My Sunday series about available light portraiture continues today with a window light portrait of Madison, who I only photographed once but it was quite the experience.
Today’s Post by Joe Farace
“She lives like tomorrow isn’t coming and yesterday never happened.”– Crystal Woods, Write like no one is reading
Over all of the years that I’ve had some version of this blog, I’ve posted many different images of many different models while demonstrating the cameras, lenses, lighting, and posing techniques I use when creating glamour and boudoir photographs.
But whenever the blog features certain models, I get nostalgic about the shoots we had together and, at the same time, the Internet seems to love these women too. I can see why. It’s not just because they are attractive but there’s an inner light shining through in their portraits too. Today, let’s talk about Madison…
When shooting photographs, the ratio of captured images vs. the number of usable mages made during a portrait session typically range from 10% to 25%, while the ratio of the best possible images drops to 1% to 5%. —from the Internet
A Special Model
I only photographed the mature Australian model known as Madison one time, although I doubt her name was really “Madison.” She was a referral from Zoe, a model who I’d photographed several times and who was featured in one of the early installments of the popular #corsetmonday series that appeared on this blog.
Like Zoe, Madison was an ecdysiast and photographing her during this particular shoot was a bit of a challenge. Part of it was that she brought an escort to the shoot, which usually results in less than optimum photographs. My thoughts on the subject of chaperones, escorts, and other hangers-on is that for every shoot I have ever had with an escort present, the photographs were not that good..
How I Made this Portrait: You may not be able to tell it from this image but Madison was extremely shy. I photographed her in the living room of my former home using light from a tall, narrow South-facing window. The camera used was a Canon EOS D60 with an EF 50mm f/1.8 lens, proving you can make glamour images with any kind of camera and lens. The exposure was 1/100 sec at f/2.8 and ISO 400 with a plus one stop exposure compensation, although it could have used another half or one-third stop more. It was corrected using techniques explained in this post.
By the Numbers
During the four and one-half hour shoot, I made 396 images of Madison. Whether that is a record for any of my model shoots, I don’t know but it’s close. That amounts to an average on one image every one and one-half minutes. I’ve never done that calculation before but may try in for some upcoming shoots. Based on the ratios listed above, I should have between four and twenty really good shots and based on using Adobe Bridge ro examine images from the shoot, I think that ratio is correct .I alos hink that ratio would be higher when photographing models, such as Erin Valakari and Pam Simpson and that may have to do with the fact that I had many more sessions with both of these models. This is a subject that Barry Staver and I talk about in the first part of our latest Pixels, Grain and Cookies Podcast.
One of the images that I made of Madison does have one interesting statistic. Her photograph featured in the Premier post in my See-Through series is notable because it was the first time but not the only time I had an image banned by Instagram. Yet, as far as this blog is concerned, the post that this image dogeared in has consistently been the most viewed post in all of the years since our original shoot. Nobody, I mean nobody, has ever come close, which is yet another reason I would love to photograph Madison again.
If you enjoyed today’s blog post and would like to buy Joe a cup of Earl Grey tea ($3.50), click here. And if you do, thank so very much.
Several photographs of Pam appear in my book Available Light Glamour Photography that’s available from Amazon with used copies of the book for $49.94 as I write this. The Kindle version is $27.83 for those preferring a digital format.