Module Two: Studio Visit

Well this has been… an experience

TLDR;
Make sure you’ve got your equiptment ready before you go to shoot…

Sunday 22nd November – The First Time

Lottie and I had arranged to meet within Preston and attempt our first ever Studio Shoot together. Me being me, forgot to get the needed equipment from the E-hub. Meaning I was left up the creek Sunday morning as it was shut.

With nothing more than my own DSLR, we attempted to get some photographs that were worth anything.

The plan was simple – Lottie needed her official headshot and I wanted to get some of her cosplays photographed. It was a shame it all went to pot…

Final Contact Sheets – Digital

Headshots:

Cosplay – Catra (She Ra: Princess of Power)

Cosplay – Ty-Lee (Avatar: The Last Airbender)

Bonus Shots

Personal Favourites:

Issues & Solutions

Issue One – No Flash Trigger

Yeah, I forgot to grab it. This meant all our lighting was done on the basic settings & model lights (Very orange, very warm colours). This is why there is a stark difference between the colouring on a lot of the images. I was able to bring the colour temperature down thanks to lightroom but each image required it’s own changes. I attempted to create a preset to ~~save time~~ keep them consistent but that wasn’t always the case.

Issue Two – Backdrop colours

I asked Lottie what she personally preferred, white or colour backdrops. She elected for colour and, for the cosplay images, picked the pale pink shade. This was beautiful to work with however, with me not knowing the colour schemes of the characters beforehand, created a weird and difficult problem. The colour pallets of the characters match the background.

This wouldn’t have been an issue…if the backdrop would roll back up. This was not the case. The roll ended up getting jammed. At the end of the shoot, it took me around 20 minutes ~~_{and possibly a breach of H&S}~~ to get it somewhat back to how it should have been.

Issue Three – The Lights themselves

I had zero clue what the hell I was doing. We’d been told in theory how it all worked but during this shoot, I just hoped and prayed. Somehow I was able to make it work but I knew I needed more guidance on how the heck all this stuff worked.

We made a lot of mistakes setting up the lights but, somehow, we got something usable out of the experience.

Wednesday 3rd December – Second Times a Charm?

The aim of this shoot created enough stress to give me serious indigestion. Module side, we’d been told to create a portraiture collection on the Film SLR’s, both studio and environmental based.

I’d arranged for Lottie and Ed to join me in the studio for a few hours to create a piece, focusing on the topic of Gender Stereotypes. Lottie, in her natural environment, dresses very Gender Non-Conforming whereas Ed dresses as a traditional male. I wanted to play around with this idea.

The main goal was to prioritise shooting on the SLR and occasionally use the DSLR to capture some silly moments and make sure my settings are correct. This then turned into a showcase of Ed in a dress and Lottie in a suit.

A visit from Dan

I’d asked Dan to come by the studio to help me out as I’d learned last time, I wasn’t actually sure what I was doing. He came by, explained the lights to me, how to correctly light the backdrops and even how to best light for the Studio & SLR combination. It was Dan’s advice that led me to use the DSLR as a fancy light meter to get the correct settings. (I did get a light meter but had no idea how to use it… We figured it out towards the end of the shoot but it was a bit pointless at that time).