Fashion - Measurements

Some new pictures I took for Bronwen Robbins of her doing measurements for her next costume design. What could it be? To find out you should also follow Bronwen's blog posted below. First though, the pictures.

http://bronwenrobbins.blogspot.com/

Thanks again Bronwen!

-Larry M. Holder

New Art Documentation

This is some sculpture and pottery I shot for Melissa LeBlanc the other day. I was really excited to try my hand at shooting the sculpture and I'm very pleased with the result. I used a single top down, left sided flash head with a couple reflectors in place to bounce the light back up. This method was suggested to me by Drew Gilbert, an instructor here at NBCCD. For the pots I kept the overhead light but made it more central and added in a left facing soft box. I wish now I had another reflector in place on the right side, as the bottom right side on the images is a little too dark by my standards, a reshoot may be in order if Melissa wants it. I could just be being picky though. On to the images.

Till next time.

-Larry M. Holder

Poster Designs

At the end of this school year in June, the Graduate Studies program I'm in will be having a gallery opening. One challenge of planing such an event is coming up with a title and an image for your poster and related promotional items. Over the last few weeks as a group we've been discussing show titles, layout and so forth. A lot of what we came up with were general words or ideas to represent us each having very different arrays and styles of work. We are now close to certain deadlines and we've all been asked to pick a selection of our favourite titles for the next class after March break. I decided, while I have a bit of time to think, why not make up some images to go with the titles and give my self a chance to really play with some concepts   I've been thinking about. I'll post the title and image one by one and give a little explanation behind the technic and concept.

Number 1

"Full Spectrum"

A fairly simple idea, but a difficult execution. I started with the idea of having three painted colours merge into three rays of light of the same colours. I picked the three primary colours, red, yellow and blue, and then gelled my flashes in the background with the same colours. The painted panel was held in place high and far enough to block out the flash heads while still leaving the distant background visible. Lining this up on my own was a nightmare. Then I lit the front of the painting from below and shot all at once, no HDR, stitching or another photoshop tricks, other then brightening the lit background. The colour from the lights merged a bit, as I expected, so I really like that this actually worked out. The concept is, you start with the basic elements and it merges into something bright and beautiful.

Number 2

"Acronym For Art"

A very simple idea, execution was also fairly simple. I've been playing with overhead projections as of late and thought it would work well in this case. The idea is a play off the word "acronym" and that in a sense what we describe as our studio practise can been used in that fashion to substitute for the word "art". The mind bubble and the words are projected onto the backdrop and the shadow is created from the light of the projector. Originally I was in the shot, but removed myself from the image in photoshop. The purple colour is created from a flash head I used to help expose the image better, in my research the colour purple is seen to represent inspiration. I like this image and idea.

Number 3 

"The Modern Struggle of Art"

This one might be a bit to dark for everyone, and is definitely a more surreal and abstract image then the other two. Again this uses projections and flashes with coloured gels, and a long exposer time. I don't really know what to say about this image, I just really love it. But again, this is more my style then one that really represents everyone.

Well that's all for now. 

-Larry M. Holder

                                   

Sometimes It Pays To Not Be So Serious

The title is a bit off putting, but I just got a little tired of writing "New Model Shoot" or variations on that. That's what this update is about though. I had a wonderful model I contacted off Model Mayhem, Leah Warren, pose for me on the weekend. Since Leah is also an actress, she was very character driven in each outfit which made for a fun and spontaneous shoot. I had noticed in her profile pictures that she had red hair and I always wanted to make a strong green background, so this, in my mind, was the perfect chance to try and get that colour. I ended up making two different colour combinations during the shoot and I really like both. Typically I do a skin softening application as of late to my models, however, for whatever reason it just looked too unnatural on Leah, possibly because her skin was already very light in tone. All and all I really enjoyed working with her, and there's a possibility I may work with her comedic acting group in the future, which sounds awesome to me. Now the pictures.

Thanks again Leah!

-Larry M. Holder

Fashion Design of Pat Galbraith

Quick little update, here is a small collection I did for Pat Galbraith, a fashion student here at NBCCD. This is one of her completed pieces and a very nice one I may say. I hope to be working with Pat and many other fashion students in the weeks to come.

What may seem like a very simple execution was really quite an extensive setup involving 4 lights. I had two lighting the background, same as I shoot models, but rather in front I had two lights. This was similar to how I shot Bronwen's cosplay photos a while ago, but in those I used two soft boxes. This was one large soft box and one slightly front directed light from above. Pretty good effect, but I need to mindful in the future of fall off near the bottom next time.

-Larry M. Holder 

Timbre Collective Product Photos

Photos from product shoot I did for the Timbre Collective's pedal boards. I really great idea and product these fellows are offering for musicians. I highly suggest if your in the music scene you check these products out.

Thanks to the fellows at Timbre Collective once again, and I look forward to making more images in the future with them. Check out their website here, if this product interests you.

http://www.timbrepedalboard.com/

-Larry M. Holder