Commercial Photographer Curtis Comeau

Travel Crazyness

2011-05-25T20:54:00.000-07:00

Hope everyone is doing well.

Colleagues and other photographers often comment on how lucky I am to get to travel and working in other cities.

(breakfast in YEG and checking out my maps for the following 48hrs)

It goes without saying that when you have a job that takes you somewhere cool and the budget allows for 5-7 days then yes it’s a very pleasurable experience.

However more often than not, time and budget are very real factors one has to consider. Or you often need to make a hasty return home to shoot another project.

(god I hope my gear arrives)

I recently booked two shoots in Vancouver and Ladysmith BC on Vancouver Island for Canadian Wildlife Magazine. Sounded like a nice trip, but in reality it turned into a rush job with little breathing room. You see editorial budgets are not huge so you have to factor in the time it takes to shoot the project.

(this is Otto, hes my first subject)

This is a very common situation I am faced with. Here is what the past 48hrs looked like.

May 24

530am - wake up

6am - leave for airport

630am – arrive at YEG and get into argument with WestJet employee about carry on weight allowance

730am - Quiznos turkey sub and Starbucks espresso – healthy breakfast.

930am - arrive Vancouver proceed to BC Ferry to double check my reservation for May 25morning because BC Ferry’s automated phone system sucks.

11am - Depart BC ferry and proceed to Otto’s house (My first subject)

1pm - Arrive at Otto’s house (my first subject)

3pm – Leave Otto’s house, download, edit and respond to emails.

6pm – Eat at my favorite Sushi Place.

7pm – Get home, watch the hockey game and go to bed.

(downloading before dinner)

(sushi at one of my favourite spots, this cost 6$)

May 25

530am – Wake up, shower leave for the Ferry

630am – Arrive at Ferry on hour before departure, sleep in car.

(view from the Ferry... moments before I fell a sleep)

745am – Pull my car onto the ferry departing for Nanaimo and sleep for the 2hr ride.

10am – Arrive in Nanaimo and drive to Ladysmith to meet my Subjects

11am – Hook up with subjects and head down to bog for the shoot

(making my subjects wade through the creek)

130pm – Finish shoot with subjects and head around town for some food and for some pick up shots.

(Ladysmith Pick up shot)

230pm – Haul ass back to Ferry to make it on in time because if I miss it I miss my flight.

330pm - Pull on to Ferry, download, edit and sleep.

550pm – Arrive in Vancouver head directly to the airport.

730pm – All checked in, waiting for my flight, at the Bar, with Honey brown Ale, writing this post.

May 26

11am - I have a shoot in studio, then another shoot for Graham Construction at 3pm.

If you enjoyed this, next week Ill be in Ottawa Ontario and heading up to Val Dor Quebec to shoot in a gold mine. 5.5 hrs driving each way. I promise to do a post on that as well.

Locations complete the look

2011-05-19T21:58:00.000-07:00

Shooting musicians is always fun. Especially when they have a specific look.

The other day I shot Dan Smith, a guitar player. He had such a rad look, and I loved the jacket he came wearing. We came up with the idea to shoot Dan in an urban setting. Which I think fit the look and feel.

The night before I was scouting for a rural location for another commercial shoot I have coming up, and I stumbled upon this acreage with this old 1930's trailer on it. The old trailer had such character that I thought it would provide such a great backdrop for a rock musician.

The problem is that I was scouting at 9:30pm and didn't want to roll up to the house and ask for permission to shoot there the following afternoon.

The following day I ended up wrapping up the shoot with Dan when I told him about this location and didn't really have permission or anything but if he wanted to travel there and see if we could shoot then I was game. Nat who was assisting and has produce several of my shoots was game too... understandably given her thoughts of the idea was that its "better to beg for forgiveness then ask for permission."

We ended up rolling into the acreage and taking with the home owner. She had no problem with us shooting, but she was curious as to why would we want to shoot "that old thing" anyways we did, and I love the collection.

Enjoy!

C

This is Sidney, shot in studio, and on location.

2011-05-18T16:55:00.000-07:00

Here's a bizarre story.

Sid's beginning her career as a realtor for Adam Dirksen. So Adam hired me to shoot her for her new ad materials. Sid showed up, sat in and we began shooting... naturally in a portrait session we started chatting, realizing only much later that we had worked together 3 weeks earlier on a medium cap advertising campaign.

Sid was one of the models on the 2011 Hudson's Tap House advertising campaign I shot that will span across Western Canada.

What was bizarre is that I had no idea who she was when she showed up nor did she recognize me.

It happens a lot when I'm shooting. I am so focused on getting a photograph for my art director that I have little or no time to interact with the subjects of a personal level, so It's just a blur...

What didn't help was that the 2011 Hudson's campaign was shot with the 200mm 2.0. The 2.0 is a kick ass lens but you need distance...so I basically just hid behind it, and had my assistant translate my direction to the talent... one of which was Sidney.

I had just flew in that morning from Vancouver, hauled ass to the Grant MacEwan University for 1pm to teach my studio class, then hauled ass to Hudson's Tap House for 5:30 to shoot the campaign, so when we were wrapped, I was bagged and ended up taking off pretty quick, not taking a lot of time to chat with all of the talent we were using.

Because of my horrific short term memory I am terrible with names, so I ended up giving the girls for the Hudson's shoot fun nick names; Its lightens the mood and makes people laugh... "blond", "stripes", " Thoroughbred"... So often I don't really end up knowing the real names of the talent...

I thought I would post these because I really dig the look of these portraits

AMA and yummmmyyy Food.

2011-05-18T16:02:00.000-07:00

For the past few years I have been commissioned to photograph the membership guide of the Alberta Medical Association. It's quite an enjoyable project to shoot and I look forward to it every year. I get a chance to work with an experienced art director and for a client who allows me to pretty much shoot what I want.

My direction changes from year to year. I end up shooting one year with hard light, the other with soft light, sometimes with tungsten while other with strobe. I want to keep the look fresh and modern.

The biggest challenge is shooting the Executive group photo. Everyone is very nice, but I'm just not a group photo shooter, so I have to plan carefully and in advance to ensure we get a shot that works.

This series was shot with Elinchrom ranger strobes, gelled with half cut CTO gels to warm up the photographs. I used soft boxes on every image, with no back light. I wanted the images to have an organic look to them.

I also shot handheld, with my Canon 1ds MARK 3 and mostly on my 85mm 1.2. The biggest challenge is that my art director really wants clean backgrounds, so I always have to keep wide eyes, and ensure there are no stray things lying around.

I just shot food for a Greek restaurant called Koutouki, which was featured on a TV series called "Family Restaurant". I will post more next week here is a teaser.

Enjoy!

More Technical Detail

2011-05-01T23:19:00.000-07:00

Hope all is well with everyone.

I am going to post a few images from shoots that show a diverse discipline range. I am going to revert back to what I did in the past and discribe my shooting techniques and tech details with every image I post.

In this post you will see some Food photography from Century Hospitality, A story on Air Travel in Denver CO, Commercial Hair Product Packaging photos from Eveline Charles Salons, a stock image purchased from me for travel story on Egypt and interiors for Vons Steak House.

Add caption

This image was shot on seamless.... I used 4 lights, and a reflector. My client wanted to see the "shine" on the girls hair that the product produced. So I went with hard light. No beauty dish here. Just standard reflectors on my Elinchrom ranger heads.

Same set up as the image above.

The creative for this Air Travel sotry was simply Glam images of airplanes. So all I really needed was access... thats what the biggest challenge was... So I armed myself with various telephotos and a bunch of granola bars and went to work.

Food...... 14 dishes in 3 hrs. We ended up shooting on white to ensure the food would POP. I wanted to food to have a sense of grandeur.... So I ended up shooting low angles and tight.

I also didnt want to shoot that shallow depth of field look that almost every cook book looks like today. Its not that I dont like the shallow DOP look, infact I shoot it alot, but in this case I wanted something that had some "pop"

Vons is a steak house... so to me it said "warm" interiors. On this particular photo, I shot metering on the ambient light on the window and used a large Elinchrom Octa-bank to fill the scene. I ended up dodging the VONS carpet in post to make it pop a bit. I ended up using the ranger packs because I hate dragging around power cords when shooting interiors.

I often get emails from magazines wondering if I have any stock of specific countries to stories they are running. So rather than sending someone to say Egypt to shoot, editors often contact photographers who have worked in that country and see of they have any one off stock images they can purchase.

People often think that istock is a good option, but its really a big nono for editors. The main reason is that same image can be used the next day for any possible use. When I usually am contacted its to purchase and image for a 3month period.

This was the case when I was asked by an editor I know quite well. He specifically wanted a photograph of the Sphinx... but he wanted it from a different perspective, and not the traditional view. I send him my contact sheets and he choose this one. Shooting this was like most of my travel. Natural light, most likely a 24-70 on the 1DsMARK3. Probably at ISO 800.
Hope you enjoyed this post!
C

Random Ramble

2011-04-25T00:22:00.001-07:00

Its 1am, and I really should be hitting the sack as I have a full day of post tomorrow. I need to complete a shoot for Zag creative, Avenue Magazine, Defense Contractors of Canada and West Edmonton Mall.

I am also working on my art gallery in my new home, and that seems to be taking a little more time than originally planned. Anyways, like I was saying I should be heading down for the night, but I just popped is JAWS 3.

I was in Best Buy on Friday and passed across a DVD bargain bin, with movies like RepoMen, Young Guns, a plethora of Steven Segal films and one last copy of JAWS 3. I also picked up The 1956 classic film “The 10 Commandments” with Charleston Heston. I haven’t quite mustered up the time to watch a 3hr and 40 minute epic film, but I hope to sometime in the next few weeks.

Cabo San Lucas and Toronto TTC

2011-04-17T20:43:00.000-07:00

I really wish I had more time to blog about recent shoots, but I have been all across Canada shooting... coupled with moving into my new place.

Its not just the move, but I decided to completely changing the style and furnishings for my new place. I used to have an organic wood furniture with and warm tones... but i just got tired to the builder beige and warm style furniture.

So with my new place I went with grey walls everywhere and white trim. An angular black leather Barcelona sectional and modern arm chairs are pretty much as sharp contrast as one can get to my beige fiber couch and brown suede bucket chairs.

