Flashback: Recently, my wife and I were having lunch and I told her that I was having trouble coming up with a new theme for Tuesday posts and she suggested “Tricky Tuesday” as a way to share some of the different tricks, tips and techniques I’ve used over the years inside the studio and outside ir. Here’s another try at this new theme…
Today’s Post by Joe Farace
According to OkCupid’s Nerd, Geek, or Dork Test, a Nerd is described as someone who is passionate about learning/being smart/academia. By comparison, a geek, according to the modern interpretation of the term—let’s not go back to any long past definition—is someone who is passionate about some particular area of expertise or subject, often an obscure or difficult one.
I’ve always been somewhat of a Geek, myself
Another, definition from techtarget.com, a geek is a person who is inordinately dedicated to and involved with technology. In some circles, it’s considered a compliment to be called a geek because the term implies a high level of competence. Me? I started my professional life as an engineer and became fascinated with ussing computers initially working with punch cards and main frame systems during the late 1960’s, later moving onto time-shared computers, paper tape and Teletype machines. long before any desktop machines wee available. When I bought my first computer, an Apple II Plus in 1980 the person at the Credit Union where I got the loan for it asked, “whatever do you need a computer for?” After I was the third person in Colorado to get an original 128K Macintosh, the die was cast. Which brings me to…
…the subject of today’s featured portrait—Ms. Erin Valakari, She’s a computer expert who might consider herself to be a geek and is a cosplayer but more than all of that she is a beautiful person, not just the fact that she’s a gorgeous model but a down-to-earth beautiful-on-the-inside person as well.
Over the five years, we worked together on fifteen portrait and glamour shoots where she and I created more than 5,000 images. During those brief and shinning moments, Erin was a true muse to me and each and every one of those thousands of images are is more wonderful than the next.
How I made this portrait
For this particular portrait. I photographed Erin in my home studio in the clothes that she walked into my home wearing. I loved them! The choices of what she’s wearing, I think, shows her true personality. The camera used was the 36.4-megapixel Pentax K-1 Mark II with a Pentax-D FA 28-105mm f/3.5-5.6 ED DC WR lens (at 58mm.) The exposure was 1/100 sec at f/10 and ISO 200.
Lighting for the portrait was provided by a blue Paul C. Buff DigiBee DB800 monolight with Plume Ltd Wafer softbox attached and used as the main light. It was placed at camera right. An Alien Bee B800 monolight with 16 x 30-inch (40 x 76cm) Westcott Apollo Strip soft box was located at camera left with another (red) DigiBee with a 48-inch (122 cm) Dynalite Quad Square black/silver umbrella that was placed in the back far left corner of the studio space. The background was Silverlake Photo Accessories’ Carbonite muslin backdrop that was suspended from my JTL background stands.
Erin’s pose probably violates every rule “the experts” say you shouldn’t do. The camera angle may be too low—I don’t remember, to tell the truth—but the attitude of the pose says everything about the subject. It shows an intelligent, proud, insouciant and yet downright sexy woman. This is probably one of my least retouched and processed portraits I’ve ever made with just some minor tweaking in Vivenza before light retouching in Portraiture 2 with a soupçon of Glamour Glow from Color Efex Pro added to wrap things up.
If you enjoyed today’s blog post and would like to buy Joe a cup of Earl Grey tea ($2.50), click here.
My book Joe Farace’s Glamour Photography is full of tips, tools and techniques for glamour and boudoir photography with new copies available from Amazon for $30.54, as I write this. Used copies start at the hard-to-beat price price of ten bucks and the Kindle version is $19.99 for those who prefer a digital format.