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Wednesday, April 24, 2013 at 2:35PM Jason Collin 
Couples model portfolio shoot in St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/100th - Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/2 power in 43" brolly foreground & SB-600 @ 1/2 power in collapsed shoot through umbrella in background
This shoot was with returning client Mark, but was by far the biggest contrast between photography services with the same client. In November 2012 he reserved a car photography shoot for his Mustang Cobra and as you can see this time it was a model portfolio shoot, involving himself and his girlfriend too no less! He saw some of my previous modeling shots at a brick wall and vintage door location and asked if we could use that same downtown St. Petersburg Florida spot.
Using my favorite brick wall background in downtown St. Petersburg Florida model portfolio shoot - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/100th - Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/2 power in 43" brolly foreground & SB-600 @ 1/2 power in collapsed shoot through umbrella in backgroundFor the shoot Mark wanted some individual shots of himself, individuals of his girlfriend, and then also shots of them together as a couple switching between the brick wall background and the vintage door. They also did a wardrobe change. For the above shot I used the pinhole filter in Silver Efex Pro to create that shadowy black & white look.
Dynamic model portfolio shoot in St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/160th - Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/2 power in 43" brolly foreground & SB-600 @ 1/2 power in collapsed shoot through umbrella in backgroundNot being professional models I suggested various ideas in addition to the ones they wanted to try too. I always like to try and get a dynamic look shot, so I suggested a hair toss. It took several tries and different starting points and remembering to smile even though she was flicking her head back, but in the end I got the result I envisioned for the shot.
Urban model portfolio shoot in St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 Tamron 17-50mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/100th - Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/2 power in 43" brolly to frame right & SB-600 @ 1/2 power in 43" shoot through umbrella to frame leftFor their first model portfolio shoot they both did great and I am of course always happy to work with a previous client again. I look forward to whatever type of shoot Marks wants to do next be it model, car or something else!
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Wednesday, September 12, 2012 at 2:23PM Jason Collin 
Julie practices off camera flash as her friend, Rebecca (also my photo student), does an excellent modeling job for her!Julie has started her second 4-pack of 1-on-1 DSLR Photography Lessons with me and is really ready to step up her photography skills! She has invested in complete setup for off camera flash, or strobist, photography. This actually does not require a large financial investment (assuming you already have a speedlight). To join the strobist portrait world it just takes a light stand, head for the light stand, radio triggers and maybe a brolly or other light modifier. All that can be had for about $125. Just add your DSLR & speedlight, and of course my photography lessons, and you can start making your own amazing portraits (see above).
For this lesson in downtown St. Petersburg Julie brought along her friend Rebecca, who is also taking my photography lessons as well! She was a very patient model as we setup up several different shots in North Straub Park and along the waterfront. You can see the very simple one speedlight setup we used with just a diffuser cap on (as it was too windy at this spot for the brolly) in the image above and a resulting dramatic portrait. I look forward to showing Julie how to become an even better strobist photographer in our next lesson!
Friday, August 31, 2012 at 2:39PM Jason Collin 
Framing the model, Rita, with detailed architecture and a vintage door - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/9 ISO 200 1/100th - Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/4 power in 43" brolly to frame left
For my model portfolio shoot with Rita in downtown St. Petersburg, I finally had a chance to use a very small part of a building I had been wanting to feature in a photo shoot for a long time. Many times I walked past this spot while teaching 1-on-1 DSLR Photography Lessons and kept making mental notes to use the features of the spot (long brick wall, medieval looking door) in a shoot someday. Finally, that day was yesterday evening with model, Rita (her official website).
Featuring a brick wall in this panorama model headshot - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/60th - Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/4 power in 43" brolly to frame right & SB-600 @ 1/16th power with diffuser cap pointed at the wallThough we only shot in a space of about 10 feet, we were able to produce a variety of different shots by featuring the brick wall or the metallic door as the background as well as close-ups and wide shots. I also switched between using a 2-strobe setup like the one above, and a single strobe setup like the lead image.
Model positioning her arm as a triangle to be symmetric with the door handle - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/60th Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/4 power in 43" brolly to frame leftRita's style of changing poses after each time I pushed the shutter made for a flow that I had not experienced with a model before. I really liked it as it kept the shoot moving giving the process a dynamic feel.
Bokeh made by traffic lights - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/60th Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/4 power in 43" brolly to frame right & SB-600 @ 1/16th power to frame leftI liked being able to make soft looking images, like the one above, along with gritty images in the same shoot as no matter how long or short of a shoot, I do like to create a variety of looks for the model. For the above shot, I thought the straight perpendicular composition looked too rigid, so I tilted my camera to remove the boundary feeling of the 90-degree angle framing.
This images features a vertical line theme - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/9 ISO 200 1/100th Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/4 power in 43" brolly to frame leftI was again impressed with the lighting job my 43" brolly did. I will feature it in a proper gear review soon. As you can see it does not take a lot of lighting equipment to make an effective portrait. The above shot features a single speedlight off camera in the brolly. All I did was place it about 45 degrees to the left of the model on a light stand using inexpensive Yongnuo radio triggers (to be reviewed soon also). Of course it also helps to have a beautiful and talented model like Rita to work with!