Everything is being changed, kitchen table, dining table, chairs, art, sofas, chairs, couches, stools, bathroom decor, home office, carpets, area rugs, tv stand, lighting fixtures... alot of work.

Anyways this little makeover has really consumed almost every passing moment of my free time.

I really appreciate all the "hey whats up Curtis? Where are the new blog posts?" emails I have been receiving, so I wanted to quickly post these photos.

Here are a few travel images I shot 3 weeks ago from a week long commission in Cabo San Lucas as well as a few images I shot in Toronto last week of the TTC and Yorktown mall for Pattison Outdoor.

Cant Hurt To Ask

2011-03-20T22:01:00.000-07:00

Back home and off again.

Just got back home from northern Alberta (yesterday), and am now packing for a trip to shoot in cabo-san lucas Mexcio.

I can't really show any of the editorial works I shot on this recent trip with the exception of one photo. I promised myself I would be more dynamic and take more risks when shooting in 2011.

An opportunity arose on Friday when I was shooting Dr Hugo Sutton of Alta Vision Plus. We were shooting Dr Hugo (an eye surgeon) for an editorial piece. We ended up shooting the with the conservative portraits cover option and the technically well light run of the mill staged mock scenarios.

The shoot was all but over. I was happy with the results, but I wanted to make good on my promise to myself to "take more risks when shooting".

So I asked Dr Hugo is he would pose for a quirky photo with some large squishy eyeballs.

In addition to being a respected eye surgeon he is also a respected academic. So naturally I was a expecting him to politely decline my asinine suggestion to have him pose with squishy eyeballs. But to my surprise Dr Hugo not only accepted, but played it up for the camera too.

When you least expect it...

2011-03-16T22:38:00.000-07:00

Obviously I travel a lot for my job. So naturally I end up staying in a lot of different hotels. Because I almost never book my hotels more often than not the accommodations I am booked in are average and consequentially never become a memorable part of the trip.

However every and then I end up being completely surprised by my accommodations and end up posting a blog on a hotel I am staying in. Last summer I posed on the Pastana hotel in London, after that was the Monaco hotel in San Fran and now the Platinum Hotel…. Where is it? Read the blog and find out.

I arrived yesterday evening to (_________ _________) , and proceeded to this new Platinum Hotel with the expectation that it would be the average run of the mill pre-approved 4 star accommodations.

I was stunned at first when I entered to see purple trendy lights and a huge Alice in wonderland chaise in the front entrance. Things only got better as I entered the front lobby. Chic design, trendy furniture, cool lighting, off the wall color palates fancied my senses.

When I entered the room, I was literally blown out of the water. Hard wood throughout, clean white paint, track lighting, zebra influenced tables, the kitchenette was encased in reflective white cabinetry, topped with grey granite. Bedrooms (two) had custom headboards, high thread count sheets, tiger accent pillows, and there was funky art hanging on the walls.

I guess had this hotel been in SanFran, Paris or somewhere in Rio DeJaneiro I would have been pleasantly surprised, but this hotel is smack dab in the middle of Fort McMurray Alberta. – I am here again for a 3 day magazine shoot.

Like I always say, “Your trip is what you make of it, but if you get to stay in a cool hotel your trip is always a little bit better”.

Gritty Heros...

2011-03-13T21:06:00.000-07:00

For the past few months the Canadian economy has been picking up steam, but Alberta trumps all other provinces. The past 6 months has seen me get call from large public and private companies I haven't heard from since the crash in 08'.

Finning Canada was one of those clients who called. They have always had a go to photographer who shot pretty much everything for them. However recently they decided to change things up and vary up style.

Finning's CAT equipment has a heavy presence in the Alberta oil sands. Consequentially last week I shot over two days a fantastic collection of images to be used for a recruitment drive. Further proof the province of Alberta is once again on the upswing.

With this collection I wanted to show the workers as "Gritty Heros" if you will. The Finning team gave me pretty much carte blanch which allowed me to really light the way I wanted to. the only challenge, which is quote coming when shooting up in Fort McMurray is time.

We really only had about 10-15 minutes to light and shoot each person because we simply pulled them off of their work duties.

*Me standing behind a 767 truck.

Hope you enjoy.

busy 3 weeks...

2011-02-10T00:08:00.000-08:00

The past 3 weeks have been just awesome. I have had the chance to work with some really fun agencies, shoot a few covers and stories for Rogers media magazines, a street level "Butter Milk Biscuit" campaign for McDonalds, an annual report for a huge international property company Grosvenor, shooting an album cover for country music artist, another annual shoot CWB shoot in Edmonton and Vancouver, a large 3 day shoot for Kiewit construction in Vancouver and a bunch of other cool shoots for West Edmonton Mall and other sizable companies in Western Canada.

(what buttermilk muffins on the street??? Nah, its just a newspaper box)

It was all topped off today when I shot an MMA fighter. The shoot and location was hooked up by my assistant / shoot producer Natalie. I really feel NAT nailed the location and look for this fighter portrait.They guy was really cool, but the location is what made this shoot. We hammered this out in about 1hr.

I also wanted to mention a just published work of mine in Edmonton's Avenue magazine. The spread is a feature about designers. Its basically product and portraits.. I am super stoked because the art direction and layout was smack on! I promise to get a copy scanned and on line.

(michelle B)

Unfortunately I would really like to post on each of these projects, but I am in the midst of prepping for a trip to New York I leave tomorrow. I have one major portfolio showing and few bunch of smaller meetings over the weekend - NY is truly a city that never sleeps or quits working.

(annual report photos)

(dr rick neuls... magazine feature)

(cover? not sure yet Katies agent has to choose)

*unfortunately I cant show any photos from CWB or Kiewit yet (wow Kiewit is such a large company its registered in spell check) due to confidentiality agreements*

Syncrude Fort McMurray AB

2011-01-30T21:33:00.000-08:00

Things have been going really well, to the point where I have to focus my direction a little more. A good friend of mine and somewhat of an unofficial mentor is reshaping his career to shoot only the jobs he wants. I think this is great because you only focus on the development of a specific area of a craft, and ten truly excel.

One of the areas I believe I excel in is industrial work. I'm not sure why, but I have no issues with working in places like Fort McMurray (for a few days). I am posting some work here that I shot for the Alberta Government at Syncrude just 10hrs after James Cameron left the site.

It's truly amazing how the aftermath of a visit from a Hollywood director can cause such a ruckus at an Oil sands plant that turns out 10milliuon dollars a day.

Because of the negative publicity the Cameron brought with him Syncrudes PR people were hyper sensitive. "You can't shoot this way.. oh no....you can't shoot in that direction either"..

Anyways the shoot worked out and here are some of the finals.

Enjoy!

C

shooting in studio

2011-01-02T17:38:00.000-08:00

Since the holidays just ended I thought I would post some new product photos, and of course a tear sheet of the West Edmonton Malls Holiday gift guide.

When a photographer shoots product on white, you really have to hope you work with a good designer to blend your work together well in the final project. I have shot in the past product on white only to have the images surrendered to subpar designers, resulting in a less than eye popping final product.

In the case of 2010 West Edmonton Mall gift guide the first good sign was I was given the opportunity to shoot some heavy brands like Burberry, Fossil, Coach, Armani and Boss. Then my images were turned over to their great designers who worked their magic and made solid collages of all the product. The final book ended up being a 20page guide.

I also decided to post some photographs of a new perfume from Issey Miyake. It's a reflective black bottle on a black background, so it presented a lot of challenges in studio.

I ended up lighting it with 5 light sources. Soft boxes, a snoot, and one of Trevor Schneider's fiber optic kits that attach to my elinchrom heads. Trevs work can be seen here. http://www.actionfigurecollectables.com/

This image is pretty clean out of camera, just slight post to clean up dust specs and a slight thinning of the reflection lines.

Enjoy!

C

Shooting fitness people

2010-12-30T00:09:00.000-08:00

Hope everyone had a great Xmas and spent a lot of quality time with your family. I have so much to post in the next few weeks so keep checking back.
I was real busy with pre holiday shoots leading up to Xmas so a lot of different stuff with that, plus a lot of proprietary commercial and editorial works have been released.

One of my main goals for 2011 is to shed some pounds (18 to be exact) to regain my weight of my ideal playing shape when I played hockey (10 years ago).

Now that we are on the topic of fitness I have decided to post photo series I did for Lori Passmore.

Lori is a fitness trainer who specializes in Yoga and the hard core Kettle Bell training. She visited the studio in December and we knocked out some clean photographs that will be suited for her new brand.

Enjoy.

C

White Balance, Gels and Cell Phones.

2010-12-09T20:48:00.000-08:00

Today we shot some real fun photographs for CWB. The one part of the shoot took us to the 24th story of the of the CWB building. We were shooting some office culture photographs in a lunch room when I looked out and saw a corner of the building that peaked out at a 90angle looking out into the distance.

I asked our art director what he thought about putting some employees in an office and shooting them from the other part of the building.

(this is pre post production... want to know why? because you can see the messy desk and the Quadra in the bottom right, we just couldnt move it ant further to the right)

The AD went for it so I sent Aaron (my assistant) around the building to set up the lights. Because the windows on the CWB building are tinted green, there were some color issues shooting through my window into Aarons window.

I really wanted to have an over the top" blue" exterior with a warm glow lighting up the office. To do this I white balanced to tungsten and doubled up the light with full tungsten orange gels. Once I nailed the warm look, we shot a few images with a custom white balance and the naked light with no gels.

(dosent Aaron look happy? No? Its ok, because we started this morning at 8:30am)

To make this happen Aaron and I were communicating via cell phones with Aaron relaying my movement directions to the employees.

I shot this with the Canon 1ds mark 3, with a 50mm 1.2 and a circular polarizer to minimize reflections in Aarons window. I triggered the Elinchrom Quadra (one) with pocket wizards.

This set up was more complex than I would typically like (I tend to like more realistic photographs), but I think this rendered some interesting results.

Edmonton Oiler Jason Strudwick

2010-12-08T19:58:00.000-08:00

Since getting back from shooting in Hawaii thing have been pretty crazy, so I haven't had alot of time to post anything really cool. I am wrapped up in planning a shoot for an annual design contest editorial spread, which is taking a bit of time with the test photos. I will be posting more on this in the next few weeks.

