Technique Tuesday: Classical Lighting Las Vegas Style

Good Morning Everybody,

We landed in Orlando, Florida safe and sound yesterday, got settled into our hotel and set out to explore the city.  Readers of this blog know that sometimes I “wax fantastic” over special restaurants we find in some of the cities we visit. 

Well today, let me point you to one of our favorites in Orlando.  It's called Season's 52 and is just sensational in the flavors they manage to put on a plate.  Hey, I don't want this to end up being a restaurant review today, but if you are reading this and are down here at Photoshop World, go check it out.  It's just a few miles away up Sand Lake Road - yummy.

OK, time to get on with today's post.  Here we go...

Classical Lighting At The Westcott Booth

You know, everybody wants to look  good in front of the camera.  That surely includes all the brides in the world with their weddings coming up this year.  We all know there are lots of photographers vying for the opportunity to shoot their weddings too. 

But what gives us the advantage on possibly having a better chance to book those weddings. Maybe our secret ingredient could be knowing something the masters of art years ago knew.  Yes, I’m talking about the Renaissance painters of that golden age.  They knew how to make people look good.

You know, I hear it all the time - people just don't want to stand around getting poked, prodded, and posed on their wedding day.  And so many photogs have jumped on that bandwagon and now lots of wedding photography looks very similar. 

Sure there are some great shooters out there turning out some striking images. What sets them apart from the "running and gunning" wedding photographer?  Many times it lies in the fact that those photographers capturing those beautiful images knows the secrets of the masters.

So what are those secrets? Let me show you, thanks to the Camera DoJo [link], Kerry Garrison. While at WPPI a few weeks ago, I was doing booth demos for my good friends at Westcott, the makers of some of my favorite lighting gear. As I'm doing my "Classical Lighting" demo, I see fellow blogging buddy, Kerry, in the audience - complete with video camera in tow.  And, he's pointing the darn thing at ME!

Anyway, I didn't mind at all.  The incident let's me take the really easy way out for this week's Technique Tuesday.  I'm just going to share with you Kerry's video which he featured at his CameraDojo.com site [link].  In it I show the three main "classical views of the face" - the secret of the Renaissance masters for making people look good.

Below is Kerry's video.  Remember, we are at a tradeshow and the sound is not going to be perfect - it drops out now and then.  That still does not impair the visual lessons I'm trying to teach to our tradeshow audience.  So why don't you give it a peek below.

Kerry has a lot more videos where that one came from too. Here is the link to the rest of the Camera Dojo's video library.  Enjoy!

Oh, BTW, I did a similar Technique Tuesday a few years ago demonstrating what I'm showing "live" in today's video.  Here is the link to that very popular video right here.

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Hey gang, that's it for me today.  I'm charging the batteries and polishing my lenses for today's Wedding Shootout.  I've got something new I'm trying today - let's just call it the Z-Cloud effect.  Now I've got you guessing, don't i? You'll have to wait and see - that is, if all works out;~) Anyway, I still hope to have some great shots to share with you this week.

Adios, -David