Here are some “behind the scenes” photos, taken by our friend D.J. Ellis, one of hottest photographers in the nation, of Stephanie and the group in Seattle this past week.  D.J., you are the bomb dude!

All the gang hanging out after a long day of shooting. The next crop of "World's Best"?

Learning from Master Yoda himself, Jim Garner. "Wedding Photographer World's Best He Is"

The group being tutored on night shots

Stephanie "chillin" with her gnomies after a long day on the beautiful beach

Nuff said. "Watch out world, here they come!" (This almost looks like a promo for 'Survivor - Wedding Photographer'.)

Stephanie just sent me a few more pictures from her workshop there in beautiful Seattle, WA.  She learned a lot but Jana and I are looking forward to her return back to the studio!  Check out all the latest Wedding Photographs on our website…

What beautiful and dynamic colors in this shot, and the contrasting long white veil really leads the eye to the bride.

Stephanie really used the sunset here to capture a very romantic shot.

The birch treeline subtly brings in the white to guide your eye directly to these smooching lovebirds. Gorgeous colors.

Excellent use of a new lighting technique to get just the right amount of light on our subject without washing out the panoramic view of the Puget Sound.

Have a great weekend everyone!

On day 3, we spend quite a bit of time reviewing & retouching of Whidbey Island Images and using the tools within Photoshop CS3 (many that some didn’t know were there).  It was a very helpful session, on how to use the tools without making the pictures look over-done or air brushed.  Here are some shots of the gorgeous area around Whidbey Island…

The afternoon session was all regarding the business side of things an excellent 2 hour session on enhancing the client experience (which Tim and I believe is the most important part of any service provider!). Keep watching for more shots from the workshop.

Stay tuned.  (Yes, my brain is FULL )

Wednesday was a day of “Photoshopping”.  We were  critiqued on album layouts of our Wedding photos yesterday from Downtown Seattle that we designed, mine went well, suggestions were made by all the other professionals which (in my case) really improved and fine-tuned the spread.  There is a lot of truth in having “an extra set of eyes” to look at things.  I am getting some one on one with Jim today on Photoshop, which I am looking forward to.  I also enjoyed learning some advanced tips and tricks with layering and blending that will really proved to be helpful.  

At 6pm to Dark, we had our Evening Photo Shoot Workshop, then at 10pm, a Fireside Dinner & Dessert right on the beach.  What a day!  I’ll add some of the Evening Photo Shoot shots with tomorrow’s post. 

I have to tell you that this beach house where Jim is hosting this private workshop is just outside of Seattle on Puget Sound and it is beautiful. It has 130 feet of low bank waterfront and is walking distance from the beautiful Deception Pass Bridge and State Park.  Westerly views from the house are of the Olympic Mountain Range and San Juan Islands. You can see it is a gorgeous place by taking a photo tour here -  www.surfcrestbeachhouse.com . 

Today has just been loaded with tons of information, with Jim’s wife Katarina also teaching on her part of the business, so needless to say it’s been busy and lots of fun! This is a total luxury, 1st class workshop and just a great experience all the way around.  I highly recommend it.

Stay tuned for those Evening Photo Shoot photo’s and more from Day 3 tomorrow!

Well, I couldn’t be more tired and my brain is full.

What a great day we had starting with a morning classroom session that took us through direction on workflow as well as Story Shooting presentation, goals and guidelines. [a great session!].  The afternoon was spent shooting models at a couple of fantastic Seattle locations downtown.  Emphasis on lighting and emotion can’t help but make us better at doing what we love, capturing couples at their best on their wedding day.  I can’t wait until tomorrow! 

Here are just a couple shots from around Seattle today…

Fun, fun, fun!!!  More tomorrow. 

Stephanie, along with our good friend Dawn Shields, will be in Seattle, WA, from July 21-July 28 for this extraordinary workshop hosted by Jim and Katarina Garner.  For those of you that didn’t hear, Jim Garner was voted by American Photo Magazine as “One Of The Top 10 Wedding Photographers In The World!”.  What an honor.  We look forward to Stephanie’s daily comments and pictures during this week as the 10 photographers attending this special workshop learn first hand from Jim tips and techniques on posing, dramatic lighting, contemporary imaging techniques, night shooting, as well as the backside of the business such as workflow, Photoshop, album design, and a host of other unique services that we can offer to you dear brides.  It should be a great week, check back daily starting this Wednesday for updates and photos from Stephanie on how it’s going!