This series I am posting right now is of Edmonton Oiler Jason Strudwick shot for the stollery children's hospital, as he and his wife are the honorary family. The stollery is a fine organization that is dedicated to children in need of medial treatment.

Here are some images of Jason. I have met Jason on a few other occasions and really think he is your average real nice guy first and then hockey player second. Jason actually came in on game day for this session. Which if you have ever met a pro athlete is saying a lot. Pros are extremely focused on game day and have very strict routines, so coming into Curtis Comeau's studio definitely qualifies as breaking routine.

North Shore DAY 2

2010-12-01T21:57:00.000-08:00

Day 2 of shooting went very well, however that was 2 days ago. Why didn’t I post anything?

Well because I came down with a case of Campylobacter better known as food poisoning that side lined me for the past 2 days.

Although all is well now I will not be visiting the KAHUKU Shrimp Van ever again.

The fact that the “roadside” eatery was a decrepit van with flat tires and covered in graffiti should have scared me off. But when I saw the word FAMOUS spray painted on the front of the van, I thought to myself “What the hell what’s the worst that could happen???”

Well, about 6 hours later thanks to the KAHUKU shrimp van I experienced hell… for about 36 hours straight.

Anyways here are a few editorial images shot of day 2.

Enjoy.

North Shore DAY 1

2010-11-29T01:05:00.000-08:00

Despite the off and on rain, today proved to be an excellent day of shooting which produced a nice series of photographs documenting the culture of the North Shore.

I began my day shooting a family at their fruit stand. They specialize in deep fried bananas, selling every kind of locally grown fruit and bbqued pork kebabs. Most of the visitors to the roadside stand were locals, but there were several members of the Hawaii 5 0 TV crew visiting as well. Tourists stayed for the most part away from the stand, which suited the locals just fine.

Next I spent a good half of the day at the pipeline shooting portraits and candid’s. I didn’t even shoot any surfing, because the waves were only 4 feet tall.

After that I hit up Ted’s bakery for a banana chocolate cream pie. Again a place recommended to me by almost every North Shoriean I met.

While eating my slice of pie, an unshaven guy with no shoes, no shirt and a half-baked look walked in and got full service. He ended up sitting at my table and we struck up a conversation. I named this guy The Angry North Shoriean – TANS.

TANS was about 40 years old, smelled of pungent weed and sported an sketchy unkept beard. During our conversation TANS ended up complaining about everything in life, but he revealed his real pet peeves were tourists. When I asked TANS why he hated tourists? His response was because they always stole the good waves.

(this is TANS posing for a quick portrait)

After meeting TANS I headed back to the house, download and waited for the sunset.

North Shore pre shoot

2010-11-28T12:04:00.000-08:00

(the office for the next few days, off to the right is a very popular local spot for surfing. the pipeline is about a 10min walk to the left.)

I am shooting the next 7 days at the North Shore on the Hawaiian island of Oahu this week. I need to document the North Shore surf culture for a cool travel publication.

(jamies pink bedroom.. I love how the bed is on a raised pedestal)

I arrived two days ago and spent them getting everything in order, chatting with people and getting my bearings. Jamie Coutts hooked up a super cool place, which backs out right on the beach, so the temporary office is pretty cool.

I also spent a lot of the second day installing software on my new MacBook Pro (it’s a tiny 13inch), which I bought just before I left for the airport. I ended up piking up the 13 inch because I have two 17inch MB pros, but they are just too big to keep hauling around on travel shoots and Eva was shooting this weekend and needed them at the studio.

(This is a stray cat named Chester who wandered in the house... We thought he seemed cool so hes hanging with us for the week)

I have to vent, I really don’t enjoy flying United Airlines anymore. Their fleet is very old. Their flight coming from SanFran to Honolulu still had ashtray holders in their armrests and the seats are very uncomfortable. I didn’t book or pay for my flights so I get that I shouldn’t have complained, but its just I have flown over 120 flights in the last 8 years and by far United is the worst. Air Canada on average gives the unfriendliness service, but their fleet is upgraded and they don’t charge you $25 per bag.

(applejacks and banana muffin, great start to the day)

Anyways tomorrow I start shooting I am very excited to finally get cracking and building my story. I am not going to shoot the actual surfing because I am told by the locals that the swell is low right now, but it its supposed to pickup by Monday. So I dont want to waste my time shooting something when I will just reshoot it all again anyways.

Eveline Charles 2011 shoot.

2010-11-21T21:31:00.000-08:00

Last week I shot the 2011 spring hair style campaign for Eveline Charles spa and salon. http://www.evelinecharles.com/

It was a intense shoot that required we shoot on two separate sets. I prepped the night before at the studio and my crew (nat and trev) met first thing in the morning on location to set up.

We shot some new product images on white and the hair collection on a sandy background. Working two sets made for a busy day not to mention all the gear we had to haul in.

The Eveline Charles team was great and had a clear vision of which direction we wanted to go with the shoot. To their credit the EC creative team wanted to go with something a little more conceptual that had been done in the past.

This collection is meant to feel like it has been shot in the 70's, a simple washed out bohemian feel.

Naturally we will need a little post production to complete this look, so the first step was to shoot clean files. To complete this first objective we shot on the Phase One and decided to accomplish lens flairs and the mimicked film stock later.

(This is without question my favorite behind the scenes photo I have ever taken. Its of my assistant Natalie standing in, while my other assistant Trev is bouncing with the foam core. Check out his facial expression... this is at about 10am after Trev had been out all night the night before. I actually burst out laughing)
Here are some of the production images.

Enjoy!

C

Behind the Scenes CWB, Architectural Photographs and Mount Sinai

2010-11-08T16:39:00.000-08:00

A while back I shot a two day campaign for RED the Agency for CWB (Canadian Western Bank)

It was a lot of fun and the art direction fit perfectly with my style. I bring this up because often agencies hire photographers based on reputation who are not always best suited for a job.

(im giving directions to the talent... making sure they SMILE big... )

Then they try to get the photographer to shoot in a style they are not comfortable with resulting in a stressful day for both the art director and the photographer.

I really dig working with RED because they have always hired me because of my organic candid style which really fits for the CWB branding.

(nikolas doing hair and make up for the office photos)

I often turn down work because I am not the best photographer for the job, this is especially the case with editorial work. I actually turned down a huge editorial shoot which featured shooting 40 individual people in about 3 weeks. Schedule aside I didn't feel that I would have done a great job when shooting so many people in such a short period of time. I think it would have been almost impossible to match what had been done the year before.

(Roberta from Red making sure the talent knows his direction)

I typically find art buyers and art directors really respect you as a photographer if you can turn down a job you don't think you are really suited for.

Back to CWB, unfortunately I can't release any production images from the shoot because of proprietary and project confidentiality (fancy words which mean, the creative for the CWB campaign is not released yet, so I can't show the photos). So I decided to show some behind the scenes images from this shoot.

I have also decided to post some architectural images of the commercial / residential property called the HYS center. I was expecting this to be your typical architectural project.

However once we reached the mechanical rooms we found some fantastic scenes that produced these images.

Finally I have processed out an image I shot for Gap Adventures in Egypt atop the peak of Mount Sinai. If you believe in the old testament, this spot was the place where god supposedly gave Moses the 10 commandments.

enjoy.

Barbados Images that didnt make the Cut...

2010-11-02T21:34:00.000-07:00

When I say Barbados chances are an image of a serene peaceful Caribbean beach suggesting relaxation or retirement pops into your head. The great travel marketing machine has conditioned us to form these pre conceived notions of Caribbean Islands...

I understand this thought process, how it has come to be, and harbor no ill will to it. I make my living contributing these types of images to the people who create these preconceived notions of a Caribbean Island, which allow corporations to inevitably vye for your hard earned vacation money.

When selling an Island through a photograph, the locals are almost always forgotten or purposefully left out of the image. And when they are included, it's usually quite contrived. They are always wearing a clean pressed white or beige shirt with a brightly light "resort logo" on the upper left hand side. The local is often holding a tray full for brightly colored drinks sporting a bright white toothy smile as if to say "welcome we are waiting for you in paradise".

With that said I have decided to post some not so typical touristic images shot in Barbados that well for obvious reasons didn't make the cut...

I find this series is still beautiful and are no less true to reality as other photographs I contrived to capture when shooting travel.

This series was shot in Christ Church along the southern tip of the Island of Barbados along the Silver Sands beach. I spent 3 days shooting there, and by far these are my favorite photographs from the shoot. They were shot on Ilford Delta 400 pushed +2 stops.

Shooting NHL Hockey for Rogers SportsNet

2010-10-27T23:15:00.000-07:00

I had been told that shooting NHL hockey was going to be very very difficult, but I found it quite easy.

The hockey at the NHL level is incredibly fast and you need top end lenses to shoot it, but the biggest challenge of all was the lighting in the Rexall arena, which I was told by other camera guys is one of the worst in the NHL. (because its low lighting).

I really hope that Edmonton ends up getting a new arena.

A few months ago I was shooting the BlackEyedPeas for Blackberry, and some of the reps from the US were really un impressed with REXALL place. The city of Edmonton tax payers really should get on board and support a new arena.

Anyways the reason I found shooting NHL hockey easy is because I still play hockey on a regular basis. Albeit the NHL is much faster than the hockey I play, my experience allowed me to anticipate the plays and things like which way a player was going to turn or which way he was going to shoot the puck... so I knew not to waste time on say a right handed shot cutting to the middle because he would inevitably turn away from me.

I actually found shooting taekwondo in Beijing much more difficult and challenging.

My assignment from Rogers Sports net was to shoot ISO's on the selected players, so I couldn't really shoot wider to "tell the story" if you will.

I did stray a little and shoot candid things like Paajarvi lining up for a faceoff, and the Goalie Khabibulin taking a break drinking water. Although Sports net didn't need any of these I thought they would be good to shoot regardless.

Enjoy!

C

How I shoot product

2010-10-24T17:56:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty open when it comes to my shooting techniques.
Because of the fierce competition in our profession many professional photographers keep their secrets close to the chest. Others get insulted when another photographer takes influence or copies their work.

Personally I could care less if anyone copies my work because I feel that pretty much everything has been shot before, so really who cares if someone gains influence from your work even if its an exact replica. When it comes to keeping my shooting techniques a closely guarded secret this is another area I really could care less about. I quite enjoy sharing photography knowledge.

