Cami

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/125 second, f/5.6, ISO 100

Jukebox Hero

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/8, ISO 100

Gymnastics Photo Shoot

I spent yesterday afternoon in a gym doing a stock photo shoot of gymnasts. The girls were a lot of fun and with their help (along with their coach) we hopefully kept the poses 'real'.

The extremely large room (12,000 s.f.+) was a challenge to light due to the rapid fall-off in the background. With my normal two softbox setup the athletes would have had a near black background. To solve this problem, I ended up firing a 600ws monolight at full power with only a reflector into the background to provide an adequate light level.



As I've said many times before, it is always great to go on location for these shoots. I especially want to say thanks to the young ladies on the team at Bailie's Gymnastics for being so helpful (and fun!).

iStockphoto Download # 25,000!

At 5:25 am this morning I reached a milestone in my stock photography business. Today's featured photo of school girls marked my 25,000th image sold from my portfolio on istockphoto.com. This now secures my spot as a diamond level contributor and maxes out my royalty percentage. Of the estimated 50,000 contributors on the site, less than 250 are diamond level.

It seems like just yesterday that I posted about the potential income possibility of selling mircrostock images. Now here I am a short ten months later making my living selling stock photography.

I'm all about setting goals and reaching them. My next sales goal? 50,000 images sold by the end of 2008.

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/50 second, f/10, ISO 100

Save the Date: Photowalking the Great Salt Lake

The next Photowalking Utah event promises to be a good one. We will be taking an evening walk out to the Great Salt Lake with noted photographer Charles Uibel as our guide. if you are not familiar with Charles' work, take a trip over to his website at GreatSaltLakePhotos.com and see his remarkable captures of the iconic body of water.

For the outing, we will be meeting at the gate at Saltair on the South end of the lake. We will then caravan to the end of the road to begin the walk. The plan is to trek out to the shore of the lake for photography. In addition to landscape photography, we will also have models and lighting/reflectors available for portrait captures.

Here are the details:

What: Photowalking Utah: Great Salt Lake
When: Saturday June 21st, 6:00 pm - sunset
Where: West of Saltair on the Southern shoreline

As with all Photowalking Utah events, this is open to any photographer who would like to join in. It doesn't matter what your skill level is, or what kind of camera you use - you are welcome to attend.

For up-to-the-minute information on the event, visit the Photowalking Utah discussion on the Flickr group at PhotowalkingUtah.com.

Note: For this Photowalk, you absolutely will want to have shoes on that can get wet (or bring rubber boots) and insect repellent on hand.

Today's image is used courtesy of Charles Uibel. Visit his website at GreatSaltLakePhotos.com or his Flickr stream at flickr.com/photos/cuibel.

Scary Movie

Today's image is a sample from Saturday's studio shoot. The shoot was based on 'tween' girls doing typical things like playing video games, watching movies and painting their toenails. This shot is one of my favorites from the set. I asked the girls pretend that they were watching a scary movie, and they did so admirably.

The lighting setup for this capture was very simple. I placed a medium sized softbox on the floor in front of the girls to create the glow that would be coming from a television in a dark room. I then adjusted the white-balance a small amount to the blue side. The combination worked well to create the scene.

The complete set will be appearing in my stock portfolio in the next week.

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/7.1, ISO 100

Trackside Bokeh

Canon 5D, Canon 70-200 f/2.8L lens - 1/400 second, f/2.8, ISO 160

Mail Call

Canon 5D, Canon 70-200 f/2.8L lens - 1/250 second, f/2.8, ISO 250

Photowalking Utah: This Saturday

The next Photowalking Utah outing is coming up this Saturday (May 24, 2008). The event will cover the Utah Capitol Hill area including Memory Grove Park, City Creek Park and the Utah State Capitol building. The outing will begin at 5:00 pm which will give a great opportunity for sunset shots. If you are attending, you can meet the group at City Creek Park (NE corner of State and N. Temple). We will photograph there, then walk to Memory Grove and finally up to the Capitol.

For more info and a roll-call of who is attending, drop by the announcement thread on the Flickr group discussion by clicking here.

This should be a fun outing. It looks as though the weather should improve by Saturday evening, but let's still keep our fingers crossed.

