Meet William, a kind hearted young man, who with good humour, allowed us to drag him down a dark lonely alleyway in Melbourne for a photoshoot. What you see is what you get in this photo, the only light used on Williams face coming from his cigarette lighter. A bit of spill light from some distant street lamps give a little relief to the background. This opens up a whole bunch of new options for us.
Shot with a Nikon D3s fitted with f1.4 24mm Nikkor lens
Bianca was amused by this character, while we were commuting between locations in Melbourne last week, she spotted a fellow traveler. Not all of our models are happy about having their photos taken, and this guy was sure was one of those. Even when we pulled up beside them we still got an earful. I’m fairly certain though that the driver of this car was kinda happy that his pooch was the subject of Bianca’s lens…. even if it was only for a few seconds.
Cute but not happy. Photo by Bianca Romeo.
Appears that our stock photography sight has been having a few problems over past 24 hours. Our archive was running but the home domain excitations-stock.com wasn’t, seems to be running again now but as a just in case we’ve redirected all traffic to excitations-stock.com to our archive site directly. So things may look a bit different but you still have access to the archive.
Access to excitations stock photography archive can also be gained by going to stockphotosaustralia.com or thenakedlandse.com both of which have full search facilities built into their structure.
Aerial photos of Lake Eyre, largest salt lake, Australia. – Images by Ian Mckenzie
On the weekend we had the privilege to photography Kimberly’s special day with her Debutant partner Taylor. The couple were great to work with considering the cold weather she had to pose in. but it didn’t stop Kim from shining in front of the camera! We understand that Deb’s are a very special day for most teenage girls and we love capturing the natural moments along with the portraits to create a unique mix of photographs for the couple to choose from! Here are a couple of shots from the weekend!
a natural shot captured of Kimberly and Taylor Walking
Silhouette of Kimberly
For those of you around the Mildura area who suffer from pain, don’t we all. And aren’t big on pumping all shorts of drugs and potions into your bodies, Robyn has some news for you. She has organized a demonstration of a natural pain relief method that she uses herself. Robyn is a big fan of this technology and uses it herself almost daily. She tells us she is always accompanied by pain, we think that she’s referring to Ian but maybe she’s not.
The demo is at our studio tomorrow evening, Monday 16th August, it is essential you give Robyn 5025 3368 a call because places are limited. It’s not one of those high pressure sales things, just an info evening with a couple of demonstrations thrown in.
Actually there is no such thing, but there should be. for those of you who have a regular photographer that you use for your photography assignments it isn’t as important. However, for those of you who only occasionally engage the services of a professional photographer or for that matter any photographer to record an event or create images for you, you really should make a point of talking to your photographer.
Sounds silly, but a lot of people just assume that their photographer is going to create images in a certain manner. For example, while in Melbourne I was speaking with a wedding photographer, who is an experienced photographer who has spent the last ten or so years developing his signature style. Having built up a reputation for quality work and creating a style of wedding imagery that is popular he charges accordingly. He’s not the most expensive game in town but on the other hand he certainly isn’t the cheapest. He confided to me that he was having a few issues with one of his brides, who he is due to photograph in the next couple of weeks. Seems she is making all shorts of demands as to the way she wants him to do things. Reasonable you might say, after all it is her money and she is the client. Problem is the requests are for services that he doesn’t offer, has never offered and really fly in the face of everything he is known for photographically.
I’m pretty certain if you asked this bride, she would say the photographer is being difficult and precious. Looking at it from his side, he is being asked to do something that he never does, isn’t part of his style or in modern terminology “brand”. The photographer says there was no mention of these special request at the time of booking and they have only been brought to his attention in the last few weeks. It doesn’t take to many brain cells t o work out all this heart ache could have been avoided just by talking more earlier.
I know we try to communicate freely with our bridal couples way before the wedding day. Even then however, we still have occasions when there are misunderstandings. The most common argument is that “all the other photographers do that”. “Why don’t you?” Talk to your photographer, whoever he or she may be. If you both know what you’re aiming for the is a whole lot better chance of getting pictures you are going to love.