(fishing line gone.. )
Let's be honest with the amount of info available online, in seminars, in schools and at Chapters (Barnes and Noble for my American friends) there really are no secrets in the photography game anymore, so why not share them?

Anyways, this post is about the positive and inquisitive emails I have been receiving wondering about my equipment and techniques I used to photography my product work on my last post.

My lighting is all over the place. I use hot lights, ambient and fluorescent but about 60 percent of the time I use strobe. For strobe I use Elinchrom. Everything from RX600, AS and RX Ranger packs and the new Quadra packs.

(shot with hot lights, look at the burn in the top right)
On my lights I typically use umbrellas or medium soft boxes. I also use hard light from reflectors and bounce it off different objects like paper, foam board and or mirrors.

(hot spot is gone with 30 seconds of post production)
I love using mirrors for close up work to bounce light back into my product, especially food. I am always using a color corrector. I like to use fishing line a lot to ensure finicky product is always in the right place like on hand bags. I also use tape and stuffing for clothing

I do not but I should use the Elinchrom fiber optic kit when I am asked to shoot jewelry. My colleague Trevor uses fiber optics and his results are simply mind-blowing.

I almost always use some sort of stylist when I am shooting. Why? Because my strengths are making things look good in pictures, not to make them look good FOR a picture.

(exposure is correct, but the "ticks" above the Fossil logo are reflecting black... So either spend 20 mins adjusting the reflections if its even possible or fix in post)

(3-4 mins and its fixed, with more control)
I do rely on post production to make the images stronger, but I do not alter the reality with my postproduction techniques. My post is mainly for controlling reflections and dodging and burning.

Hope this answers a lot of questions people may have.

Today was a good day.

2010-10-21T00:08:00.000-07:00

Today I had a cancellation and re booked a shoot for a full day for a furniture manufacturer. Well it was actually for an agency, but you get the idea.

Usually I charge a cancellation fee, but in this case it was a welcome day off. I spent the first half catching up on processing.

One of the processing projects was from a really cool shoot for WEM (West Edmonton Mall) which included some cool brands Burberry, Fossil, Coach, Sephora and a few others.

Nat bailed me out by running around the city finding me a blown fuse for one of my Elinchrom 600 lights... (thankfully I had a backup) and a huge thanks to Pat and Nicole for doing the styling... without them I would have been lost.

The second half of my day was spent running around town with a quick stop to pick up a new GIJOE comic to which the cover art that was just sent to me from his agent.

Many of you know I collect original comic art, and lately I have been into an artist named Agustin Padilla. He's a very talented artist and was just signed by IDW. The reason I mention the comic is because I always frame the art with the comic side by side.

If anyone is interested new comic covers (1-3 months old) typically sell on the open market for between $750 - $2500. Once the covers mature between 3-5 years if the artist is still going strong covers sell for around $1500-$4000. And anything 20 years or above you start to get into the $3,500 and up to about $10,000. If its a classic cover $30,000 or more is not unheard of.

Hope you enjoy the photos.

I am kind of fired up because I am shooting the Hall, Eberle and Paajarvi for the Edmonton Oilers for Rogers sports net tomorrow.

C

Election Night Coverage 2010.

2010-10-18T23:32:00.000-07:00

(Mandel supporters hearing the results)

Here is a series of photographs from Stephen Mandel's Election Night (last night) event in which he secured his third term in a major victory.

My involvement with Mandel's campaign was that I shot his portrait that was used as his 2010 campaign image.

(Taking a pause before addressing the crowd and media)

Because I'm more of a commercial shooter and not a daily newspaper photojournalist I am used to having the luxury of time and my subjects undivided attention. Whereas when shooting news a photographer has to battle in scrums to get his or her photo, not to mention your subject's attention is divided amongst several people all of whom are bombarded the subject with questions...

(I love this image because I am shooting it with a 200mm through the crowd)

I am well aware of what happens in scrums and the insanity of events like this, so for this series I decided to shoot the event in a little different style than everyone else.

(without question one of my favortie images of the evening, Stephen and his wife)
First off I shot in Black and White just like the campaign portraits. Then rather than fight the scrum and the crowds I decided to shoot them. I wanted my pictures to show tell the story of what happened as opposed to a tight ISO crop of Stephen.

While most of the main stream media was all scrumming the microphone shooting insanely tight I decided to pull back and shoot what the people were seeing... and then I noticed something really cool.

The crowd was really into what Mandel was saying in his speech, so I turned my camera on them. I think I was the only shooter in the room who had his back to Mandel while he was speaking.

I guess it may have been rude, but I just felt that the people in the room were just as much as part of the event and they provided excellent photographs to add to the story.

(another one of my favorites... random person in the crowd)

(Mandel hugging his wife on stage, another term to go)
Hope you enjoy this series.
C

This week and Architectural and Interior posts...

2010-10-17T23:45:00.000-07:00

This past few weeks have been really busy, shooting a few campaigns for WEM (West Edmonton Mall) some portrait sessions and some work for Pattision Outdoor.

This upcoming week has looks great as well tomorrow (Monday) I shoot an interiors session for Avenue Magazine, a portrait series for a pretty big law firm, Tuesday I had to turn down another shoot for WEM in order to edit the campaigns I shoot last week. Wednesday is a full product day on location for Pure Vision, Thursday first half of the day I am shooting again for Pattison Outdoor and then Oilers NHL hockey for Rogers Sports Net, only t close out Friday in studio shooting portraits for two more clients, then running off to shoot for the City of Edm in the afternoon.

I have decided to post some images Architectural images from a few shoots. Series 1 from a 1.2mil Ace Lang home.

The home was 4000 + square feet and featured plenty of natural light. So just a kiss of strobe and a little coaxing of the ambient lught made this shoot run very smooth.

Next is some interiors of the Melting Pot an American Fondue restaurant franchise that just opened up their first restaurant in Canada.

More more difficult because the space is very intimate, and very dark.. lighting was a real pain for this one.

Finally some exterior images of the dual outdoor Fuhr sports park field in Spruce Grove AB shot for some economic development brochures.

panoramic... useless for most purposes, but fun to shoot..

Advertising Work in Print

2010-10-08T17:46:00.000-07:00

Hey Gang,

I finally have time to post some blogs on a regular basis. Here are some current billboards that feature some of my photographs.

I am also posting a brochure I shot for CWB a while back, I finally had the chance to see some of the work in print. I am quite happy with the results.

Here is some of the work.

Again all of this was shot a while ago, but because of confidentiality agreements, I really couldn't post any of the images, till they "hit the streets".

Enjoy!

LOWEPRO what a company!

2010-10-07T23:23:00.000-07:00

I thought I would share this post with everyone because I usually get alot of questions in my email from my blog about the equipment I use.

I primarily use Lowepro bags for my gear. I own 3 different backpacks, a bunch of Omni Pros, 2 pro rollers and a few shoulder bags. (Some are pictured here while others are at the studio so I couldn't photograph them.)

I really like the durability and innovation that Lowepro bags and belts offer. The only problem for me is because of my heavy travel schedule I end up really giving my bags a beating. Almost every LP bag I have used has withstood the abuse I put them through.

However one bag in particular has always given me a problem. The CompuTrekkerAW and the CompuTrekker AW (ROLLER).

This backpack / backpack roller case is by far the best designed camera/laptop backpack of all time. Its light weight, durable, fits snug, spacious and is perfect for any system out there.

The only problem is the damned zipper. They tend to wear out quickly and split at inadequate times.

Like a hot girlfriend who has nothing upstairs, I ended up sticking with the compu trekkers because they are so "well designed" and although incredibly frustrating, the benefits outweigh the headaches.

(the crappy zipper... you can see the damage here... this causes splitting)

However 3 years ago I became so frustrated with the backpack compu trekker I ended up having this Chilean shoesmith to sew in a custom zipper. It cost me about $150, but it works great.

Fast forward to last year. Like clockwork the zipper on my (at the time relatively new) Roller backpack started to wear and split, so I decided to take it to the Chilean fella for a new zipper, only to find out he closed up his shop.

I spent a few months scouring the city to find a shoe maker or luggage repair store that would replace the garbage zipper with a heavy duty one, only to face a wall of rejection from various repair men.

(my replaced zipper)

Frustrated I didn't want to deal with warranty again and so I simply threw the bag on the shelf and parked it for several months. A few weeks ago I needed the rolling capability so I pulled out the roller and have been using it with frustration ever since.

Last Tuesday in Vancouver Airport the compu trekker roller and nova waiting to be picked up...

Now to the purpose of this blog.

3 days ago I was in Vistek www.vistek.ca after a shoot to pick up a few things when the Lowepro rep walked in to chat with the manager and sales team.

Me being who I am I decided to share my thoughts with him. I mean, that's what reps do. They take feedback from clients and sales teams. These are the people who really affect change. He was cool. He listened intently to my feedback.

I told him how I thought how great Lowepro products are, but my crappy experiences with my compu trekkers and compu trekker rollers.... I explained that in my frustration I bought a THINK TANK bag for my medium format camera because at the time I was so frustrated with Lowepro compu trekker zippers.

Because I had just finished a shoot my compu trekker roller (with my gear) was in the back of my SUV... He asked to see it.

When he saw the bag without a second of a thought, he offered to replace my bag with a newer version. He didn't bother asking me about how long I have owned the bag, or what I shot or who I was. He simply looked at it and was like," I see, ok lets replace this one."

He didn't want to hid behind a (12month warranty) technicality or pass it off to someone else... he dealt with the issue head on and wanted to ensure I was happy.

I wasnt asking for a hand out or even a replacement, just letting him know about my thoughts.

I have never been so impressed with rep in my life.

I am super stoked because like I said I really like Lowepro products and the rep explained to me that the newer version actually addresses the zipper issue. They actually have upgraded it, as well as the tripod holder.

Not all products operate the way we (photographers) want them to, but it's not so much how the products work, but how the companies or realtors deal with an issue when a client is not happy.

And Lowepro proved to me that they are at the top of this list. Vistek too!

RIDE ALONG PHOTO EXHIBIT launched today.

2010-10-04T16:40:00.000-07:00

Today I launched my photography exhibit titled The Ride Along at the city hall in Edmonton AB. The exhibit itself is 48 feet long, 7 feet high and features twenty nine 16x24 canvas prints.

