shooting on film
This video gives a brief insight in to John Cowans Fashion Photography work during the 1960s. You will learn about his style and then move on to looking at a shoot I did in Bath, England in the summer. Each shot is carefully analysed to give the viewer an understanding of how to create well posed and lit portraits in the street in summer weather conditions.
Read MoreI shot these on Provia 100F, as a continuation of the shoot I did with Evie at the Mansion. Stick around and I’ll show you how I got these amazing shots.
I shot both with my trusted Bronica Zenza ETRS with the 75mm f2.8 lens. As I shot with and without flash, each shot was carefully metered, with apertures and shutter speeds adjusted accordingly.
Let’s dive right in, the garden was perfectly manicured with this beautiful chair/bowl style golden hammock which was not going to be left out this shoot.Luckily Evie's friend Sammie had turned up and I wasn’t going to pass up on an opportunity to take some duo shots!
I setup a beauty dish with a single Profoto light angled 45 degree angle and then took some time choreographing the shot. In these situations having some knowledge and experience with light shaping tools certainly helps. An assistant would be an additional benefit but alas this was not the case today.
You can almost feel the detail in the images. This is the real benefit of shooting with slower films, the extremely fine detail and clarity of the image is unrivalled. The lights and shadows are perfectly balanced, one criticism could be the flowers have been heavily darkened. However it fits in with the mood and atmosphere of the image itself. In a sense of suspense and waiting, the darker rendition of the vegetation certainly adds to the textured drama of these shots.
Question for you, if you were in my place, how would you have shot this scene with Evie and Sammie or Evie alone? How would you have created this shot differently? Let me know in the comments below!
Thank you Sammie for jumping in a few of these shots! Sammie disappeared off to sort out a few things and Evie and I continued working in the garden as the light started to diminish more rapidly.
I wanted to get in a couple of more sets while we still had some time left. I wanted to see how this film would perform under lower natural light conditions. These two image images show that the images come out with a much cooler palette and tones. The isn't that burst of energy or color that you may get with off camera flash.
The natural light was disappearing too quickly and I reverted back to using the beauty dish and profoto light. In these images you can see that perhaps the touch of light was too strong and I could certainly bring that down a little in lightroom.
Purely for demonstration purposes it has done its thing. For me the light is quite overpowering, if there was a little light on mansion in the background then perhaps it would add a little more depth to the image.Or perhaps even in the foreground, there needs to be something going on just to add to the story and texture of the image itself.
Apart from the technical elements, clarity and detail, you can see, what really makes this image is the composition, pose, textures provided by the foreground and background create much more to the narrative of this image.
You have seen a couple of different setups here all using a single light source throughout. How would you have done things differently? What type of light would you have used? Would you have added in a second light? If so, where? What was missing that could have made these images be even more impactful? I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
Seeing it in film strip itself is another thing all together. The runner up shot for me was Evie resting he arms on her right knee wearing the pink dress near the end. With or without flash, be mindful of the foreground and background. What are you using to separate your subject and what narrative are you creating with your image.
I am loving shooting with slide film, its not just the detail and depth but also seeing your image in your hand. It's something else altogether. Get out and shoot some!
Thank you for watching all my videos, do go ahead and comment below. Have you shot with the Bronica Zenza ETRS or similar 6by45 camera or with Provia or any other slide film stocks?
I would love to hear your thoughts on this shoot, the images, how you have shot with Provia? What are your likes and dislikes about them? What do you recommend I shoot next with it?
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