'At My Home' Photo Contest

My friend Udi over at DIYPhotography.net is holding a photography contest. The theme of the contest is At My Home. There are some great prizes available to the winning entries, which will be selected by an impressive group of judges. For more information, drop on by the contest page at http://www.diyphotography.net/at-my-home-photo-contest and check it out. And why you're there, add DIYPhotography.net's RSS feed to your reader if you haven't done so already.

Today's image is a quick portrait taken last year of the most important person in my home, my wife Michelle.

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/9, ISO 100

Welcome Back, Indiana Jones

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/100 second, f/6.3, ISO 100

The Cover of The Onion Magazine

One the of things about selling stock images through a stock agency is that you have limited control over how your image is used. I found out over the weekend that one of my images had been used on a recent cover of The Onion Magazine's weekly print version. While it is normally great to see an image in use, this particular usage made me stop and think. The standard license at iStockphoto.com (where I sell images) limits purchasers in how they can use an image, but there are always gray areas. Here is an excerpt from the iStock license concerning this:

6. use the Content in a fashion that is considered by iStockphoto (acting reasonably) as or under applicable law is considered pornographic, obscene, immoral, infringing, defamatory or libelous in nature, or that would be reasonably likely to bring any person or property reflected in the Content into disrepute;

7. use or display any Content that features a model or person in a manner that (i) would lead a reasonable person to think that such person uses or personally endorses any business, product, service, cause, association or other endeavour; or (ii) that depicts such person in a potentially sensitive subject matter, including, but not limited to mental and physical health issues, social issues, sexual or implied sexual activity or preferences, substance abuse, crime, physical or mental abuse or ailments, or any other subject matter that would be reasonably likely to be offensive or unflattering to any person reflected in the Content;

While both of the models in the photo have signed a model release agreeing that they have no control over the use of their likeness, I'm still left to wonder if the above license clauses have been violated.

This is just another thing to consider when shooting stock images and especially when using models.

Dr. Legg, I Presume

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/125 second, f/5.6, ISO 100

Detective Stock Photo Shoot

My most recent stock photo shoot was a Dragnet meets GeekSquad meets Men in Black type of theme. I wanted to have a plainclothes police officer with a very clean look. My friend (and fellow photographer) Glen stepped in to model as the detective and pulled it off nicely. With the help of Erik playing the part of the 'perp', we put together a nice set of images to add to my stock portfolio.

The lighting setup for this shoot was fairly simple (as most of mine usually are). I used both of my Canon Speedlites (430 and a 580 II) off camera to light the scene. For the location we used a favorite of mine, the alleyway next to the studio.

As always, we had a lot of fun and got a few strange looks from people passing by as we did the shoot.

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/100 second, f/4, ISO 100

Mirrored Imagination

Today's image is a concept shot I did after last week's White Bedroom shoot. I like the idea, but I think I'm going to photograph it again in a more natural setting (bedroom, store, etc.).

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/125 second, f/7.1, ISO 100

Galileo

I was doing some shooting in studio yesterday experimenting with different lighting setups for product images. When I'm testing stuff in studio, I generally look around for something handy to use. In this case, my Galileo Thermometer worked well.

Here's a behind-the-scenes shot of the setup I used for the shot.



This Darkfield Lighting technique works well for shiny objects and is relatively simple to pull of. For a more detailed description and setup, check out my friend Kim's blog post.

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/125 second, f/7.1, ISO 100

Wedding Kiss

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/320 second, f/5.6, ISO 100

Bright Eyes

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/100 second, f/4, ISO 160

White Bedroom Photo Shoot

My latest stock photo shoot was a "White Bedroom" session. The concept was to create a clean & wholesome look of a young woman in various scenes in her bedroom. To create the set we brought a small bed, night-stand, bedding, lamp, alarm clock and other typical bedroom items (predominantly in white) into the studio and set them up on a white seamless background. The reason I chose the white was to surround the model to allow her face to be the main attraction.



The model in the shoot was Alyssa. This was her last stock session with us before taking off for a couple of months out of state on her summer break from college. I have photographed Alyssa more than any other model and we work very well together. With my wife Michelle (above) assisting me with hair, makeup and the other little details I always seem to miss, we captured numerous scenes to add to our stock image portfolio.



