisheye lenses are best if you can keep the plane of focus parallel with the subject. I like to work with really prominent foreground objects.

Matthew: I used to shoot with them but haven’t used one in awhile.

Question Three – Compression in TIFF Files

I was wondering if you could explain the different compression in regards to tiff files. Am using Aperture and not sure if I should use zip, lzw or none. I do allot of portrait retouching so I use 16 bit files and would like to keep the best quality file. George Vivanco form Long Beach, Ca

Scott: I’ll keep it short and simple. You should use no compression. A Tiff file is already a lossless file without compression.

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