You may (or may not) remember my chance meeting and portrait sessions with Sherman Hemsley the actor from The Jeffersons, Amen, and many other shows. Here is the thread from that shoot:
https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=752654
Well he had so much fun doing that and liked the pictures so much he fulfilled him promise to let me do another shoot. This time his agent requested we do something "gangster like".
It's interesting how a small idea like that quickly blossoms into a huge deal. We ended up with 20 - 30 people on location (everyone involved brought a few friends) and of course all of them brought a camera. I found a 1930s car at a local car club, 100% authentic dual Thompson submachine guns (firing pins removed for this shoot) from a nearby city police station, I arranged for a deputy sheriff to secure the location (mostly due to the weapons on set), I bought a fog machine, booked my makeup artist, and made someone in charge of making sure his wardrobe stayed looking good. Additionally, I stationed someone at each light to "hold onto it with your life". The last thing I needed was a light falling on Sherman or the car.
Sherman was in contact with me all week long about wardrobe (he sent back several suits) and his agent also called several times with questions. Everyone was very excited. The pressure was on but thankfully the last thing I was worried about was my gear. I was confident that between the 85L, 1Ds2, and White Lightnings I was using the best gear in the business. All I needed to get the shots I wanted was for everyone to show up. Well everyone showed up...
C&C welcome! I ended up doing very little post processing. Pretty much what you see is what we shot. I tried a few different vintage color looks, but didn't feel they really added much.
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1. Have water on set for everyone. Sherman got thirsty and I had nothing to offer.
2. Smoke is hard to work with. Bring a fan that will blow the smoke where you want it. Being subtle with smoke is key. I didn't want it to look like something was on fire. I wanted it to look like maybe a gun battle had just ended.
3. Limit the flash photography allowed on set. EVERYONE brought a camera and when I started snapping they started snapping which resulted in a paparazzi style batch of flash bulbs popping.
4. Make everyone take their picture with your celebrity before hand. At the end he was tired and didn't really want to pose for pictures with everyone (though he did without complaint).
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