"Sneaking A Peak"

"Sneaking A Peak"
© David A. Ziser

This image is a bit of a "blast from the past". Any time you see them come up square, it usually means an image from the film days. That's the case with this image, but it is still one of my favorites.

I know I post a lot of dramatic pictorials, but 90-95% of the images I show the client are hopefully a great collection of spontaneous candid images - much like this one.

Here is the story. The girls were lined up and ready to walk down the aisle on the cue from the bridal consultant. The doors were just opened for the processional to begin. The little flower girls wanted to see what was happening and both leaned at the same time to "take a peek."

My Hasselblad was fitted with the 50mm Distagon lens. When I saw the girls lean over, I set the exposure quickly to get the shot. Even after all these years, the image still captures the spontaneous essence of the moment.

Camera specs; Hasselblad fitted with 50mm Distagon lens, F4 @ 1/30 second, Vericolor 400 film. Enjoy! –David

p.s. Hey gang, I’ll get the rest of Thursday’s post up tomorrow. A bad cold, a Bar Mitzvah shoot this afternoon, and a horrendous traffic jam getting back to the studio has kind of thrown a wrench into the works today.

All is good though – see ya’ tomorrow.

-David

"Blue Boy"

"Blue Boy"
© David A. Ziser

This is one of my favorite and most lasting images I have ever taken over the years. We were set up in the church basement during the reception – portrait background and lights in place.

I remember trying to get young Nicholas to smile and he just would have nothing of it. Even his dad was tying to coax him from behind my camera - still no luck. Finally his dad ordered Nicholas to do what he was told. He defiantly finally pushed his hands into his pockets, said “No”, and pouted back. I hit the shutter, and knew I had the shot.

Nicholas is now in his mid twenties and has his own little "ring bearers" running around the house. I had not seen Nicholas in 22+ years, but his fiancé call and both she and Nicolas came by and interviewed me to photograph their wedding. It would have been great shoot my most famous ringer bearer as a groom.

Camera specs: Medium format Hasselblad CM camera fitted with 150mm Sonar lens, F8.0 at 1/125 second, Kodak Vericolor 400 film 9ISO 400).  Enjoy!  David

"Somewhere in Time"

"Somewhere in Time"
©David A. Ziser

I get quite a few requests from my DPT readers asking me about my favorite wedding images.  Do I have a Top 10 list of my top all time images.  On Thursday of this week, I’m planning to review a few of those images with you.  This is one of those images.

It was taken a number of years ago in Rochester, New York.  I remember I captured the image in one of the city’s government buildings.  It was approximately 10 minutes after 12:00 noon and nearly all the civil servants had left the building on their lunch break – we practically had the building to ourselves.  The location was almost Romanesque with all its beautiful arches and columns.  What a great place for a wedding photograph!

I went up to the forth level asking the couple to stay on the second level.  Compositionally, I think the image is just striking.  I’ll talk more about how the image came together on Thursday.

Camera specs:  Hasselblad 500 CM fitted with 40mm Distagon lens, F8.0 @ 1/500 second, Vericolor 400 speed film.  Enjoy!  -David

"You Lookin’ At Me”

"You Lookin’ At Me”
©David A. Ziser

OK, I know the title paraphrases Robert De Niro in “Taxi Driver” but I thought it fit this photograph. This is an image I did several years ago while on a trip to Australia.  I was doing a few workshops and we got to work at some great locations.

I remember this being on the steps of one of the imposing government buildings in downtown, Melbourne.  What I remember most about this location was that is was a very overcast day, but more specifically, how dark the concrete walls and steps were.

The steps were a perfect “prop” for my super wide angle portrait of this young man. I placed the 40mm lens on my Hasselblad, gave the steps dominate billing in my viewfinder, and shot away.  The first shot was quite bland because of the flat lighting and dark background.  I had one strobe with me and it was set up to fire remotely.  I thought that instead of using it as a key light coming in from camera right, as so often would do, it would better serve me by using my strobe as a backlight (at 100 w.s.) to really define and separate the young man from the very dark background. 

I think this was the best approach for this image.  The strong leading lines of the steps add the impact that I wanted for this shot.  And, the backlight worked it’s magic in spotlighting the main subject.

Camera specs (to the best of my knowledge):   Hasselblad 503C medium format camera fitted with Distagon 40mm super wide angle lens (89 degrees field of view or 24mm - 35mm equivalent), F5.6 @ 1/125 second, Kodak Ektacolor 400 film, ISO 400.  Enjoy!  -David

"Waiting For My Bride"

"Waiting For My Bride"
©David A. Ziser

I dug deep into the archives for today's image.  So deep, in fact, this is a film image - oh my!  Hey, all kidding aside, I still like this image for it's composition and impact.  The architecture and design of the church sanctuary really complimented the fisheye effect you see in this photograph.  The thing about using fisheye lenses is this.  If the background is full of circles, arches, and bending lines already, the fisheye effect is somewhat disguised.  In this case, not only was it disguised but it really added to the impact of the shot. Lighting is coming from camera left from my 200 watt second strobe at 1/4 power about 10 feet away.  I was of course shooting through my translucent umbrella to soften the light on the subject.  The "kick light" on the back of his head was the result of the light pouring in from the stained glass window out of camera range, camera right. With the groom in quadrant #4, bottom right, I think we achieved a pretty dramatic image.  Camera specs:  Hasselblad 503 C fitted with 30mm Distagon lens, F 5.6 @ 1/15 second, Kodak Vericolor 800 film (ISO 800). Enjoy! David

How Many Megs - Hasselblad's New 39 meg Offering

Hasselblad may have already hit 39 megapixels more than a year ago, but that doesn't make the company's new H3D II DSLR any less impressive. Here is a quick story about Hasselblad's latest offering. I was a big Hassey shooter years ago - back in my film days, and loved, loved, loved their system. Now they have one of the hotest digital systems available. You can check it out here.