(making sure the Vynel is straight... I only had one shot, because I only made one print...)

The exhibit features images I photographed of Edmonton Fire Fighters during the past 4 years.

(final presentation)

The artist statement is below if you care to read it. You can see the exhibit online if you click on "photography exhibition" on my nav link at http://www.curtiscomeau.com/... or you can check it out in print form if you are in Edmonton from Oct 4-11th 2010.

(laying out the exhibit)

Artist Statement

The Ride Along - Curtis Comeau

As a kid, I wanted to be a firefighter. The trucks, the hoses, the danger. It was all very appealing at the age of 5. Today as an adult and as a professional photographer, I got to realize the dream of many little boys by photographically exploring a day in the life of an Edmonton firefighter. In realizing this school kid dream, I guess it shouldn't be a surprise that my one day turned into four years.

I am pleased to present before you a collection of photographs taken on dozens of ride alongs with Edmonton Fire Rescue Services from 2006 to 2010.

I had originally planned to photograph firefighters for a week, then display the images at a small local venue. After my first couple of ride alongs, I knew that I could never fully tell the story of these brave individuals in only seven days.

So my day in the life became a journey. Over the past four years, I joined our firefighters on dozens of calls. Over that time, there were several opportunities where I could have opened this exhibit and called the project complete. Maybe it was boyhood wonder, but it never felt like I had yet captured the full story. So my ride alongs continued. It was finally in winter of 2010, after photographing a significant and big fire, that I realized I could photograph fire fighters forever. I had their story. I was just continuing to live mine. At that moment, I decided it was time to release the collection of photographs and share their lives with others.

The men and women I photographed were gracious in welcoming me into their risky professional lives. But I was always cautious to observe strictly as an outsider. There were many times when the commercial photographer in me was tempted to influence or light a scene to make it more visually appealing. Thankfully, I remained focused on the fact this was not a technical display of photography, but rather an exploration of a subject through the discipline of photography.

An exhibit of this size is not possible without the support of many individuals.

The entire Edmonton Fire Rescue Services staff for letting me into their world and allowing me to openly and honestly photograph them. My friends and family for supporting my photography and helping me edit the countless images I amassed. Klyment Tan for lending his printing skills and technical knowledge. Eldon Kymson for designing the exhibit. Jennifer Fisk for ensuring my words and writing make sense. The Fire Chief Ken Block and his management for allowing me to choose and display the photographs I wanted to show, and partnering with me on this. Tim Wilson, whom I consider partner in this, as without his support this exhibit would have never have come to life.

And finally, I thank you for taking the time out of your busy, relatively safe and risk-free life to visit this exhibit and join me in my exploration into the lives of our city's firefighters.

Best,

Curtis Comeau

www.curtiscomeau.com

Marks relaunch

2010-09-27T20:41:00.000-07:00

The past few weeks have really been busy. Shooting has entailed alot of new campaign work for several agencies.

This post was shot for the relaunch retail clothing store called Marks formerly known as Marks work warehouse. I shot these on white seamless and used the large elinchrom 6 foot octa.

(even the CBC camera guy who was filming us got in on the action...)

My firefighter exhibit opens on the 4th in Edmonton at City Hall and I have a media day set up for interview on the 5th...

Then I plan on giving almost blog daily updates from shoots these past few weeks in next week as I take a 2 week hiatus from shooting.

Enjoy!

Melting Pot and shooting Fashion with a Jet

2010-09-09T23:25:00.000-07:00

Todays shooting went really well. We shot some interiors for the new restaurant called the Melting Pot. A high end fondue restaurant chain with 130+ stores in the USA. The one we shot today is the first one opened in Canada. We shot this series from 10am-230pm. (unfortunatly I cant release any of these images yet for proprietary reasons)

Then I had to haul a** to the city center airport to photograph Rees and Michelle on a private Jet we only had till 4pm.

Basically while I was shooting at the Melting Pot Rees was getting his clothing from Sterling and his crew at Derks formals, while my assistant Nat was running Michelle to Identity Clothing to get her wardrobe.

(Michelle at Identity Clothing with Nat trying on shoes... love that carpet)

We all met at the hanger so Michelle could get her hair and make up done by Prince Nikolas... In the mean time I light the scene, I while Nat ran back and forth from the hanger to the tarmack making sure the shoot ran on schedule.

(Nikolas doing his thing...)

It was really cold outside and the drizzle was making life really uncomfortable but the models pulled it off. We shot this series in about 30 mins. Total time 120mins from arrival.

(my initial vision for this shot)

For the teckkies out there. I shot this with 4 heads and two packs. Pretty technical for me, and not something I like to do alot of.

(are u kidding me??!!?? this guy is from Edmonton)

The Elinchrom ranger packs had 3 heads. One head for Michelle on the exit of the plane. Another head for the jet engine, and the last head which ran off Michelle's pack acted as Rees's back light... but just a little "kiss of light" (and many of you know I feel that the use of a heavy backlight seems Wal-Mart portrait like and very contrived) .

(completeing my tests before Michelle arrived)

The last light an Elinchrom Quadra head (quickly becoming my favorite). This Quadra light Rees just off from camera right.

I shot it on the Phase One... with exposure tests on the 1DS mark 3. Typically I would have metered properly but I was short on time, and needed a visual so I shot on the Canon (cause the screen on the $25,000 phase one sucks)

(here is the gear used to complete this shoot the car is loaded with other stuff we didnt use)

Shooting Vons Steak house tomorrow 9am!

Enjoy!

Day 9 of 9 - Beauty Product for West Edmonton Mall

2010-08-31T20:32:00.000-07:00

Today we wrapped up the final day of 12 shoots in 9 days.

It was a full day of beauty products shot for WEM. Today I worked with the WEM marketing team and pretty much huddled around the studio step up we brought to the location.

The shoot itself was varied. We shot shoes, jewelry, and make up. So the lighting needed to change a bit to ensure each product was shot properly. I am very happy with the results of everything I shot the past 9 days.

I thought I would post this pic, as I know I will be asked by a few readers about shooting the shoes. How did we get the straps to stay? It was Luke's idea - Fishing line.

I personally have used other methods, but the line worked great and I will be using it again in the future.

Thanks for all the comments via email and checking in each day to see what's up. I am taking the next 5 days off of shooting (and blogging)... and going to process some of the shoots over the next little bit.

Next week some pretty cool shoots, so check back and I have a lot of nice tear sheets that came in over the past week I want to post as well.

Ciao!

Day 8 of 9 West Edmonton Mall bridal fashion spread.

2010-08-30T22:19:00.000-07:00

(my shot, which will not make the cut, because it does not work stylistically.. but its nice)

Today we spent the whole day shooting West Edmonton Mall's 2010 bridal fashion spread. The shoot itself took place at WEM and we were supported by their great marketing team.

As many readers of my previous blog posts know I sketch out pretty much every shoot I do. Its a previs technique I learned in Television which is basically storyboarding.

I use sketches as guide line when things arent going so well, or when I want a refresher when shooting for 6hrs or more. If you look at the sketch on the right, you will notice its an awful lot like the photo above. I used the sketch as a starting point, and in the final image, basically evolved the idea to a more "straight up" pose. For this shoot I brought 3 pages with 6 sketches each.

The shoot itself we shot 9 or 10 dresses with 6 different models.

Stylistically we had to shoot it on white or light grey because the women were going to be "cut" out and placed in the layout. This posed a challenge as dresses are white and we wanted the images to be easily cut out, with little or no color casts.

I shot it on the Phase One because I really wanted the highlight details so the designers could have great tonal range making their job easier.

At the end however I did do one shot the way "I wanted" and the lead designer Luke was cool with letting me do it. Its the girl in the red dress (the first image on this post) on the dark grey background. Although this shot rocks (in my opinion) It is completely un-usable in the spread because its too moody and too dark for the concept.

That's the thing a lot of photographers forget, often what they may consider are the best looking photographs are not the ones that can be used in print because of things like layout or conflicting style dictate how you need to shoot.

(stylist from Evelyn Charls touching up hair)
I think that's why it's really important for a photographer to be able to understand different styles and ways of shooting.

Please excuse all the dust specks... these again are clean out of camera with 0 touch ups.

Enjoy!

C

Day 7 of 9.... to calgary and back again..

2010-08-29T23:59:00.000-07:00

Day 7 of 9

Its 12:30am. I got back to edm from cgy at 11pm, then booked it straight to the studio to prep and sketch for tomorrows fashion spread for West Edmonton Mall. We arrive at 8am, so I have to post this and head off to bed.

Shooting in CGY went well today. I shot another round of images for a skin care clinic. The owner had a some really out there ideas, so as you can see they are really off the wall, I cant really post alot of these because they need to be chosen by the client.

(troopers.... It was cold out side! )

Before the crazy skin care photos. I shot some trash the dress photographs for Sarah and her two closest friends from high school. They are all married and are each other's brides maids. So Sarah thought it would be fun to do the photos as a group.

(i think all girls like twirling in the streets in their wedding dress)

Pretty much all of these were shot on the Phase One camera.

Sarah's dad is does astronomy photography as a hobby. In chatting with him, I found out he can actually shoot galaxies from his telescope. I plan on visiting him when I get a chance, but time was just to tight on this trip.

(when i asked Sarah to take off her shoes, one of the girls politely told her to watch out for needles... now thats urban shooting!)

Enjoy!

Day 6 of 9 (product in studio)

2010-08-28T23:56:00.000-07:00

Today was pretty easy, just shooting product in studio. It was kinda nice because I had a chance to catch up on sleep.. I didnt get into the studio till noon.

I the first series was more windows product for Pure Vision. The other was a 12 inch sideshow collectables figure.

I had alot of fun shooting the sideshow figure because of the insane detail the figure sported.

(i did more than just play with action figures today!)

I really don't have much to write about shooting product on seamless with the exception that I pretty much used various strobe lighting techniques to get the results I needed.

(windows product is in no way as cool as action figures)

Just this quick post, as I have to head back to Calgary tomorrow at 9am for a 12noon shoot.

Enjoy!

DAY 5 OF 9 Long day of Interiors and a Readers Digest tearsheet

2010-08-27T19:28:00.000-07:00

I just got back from shooting another round of Interiors for the new 9 schools built by Bird Graham in Calgary. We started at 7am and ended at 5pm. (So I drove to CGY last night arriving at 11pm to get a few hours sleep)

I have finished shooting the Bird Graham project, and am hoping in some spare hours tomorrow to process out all the proofs for the client for mid next week.