Featured here are a couple of my favorite shots from the series. They involve a sleeping/tired girl and an old-fashioned analog alarm clock. This is an everyday scene that most of us can probably relate to.

Here's a link to the complete set on iStockphoto.

Gallivan

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/200 second, f/6.3, ISO 100

Tables Turned

After photographing young model Kate on the streets of Salt Lake City last weekend, I handed her my camera on the way back (it was almost as big as she is) and let her shoot away. Here's a shot she caught of me 'working it' for the camera.

And here's one of my fellow photographer Julie horsing around after the shoot. I must say that Kate handled the camera well and captured some nice moments.

Canon 5D, Canon 70-200 f/2.8L lens - 1/1600 second, f/2.8, ISO 160

Kate with the Matching Cap

Canon 5D, Canon 70-200 f/2.8L lens - 1/640 second, f/2.8, ISO 160

Where Tungsten and Daylight Meet

Today's image is another shot from last Saturday's photography class excursion to the Great Salt Lake. The combination of the blue background and the normally toned bride were achieved completely in camera by lighting the model with several handheld tungsten lights and adjusting the white balance to the corresponding temperature. The naturally lit background then became the wonderful blue tone displayed in the image.

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/30 second, f/4, ISO 160

Photographing People with Kenneth Linge

This past Saturday wrapped up a three part teaching series that Kenneth Linge has taught this year called Photographing People, Parts 1, 2 and 3. I feel privileged to have spent time as a student in all of these classes. Anyone that has followed this blog for a while knows that Kenneth is a master portrait photographer that openly shares his techniques with the students that attend his seminars.

In part one and two of the series (held earlier this year), the students spent the majority of the time receiving instruction from and working with Kenneth (along with his wife MaryLyn) in a classroom environment. Part three was a departure from this setting, as we were given the opportunity to put our skills to work and venture out into the real world.

For the first part of the day, the students were paired up, given a model and instructed to head out into the downtown area of Salt Lake City to find locations to photograph. I captured the image of Brittanie (above) during this part of the class. It was taken just off of a sidewalk against a red door.

When the afternoon turned toward evening, the group of students, models and instructors headed out to the Great Salt Lake for some twilight shooting. As the sun set we had the opportunity to continue to put the techniques we'd learned to work in this beautiful setting.



By using a combination of natural light, reflectors and tungsten lights we were able to create some rather unique portraits. The above black & white image of Brittanie standing on the shore is an example of the use of a combination of these three methods of lighting.



Over the past year I have attended a total of eight days of training with Kenneth and MaryLyn Linge. Even though the teaching was aimed primarily at portrait and wedding photography, I can honestly say that the greatest skill I have received from them is a greater ability to see light as it relates to photography. This fluency carries over into ALL aspects of my photography and has greatly helped me in my stock photography business. I look forward to continuing to learn from them in the future.

To learn more about Kenneth Linge and The International School of Photography, visit his website at KennethLinge.com.

Thousand Dollar Flower

This simple capture of yellow flowers just became my first image on iStockphoto to generate over $1,000.00 in income. Regular readers might remember the dumpy surroundings in which this shot was taken (read about it here).

The overwhelming majority of my stock portfolio feature people in lifestyle scenarios and not nature shots since people photos simply sell better. iStock even discourages new contributors from uploading flower photos (they do so anyway), so I find it humorous that this shot has done so well.

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/125 second, f/4, ISO 100

Through the Window

Yesterday's wedding shoot in Salt Lake City included rain, snow, wind, sunshine and lots of cold. In spite of the weather, I'm pleased with the images captured.

I worked with videographer Matt of Happily Ever After Video yesterday. It was great working with Matt again (I've worked with him one other time). One of the nice things about working with another artist is the sharing of ideas. The through the window pose featured in today's image was suggested by Matt. It is such a simple shot, but works quite well. I really like the voyeuristic feel that the window foreground adds.

It's several weeks before my next wedding shoot, so it's back to putting on my Stock Photographer hat and getting on to creating more images.

Canon 5D, Canon 24-105 f/4L lens - 1/160 second, f/4, ISO 100

Bethany

Canon 5D, Canon 70-200 f/4L lens - 1/200 second, f/5, ISO 100