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Wednesday, May 23, 2012 at 4:33PM Jason Collin 
These are actually post office steps! The neon in the background is real, though modified - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/5.6 ISO 400 1/160th Strobist: Nikon SB-800 Speedlight @ 1/4 power in 43" brolly to frame left & Nikon SB-600 Speedlight @ 1/2 power with diffuser cap to frame left
I cannot say I explicitily intended for my model portfolio shoot with Alexandra to turn into a film noir style, but through editing of the images it certainly turned out that way. We were shooting in the late evening from about 7:45pm to 8:25pm mostly around the Arcade in downtown St. Petersburg. The Arcade is a great location offering a variety of shot opportunities, especially at that late time of day with all its shadow opportunities. The above shot was actually the very last shot of the shoot. The background features the neon sign of a cafe across the street with the contrast selectively turned up so that only what is illuminated by my speedlights and the neon remain visible.
Using long shadows created by a speedlight outside the gates - - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/4 ISO 400 1/160th Strobist: Nikon SB-800 Speedlight @ 1/8 power in 43" brolly to frame left & Nikon SB-600 Speedlight @ 1/2 power with diffuser cap to frame leftI chose the Arcade as a shooting location because of the great, very tall, ornate, iron gates. I knew they would make for a fantastic background and/or prop. For the above shot I placed a speedlight outside the gates to frame left in the alley to help cast long shadows in the foreground. I composed so to accentuate them. Alexandra came up with a great pose taking my one small suggestion to create space between each arm and her body, something I always make sure is set otherwise the model will appear to have a lumpy body or strange attached arm. Alexandra in fact did a great job overall allowing me to focus on creating mood and atmosphere with my lighting and composition.
The 43" brolly creates soft shadows, I love it - - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/4 ISO 400 1/160th Strobist: Nikon SB-800 Speedlight @ 1/8 power in 43" brolly to frame left & Nikon SB-600 Speedlight @ 1/2 power with diffuser cap to frame leftThis shot features the same gates and lighting setup. Without the speedlight outside the gates providing backlight, the gate on frame right would appear dull and lack the reflective light on it. Additionally, the same speedlight provides rim light around the model, especially her hair, right arm and right side. A photographer can do a lot with just two speedlights positioned in key spots. I could carry all my strobist and photography gear that I used for this shoot myself, following the "lighten up and shoot" philosophy.
A single strobe setup with intentional background shadow - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/4.5 ISO 400 1/160th Strobist: Nikon SB-800 Speedlight @ 1/8 power in 43" brolly to frame rightThis shot is different than all the others in that it features only one speedlight positioned to create Rembrandt lighting (nose & cheek shadows touch leaving a little light under the eye) on the model. I wanted to include one soft feeling image in the shoot as most of the others were really strong from a posing and overall feel perspective.
Thank you again to Alexandra. You can follow her work on Model Mahem and Facebook.
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Thursday, May 10, 2012 at 4:31PM Jason Collin 
This editing style was inspired by the Jem cartoon series! -- Model: AbbyI was going through Netflix's always woeful list of new releases when I saw that the cartoon series Jem was now available. I remember watching this cartoon in the 80s because of the vivid pastel colors and style of the animation. So this afternoon I went about converting one of my own photographs into a Jem-style image.
The above is my final image next to a photo of Jem (source Wikipedia). Maybe long before I saw Jem in Netflix I had a subconscious thought to convert the shot of model Abby into a Jem-style one as I did not really like how I originally shot the photo, but I kept it lying around for some reason.
The first thing I did was to load the original image (see above) into Photoshop CS5. Well, actually before that I did some slight warming to the image in Aperture 3 via Nik Color Efex Pro 3.
In Photoshop using the Quick Select Tool (W) I selected only the background of the image. I did then click on Refine Edge to make the border along the hair look more natural and less choppy.
The next step was the key one and really how I thought I would go about making the photograph look more Jem-like and I knew how to do it entirely because of making mistakes in the past with my keyboard shortcut usage. I always use CMD-SHIFT-I to resize images before I post them on this site and Facebook, etc. Sometimes I end up hitting just CMD-I which is the Invert command in Photoshop. Since only the background was selected, only the background became inverted going from black to white and the bokeh from yellow to purple, which to me is much more Jem-like!
Next to clean up the image and make the model look more like Jem does, I used the Clone Stamp Tool (S) at 40% opacity and just sampled an area then brushed over that same area repeating as skin tone and texture changed for each part of the face. This is the quickest and easiest way I know of for smoothing skin. Note, I did not say it was the best, just the quickest and easiest.
To further the smooth and glowing look that Jem has, I used a free Photoshop action available here. That completed the look. I did not intend to tightly crop the image, but after all editing was done I thought a tighter crop was a better way to feature the image. I just hit C in Photoshop to bring up the Crop Tool.
Try this Jem-style process out on one of your photographs and post a link to the results in the comments below!
CS5, Photoshop, editing digital photos, headshot, model in Photography Tips