Chris - Part II

Here's another from my session with Chris. I'm glad I got the chance to work with him before he signed with his agency... I finally got to practice working with a male model & lighting, which I've wanted to do for a while.

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Again, awesome. Was this part of the same shoot as your previous post?

peoplearescary wrote in post #12425802
Again, awesome. Was this part of the same shoot as your previous post?

Yes same shoot, just took a while to get these processed. I also wanted to sepearate this from the B&W's as I feel this has a totally different mood.

I agree that the mood is very different with the color version. I feel the image is much warmer, the model appears to be in a reflective state - contemplative. The B&W's struck me as being cold and closed off, almost as if the mood of the model was of the same. Good job on this shoot Matt.

Do you find lighting to be very different for males as opposed to females? What did you learn through shooting Chris versus your previous lineup of female participants? Which is more challenging?

CiM_Photography wrote in post #12425966
I agree that the mood is very different with the color version. I feel the image is much warmer, the model appears to be in a reflective state - contemplative. The B&W's struck me as being cold and closed off, almost as if the mood of the model was of the same. Good job on this shoot Matt.

Do you find lighting to be very different for males as opposed to females? What did you learn through shooting Chris versus your previous lineup of female participants? Which is more challenging?

Thanks sir, I appreciate the kind words.

For Chris, we began running through ideas about how we wanted the finished image to look. I noticed he had that classic Hollywood cheek bone/jaw line thing going on… and shooting in natural, evenly lit lighting wouldn’t bring that out. So I decided to go for more shadows and control the light.

Shooting in natural light isn’t always the easiest thing, but it is easier then strobe lighting for obvious reasons.

I really wanted to add a male model to my portfolio to show I’m capable of being diverse, and not always only about shooting pretty girls with shallow DOF in natural light.

I find this lighting I went for Chris with (dramatic/contrasty) CAN work for a women, but it will look a tad masculine, bringing out their jaw and cheek bones. Sometimes this is just perfect. But I find soft light for females works better overall.

Again just all my opinion.

I've been at photography seriously for only the past 4 months, so everything at this point is a challange and a learning lesson...

And I think that fun shows in the images you've developed recently. You're much further along your learning path than I am - I simply do not have the brain time to commit to creativity right now, which is mostly a self-induced funk.

I ask these questions so that I feel better prepared to apply myself when that time comes. Watching your work grow from the Stranger project to photographing your wife's friend on a blank wall in your residence, to posed photography and now this... it's the type of therapy and inspiration that I need to get out of this rut that I've landed in. It almost makes me embarrassed with my own work, which is exactly the kind of friendly jab that I need to become better than my current self.

Anyhow - don't mean to derail. Great work.

Here's one more. I like it overall, but I like the pose (personally) in the first post a little more.
This one has a 'sex appeal' look to it... perhaps good for an fragrance add or something... ?

I commented on this one in another thread. This series is just great.

CiM_Photography wrote in post #12426060
And I think that fun shows in the images you've developed recently. You're much further along your learning path than I am - I simply do not have the brain time to commit to creativity right now, which is mostly a self-induced funk.

I ask these questions so that I feel better prepared to apply myself when that time comes. Watching your work grow from the Stranger project to photographing your wife's friend on a blank wall in your residence, to posed photography and now this... it's the type of therapy and inspiration that I need to get out of this rut that I've landed in. It almost makes me embarrassed with my own work, which is exactly the kind of friendly jab that I need to become better than my current self.

Anyhow - don't mean to derail. Great work.

I totally hear ya man. Totally. I work full time so this is only my hobby/side thing. And when a perfectly nice weekend would come along, I would want to shoot, but I would be in a rut of “what should I shoot”. In the beginning I had no idea/direction of what I liked. I shot my car a million times (see my flickr) and always shot EVERYTHING in an ultra wide angle and did HDR to everything, lol...

I’ve recently found that I like portraiture. I’ve found what I like and now I’m focusing on it. I like working with people. I like their expressions/emotions displayed. Moods that can be created via portraiture… compared to static subjects, for me, I find portrature work more interesting... so I started to focus on it.

So what I did was my Strangers Project to practice, and also because I simply thought it was a cool concept which I borrowed from the great Markus Schwarze. Now I’m more getting into model/posed shots which I owe the credit to the great Jordan Voth (shout out to Jordan! you the man!). Both of these guys are huge influences on me.

So I guess what I’m getting at is, once I found my ‘nitch’ (portraiture), it brought me out of my personal funk and now I have direction/focus.

I don't know if any of that rant helps... but that pretty much sums up the past 4 months of my dive into photography.

I really like them Shalaby! Both the B&W and Color ones are great. I do find myself, however, coming back to the dark areas in his eye sockets. I think that connection between the viewer and model is found in good eye contact and with the eyes being so dark here I don't feel connected. Maybe a reflector would have helped - but I understand that sometimes that just not possible.

Great job all around

I hear ya, and for the most part I agree with you. Eye contact is critical.

4 out of 5 of these shots as a whole series, he was looking away from the camera, so there was no eye contact with the camera even if the shadows weren't so heavy... but I hear what your saying.

I'm a fan of most of your photos and I really like these. I didn't comment on the B & W series, but the processing (which most people seemed to like) made the pics look flat to me. The poses, however were excellent.

I really dig this set of shots you did with him man. Clean lighting and nice posing. Keep it up and thanks for the shout out!

Both shots are very nice, nice lighting.