My CGY hotel was really nice. The Acclaim hotel in north Calgary, which is brand new. Plus I just loved the Acclaim's tag line of "Sleep with someone new" - brilliant!

(racial based hand puppets for Kindergarden kids, I had to pose for a pic with them)

Processing out 18 schools with exteriors and interiors is going to be a lot of work, and I am kind of dreading it. I also need to fit it into my the time line of shooting more product tomorrow in studio which needs to be shot for a Monday deadline.

Anyways I also wrote a blog earlier this month on seeing your work in print quite a while after you shoot the project. Well I shot a portrait of a for readers digest in early spring for their Canadian Innovators section, and I hadn't seen it in print until today.

I was taking a bit of a break in the teachers' lounge at a school, and picked up this month's issue of Digest and saw the piece. We shot it knowing they were going to blend the image into a blue background.

I really thought they would have picked another image of him holding a molecule.

I think they choose this one because he was smiling, which is cool. But I rather prefer the other one I have posted below.

Either way it worked out, and I like the rendering the graphic team did for it.

Anyways its 8pm and I have to unload my gear and prep for tomorrow... Thanks for checking in!

Day 4 of 9 - (two half days) Interiors and Product at Oodle Noodle

2010-08-26T18:04:00.000-07:00

Today's post is going to be in chronological order.

6am: Wake up, got to bed last night at 1pm, so pretty early morning.

7am-10am: Shoot commercial interiors for the public and catholic schools built by Bird / Graham. This has been a huge project for me, 18 schools across Alberta! The schools are slated to open on Monday, so we needed to get in today to shoot the last interior series for the Edmonton.

10:30am-11:02am: Stain wooden planks for the Oodle Noodle shoot at 1pm.

(eldon checking out the syling)
11:02am-12:04pm: Nap on the couch

12:05pm- woken up by the entourage Margo, Nat and Eva running around the studio prepping for their own things.

1:30pm -5:30pm Show up a few minutes late cause google maps sucks! Then shoot some great Asian food for Oodle Noodle with Eldon (creative director from Ignition Media).

(Because Oodle Noodle is going through a complete revamp and re branding they decided to have their dishes shot properly. My idea was to have an old Asian feel. I wanted to feel like the dishes were placed on old wooden tables (which is why I stained the wood before) with this light coming down from above like in an old Japanese temple. I didn't want it over styled, but I wanted the food to be "bathed" in light.

(Eldon and Sonny making sure that we are on track product wise)
The cool thing was Eldon really wanted the food shot fresh, right from the kitchen. So the owners literally cooked the food right there, placed in on the plate and we shot it right there in the kitchen.

(because the food was fresh we could actually sample it)

interiors of some schools...

6pm-7:30pm...download, post blog and Drive to Calgary to shoot tomorrow staring at 8am again! Unfortunatly no time to process any of the images... but you get the idea.

Till tomorrow!
Enjoy!

Day 3 of 9

2010-08-25T20:06:00.000-07:00

Day 3 of 9

Fashion spread for Derks magazine.

(I hate group photos... so why shoot a group entourage? Because I suck at them and shooting more its the only way to get better.. but im really happy with this one.)

Its 7:40pm and I have to be honest the end of Day 3 feels like the end of Day 8. Today began at 9arrival time to shoot at 11pm.

This shoot is for a bridal fashion magazine, but traditional bridal fashion is not really my thing. Im not into adding textures in post and calling it "fashion" either.

But when I heard Gay hooked up Kelly from the AB Ballet with this uber crazy (Elton John inspired gothic circus gone bad costume). Then I was really on board.

I wanted the shoot to feel like an Mature rated "Tim Burton version of the Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus"

I sketched some ideas last night after my other shoots and brought them to the location in hopes for approval. When I arrived I presented my sketches to Gay. She simply looked at me, smiled and said "Curtis do whatever you want, that's why be brought you on board."

(check out the sketch on the top right, pretty much exactly what I wanted)
We shot this series at Gay and Darryl Derks house. Although the Derks are cool people, I was a little leery a t first when I was told our location was their house.

(you dont see it here... but in my head im thinking WTF am I going to do with this group photo??)

When we arrived I quickly realized their "house" was actually a photographers play ground, complete with vintage furniture, gold painted walls, cool textures everywhere, huge ceilings, props and details around every corner and a back yard garden with slate flagstones!

(originally I was thinking treat him like a puppy...then this came up)
Darryl (also a photographer and owner of Derks formals) even had black out curtains to block light if you wanted to control the day light!

(This is without question my favorite picture)
It was seriously 100 times better than any studio I have shot in! They actually could have charged me a studio rental fee!

I ended up shooting 50%out side on a cool set built by Christina from ID Bohemia... Then I simply moved indoors to shoot against some of the gold walls in the house. I ended up using a complex outdoor light set up for me (two lights :))

Indoors on the golden walls I rocked my friend Curtis's Prophoto Ring flash. As soon as I saw the golden walls, I called Curtis T and asked to borrow his ring flash.

The walls screamed "photograph me with a ring flash" Then I sent my assistant off to pick it up from his place.

So heres what I came up with.

Day 4 of 9 begins tomorrow at 7am. Interiors - then on to product at 1pm.

Oh none of these pictures have been worked on in postproduction they are clean out of camera.

Enjoy!

C

DAY 2 of 9 Product on Location

2010-08-24T17:12:00.000-07:00

No Transcend coffee this morning so the first half of the morning was a little rough.

Today we basically shot the whole day (8hrs) for Matt Aubin over at Pure Vision.

(basically my view since 8am)

We shot a wide range of window products that proved to be quite a challenge and a long process to complete.

We shot on white seamless, but the product (large windows) were also white. So we really needed the dynamic range for PV's team to do their thing with the final images. I ended up shooting on the Phase One so the quality was there right from the start.

(nat cleaning windows, her view since 8 am)

Cant wait to see what the gang at PV does with the images!

Locations are always a challenge because you are basically bringing everything with you and you have to be prepared for everything. We shot on Elinchrom power packs and AC Elinchrom 600 heads.

8am-4pm then right to the studio to process the images.

Day 3 tomorrow, Fashion spread for Derks formals. 8am bright and early!

Black Eyed Peas and Product in Studio.

2010-08-23T22:52:00.000-07:00

Day 1 of 9

Black Eyed Peas and Product in Studio.

apl.de.ap from Black Eyed Peas

Today marked the opening of my 9 straight days of shooting. I started the day at 8 am shooting product in studio for Pure Vision. But not before my transcend coffee.

(Taboo from Black Eyed Peas, I love shooting close in black and white... In my opinion rock stars should always be shot in Black and White)

Once I had my caffeine fix, I set up the studio which was pretty simple stuff, product shot on grey seamless.

(my trancend cappuccino... http://www.transcendcoffee.com/ )

From there I headed over to Rexall place to shoot for the Los Angeles agency that represents Blackberry. Bberry was the main sponsor who brought in the music group the Black Eyed Peas to town.

(Trev putting in a solid 45 minute work day at the studio)

I arrived at 3pm set up go through security, sign off my first born child.

I did some coverage for BlackBerry for a bit then around 7pm set up for the BEP members.

The two band members Taboo and apl.de.ap showed up for pictures. They hung out for a few frames did their thing (smile, frown, look cool) then headed back to their rooms. Althought the guys were cool, It was unfortunate that Fergie didn't come out to, but hey that's the life of a rock star.

I then downloaded and turned over the images to the agency right there as per my contract. With the exception of these, which I have permission to use.

If any of you are interested I will be posting daily what will be going on over the next 9 days.

(Me looking happy at 9am)

(Because of the my contract I had to put my credit on the BEP pictures... I really dont like doing that I think its kinda tacky, plus Im too lazy to do it... )

Pleasant Surprises

2010-08-19T21:01:00.000-07:00

Unlike wedding or family photographers one of the problems with shooting commercial is that you basically have NO control over the creative final output or media buy or the timing of your work being seen.

It may take months or even years for your work to make it into print, sometimes you actually never get to see your work in print because its released in another market or is used for pitches or internal purposes.

You could work 10 shoots in a month and never be able to share your work because of proprietary processes and branding and marketing considerations.

That said its always a pleasant surprise when you open a magazine months later and see your work in an AD the way you envisioned it. Other times you look at the AD and say "Hey isn't that my picture??" or "wow I didn't think the agency would use the work that way!"

This is kind of cool in a way because you as a photographer envision an AD one way, then a designer gets a hold of your images and does his (or her) thing.

I thought I would share a couple with you

The first is a Union Hall ad that appeared in Profile magazine. The shot was originally a huge band series because Union Hall rocks. When Ignition Media asked for this group photo I was kind of like ummm.. it's not that great. But when the designer cropped it that's when it all came together.

As a photographer I had no idea the designer was going to do this.

Next is an ad for Graham construction which has appeared in a lot of trade publications and places live Venture etc...

I shot this series at a plant under construction and we did two images of the Buggy and the Truck. Graham uses both. I really liked the picture of the Buggy.

It's cool, has presence and is composed well.

But the client obviously wanted to see their company logo, which is not seen on the Buggy, so I understand why they went with the truck photograph.

C

EXILES (Exclusive Page) www.exiles.ca

2010-08-17T23:25:00.000-07:00

EXILES (Exclusive Page)

Many of you may know from my Blog, I collect original high end comic art. I also read several graphic novels. So its safe to say I am well steeped in the Comic universe.

So I have been following an online web comic called Exiles.

Exiles blends popular Vampire lore with current events and strong religious undertones (Check out the series and see what I mean) Its one of the most impressive stories I have read in quite some time.

The story and art are created by Paul LaRue who hails from Edmonton Alberta (which is super cool). I have worked with Paul before on several commercial projects so when he launched the web comic I followed it closely.

Since its first page hit the net I was very interested in the book. Very early on I was hooked. Last week Paul let me know about an exclusive page he drew as a three panel a mini sub plot, which I could post on my blog. This mini sub plot takes place shortly after pages 9 and 13.

Its about a CSI photographer who is photographing the crime scene.... I am super stoked because the photographer looks somewhat familiar to me... Hopefully nothing bad happens to the photographer if he ever pops up later in the Exiles universe.

