Olivia Dantes at St. Brigid's Church

Olivia Dantes sat for me at St. Brigid’s church. Once again I used the Octobox on an Alien Bees AB800. Shot on above also used a grid light on the background. I had great makeup from Monica Bulyard. These fashion shots can be quite fun. The dress in the alter shot is a PVC dress I love the Rembrandt style lighting in the first shot. To get this lighting the Octobox is only about 3' from the subject. Similar to the light in the Lady with Ferret shot previously shown. You can see more from this session at my flickr page.

Maggie Runner

We travelled to Long Branch Farms near Half Moon Bay. This shot used three lights. My make up person, Christina Del Ben, had a friend, Maggie Runner, who decided to pose as a 50s bombshell for the shot. Maggie has a great wardrobe, and this yellow number was perfect for the location, an old airstream-style trailer being used as a mini-golf clubhouse. The lighting worked out great, but the background through the trailer door and the window did not. I tried to blow it out, which I did. But I ended up replacing it with a background from nearby Pescadero that I had shot a month or two earlier. I am very happy with the result. This shot ended up with 30 or so layers.

The shot used a grid on the 600B next to the camera on her face. Octobox on 7B strobe camera right. And a snoot on the other 7B strobe to light behind the models head on the left.

Josey Baker

I met Josey Baker at Pizzaioli at 6 am for a shoot of him baking bread. When I arrived, Josey was cooling doen the wood fired oven form the night before. He has to get it down to 500 degrees to to bake the bread perfectly. I like getting him in the act. In my favorite photo, at the top, he is tapping the loaf after removing it form the overn. He can hear if it is cooked enough.

I wanted to reflect the morning light so I used my big octobox from the left side. In the top shot, I filled with a hand held PL160 speedlight, just below the camera lens. I like this light. It is soft and dramatic at the same time. A few people suggested I should put a light in the oven to make it look like fire, but there was no fire. Just the radiant heat from the fire the night before.