Studio Photography, The Story Behind the Picture
A fantasy bunny mask look with the very sexy Mishel who has lovely long blonde hair which worked out great for my shots. I wanted to shoot what I thought would be a sort of fantasy look with the black and white stripes. If you had seen another shot I had done with Playboy® Playmate Barbara Moore on a swing you would have seen a similar corset & stockings before. I am big on using props as much as I can get away with. When you spend money on outfits you have to get the best out of them and stockings are easy to keep using if you take care of them. The model was the one that came with the shoes so that’s a new twist and I had the gloves to add to the look. These images were shot on a white backdrop with a ring light to get a look that I could work with, I took the image into Adobe® Photoshop and used some filters on it for the look you see here. I used a Canon 60D with a Tamron lens Zoom 28-75mm F6.3 1/125sce ISO 200 My real focal length was 40mm I find that a lot of the time if I shoot 3/4 images or full length I am at 40mm. That is why I have a 50mm stm lens that I like to use most of the time. On a crop censer it looks about an 85mm which would be on a full frame, but it really is a waste of time thinking about what the focal length is as it’s...
Playboy Playmate, Studio Photography, The Story Behind the Picture
In these shots of Playboy® Playmate Irina Voronina for Maxim online I set up a white backdrop with some silver cards to add some dimension and interest to the shot. The white back drop needed to be white so I had two lights facing the backdrop they would be behind the cards so I would not have any light bouncing back onto the model. You have to keep the lights bright but not to over exposed or you will have some flair that will come back onto the model. I would say the best way is to have them about 1-1/2 stops of light brighter than your front lights. Now with the cards on each side it made for a nice look of depth in the shots. Just have your model stand between them and then light her up with the use of some front light. You can use a ring light or soft box. I would not use round lights or modifiers as they will show up as a hot spot on the cards. So tall softbox would be the hot ticket or as I said I used a ring light. A ring light would that not make a hot spot because its in line with the model and she is stopping the light from showing up as I hot reflection. Now the nice thing about the cards is that they will reflect back light to light up the model from behind so you will not see a shadow, the white backdrop also helps with this as well. Working with a Playboy® Playmate Like Irina will help get...
Playboy Playmate, Studio Photography, The Story Behind the Picture
This Playmate Poster story behind the picture is about coming up with an idea for a Signature poster of the lovely Playboy® Playmate Neriah Davis. I had seen an image of the famous movie star Brigitte Bardot and thought I could use this as a guide for one of my own idea’s something simple and sexy as I was shooting a Playmate. When you shoot for a poster company or for any one that you think will need to make a decision (Pick a shot) of what they think it's best to come up with more than one idea. My first idea was the Brigitte Bardot sitting on the floor topless with black stockings on, Neriah would have to cover her boobs to be able for the poster to be sold to the public. My other idea was to have her against a red backdrop in satin underwear. Each of these shot were going to be in the studio so I would have to come up with similar lighting that would work for each so that I could have them done in a one day shoot. The sitting on the floor shot was with a white backdrop and a nice shinny floor for some reflection as I did not want it to look like she had been cut out and was floating. The Red back drop shot was with a satin cloth draped from a rod across some back-ground stands. This shot was only going to be a ¾ shot so I did not have to do anything about a floor. The lighting was almost the same for...
Playboy Playmate, Studio Photography, The Story Behind the Picture
My big tip when working with a model is talk and assist them in pose’s don’t just let the model go. I am fortunate to have a seasoned Playboy® Playmate to work with on this shoot, Barbara has many poses that she has used from her ongoing work with Playboy® and other photo assignments, that is what helps make a seasoned model. This story is about how I set up a swing and made my images look like a trapeze artist with Playboy® Playmate Barbara Moore. My first thoughts were how to go about making it safe to be on a swing and what outfit I should use. When working on a new project or set of images one of the things I like to do is think of the story line & have a starting point and an end point. You don’t just shoot and hope for the best shots to show up it’s not luck of the draw. I did find a corset which was black and white striped & I also found some stocking’s that had black and white strips on them. I had a white bower and white shoes that also went well together so things were looking good for the outfit. Now for the swing, I made it out of plywood and covered it with foam and black cloth I had drilled holes in each corner for the ropes to go through and twisted the two on each side together into one cord on each side leading up to clips that would go to rings that were in the rafters in the celling of...
Penthouse Pet, Studio Photography, The Story Behind the Picture
I received a lot of e-mail requesting how to work with a ring-light and why would you use one. Shown below (image) is the right light I use and as you can see it’s got a large strobe light inside the front part of the product. The strobe is behind a plastic window which in my opinion is a good thing as its protected if you happen to knock it. Also, inside are some LED’s which you can switch on to use as a modeling lights which help's you to see your subject, and the LEDs have 3 different brightness. This will not affect the strobe light exposure as that has a lot more power than the LEDs. On the back, there is a power on button and also a way to control the amount of power by moving the ring dial around & as you do this it goes up and down in third stop incremental to adjustable the power. The total power output is 400ws. There is also a test button to make sure that the light is working. It has a big battery on the bottom which you charge up with a transformer. Having a battery makes this strobe portable so it’s a go any were light. On the side, you have a way to plug into the strobe to sink it with your camera, one is a PC cord input and one is a USB, there is also included a socket for a remote control. I like to use a PC cord which then connects to my camera by the hot shoe mount, sometimes...
Playboy Playmate, Studio Photography, The Story Behind the Picture
I had so many e-mail requests to shoot another sexy image of Playboy® Playmate Carrie Stevens that I thought I would go back to my bunny series and shoot another bunny idea with her. This time I would shoot on a black backdrop and the challenge was to get the model to stand out away from the background with some rim lighting. So, in these shot’s I used blue light for a bit of a Rock & Roll theme. I asked Carrie if she would be up for another bunny look, which she said she would love to do. I set up a black back drop and placed two strip lights on each side of her behind were she would be standing. I needed the Carrie to be well away from the backdrop so that the front light would drop off and not light up any of the black backdrop as I wanted it to stay black or have a wash of the blue light. In the two strips lights I had placed a blue gels over the lights so that they would kick out the blue light. I then had a ring light set up to the front of her for my main light. The exposure was F8 at 125sec ISO 200 for the front light and the back-side lights were about ½ a stop brighter and with the back lights pointed right at the camera we had to look out for flare. So, we used some cards on each side of her to stop this from happening. The camera I use for the shoot was a Canon...
