Last month, I photographed the Emmes Corporation 10 year celebration for their office opening in India. From their headquarters in Rockville, MD, the staff went above and beyond to demonstrate the Indian culture. On this occasion, they highlighted the employees that emigrated from India, and all the people that have expanded their business through their work there.
During the day, the floors of their headquarters were decorated in like manner to keep the celebration top of mind. In one room, there was a henna artist producing designs for employees that came by. Later in the afternoon, a yoga teacher that had a peaceful meditation session in a large empty room. In contrast, a Bollywood dance class got the heart rate up after lunch! Finally, you could chill with the sitar musicians playing in a break room. What a colorful day at work!
Since I have an upcoming group fashion shoot, I wanted to revisit a solo session from last year. The first time I met Kyle McKay, he was a model at a fashion show in Springfield, Virginia. At this time, I was very new to photographing fashion shows. While there may be a lot of events in the area, I ran into Kyle at a couple of them as he worked hard at gaining experience. In getting to know him, he was very ambitious in pursuing more fashion projects, though he was collaborative with everyone involved. So when I wanted to expand by studio portfolio, I reached out to him.
In the time since we last saw each other, Kyle and his friend, Mehr started a styling and makeup company, M&K Productions. When we planned to do a portfolio shoot, both of them came to the studio. Mehr worked her makeup talents to create a professional look for his headshots. Initially, these were a great example of their professional styling. For executives that need updated professional portraits, this look is nicely even.
After making some ‘standard’ headshots, I had what I needed for my portfolio. Since we had time, I asked Mehr if she wanted to do something crazy. Because they also have a theatrical painting service in their company, she asked if she could really do something crazy. Of course, I said, ‘Yes!’ So she created this blackbird-inspired look on Kyle’s face. This is a markedly different look from his professional headshot!
Lastly, I changed up the background with lighting. The black background was working, but sometimes his hair would get lost. When I asked the room for suggestions, red was the consensus! So I put a red gel on a flash, and put it on the background. It was a really enjoyable shoot with these two, and I look forward to future shoots together! If you have any ideas that you would like to work on, please contact me. I am looking for more collaborations in the studio!
Theatrical lighting for stage performances adds to the spectacle of musical performances. In the times I have covered musical groups as they performed, I have enjoyed using the additional lights around the stage as cool props that can add to the images. The lights at SingStrong were especially timed with the performance which enhanced the mood of the performances. They can be challenge to get good focus as the darkened arena against the strong point light sources is not ideal for auto focus systems in cameras. There are a lot of missed shots in the collection!
The other challenge comes in post processing the images after the concert. The lighting can be very strong in color casts. Whether that comes from gels over lights, or LEDs that can be any color, they will cast strong color. Of course, this color will be over their faces and skin tones which is always a challenge to balance afterwards. For this shoot, I had the white balance set to auto. Because I was shooting raw files, I planned to adjust the settings later in post.
The lighting in the photo was a strong blue backlight that you can see on the left of the frame. From the front house lights, there was a red light on the front of the performers which is a common combination in stage lighting. To balance the color in Lightroom, I went into the Develop module, selected the White Balance tool, and then placed a point on the gray head of the microphone. I always look for gray colors for balancing as a starting point, and it worked well in this case toning down the pink skin tones.
I have much better luck going for gray tones in the frame. Sometimes there is not enough data in white or black areas to get an accurate white balance setting. The software may tell you, however, it will not change anything in your photo depending on the image. Of course, it is always important to have a calibrated monitor to ensure consistency in printing images. If the color cast is too strong, removing all color from the photo is also an option, and one I go to frequently!