For those of you that haven’t seen Jim and his teams work, here is a sample. You can see he deserves it. Congratulations Jim!!…

Stay tuned for more, beginning every day starting this Wednesday! 

Are you looking for the type of images you would get if you went to a “traditional” portrait studio downtown in your home town? Or are you looking for more “cutting edge” or avant gard styles? Something you might see in fashion magazines? Something else?  I recommend a book that our good friend and fellow photographer Jim Downing sent us some time back written by Gary Bernstein. It is probably one of the best books on lighting you will ever read on use of light, light metering, camera settings, lenses, exposures, and composition, shows photographs of models, celebrities, and individuals, and describes the composition and lighting of each portrait in easy to understand diagrams.

• Color or black & White or both?
• Individuals or groups? Any specific age-range of subjects?
• Head shots? Head and Shoulders? Bust? Waist-up? Full length?

The feature of this book that makes it so worthwhile to me is that it breaks down exactly how to light a portrait and teaches you how to look at other portraits that you like and try to figure out the lighting that was used. Look at the catchlights in the eyes. The direction the nose and eyebrow shadows fall. The length of the shadows, etc, etc, the real “psychology of portrait lighting” and interaction with the subject.
 

When Jim told me about this book and that he studied it back in college in the 80’s, I thought, “how dated can this be”?  But he sent it to me, and I have to admit he was right, again!  This book is like a university education on professional lighting techniques in your hand.  You may get more exercises and assignments from paying big bucks at a university for this training, but the principles are all right here in this fantastic book at a fraction of the price. 

You may have a hard time finding a copy, I think it’s out of print.  To be helpful, here is a search via Amazon to find used copies [much more reasonable] :  Availability on Amazon – Click Here  ISBN: 0-89586-269-7

I hope this is helpful, let me know if you have a copy and how you like it.  Our readers will appreciate your comments about it.

Happy shooting this weekend!

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Tim and I love cities. Being from New York, the hustle and bustle of inner city life (while not for everyone) does provide great areas that are so interesting to spend time in – both on a personal level but also photographically.

Some people might be a little depressed by the greyness of concrete, towering skyscrapers and graffiti covered decaying walls (Tim’s favorite!) – but I find them full of photographic potential.

Urban Landscape Photography looks for these photographic possibilities in the cities and and urban areas where we live and work. Urban Landscape photography is often gritty, it’s not always pretty and it can be quite abstract.  Very cool, especially for portraiture!

Following are 10 tips to help you improve your urban landscape photography [You can also email and sign up for one of our "Urban Photography Workshop" starting this fall in Kansas City - space is limited to 6 people per outing for maximum benefit. Only 5 openings remain]

1. Take a Variety of Lenses

I find that taking two lenses with me is usually enough for urban photography. I prefer to take one wide angle lens and a zoom with a fair bit of length to it. Longer focal lengths are useful for capturing the details of a decaying buildings or street scene detail elements that add ‘real’ character to a shot. Wide angle lenses are great for capturing the big picture and they tend to give a bigger depth of field which can add interest and a nice feel to your shots.

2. Other Gear to Take

The gear you take on an urban landscape shoot will of course reflect your own style of photography (and budget) but in addition to the above two lenses and DSLR I sometimes take a tripod if I’m going to shoot into the evening, polarising filters, UV filters, sling style camera bag (I use a Shootsac bag which I find gives me the access I need as well as being reasonably inconspicuous, spare batteries (a MUST!) and I generally take my external flash with me (although I don’t use it as much for landscape shots – it’s there more if I find a good portrait opportunity).

3. Look for Contrasts

One of the things that Tim and I love about cities is the diversity that you can find there – both in terms of the  people (it’s where all types come together) as well as visual diversity in the sites you’ll see there. Look for and capture the contrasts between architectural styles, building materials, colors etc and you’ll end up with some very interesting shots.  Shoot from elevated and ground levels to add extra dimension to your subject, you may be surprised with one of the most artful shots of your career!

