Biography | Crockett Website | Tutorial 1: Jennie
by Will Crockett |
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Meet Bull.
A photo session at ShootSmarter University with photographer Will Crockett Bull is a professional armwrestler, a local bar owner, and a really nice guy. No kidding, he’s cool. Bull needed a photo of his “bad self” for a large print we will be making for his bar wall so we invited him to come on up to the studios for a shoot one night during our recent 4 day digital workflow class at ShootSmarter University. The students were eager to watch and to help out during the shoot as we clicked through a few of my favorite Tamron lenses mounted up on our Fuji S3’s to create a pile (over 200) FINE jpeg files. This full length shot is my favorite from the session and it was made using the Tamron SP AF28-75mm F/2.8 XR Di short zoom using strobe and just a touch, or should I say smear of ambient light from the studio and modeling lamps. If you look carefully, you can see a feint glow of amber light in the window in the upper right and just off the handlebars. This is a fun technique I like to use to take some edge off of a zippy shot, and is done by shooting at a 1/2 second exposure and moving the camera a bit using the rear curtain sync feature on DSLRs. |
Next we had Bull throw a leg over the Harley and we switched over to the Tamron SP AF180mm F/3.5 for some tight shots and came away with this winner below using hard strobe light from the left mixed with the overall smooth light from the 10x20 foot Chimera F2 bank that lives in the ceiling of this studio. This long 180mm lens is good not only for getting in tight on shoots like these, but the compression or “flattening” of the handlebars to the subject and wall is a great tool for boiling down the compositional elements in a photo. |
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To wrap up the shoot, we had some fun! I changed to the SP AF14mm F/2.8 lens and worked right next to Bull to capture some different expressions and “looks” to get a few really terrific images like this one of this rough and tumble biker with a heart of gold. The 14mm is a great way for me to get a little creative, work tight with my subject and add dimension to photo shots like these. Bull is very pleased with the images, ordered a bunch of prints, and has become a pal of mine and a favorite of my staff. So if you’re looking for a way to expand your creative eye, or looking for a way to boost print sales, why not try changing lenses during a shoot instead of locking in to only one zoom range. It sure helps me to turn a big ole studio into my own custom digital canvas.
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