The Third Cut's the Keeper

After putting together The Tidewatcher, putting it up on the website, re-cutting it for length and clarity, letting it sit for a month - then cutting it yet again, I think I can finally say... This is about as good as it's going to get!

Actually, the project was a HUGE learning experience. I discovered that imagery which might make for a great motion picture does not always translate well (or with as much impact) in the form of still photos. Less definitely is more here. And the fact that there is no music, nor sound effects means that the dynamics of a "still-image movie" are much different in the final form than they might be when originally written or imagined. But overall, it is a project I am glad I attempted - and I may try another such 'cinematic project' at some point, who knows.... Stay tuned

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Playing With Dramatic Light

I have this image that keeps recurring in my mind. It involves the cold blue feeling of a dark winter and the glowing orange of a firelight. So far it seems to keep eluding me, although I think this is largely because every attempt I have made to capture this "mood" has been done in a hurry, or in the rain, or some other situation that forced me to run through it rather than walk it out. This shot is one such version. I may need to go back with a slightly different lighting setup and try some more. Perhaps in a different location.

It's Not The Light, Its What You Do With It.

Standard soft-light shot with umbrella Snoot light for that film-noir look T his past weekend I had the opportunity to shoot with a very talented East Coast makeup artist, and an amazing model (!) S ince I knew that I would be working in a relatively small space, and did not want to set up lots of plugged in lights, I used a Vivitar 285-HV speed light and bounce umbrella. Once we got the images we were after, but before we wrapped the shot and struck the set, I dropped a snoot on the light, swiveled it around, and tried my version of a "noir / vintage album cover" look. These are just quick samples of both styles, pretty much as they look straight from the camera. The refined, polished, edited versions will be coming up later - but it is nice to see that even a small and often overlooked "old-school" flash unit can still create pretty impressive light!

Be 'Practical' With Lighting

In Hollywood cinematography, there has been a sea-change over the last thirty years or so, away from "Studio style" lighting setups, to scenes and shots motivated by practical lighting. Gone are the days when a cowboy enters a barn, turns on one single lantern, and is blasted with pure white light coming from 12 different sources. But what does that sentence mean? "Motivating light using practical sources?" It sounds confusing and jargon-esque to the uninitiated. And how does it apply to still photography..? To boil it down, "Practial lights" are any light sources that appear in the shot. A lamp. A streetlight. Car headlights. The idea being that if you have a person sitting next to a fireplace, or at a table lit by a lamp, that light source wants to predominate in the shot. So most of the light should look like firelight, or lamplight. And that [lighting] element should be clearly in frame. This does NOT mean that you should always rely solely on t...

C. M. Franke | Photography

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