Sunday, June 22, 2008

Bradley in "air"


After fire and water, it's time for the third element: air. As you know, I found this spot sometime ago, when I was looking for a place to take Bradley's photos. And here's what we got.


In the first photo, Bradley has a great look! He's looking right into my camera and he seems like he's got there effortlessly. In this shooting I liked the idea of having him flying "over" LA in the image. You don't see the foreground, so that you don't have a reference and you don't know how high he actually is.


While the first shot is very intense, the second is more dramatic. In this image I like the fact that I tilted the camera and that you don't see his face. These images were taken at sunset. I was hoping for some clouds to make the background more dramatic but as you can see...no way!
So, I decided to set the WB to incandescent and to underexpose the background by one stop. This way the sky turned into an intense blue, almost electric, and I liked it for this.

To light Bradley I used the usual two flashes. Both camera left opposite to the sun that was setting on camera right. One flash gelled with 1+1/2 CTO is the key and it's positioned 3/4 on Bradley's side. The other, with a red gelled on it, is strongly underexposed and gives that little red that helps Bradley to pop out of the bright blue sky.

There were other images that I liked a lot but at the end we chose these two for their distinctive look: one were he look at you right into your eyes and one in which he's very dynamic and dramatic. I think they both fit pretty well in this collection.

PS: after we finished shooting and it was getting dark, guess what, a wonderful full moon appeared at the horizon and took some more nice shots of him dancing (not flying this time...) with the moon in the background. We got some good shots but I'll show them in the near future. now I want to move on to the next element...

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5 comments:

Smartix said...

I think these two pix really go together. I remember that my first choices were two other images but as you said these are stronger. I love the way Bradley moves, he's always present. Once, when I was getting out of his class I started to imagine him as a kid and I could see him jumping all over and playing with all the different surfaces around him. And all of this is in these images!

Paolo said...

Thanks Smartix, I think you really got to the point in your comment. That's why Bradley is "air" for me. It's funny, now that you said that, I can see him too, jumping all around as a kid! Like, as an adult, he doesn't do that...
I'll post other images from his photo shoot soon, so we will see him in different poses...and not always in the air!

Anonymous said...

i just compared the ones we did and the Bradley's ones. very nice job with the colors. would have been nice if there had been some clouds as well that day.anyhow, i'm not sure but check the very left bottom corner of the first pic of Bradley. ciao
jng
ps can u choose some easier word verification?i'm a horrible typist

Anonymous said...

Here I am, ready to continue my reviews of the ‘Elements’.
“Bradley and air”, here you have a simple match between the photos and the symbol. The dancer is in the air and there is a lot of air/sky in the background. Altogether the photos are as airy as it gets. I like the way his body is lighted over the bluish background. I don’t understand the technical details, but I like the result. I wish I didn’t know how high he jumped, because I like to think he is very high, high above LA … but I do see a bit of ground in the bottom left corner (isn’t it). Maybe you can crop that out. Other than that I like this picture and the idea behind it.
In the second shot, the dancer is perfectly positioned in the frame, but the background is tilted. I can’t make up my mind whether this is a fault. For my perfectionist eye, I’d like the background to be straight, but tilted as it is … it makes me dizzy and that’s how being in the air feels like. Definitely, from the point of view of the symbol, it’s a plus!!! Ahh, and I prefer it without clouds … you wanted air, didn’t you?

Paolo said...

Wow, I must say you didn't miss a single detail.
I know about the far left corner, in the prints you don't see it but here I just forgot to fix it.