Thanks everyone who is visiting from Scott Kelby’s blog. I have been responding to emails as quick as I can. I also appreciate all of the kind words given. The blog is up here for those who do not know what I’m talking about.
In the last entry I said I’d post an image of my new studio space. Well I created a self portrait for the Kelby Blog in the studio(below) so you can pretty much get an idea of it. Not huge, not tiny… just right for my studio needs. I have not taken a self portrait in quite some time and I always forget how silly it feels setting the timer and running out to the mark just in time for the shutter to sound.
fun facts… camera I’m holding is totally a prop. never use it. Octabox/brollybox was set off just or effect… I didn’t really need to light the wall.
Helped out my good buddy Cole with this video. All I did was light/shoot it. Cole did the editing and all the audio. Little projects like this is what the 5d is really good for. The setup was amazingly simple yet yields a nice clean result. Great job Cole.
Last minute gig with the always fantastic Lionfish agency in Seattle. They flew us to New Orleans where for three days we shot Microsoft partners in preparation for a huge convention Microsoft is having in July. Most of the work was done on a blank back drop while I was able to capture subjects in different environments in the historic venue we were setup in. At the same time as the stills a hefty video production was going on as well as various business meetings the partners were having. This meant many times I had to be quiet while directing a subject… more times than one I’m sure I ruined the video crews take. While I had a set of strobes setup for portraits I was constantly moving portable strobes all over trying to work fast and find the best quick lighting solution for each area. Overall everything turned out great… especially since these are not professional models but real world business people.
I’ve been too busy to really post anything that I’ve been working on lately but wanted to post something this evening. I picked my father up from the airport this past week and asked him if he’d hang out for a little while and help me do some sample shots for a possible future gig. The style of this was intentionally in a similar style of the tremendously talented Phil Toledano and his days with my father site(old man+f1.2/f1.4). Phil’s images are very well put together with a heartfelt story to follow as you view. While I could write a short story explaining why my father looks so darn sad… these were not created for that purpose.
So I finally received my new camera this afternoon and played with it for the remainder of the day. What I found to be the most fun was the video portion. It is somewhat overwhelming having something so capable of so much in my hands. It is interesting trying to film in different lighting just to see just how the sensor reacts. I only have one nitpick about the video portion and that is the low shutter speed. Mainly I want to shoot wide open with this camera and it is only really achieved in low light. I didn’t bother to push the ISO past 6400 as it is just acceptable and really only marginally better than the original 5d from what I can tell. It also looks like I’ll be buying new batteries since the many old ones I have aren’t compatible. All in all I’m very pleased with all of the little upgrades and happy to have such a bump in resolution. Watch the video below for some silly nonsense clips I threw together this evening. I wasn’t trying to be serious and I did tell my friend Cole Nesmith to give me a 90210 vibe.
…So after writing this and continuously thinking about it I did some digging to see what other people thought about the video coming from the mark 2. I would watch short clips I took and while they look high quality and interesting something seemed not so cinematic. Of course one has to remember this is 30 fps and not 24 which is one of the big reasons it doesn’t have that film feel. That might be the main reason but it has a certain appeal that looks good to me but strange at the same time. The fact that the last video camera I owned was when they first went digital leaves me little to compare this to. I suppose what I’m really wondering is how good is the video? The Vincent Laforet video is proof of the cameras strength in low light… but is that it? Are cinematographers buying this camera to shoot with? I really don’t want to sound like a gear-head but this just has me very curious.
one more thing…my website was a featured example in Laura Brunow Miner’s BLOG I’d like to thank her and the talented Corey Hickey for that.
PIZZA ROLLZ! ..ha
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