I am told Exiles will eventually make it to print form in the near future. Im not sure about the details, just that eventualy its coming.

Check it out, if you like it you can sign up for updates.

Exiles Comic

Make sure to check it out from page 1. But I promise you around the 30-40 there are some super cool reveals, which would be relevant to alot of people, but you need to know the full story to feel the impact of the reveal.

Enjoy!

Random Images

2010-08-16T20:51:00.000-07:00

Here is kind of a random sampling of images.

The first one is of the former Premier of Alberta Ralph Kline. The portrait is a bit older but its strong because he makes such a bold statement on the page, which is rare for a politician. I am pulling the image from my archives to appear in an photography exhibit put on by Aaron over at three ten. The exhibit opens in September.

Another is of Ed Hervey a former pro football player who is now a pro football coach.

Here are also some interiors of I shot of Delux restaurant in West Edmonton Mall. I shot the interiors at 7am on a Sunday, which was way too early for me, but we needed to get in before the restaurant opened.

Delux is part of the Century Hospitality group whom I've been shooting interiors for the past 5 years. Century owns quite an array of restaurants http://www.centuryhospitality.com/.

Finally the last is a cover I shot for a national first nations magazine. The concept was show that the subject was split between his native and north American roots.

Enjoy!

DeFazio Biscotti

2010-08-12T10:30:00.000-07:00

DeFaszio Biscotti.

Last week, or something like that... (the past few weeks have seemed to all blend together in a mishmash of work) I shot some product images for DeFazio's tradeshow booth. They are one of Canada's leading gourmet biscotti makers and you can (or could find their product in various coffee houses across Canada including second cup chains)

When Angela the owner inquired about a shoot she informed me that everything they do is handmade, and she took a lot of pride in that fact. So when I was planning on how to shoot, I knew I didn't want her images to be over styled only to be lost in galaxy of props. I wanted to keep it simple. Technically I wanted to have the images really sharp to show every detail of the handmade product when enlarged 6-8 feet tall.

We also shot some of the baking process as well.

(What I love about this picture is his fingers.His fingers suggests he is being respecful towards the product)

Which was a lot of fun. I really enjoyed shooting this because it was so authentic. Carmine (Angela's husband) was the main baker.

(Carmine measuring the dough)

Carmine is an old school Italian. No messin' around. He went about his routine and did his thing. He made me work for my photographs. There was no setting up shots, no slowing down his work. There was no mistake I was in his house. I kind of felt like a kid who was meeting a girlfriends old school Italian dad for the first time; respectful and cautious.

I didnt dare ask him to stop and re do something for the photograph let alone smile while working

But I liked that. I feel like the photographs from the process are very real. Setting up lights and recreating the process just wouldn't have worked in this situation.

(hand dipped...)

Technically lighting the scene may have worked, but I think too often photographers fall on technical skills to create a photograph rather than capturing life unfolding in front of them. I think had I light this series the photos would have felt contrived and forced.

trevor setting up some additional product

Anyways enjoy!

Directing TV commercials

2010-08-08T22:03:00.000-07:00

For those who dont know, in addition to photography I also freelance direct tv commercials as well as other film and video projects. I have been doing this for quite some time. I find television when done well little more complex than photography, you have to work well with people because crews are much larger. However when done right its a very gratifying experience.

(Shane watching for continuity, I'm watching the scene, Jamie on camera, MKM art, copy and accounts in the background)

We just wrapped two days shooting commercials for Integra Tire Yesterday (produced by original productions and MKM). Without question Day 1 was one of the most difficult shoots of my career.

(Jamie raising a lighting concern with me)

The technical side of the shoot was not difficult, but the environment we were in made life very uncomfortable.

(Jamie freezing his knees.)

On Day 1 we shot two commercials over the span of 14hrs on a cold hockey rink. Because of the tight shooting schedule and to say on budget, we basically couldn't leave the rink to warm up the entire time. (with the exception of a 15 minute break at noon)

(Jamie, Myself and Mike from MKM)

However our crew was simply awesome. It consisted of Jamie Coutts (DOP/CAMERA OP), Nathanael J. Sapara (Key Assist), Jesse (sound), Shane Turgeon (assist), 3 MKM agency people and of course myself.

(Nathanael and Jesse)

I had a clear vision for the on ice spots. It consisted of a moody hard light. Lots of shadows and contrast with deep blacks. I wanted a lot of mood and emotion while Meaghan (our talent) skated.

(explaining to Meghan that im on a close up shot, so she doesn't have to worry about her feet)

My vision was approved by the art director over at MKM, which basically meant we were both on the same page. This simple mutual agreement may seem small, but its a huge plus when two creative minds agency and director agree.

(Jamie asking me for the second time if im sure its a good idea to film right behind the net as Meghan shoots pucks)

It makes the shoot fun, and run smoothly. Having fun onset is not something that's easy when you start at 5am and end at 7pm... spending pretty much that whole time on a cold ice surface.

We elected to shoot with a bunch of HMI lights. This allowed us to have daylight balanced lighting as well as have enough power to light alot of the rink, while still keeping a lot of it in the shadows.

(Our talented bunch of actors waiting for us to light the scene)

I decided to post some of the production stills that Nathanael and Shane took during the day.

Enjoy.

10 mins with Michelle P

2010-08-06T12:30:00.000-07:00

Here are some test shots of Michelle Potvin. Michelle is a fantastic talent who came into the studio today to test for a campaign image series for a restaurant chain here in Edmonton.

She basically came in and allowed me to shoot her with no hair, no make up and just a little black dress.

The agency concept calls for a would be a high fashion “who gives a fu*k” look. So I decided to get my inspiration from Mario Testino’s early work, which lent iself to a hard flat light.

I also wanted a quick shot of Michelle in sunglasses, so I gave her my ray bans, and she kind of looked at me funny and said in such a polite voice “uuuummmm… Can I get my glasses from my car? They may look a little better, but if you want these that’s cool…”

Hmmmm do ray bans really suck that bad?

Anyways. Here is what the 10 min session produced. These images are clean out of camera no post.

Enjoy.

New Editorial Interiors

2010-08-05T22:01:00.000-07:00

Some more interiors for the 2010 Alberta Ballet home and garden tour magazine.

This series was a home series photographed over 3 days and 6 homes. We needed to shoot 4-6 images for each home, and a cover option. Each photographs also needed to include a floral arrangement (in which collections were brought in by individual florists).

So on one level it made the project a bit challenging. However in the end it all worked out just fine.

Enjoy.

Pics that Never Made the Cut

2010-08-03T22:59:00.000-07:00

This series was shot for Tomato Magazine for a piece on a new commercial kitchen renovation for Northlands.

The call from my editor was to shoot the interior but obviously while I was there I ended up shooting some of the Chef and his team doing their thing.

(After I took this I seriously considered becoming a vegetarian)

I quite enjoy shooting food related editorial images for Tomato. Mary provides some very unique stories which means I shoot in very unique places, so I am always excited to see what she throws my way.

Because of editorial considerations these images I am posting never made the cut.

Not because they were not strong enough, but because the story was about the kitchen and not the people who occupy it.

I completely understand, and this is quite common when shooting editorial assignments, but I really wanted to share them anyways because I quite like them, and if I don't post them here they will never see the light of day.

I just love the pig photo. Its so in your face. Its raw and real. But I can completely understand why a food magazine editor would cut this photo.

Period Dress

2010-08-02T23:04:00.000-07:00

I have always been fascinated by period dresses and costumes. Not to the point of obsession, but I find them interesting to look at. So I set up a photo shoot with Larissa a few months ago and decided to post some of the images and process. I should have posted this a while back, but i have no idea why I didn't.

We shot this series on the Phase One. The out doors photo was taken with a couple Elinchrom ranger heads with a strip light and a can with a 45 degree grid.

In studio we shot against a wall with a trendy textured removable wall paper (not to easily removed). I lit Larissa with a pro photo ring flash I borrowed from my friend...

natalie leaving me with all the gear to pack into my car.

The ring flash was really cool and I am seriously thinking of picking one up. Especially because I heard that you can get one for the ultra compact Elinchrom Quadra.

larissa having some fun during tests.

Medium Format KIT

2010-08-02T13:56:00.000-07:00

As promised here is a breakdown of my medium format kit.

Digital Back

So what I have here is the Phase One P30+ digital back. Its a crop sensor digital back, which does slightly crop the focal length of my lenses, but it does allow me to shoot up to 1600 ISO. Although I rarely go above 800 ISO.

Body

I use the Mamiya AFD2 body. Its actually a not the greatest body to use, I am planning on getting the AFD3 body in due time. The problem is that the shutter sync on the AFD 2, gives me a slight delay which can be annoying, and the AF is a single point, which sucks. So at times I have to resort to manual focus. Not the end of the world but, annoying none the less.

Lenses,

I use the 35mm 2.8 which is like a 20mm in SLR terms. Then the 80mm 2.8, which is like the 50mm in SLR terms And I use the 210mm, which is like a 170 in SLR terms. For me this is a nice focal range that allows me to pretty much shoot anything I want.

Batteries

The Phase One backs really eat alot of Juice, so much so that I need to carry 3 batteries for a day shoot. So 3 batteries is a minimum. Alot of people dont realize this when getting into an MF system, and then are hit with an $90/batt price tag.

Light Meter

I rarely use a light meter when shooting SLR, but when shooting medium format its a must. I use the SEKONIC dual spot and ambient light meter.

Bag

I use a think tank bag, smaller but i find a little more durable then Lowepro bags. In it I always carry parking money, cards, a sharpie, AA batteries..

Memory Cards

For this kit I also use the 16gig sandisk 3.

Additional

When shooting MF I also use alot of things from my 35mm kit like "Pocket Wizards", Sunglasses, Lanyard, Color Checker, Polarizer etc...

architectural work

2010-07-28T12:50:00.000-07:00

Schools for BIRD/GRAHAM.

This past week I landed a real nice contract for the joint venture of BIRD/GRAHAM construction. Its an architectural contract that has me shooting 18 newly constructed schools in both Alberta's cities Edmonton and Calgary. Im quite into the project right now trying to work it in when shooting Steven Mandels campaign images and trying to juggle a couple agency shoots in Vancouver.