If you happen to be a photographer and reading this, you may like consider doing what we try to do. Suggest other photographers who provide services that you don’t. For example we don’t offer shoot and burn services to our wedding clients. Our choice, it doesn’t sit with our “brand”, that doesn’t mean it’s not a legitimate form of wedding photography in demand by brides. Just means we don’t dot it, therefore we’re happy to refer couples to photographers who do.
Last week while in Melbourne, Bianca and Ian took advantage of a rare few minutes of sunshine to create some fitness stock images on a beach near St Kilda. Much to the amusement of late afternoon beach goers.
It was good to get back into the swing of wedding photography after a break of a few weeks over winter. And what a way to start the new season. First we swung by to check out how the boys were going. No worries there, Michael and the crew had everything well and truly under control.
Quick check, tie looks good, let's get this show on the road.
There is relaxed and there is RELAXED, fairly certain Michael fits into the last category. In fact early warning signs for us that we were in for a great day.
And just for the girls, here's a bit more of that amazing dress.
A new effect on this one of Elyce and Michael, haven't worked out what to call it yet but I'm sure we'll think of some thing. This image was captured in the same location as the one above. Beautiful light in a private home, and a bit of Lightroom trickery.
Here's some of the fun antics we managed to get up too. Luckily this couple were like the bunny in that battery add on TV.... they just kept on going. This was one of Elyce's ideas, " I want a photo under a lamp post".
As Elyce and Michael left the reception, a number of overhead distractions took place.
Way back when I was first starting out on my path into a career in photography, I was fortunate enough to cross paths with a man who I’m not going to name because he is a gentleman and would be embarrassed if I did. Suffice to say that this man was a talented photographer, did with a camera what many would only dream of doing. The thing is he had a disability. Born with both a speech defect and a badly deformed frame, meant that he would go through life where ever single step he took would be a struggle and with only one arm that functioned anywhere near normally.
Yet this amazing man had a gift. He could take photos. Photos that captured the moment perfectly, beautifully composed images created just at the right instant. On top of his gifted eye, he was very handy in the darkroom, and was able to produce prints of such amazing quality that most of us were just left wondering how he managed to use the same materials as we did and yet produce images that just stood head and shoulders above our meagre efforts. He was a wedding photographer and must have shot many hundreds if not thousands of weddings over his career. Until ultimately his disability caught up with him, it began to become just to uncool to have some disabled guy who walks funny and talks with a speech impediment taking photos at a wedding.
Pity really because he was able to shoot the pants of most able bodied photographers, even with one arm firmly wedged behind his back.
Yeah, I know I’m always posting pictures of ballet dancers. That’s because I love shooting with dancers, just don’t get enough opportunities out here in the never never.
Anyway there is a slight age difference between our two models today, both are regulars here at excitations barn style studio and both know how to use the studio space to their advantage. Will go with youngest first, Clancy, who, after the addition of another sibling, is now the big girl in her family.
Clancy gets ready to hit the stage at excitations studio.
Slightly more dramatic shot of Mikayla in excitations photo studio. Instead of using soft lights, we went with a number of small spot lights, a couple of them rimlighting Mikayla's form and another lighting her face. Also poped a couple of blue gels into the mix, just to add a bit of moodiness to the final image. I love working with hard lights, unfortunately unless your model has great complexion you stand the risk of emphasising even the tinyest skin flaw with this style iof lighting.
People expect all shorts of different things from a photographer. I recently heard a lady complain that her photographer turned up and took photos of her family and all he brought with him was a camera…. nothing else. While her friend had another photographer who turned up with a car load of photographic equipment. She felt ripped off.
Truth is it doesn’t really matter how much equipment the photographer brings to a job, providing of course he has all the gear necessary to get the pictures required. And some times you need a whole bunch of equipment to do what looks like a simple job. I’m just as happy shooting with just one camera and one lens, with nothing else because that allows me to concentrate 100% on my subject. It all comes down to the photographers ability to see the picture. communicate with his or her subject and capture that special moment. Sometimes of course you can’t take a picture without all that extra gear hanging around. But at days end, the final result comes down to just one thing…. the photographers ability to SEE.