No Flash In The Pan!!

Until fairly recently I had used some cheap ebay triggers for studio and location work which worked fine the majority of the time but became increasingly frustrated with the number of misfires I was getting – you get what you pay for I guess.  I replaced these with a set of Yongnuo RF603 triggers which were a real improvement and my misfire problems were a thing of the past.  A friend of mine Stu Glen was in raptures about a set of Pixel Kings he had recently bought and the virtues of High speed Sync (HSS) which worked with both hot shoe flashes and studio strobes.  I was close to investing in a set but then read that Yongnuo were about to release a similar trigger, the YN-622C, the rest as they say is history!!

These are my thoughts, admittedly based upon one location shoot, about the new trigger.  The   YN 622C is a fairly substantial piece of kit and solidly built with a metal hot shoe attachment.  It is a 2 way transceiver with seven channels and 3 flash groupings available.  Functions available include TTL ratio control, manual selection of power output for different groups and HSS.  The unit runs on 2 AA batteries, has an on off switch together with controls for group and channel setting and a test button, something I missed having on the 603.

My main motivation was to use these on location with my Bowens lights / Travelpak set up so I headed out with the lovely Sharon to try them out in the field.  Set up is a doddle with one trigger locked on to the camera, secured with a locking screw, with the other attached to the Bowens Gemini 500 strobe via a cable which screws into the side of the unit.  The units worked really well throughout the shoot, firing faultlessly, though to be fair the camera to flash distances were not too demanding.  Towards the end of the shoot I really pushed the HSS,  or Super Sync as they call it, and the images posted were all shot at f1.4 and between 1/2000 and 1/4000 sec,  iso 100, which obviously throws up a lot of creative possibilities for future shoots.  So a really promising start and to say I was pleased with their performance is an understatement, will hopefully get to shoot a lot more with them before the winter weather finally arrives.

 

Just Dance

Recently had an enquiry from Jade who is currently in her final year of dance training at Bird College in London.  Jade wanted some images that she could use for upcoming auditions with a few fun ones thrown in for herself.  The shoot took place at Banana Studio in Newcastle with Alex Pretswell on hand to do hair and make up.   I really enjoyed working with her, although she was a little nervous at the start she quickly settled into the pace of the shoot and produced some really elegant, powerful poses that showed her athleticism and grace.  Shooting these images has inspired me to do some more dance related stuff and that has been put on my to do list for 2012.

Goldigger

Recently, I was asked to take part in a shoot with Durham based MUA Ashleigh Reid by model Jenny Clewlow.  Ashleigh was in the middle of planning a series of images based around the 7 Deadly Sins.  The shoot was to take place at Penshaw Monument on what turned out to be an absolutely freezing day!!  The brief was trying to get an image of a WAG caught in the act of burying her ex!!  Ashleigh was great to work with, really well prepared and Jenny looked a bit too handy with that shovel for my liking!!  Great way to spend an afternoon, despite the cold.

Kirstie – Fashion and Beauty Shoot

Kirstie Fashion and Portrait shoot

After the Marlena shoot we had to come back for more!!  Once again I had the services of Julie Ann Pattinson as MUA and stylist and this time Kirstie as the model.  I first met Kirstie through a friend of hers who I had worked with before, she had not really done any modelling before, and had no real desire to pursue it as a career, but wanted to give it a go and see how it turned out.  As you can see she has a great look and proved to be an absolute natural.  Fortunately for me she really enjoyed the shoot and we ended up shooting several more times over the following months.  We worked through a series of ideas, one of which included her being buried in a mound of autumnal leaves which I had collected a couple of days before the shoot and dried out on the conservatory floor, unfortunately the odd spider remained which did cause one or two slightly hairy moments!!  It was a long day and we shot for around seven hours with only a short break for one of my legendary sandwiches 🙂  Had a great feeling of satisfaction following the shoot though and a real sense of achievement.  Big thank you to both Kirstie and Julie for their patience, good humour and expertise which just made the whole thing so much fun.

New Business Cards

Well i thought it was about time that I had some new business cards so I started looking around for a supplier.  A couple of people had recommended Moo.  What I really liked about them is that you can choose as many images as you want for your cards, up to a maximum of 50,  at no extra cost.  The interface is easy to use and the whole thing was very straightforward.  Delivery was within 3 days with the cards packaged in a smart presentation case.  The quick grab shot here doesn’t really do justice to the quality of the print, suffice to say I’m very happy with them and will be ordering some new ones soon to reflect different areas of my work.