I decided to shoot this Alberta architectural contract on the PHASE one P30+. My reason for this was I wanted to be able to handle and manipulate the dynamic range of the highlights and shadows because I am shooting the images primarily during hard sun of the day. I wanted bright colors, and vibrant images, but not overly processed.

I think over processing is a mistake many shooters make nowadays, and I am trying to avoid it with proper planning, the right tools and well of course a bit of luck.

In addition to shooting on the PHASE p30+ back I am using the prime 35mm 2.8 lens (which is like a 20mm on an SLR body)

Google maps is serving as my locater, and my ipod is my entertainment while shooting.

For fun, I have also dabbled in a few panoramics of the schools. I am really liking what results they are producing, but not sure if they are suited for such a project. Time will tell.

Enjoy!

#94 "Scotty"

2010-07-27T23:37:00.000-07:00

94

Scott Stewart.
A great hockey teammate.
A great person.
One of the best one timers I have ever faced.
We will miss you man.
Life's too short.

C

My Standard 35mm Equipment Kit

2010-07-25T21:06:00.000-07:00

Hey Gang,

EQUIPMENT BAG

Thought I would post something a little more fun on the blog. A lot of people email me about little questions regarding my photography gear, what lights I use and what I carry in my bag. So I am for this post I am going to share what's in my standard 35mm kit. Keep in mind depend ding on what I am shooting, I will add a few things and take out others, but for the most part this is what's on me at all times.

1. Focal Range. I like a wide focal range, so I use basically the Canon 16-35mm 2.8; Canon 24-70mm 2.8; Canon 85mm 1.2; Canon 70-200mm IS 2.8 (Which I am strongly considering going back to the 2.8 NON IS version, as the IS version is much heavier) Canon 15mm Fisheye 2.8 (which I rarely use, but I still carry it). I also have a 50mm 1.2, but almost never use it... so it stays at home.

2. BODY. I use the Canon 1DS MARK 3. I am very happy with this camera. Mine is quite literally beat to S*#T, but it still works just great.

3. Often Looked Over Gear. As photographers we are often talking to people really close to us so GUM is a must. You would be surprised how many art directors tell me about other shooters Coffee Breath. Next is sunglasses. I carry polarized RayBan aviators. Its not so much a fashion statement, but the lenses are great ; they are not cheap Chinese plastic that will inevitably burn your retinas, and I can shoot outdoors with them on, without poor visibility. Finally a Lanyard. When shooting places you need access, I always lose the little "badges" so a lanyard allows me to stuff it in and wear it around my neck.

4. Make Pics Look Pretty - Color Checker and Polarizer. If you don't carry these, get them, now. They really help.

5. Batteries; Ok I use rechargeable to "help the environment" but they really suck and a really unreliable, so I carry in the "RED CASE" a set of Full AA Energizers... But in this case crappy Duracell's... which suck, but I was in a pinch in Vancouver and that's all the 7-11 had... $10 for 4 crappy Duracell's.. Coppertops dont last!

6. Flash and Triggers. I always use pocket wizards. They are pretty reliable to trigger my Elinchrom Strobes. I also use Canon 580 EX and EX2 flash heads... Then I always... and always carry a long sync cord... I always carry an old school sync cord because sometimes I leave my pocket wizards in my medium format bag... leaving me with no way to trigger strobes... If you ever see me shooting with a sync cord its because I forgot the pocket wizards..

7. Memory Cards. I shoot with 16 GB and 8GB SanDisk mem cards. You will notice a 1GB "Oh Shit" Card I carry buried deep into my bag...I hope to never see it unless I am cleaning my bag, This "OH SHIT" card is used only when the words " I forgot my memory cards at the studio" are uttered to my assistant.

8. TAPE... oh my god this is one of the most important pieces of gear in my bag. Its been used for everything for placing a mark, repairing my 1ds3, placing flashes in hard to reach places, taping up scrims and gels pretty much everything.

So yeah that's pretty much my Tools of the trade.

In a bit I will post my Medium format kit, which is much less and a lot cleaner than my 35mm kit.

Enjoy!

Artisan Cafe Food Photography

2010-07-22T23:36:00.000-07:00

Shooting food for an Ignition Media client.

Shooting food is fun, I like it because you can really use the ambient light to light food in a rather romantic way. I often use a boom and large soft box to light food, but when I am shooting on location and the ambient light is right, then roll with that.

I also use alot of reflectors and mirrors to light food as well. And color accuracy as well as kelvin temperature is really really important when processing out food images.

(This is a color checker.... it keeps my colors in check my assistant Natalie is holding it)

For this shoot, the cafe is a artisan cafe, so I ended up purchasing some pine wood planks and staining them so the tables would have a real organic feel.

(Natalie holding the reflector... Dosent she look happy? She was actually super hungry during this shoot)

(i think this was a mango mojito... which i got to drink after i shot it)

The art directon here was from J over at ignition... The client is artisan cafe Artisan Cafe he as always did a great job.

Enjoy!

Harley Davidson and Molson Canadian poster series in Calgary AB

2010-07-20T17:34:00.000-07:00

Just got back from shooting a 3 poster campaign for Molson Coors and Harley Davidson in Calgary. Left first thing in the morning arrived on location at 11am and we shot till 2pm. Nice quick half day.

I'm not a motorcycle guy, not at all. In fact i drive a BMW x3 and before that and Audi A4... so my experience with choppers was nil..

Needless to say I had to do some research into bike positions and how I wanted to shoot it.

The other thing is that commercial photographs of vehicles are almost never shot in western Canada, Unless its from a private collection, so I really needed to plan how I was going to shoot the bike properly, as my vehicle experience was also slim.

Comically I don't even know how to move a motorcycle, so I had to have the store guys do it for me.

We shot the bike on location in the Harley store, which is never a great idea (to shoot at a store), but because they had this empty warehouse and the scouting photos looked cool it all worked out, and the client seemed really happy.

I lit the bike with two backlights flagged off with black cardboard. They were Elinchrom Ranger packs. The main light was a Elinchrom 600 with a Elinchrom square medium box.

I shot it with the phase on P30+.

Off to play hockey, then shooting another series tomorrow.

Enjoy!

Mayor Mandel In Studio

2010-07-18T21:23:00.000-07:00

I just flew back from Vancouver for a quick shoot of Edmonton Mayor Stephen Mandel. Now I cant really say what the photographs are for at this time save the fact they were not shot for non profit, the city or editorial.

I quite enjoy photographing Mayor Mandel. He is very focused and always does what I ask. In front of my lens he always seems to be quite at ease and lets me do "Whatever I want".

That is pretty flattering words for a photographer to hear from someone who is in the public eye.

When shooting politicians they always give you "the smile", which is fine, and cool, but I always like to nail a photograph of a politician without a smile.

I think shooting a politican with a non smile is refreshing in a way. You see them as human. I did this with alberta premiers Ed Stelmach and Ralph Klien.. the non smiling images reveal so much about a person.

Anyways, I cant post any of the images that were submitted for selection, but these ones are permitted as they were not in the mandated creative direction.

i like this photo... i dont know why. but i do, so im going to post it.

Im pretty excited because I shoot tomorrow for an artisan cafe, then off to Calgary for a campaign with Harley Davidson for Molson and back to shoot another series for the un named project for Mayor Mandel on Thursday.

Enjoy!

Preparing for upcoming 2010 Editorial and Travel Photography Semiars

2010-07-11T17:58:00.000-07:00

In preparing for my upcoming Travel and Editorial photography seminars I have been scouring through various travel images shot during the past 8 years. One of the cool parts of the travel photography portion of my workshop/seminar is my postproduction techniques.

Shooting editorial and editorial travel requires very very different post production techniques then say commercial work, or even weddings and family. In fact weddings and family photography is probably the furthest you can get from editorial travel photography.

Post for Travel requires things like metadata management and knowing which specific editing techniques are acceptable, and which are not for magazine publishers.

So I thought I would post some of these images from 2003/2004 shot in Thailand, just as the western "Thai Travel Boom" really kicked into high gear.

Enjoy!

Rickey Ray - CFL Edmonton Eskimos Quaterback

2010-07-05T12:07:00.000-07:00

If you have been reading my blog a while back I wasn't posting a lot of images, although I was shooting a lot. The reason was because alot of my work could not be shared because the assignments had not been released yet. Here is one of those projects.

It's a cover and a spread shot for the AUG issue of Avenue magazine. Its of CFL Edmonton Eskimos quarter back Rickey Ray. I was really glad the art director chose me to shoot this story. The first reason is because I really enjoy shooting athletes. They are to the point people and often have a confident demeanor to them. They are also very busy and I like shooting under short time periods. I find I work better and more efficient when under the clock.

That all being said, Rickey gave me as much time as I needed to shoot him.

We shot the spread at a really cool restaurant which provided a whole whack of shooting options. We arrived at 8am for setup. Restaurant manager was really cool and pretty much let us move whatever we wanted to. So Nat and I took him up on that and basically re-designed the space.

The art director arrived at 845 and Rickey arrived at 9am, he arrived by himself without an entourage. Which is cool because it makes things go so much quicker.

We shot about 5 outfits in about an hour. Rickey shot really well and did everything I asked of him.

What shocked me was that Rickey was so soft spoken, and such a nice guy. There was 0 ego. He was also taller and much slimmer than I thought he would be. He told me during the session he had infact slimmed down for the upcoming season.

We had just wrapped up shooting the opening shot with Rickey against the slate wall. I said the shoot was done and that was a wrap, then he said to me "Ok great, I was just getting nervous that I was running out of time on my parking meter"

here is a production photograph (never made it to print)

How cool is that? Here is this pro athlete worried about his parking meter, most guys would have just been "ok man I have to get going when is this going to be done?" Or did the Curtis Comeau - "whatever its just a parking ticket, until you have to renew your registration and find you have $450 in parking tickets!"

All in all it was a great shoot. but I can't help myself when I look at the opening spread wondering if Ricky thinking about the time expired parking meter?

Enjoy!

London Released images

2010-07-04T13:41:00.000-07:00

LONDON TRAVEL

Three months ago my 3 day shoot in London produced some great editorial travel images.

Typically when shooting editorial, the copyright transfers back to the photographer after 90 days post publication. Some magazines typically European ones have a 30 day hold on the images.

So now that my 3 month copyright release period is over I can release these on line. I am pretty happy with the results. Enjoy!