What's the Best Projector to Buy for my Next Photoshoot?

This image was all captured in-camera in a single frame thanks to the power of using a projector on set.

There are quite literally hundreds, if not thousands of different projectors out there to buy right now. They can range from £10 to over £10,000, but which projector should you invest in for your next photoshoot?

If you’ve ended up here, then I’m assuming you’re using your new projector as a light source in your next photoshoot. If on the other hand, you’re after advice on what projector to buy to watch the footy on (that’s soccer to the less informed ;) ), you’re in the wrong place.

The reason I make this distinction is because we as photographers need to use these projectors for a purpose they weren’t necessarily designed for. Consequently we need to be looking at specific factors that apply to us as photographers, not us as viewers.

For the purposes of this article, I’ve broken down the 5 key factors we should be considering before purchasing a projector for our next photoshoot. They are as follows:

Luminance
Throw Distance
Contrast Ratio
Resolutions
Connectivity

Art of Projection

Full disclosure; I’m writing this article as I’ve recently announced my new ‘Art of Projection’ workshop and as a result I’ve been sharing a bunch of images that were taken with a projector. As a result of this, I’ve been inundated with messages and questions about what projector I use and what I recommend. For my Art of Projection workshop, I’ve written a jumbo PDF of notes and at nearly 50 pages it covers everything you could possibly want to know about using a projector in your photoshoot. This article peeks at a few of those pages from that workshop PDF and it’ll help give you the basic knowledge on what to look for before purchasing a projector specifically for photography.

Want to learn more about using projectors? Check out my workshop dedicated exclusively to just that Art of Projection — *Want to learn more about using projectors? Check out my workshop dedicated exclusively to just that* ***Art of Projection***

5 Projector Features to Consider

1. