Showing posts with label fuji. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fuji. Show all posts

Friday, 15 May 2009

How to turn Portrush weather into summer.

Portrush, the golden jewel of the North Coast. Known for it's rare sun, rare temperatures, motorbikes and Barry's Amusements. For kids the world over it's a BIG deal to get there.

As ever I keep an eye on the forecast which was cloudly, the odd rain shower but dry. Wrong. Over the Coleraine mountain there was a lot of rain, it was just trying to figure out which way it was going.... Portrush direction from my guessing.



When I arrived most of the crew (see above) were already there. All those people for one model, it was a good laugh as well, which always helps. Once latte's were consumed it was down to work. Now Ashleen was a total star considering that the temperature was not exactly the best, plus she has a small audience in the form of restaurant goers peering out of the window. Not to mention that it was practise lap night for the Northwest 200 so there were motorbikes everywhere apart from where we were.

In the car was my light kit: Sigma flash, Nikon Speedlight, Fuji S5 Pro, monopod, reflectors, two banks of 5ft striplights and a lot of gels, plus a laptop and lot of A clamps, muslins and assorted light shaping stuff. Come prepared! I hardly used any of it. In fact the one that was left on the living room floor at home was possible the one thing I needed.

So, how do you turn Portrush drab light into summer, half cut CTO over the Nikon Speedlight did the trick nicely. And with Ashleen having ginger hair the CTO just lifted everything up nicely, she was totally professional and didn't moan once, in fact I made more of a fuss by making her wear a blanket every five minutes and when I needed to setup the next shot.

I'm not going to put any images up until the posters are done for the catwalk show.

Saturday, 25 April 2009

One of the best shoots I've ever had.

The last twelve months seem to have blessed me with some of the best shoots I've done. Yesterday was excellent though everyone's first though for a wedding: "what's the weather like?".

Now the Met office don't always get it right no matter how many "it's supposed to clear up by 1pm" sentences I heard the rain didn't let up all day. From the moment I started shooting at 11am until I stopped at 10pm. Always have a "plan B" is my motto, so we rolled out plan B with immediate effect.

Off camera flash was the order of the day, the formals and bride/groom portraits were all done in the church after the service. Once the larger formals were done I spent 30 minutes with the couple, "can you hold this high please" I asked and a semi bemused Groom held my SB-600 as high as he could. Hey presto, simulated daylight coming through the window of the church, with a bounce card the light spread nicely. Same again but with me shooting from the balcony and Nikon's CLS kicked in no problems at all (I'm sure glad Fuji kept CLS in the S5 Pro).

I'll post some pictures up soon but I want the bride and groom to see everything first.