Let’s talk about how to prepare to go on location as you can’t take too much gear if it’s a small assignment. I received an e-mail from Yvette Kingston, AKA Yvette Nelson about going on location in the Malibu Hills for a shoot. Yvette informed me that she had found some great places in the Malibu Hills and thought it would make for some great images. I always enjoy working with Yvette & as you guys might know she use to be the number one “Fredricks of Hollywood model”.
We set up a date to shoot and I went about preparing for what I would need to bring for the shoot on that location. I would need my full frame camera and an 85mm lenes, plus a backup lens a Tamron 28-75mm and a second body just in case anything went sideways as when you are on a location away from the studio or car you need to make sure you have some backup items as it’s a bit of a drag if something happens! This also includes more than two SD cards.
I also included a point and shoot Canon G15 that I would use for some video when I was shooting, I would put it on a tripod so I could set it up and let it film me shooting and I would not need to bring anyone else. I was able to get all my gear into one of my small camera bags that I could strap to myself as I was not going to bring an assistant for this shoot.
I did bring my ring light with me as that would be my main light, I was going to be using the sunlight as my highlights for back lighting and background light. Picking the right time of the day (4.30pm Winter time) was also in the mix as you don’t want to shoot mid-day with the sun beaming down on you and your model. I set my f-Stop 4.5 @ 1/125 with an ISO of 100 this way I was guaranteed to keep my backgrounds out of focus (Bokeh)
On the way to the locations that Yvette we walked by a spot that had some long golden grass which looked great so I put that thought in my head for on the way back as I had with me some Jeans from a shoot that I did some time back and they let me keep the jeans so I was thinking a sort of groovy look with some glass’s which are the images you see here. We stoped off at the first location and it looked fabulous and we set up to shoot. Yvette put on one of the outfits she had and we got the shots done, we then moved onto the next spot and Yvette got into the next outfit it all went off without any issues. On the way back we shot my groovy jeans images.
Here is some advice for models who would like to shoot images like this, if you can send some images of the clothes that you think you want to shoot in to your photographer so they know what your looks will be. Also have a good idea of how you are going to pose, look at some magazines to see what’s happening with some of the top models and how they do they’re poses.
