Retro Glamour/Pinup with Marlo Marquise

These are from a set that came out of my last shoot with Marlo Marquis. Marlo is a burlesque performer and loves the retro classic styles of the 30's and 40's. She has that classic look to go with it and it suits her well.

My favorite of this set is the full body pose. Although it is a static pose, there is a feeling of fluidity and movement here. I just feel she knocked this pose outta the park and I'm pleased with my light and camera angle as well.

The lighting came out of a 24x30" Photoflex softbox powered with a White Lightning x1600 head at camera right and approximately 7 ft high. A 20320" box just below it (relevant only for the full body) to light the waist down. Powered by a Canon speedlite 580EX2. Another 24x24" box at about eye level on camer left to provide fill powered by another 580EX2.

A strip box powered by a White Lightning x800 head on camera left and behind and above subject angled slightly downward. This provides some hair light and some rim for the subjects right side (camera left).

The white paper background is lit by two Vivitar 285 flashes shooting into small lumiquest softboxes (6x9") attached to the lights. I like to illuminate the background to a lesser than white exposure to avoid blowouts from reflection and also for the reason that I like the bg's to be off-white as opposed to stark white.
The bg would be easy to make completely white later in processing if I ever felt it worked best for a particular image, and so my options are open.

I usually let the subject do their thing while shooting but I do actively give model direction. I think a photographer should be involved in the direction and should not hesitate to suggest variations of a pose or to look a certain way, etc. A good model/subject certainly makes things easy, but they cannot see what I am seeing through the lens and the slightest variations of body positioning and/or eye contact or looking away can make a difference. Marlo is really fantastic, with an incredibly fine sense of styling and and fantastic presence.

I have a shoot coming up in the very near future which involves Mona De Lux, some retro pinup/glamour, some latex wardrobe provided by Venus Prototype. stylist Masae Satouchi and....industrial plastic wrap....

Stay tuned. :)

Peeves...

Peeves....we all have em. Those little things that particularly annoy us more than others and get easily under our skin.
So it would be of no surprise to those who know me personally that a few of my peeves would involve driving, since driving is one of the few things that have ever come naturally to me.

I have been driving since I was about 13 years old. My parents would occasionally head off to the city by subway to take in a show and could easily be gone for about 5 hours. I knew where the car keys were kept and one day decided it would be good fun to take the old 1969 Dodge Coronet out for a spin. I'd take note of how it was parked in the back yard and make sure to keep it the same. I went and picked up a few of my friends and we would have a blast, and a few close calls where the police passed us and did a double take because I certainly looked my age then.

Since then I have driven most everything from motorcycles to 60ft long articulated buses. I was a bit of a speed demon when I was younger but like most of us we wise up and mellow out a bit with age and experience.
So, some of the things that really get under my skin are not the usual culprits that seem to piss most everyone else off such as riding up on the shoulder to cut in front of a line of traffic, getting cut off, driving slow in the left lane of a highway (that gets close though), wreckless speeding, etc.

The things that seem to bother me most are the actions of drivers that don't seem to have a clue that there are others on the road. While driving along on a city street, the car in front begins to slow for no apparent reason. Ok, so I can assume the driver is going to double park or something and so I lay back and wait for his move. He then proceeds a bit further and pulls nose first into a spot, then stops mid way with rear of car blocking the lane. Arrrg! Alright, I don't get bent outta shape like I might have when I was younger but it still has me cursing under my breath and rolling my eyes in disbelief.

Another situation I have seen too often is when a driver begins making a turn, then decides midway that they want to turn in the other direction. Then there is the driver that almost comes to a complete stop on the right lane of the highway to double check if the exit coming up is the one they need...

Its important that when you begin an action that you follow through to completion. If you decide the parking spot was not the one you wanted or you needed to turn left instead of right you really must follow through with what you started and then regain your bearings and make the neccessary corrections later. Much of driving involves anticipation for both getting around traffic and for defensive purposes, so when you as a driver do things that are unpredictable it causes a dangerous situation for you and others around you, no matter how slow or careful you may think you are. Its also not really a matter of a driver being stupid, as I have seen these things done many times over by Doctors (MD plates). It's either sheer arrogance , and/or just a lack of common road sense.

Ok, so just had to get that out there! Also haven't blogged in a while and wanted to keep things alive here :)

I do have some ambitious shoots and projects coming up in the near future and also want to get back to some of the barns and abandoned structures that I love venturing into.

Oh, driving at night with your bright lights on...arrrggg! :P