A Post About Colours and Cosplay

Hi there folks! I'm just posting to let people heading to Anime North in Toronto this weekend that I will be on sight and I will have a photo booth in Photo Alley. What I'm mainly posting for is to showcase some colour selections for my background for those interested in having me do shots for them. So, as follows based on testing are the best and brightest colours you can pick from.

Now keep in mind these might not be exact, I'll have to run some tests in the TCC when I get there, I sure the lighting will differ slighting in that building. That being said, it will be pretty close, so if your going for a certain look in your photo, colour makes a big difference. I'll be more then happy to select for you, and I do have other colours on me, these ones just stand out the best. I'm really looking forward to meeting everyone there and having a great time myself. Also, I should mention that this colour is a smaller highlight in the background compared to my studio work, but still really adds something. In fact, here are few "regular" photos I did outdoors using this setup and post process. 

It didn't much show up in the first image due to the fact that it was a blue colour and a bright sunny day, but it's still a fun and sort of interesting image.

That's all for now, see all you convention goers in a few days!

-Larry M. Holder 

Two Models, At The Same Time

I actually have two model posts to make today, the first just happens to actually have two models in it, Jill Green and Kathryn Chase. It was a pretty fun and  casual shoot, I'm actually really happy with how random the look of the images turned out. My only issue was this shoot, was that I wasn't paying attention to the glare off Jill's glasses as much as I should have, thus a lot of shots didn't turn out good. Still I was able to pick out several that are both funny and interesting at the same time, I also did a few individual shoots too.

I'm really happy with the lighting in these as well.

-Larry M. Holder

New Portrait Shoot and More Editing Advice

All right, here's some new portrait work, I know I'm on a roll! This work features the wonderful Jill Green back for her second shoot with me. Jill's a great subject once she gets into the groove, but that also means I have to shoot a lot of images to capture those awesome images. I'm not complaining, it's time well spent in the studio. This time though I may have shoot too much cause I ended up with a huge file full of favourites, 27 to be exact. My editing process goes as such, group the photos together by type, like full body, mid-shots and close up for example. Then I proceed to find the similar images in those groupings, the best poses stay, the others go into a "No" folder, there not bad, so I'm not just going to delete them. In fact I don't delete anything, my raw images get backed-up and stored on an external hard drive, this way I'll always have them just in case. You might not want to use an image for your website, but the person might really want that picture, take this one for example:

I'm not going to use it on my site, but it feature's Jill's new tattoo, so I know she'll most likely want at least this digital copy, so I put it here in my blog for her. Sometimes I'll see an image that's awesome, I love it, but it doesn't fit with the thematic flow on my site, or represent the person in the image very much at all. I still want to keep it and have a good print version saved on my computer and backed up in the external hard drive and eventually a disc. This image here makes her look really depressed, I cropped with a lot of negative space so she looked very lonely. 

It's a very compelling image on it's own, but doesn't represent her personality, which is what my portrait work is about. This I probably wouldn't even post on here normally, but rather keep it in case an idea for a series came into my mind at a later date and time. The next step is boiling down to no more then 10 solid images for the blog and then a top 3 for my website, that's the guideline I'm going by now. It forces you to really think and pick the most compelling work in your mind. Every photographer I know of does this process, some more then others, but it should become second nature after a while. Anyway, here are the top picks for the blog, the first 3 are the website pics, and thanks again Jill.

P.S.  - Rain really sucks sometimes 

-Larry M. Holder

More Alternative Portrait Work

My second alternative portrait shoot, based off the awesome shots I did with Kayleigh Smith earlier this month, I present to you some new work in the same vein. This time featuring the wonderful Jill Green, the shots turned out quite nice in my mind. I seem to have worked out the minor issues that I ran into last time and now have it down to science as far as lighting goes. So for anyone that's looking for a nice studio picture with some flair, please contact me if your in the Fredericton or Saint John area and let's book some time. It's as easy as emailing me at larrymholder@gmail.com or if your coming from Facebook, just message me there. And now for the show!