It’s #anythingcanhappenday and today’s post again features a portrait of the amazing Pam Simpson. This image was originally shot as part of the print edition of Shutterbug for a lighting equipment review but also reflects the model’s style.
Today’s Post by Joe Farace
Some people’s photography is an art, not mine, Art is a dirty word in photography, All this fine art crap is killing it.—Helmut Newton
Helmut Newton is one of my photographic heroes for many reasons and not just limited to the style and aesthetic quality of his photographs. I think his above quotation is also a reflection of how I sometimes feel about my own glamour photography, especially when looking at some of the images I’ve made over the years of Pam Simpson. Over 14 years or so that I’ve photographed Ms. Simpson, we have created lots of images that showcase her many, many different looks in many different styles.
It’s all About Style
One of the delights of working with Pam all these years was never knowing what her hair style or even color would look like shoot-to-shoot. When I opened the front door, it was always a surprise. As you can see in today’s featured portrait, her hair is much shorter than in The Many Moods of Pamela Simpson post, which features some of the last photographs I made of her as a blonde. (She’s now a brunette in a another post I wrote about developing a portrait stye.) You can read more about Ms. Simpson in my blog post, Capturing the Essence of a Portrait Subject. For my Patreon members, there are several posts featuring uncensored images of her as part of the Password Protected posts that are one of the benefits of membership,
Any successful model photo shoot begins with a concept. Typically I draw my initial ideas from the kind of wardrobe a model brings to a session. Then I bounce my ideas off her and then begins the real collaboration as we refine that idea and begin the shoot. It doesn’t end there and during the session we work through and shoot through the poses before it think we have any images that we both like.
How I made this portrait: For High key portraits, images like the featured photograph use soft lighting and contain mostly white or pale tones. High-key lighting is typically free from dark shadows but can contain small darker areas such as the subject’s hair or eyes that will keep the portrait from looking too boring. Although in this case, Pam is wearing a dark colored corset. The high key look is generally thought of as producing an images that is “positive and upbeat,” although I am not sure I 100% agree with that assessment because I think it ultimately comes down to the attitude and mood expressed by the model. This one, for example, exudes an element of fun and sensuality, although maybe that’s just me.
Today’s portrait is from Pam and my first session together and continues a theme from this part Tuesday by using a one-light lighting setup. It was shot using a single monolight with a 40-inch parabolic umbrella mounted and placed at camera right with a 32-inch reflector at left for fill. The camera was a Canon EOS 5D Mark I with EF 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM lens at 56mm with an exposure of 1/125 sec at f/14 and ISO 100. The background used was the (formerly) white walls of my 11×15-foot home studio. The image was originally captured as a JPEG file before I instituted my RAW+JPEG regime. Image was processed using the Color Efex Photoshop-compatible plug-ins.
Used copies of Gary Bernstein’s landmark book Burning Cold which served as an inspiration for my series of portraits of Ms. Simpson are available from Amazon starting at $13.94 in paperback or $16 in hardbound, as I write this. Ms. Simpson is featured on the front cover of my now out-of-print book Posing for Portrait & Glamour Photography. Kindle versions of that nook are available $29.99 for those preferring a digital format.