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We
wander the house, looking for more good
light. At this time of the year, and
this late in the afternoon, there's a patch of
sunlight on the living room floor. We
had Kira occupy that patch with her lovely
self. I tried a couple of exposures but
I didn't like it -- it was too contrasty for
my tastes. Admittedly, once cleaned up
with my photo editing software,
these are interesting pictures, but we didn't
stay here long. We continued our search
throughout the house. |
We snapped a quick
picture here, under the single skylight in the guest room, at the top
of the stairs. You can see the top of the stairs through the
open door, behind Kira's left shoulder.
I liked the glowing
light, so I figured we'd stay here for a little while and make a few
exposures, but there were some adjustments that needed to be made:
- I chose to close
the door to the top of the stairs, because the light & angles
there are too confusing.
- I didn't want to
hand-hold the camera -- I was concerned about slight
blurring. I did have a table top tripod that was just sturdy
enough to hold my somewhat bulky camera.
- I decided that I
wanted a lower camera angle. The camera was set at its
widest angle setting (it would have been easy to reach out &
touch Kira's hand from my position). With a lower camera
angle, there's be a little less distortion.
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Here's
the first exposures after I
made those adjustments.
With the light coming from the
skylight above, I had to ask
Kira to "cheat" her
face up towards the light a
bit. That, with
the lower camera angle,
created an interesting
"feel" to these
pictures. So, we were
ready.
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Kira lamented that she
didn't have many pictures of herself clothed, and she didn't have many
pictures of her smiling -- she wanted some for her Myspace
profile. So, she donned her blouse again, and we had a little
fun.
It's funny to think
that she's bottomless in these pictures. Makes you wonder -- how
do you know that the telephone operator isn't nude when you talk to
her?
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Okay,
I'm feeling playful. I
adjust the camera settings so
that the shutter was open for
1/3rd of a second, and I ask
Kira to shake her head back
& forth. By putting
her hands on the table, these
weren't blurred, but there was
plenty of movement captured.
Spooky, huh? We make
several purposely blurred
exposure.
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There are lots more
images in the Out Takes gallery.
I ask Kira to
remove her top, and we continue to play. The trick was to try to
move only specific parts of her body. To be successful, it was
essential that the camera was on a tripod and that part of Kira's body
were "anchored" to something that wouldn't move. The
chair isn't moving. When Kira rested her arms on the table, that
stabilized her all the way up to her shoulder.
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Here, we try keeping
everything still except Kira's
arms.
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We move into my office
/ sitting room. A couple of weeks earlier, I used this setup
with Sylvia, and I liked
it, so I thought I'd try it with Kira. Do note that by now, Kira
& I were working at the early evening, several hours later in the
day than the Sylvia images.
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Again, the light comes from
above, so a minor adjustment
to Kira's head position can
make a big difference.
It also amazes me how weighty
that background appears --
that's really just a gauze
that semi-translucent, but
because the light strikes the
backdrop at an angle, you
can't see through it.
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I guess I still had
the purposely blurred images in mind, and I thought I'd try to get
Kira to toss her hair back.
It doesn't quite
work. There's not enough tonal separation between the parts that
are in motion and the background. Let that be a lesson.
And for some
reason, I lose interest in this setup. We move on.
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The
objectives of sittings with models
changes as I gain experience with the
model:
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The
first sitting with a model is
typically a "get
acquainted" session. I
focus on getting to know the model
& seeing how she moves, and I
do this by using standard idea.
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During
the second sitting, I start using
ideas inspired by my getting to
know the model.
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The
third sitting is often my
favorite, because by then, I'm
generally coming up with ideas
inspired by the model's strength.
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The
fourth & fifth sittings are
also filled with experimentation.
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By
the seventh sitting, all bets are
off -- I've run through the ideas
the model has been able to
inspire, and by now, we just are
winging it. Hence, the
purposely blurred images with
Kira.
This
sitting concludes with Kira
Cornered.
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