4. Urban Portraiture

A constant challenge for urban landscape photographers is that cities are places where people naturally gather.  There’s nothing wrong with people but in urban photographs they do tend to become the focal point of shots whether you want them to be or not. Our thoughts on people in urban photography is that you either work  with the fact that there are people in the shots and use them as a focal point or if possible they need to be eliminated from the shot – there’s not really too much middle ground. One way of eliminating people from shots is to shoot on weekends or after work hours. Ultimately when it comes to whether to include people in a shot or not I ask myself the questions ‘are they relevant to the shot?’ and ‘do they add or take away from the composition?’. If they add something – include them. If they distract -  get rid of them.  Patience is needed in most of these settings, so just prepare yourself.

5. Evidence of People

If you choose to take the approach of eliminating people from your shots they almost always still live in the shots by the things that they leave there. Urban landscapes don’t always include people directly but speak about the way we live (both good and bad). It can be very powerful to look for the evidence of people in a landscape and to feature this in your shots. In doing so you add layers of interest and make your photos more dynamic.

6. Research, Research, Research Your Locations

Urban landscape photography might seem like a pretty spontaneous thing (and at times it can be) but many of the most spectacular shots are a result of very careful planning. [Tim and I may spend hours scouring a specific area looking for angles, nooks, checking lighting, and visualizing "unseen" angles, etc]  It’s amazing how a location can change depending upon the time of day (as a result of angles of light especially) so scout out potential locations at different times of the day and consider returning to the same location over time to see what else it might offer. In terms of what time of day is ‘best’ to photograph – it really has a lot to do with the locations, but our preference is late afternoon, early evening (an hour or so before dusk) or on days which are  overcast but where it’d not too dark.

7. Look for Themes

While there is real diversity in urban areas there are also many recurring themes of life. For instance recently in New York at the New York Photo Festival, Tim and I saw lots of urban landscapes that explored the places people lived in different Burroughs of the city – it was a series of simple city scenes bridged together bay using neighborhood elements ranging from park benches, to converted warehouses, to old period homes. Seeing them all side by side was quite powerful.

8. Shoot into the Evening

Cities change incredibly as evening comes and the lights go on. What can be a drab or featureless scene can quickly become something with a lot of character and mood. As mentioned in tip 6 above, we enjoy shooting in the twilight zone between day and night as there is still light in the sky but you also get the impact of city lights – result?  Very dramatic images!  This also requires patience, mentioned in tip 4, you have to want it, which means waiting for it on occasion. 

9. Explore Different City Zones

One thing that fascinates me about cities is the differences in the feel and sites that you can witness from area to area. Within a block or two  you can move from a business district or commercial zone to a gritty, run down industrial zone or a trendy inner city residential or shopping area. Many urban landscape photographers have a preference for one or more of these types of areas but if you’re just starting out it can be worth experimenting with exploring the possibilities that each of these areas can present you with.

 CAUTION: Please, keep in mind that not all areas of cities are always safe – sometimes for this reason it can be wise to shoot with others.

10. Finding the Urban in the Suburban or Rural

Don’t live close to a “urban metro area”?  That’s ok, most of what I’ve written about can be explored in the suburbs and even smaller towns as really urban landscapes document and explore the places where people live and gather – bid or small.  For example, we shot Raul & Erin’s engagement session in a single back downtown alleyway in small Monett, Missouri, population around 5000.  With the use of all these 10 tips, check out how the shots came out here.  Believe me, with a little imagination, you can give your photo’s (no matter where you are) an urban, gritty, modern, artful flair! 
 

I’d love to hear your feedback on these tips and if you have something you use that you’d like to share with us.  We’d love to hear it.  Remember – email and sign up for one of our “Urban Photography Workshop” starting this fall in Kansas City, we’ll show you how to put all these tips into real life application and make it very profitable for your business. [Only 5 openings remain]

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Check out these extreme portraits Stephanie  took while working two days with master photographer Bambi Cantrell there at WPPI in Las Vegas.  Stephanie told me via email:

Bambi has given me a new zeal for shakin’ things up in the  photography field!  Our theme for this session was fantasy portraits – A walk on the wild side. Gorgeous models with creative use of style, design, and art with body painting were used to help us step outside of our regular shooting realm to seek creative ways to light our subjects in a relatively short amount of time, which challenged us creatively.  It was a fantastic time.  Only 20 students per master photographer were allowed (not chosen)  in each 2 day session.  I can’t wait to apply some of these advanced techniques on our future portrait sessions, especially with our Seniors!

Looks and sounds like we are in for some exciting shots from Stephanie, I can’t wait.  Thanks Bambi for the tips!