Black Light Halloween Photos

      It's that time again. Each year we create our Halloween photo project. This year's theme was "Blacklight". Yes, just like the posters us old people had on the walls when we were young. This was the same premise, but not with ink, we used UV Makeup to make these portraits come to life. 

Black Light Halloween Fairy 

      The process started with me, painting each of us with regular black makeup (skin has a glow under UV light, so I had to cover most of it up). Then I layered a combination of different makeup colors, based on the design I had drawn up earlier.

Black Light Halloween Scarecrow

I tried to come up with a different color pattern for the three of us, to make us as unique as possible. Each person took about 2 1/2 hours to apply the makeup and only about 30 minutes to shoot the photos. There is very little post processing in Adobe Lightroom. I didn't need to use Photoshop at all. 

Black light Halloween Clown

      We are all illuminated by a custom made ring light equipped with (8) 25 Watt Fluorescent Blacklights (pictures included of the rig below). This provided enough light to capture the photos at a decent camera setting for detail.

      I wanted to make a video this time because I didn't think people would think it was real (i.e. photoshopped) unless they saw it for themselves.

I hope you enjoy this year's photos. If you have any questions, please leave them below. FYI, I'm already working on next year.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Black light Halloween Fairy

Black Light Halloween Scarecrow

Black Light Halloween Clown

Family Shoot in Utah

After an amazing week out west, I got the chance to shoot some personal family photos in some of the Utah State Parks. There are some spectacular views everywhere you look, so it was not that hard to find a great place to explore and take some photos.

Harry Lester - Music Therapist

Harry is a singer / songwriter / music therapist and one amazing guitar player. Harry is currently working on his Master's degree and I am assisting him with his final project, a Music Therapy Instructional DVD. We decided to do some photos for the dvd menus and possible cover art.

Halloween Family Portrait 2014

We present our 2014 Halloween Portrait. This year's portrait was the most difficult one we have tried to date. We have done 7 portraits since 2008. The theme this year was Skeletons. I wanted to go a little less photoshop and a little more photographic style, but I ended with a pretty even amount of both. The makeup took the longest (almost three hours for the three of us). I did all of the makeup myself.

Halloween Portrait 2014

I went with a single light setup. White lightning 1600 in an octobox (Thanks Stan - stankaady.com ) at a 45 degree angle right above the subject with a black backdrop. It highlighted the face and made great shadows on the chin to emphasize the makeup. 

Sue in her Skeleton Pirate outfit.

Tyler in his Skeleton Warrior outfit.

I realized it is very difficult to try and shoot while wearing tons of makeup on your face. It's even harder to try and take a "selfie". It was one part of the process, I had not thought of. I was able to take good photos of my wife and son, but I was not quite satisfied with mine. Regardless, it was a great experience. Next time, I will plan better.

That's me as Papa Legba (Haitian Voodoo)

Time to start thinking of next years shoot!

Breanna Senior Photos

It was my pleasure to photography Breanna this past weekend for her senior pictures. This was her first photo shoot and she did a fantastic job. 

We started at her home in the late afternoon and later moved on to Sope Creek to pose by the old paper mill just outside of Atlanta. The weather was beautiful but hot.  It was a pretty good hike to get to the location, but it was worth it. The mills were very cool. We thought we might be in trouble when a group of high school kids were having a water gun and water balloon fight in the ruins, but they were cool and stayed well away from us while we were shooting.

Our last stop was Marietta Square and the sun was setting fast. When we arrived, I had forgotten how busy the square gets on the weekend. Lucky for us the "good light" was available away from the crowds and we got some great shots before the end of the day.

It was an adventurous shoot and Breanna and her mom enjoyed it, at least I think they did.