Exploration with Culture
Location: Cal Anderson Park, Seattle, WA
Model: Various
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark II with Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 USM Lens
variety of settings, ISO 100, handheld.
Post: Adobe LR4 & PS5
For more weddings and portraits by Cameron Karsten Photography please visit: CK Weddings
Matt Kuntz at home on Bainbridge Island, WA, working on his Mustang during sunset.
Location: Bainbridge Island, WA
Model: Matt Kuntz
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark III with Canon EF 24-105mm f/4 L IS USM Zoom Lens
composite w/variety of settings, ISO 100, tripod.
Post: Adobe LR4 & PS5
Three shots in three separate scenes, telling the same story within a narrative series. It tells the tale of a model of three eras of fashion: the 60s, 80s and modern. As a model, she’s on the journey of her career. Although she has it all – the beauty, the clothes, the style and money – she finds herself at a crossroads seeking more, but is subsequently slipping into a lifestyle she’s becoming all-too familiar with.
Location: Bainbridge Island, WA
Model: Morgan Terry
Stylist: LK
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark II with Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM Telephoto Lens
variety of settings, ISO 100, tripod mount.
Post: Adobe LR3 & PS5
Tobacco-smoked meat; it’s what’s for dinner. This is my “still-life food” shot for an anti-smoking advertisement. Originally I sought to make the meat look like a heart hooked and strung-up over a smoking ashtray, but the meat just looks like meat. Next time, I’ll get a realistic-looking heart and blacken it a little more to show the ill-fated effects of smoking cigarettes.
Window light was the light source to camera left and an off-camera Canon 580EX II Speedlite bouncing off a silver reflector was the fill at camera right.
Location: CK Studio, Bainbridge Island, WA
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark II with Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L IS USM Macro Lens
100mm, 1/10 sec at ƒ/6.3, ISO 100, tripod mount.
Post: Adobe LR3 & PS5
There were numerous things that went wrong with this shoot, which I did not become aware of until after during the hours upon hours of editing. To say it before I present to you these pieces: I don’t like them. In fact, I loathe them. Then why this post, you might ask?
First off, it is a visual record. Having rediscovered my love of fire, unleashing the pyromaniac youth within, stored memories from the times after school alighting pine needles with a magnifying glass to more explosive encounters involving cans of highly flammable RAID and a stack of wood set next to my mother’s house, I love fire. So, why not shoot it?
Secondly, I want these images to rest upon this web layout as a stage of photographic development. With this rekindled love of flame, I now have the desire to master the quickest, most intense flash of heat through the lens, and elegantly incorporate it’s fluid speed into my work creating a uniqueness and individuality.
Thirdly, using fire during work makes work so much more exciting.
So I present the first two shots involving TRESemme and fire. Again, these images are not worthy of due credit or professionalism, therefore I would never finalize them for a client and expect a pat on the back with a fat check. They’re merely a recording of the road to fire I am just now beginning.
The first one was shot with the bottles on a white background. These have too many reflections in the cans to represent the product accurately. Then when shooting the flames I discovered the speed at which they release. I sprayed the hairspray over a lighter, which singed all knuckle-hairs instantaneously, and witnessed these flames all but vanished on the sensor before the white background. So I switched it out for black and added a mass of strobes and hot lights. When I went to composite the images in PS5, I realized the task at hand to mask the black background flames with the white background cans was near impossible for a realistic, sellable product. Plus, for stop motion, the flames are not frozen, even at 1/1000th of a second!
This next image is an improvement considering the background, but the rest is just an attempt to experiment and learn after staring at a computer screen for 5 hours. I’m displeased with how both of these turned out, but the learning curve was steep and that’s all that matters right now.
Location: SCCA, Seattle, WA
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark II with Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L IS USM Macro Lens
variety of settings, ISO 100, tripod mount.
Post: Adobe LR3 & PS5
High Key photography is a classic product set-up: bright subject, with few shadows and nice highlights. To go with au naturel consumerism, Tom’s of Maine toothpaste came into play.
The idea was to showcase the “Crystal Clean” result after using Tom’s. Somewhat pleased, I don’t feel totally successful with the project. The crystal in my model’s hand appears too large and the actual toothbrush on the right feels unnatural due to the lack of the bottom of the brush. In the end, the photographer decides about his/her image, while the audience decides on their individual experience.
Location: SCCA Studios, Seattle, WA
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark II with Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L IS USM Macro Lens
variety of settings, ISO 100.
Post: Adobe LR3 & PS5
Ian Cipra is a man with a passion for apples. Working the tourist crowds of Pike Place Market in Seattle, WA, Ian sells not only apples, but grapefruits, plums, seasonal fruits and loads of vegetables. One day it might be a free slice of pear to push their sales. The next might be an orange. But on this day, he was representing the crisp sweetness of the Jazz apple. And thus the tourists flocked – passing, observing, tasting, purchasing – while the apple man put on a show of wit and camaraderie.
The assignment was to photograph a stranger. Approach someone. Collect a volume of point of views: EDFAT. Broken down, it stands for 1) ENTIRE, for observing the entire subject; 2) DETAILS, dissecting the subject into specific details; 3) FRAME, framing those details into strong, original compositions; 4) ANGLE, to shoot a variety of angles; and 5) TIME, building visuals by using slices of time. After 500 frames, an hour and a half of time, and switching between four different lenses for variety, Ian Cipra came out with energy and sold loads of jazz apples to smiling customers.
Location: Pike Place Market, Seattle, WA
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark II with various lenses
variety of settings
Post: Adobe LR3 & PS5
While on break, I had three weeks to come up with a composition for dark glass. When I was young, my grandfather gave me this old Kahlua bottle, and for years I burnt a candle in the crown. So, with the ambience of candlelight, I created an evening scenario with the added smooth tasting digestif White Russian.
I shot the bottle, and from there worked around the composition. And since it was an old bottle, the label was long removed. Therefore, I took today’s bottle, captured the label, and masked it within PS5, shot the tumbler with the White Russian, added reflections and a tabletop, brushed in the smoke and took my archived image of a wood stove fireplace to fill the background. The text was selected from the label and fit within the frame. Complicated but well-worth the time, as well as multiple White Russians consumed throughout the process.
Location: CK Studios, Bainbridge Island, WA
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark II with Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L IS USM Macro Lens
variety of settings, ISO 100, tripod mount.
Post: Adobe LR3 & PS5
A George Hurrell-inspired photography assignment creating a classy black and white 1920’s film noir/glamour shot. Involved set construction, props, wardrobe and some serious lighting skills. Here is my mortician with a new patient waiting behind the walls.
Location: SCCA Studios, Seattle, WA
Model: William O’Donnell
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark II with Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM Telephoto Zoom Lens
70mm, 1/100 sec at ƒ/7.1, ISO 100, tripod mount.
Post: Adobe LR3 & PS5
To light this image of Stranahan Colorado Whiskey I used a giant soft box and placed two Profoto lights inside facing each other to blow out the background. With two large black cards left and right of the bottle, the edges became defined. Then with one Speedlite below and slightly in front of the bottle, which rests on plexi glass, I fired it to highlight the label. One final softbox was placed directly behind the camera and raised to hit the bottle at a 45 degree angle.
There were four exposures composited in PS5: bottle, label, cap and pour. To wrap it all up in post, the image was masked with a white background.
Location: SCCA Studios, Seattle, WA
Camera/Lens Specifics: Canon 5D Mark II with Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L IS USM Macro Lens
100mm, 1/160 sec at ƒ/22, ISO 100, tripod mount.
Post: Adobe LR3 & PS5
Cameron Karsten's Imaginarium 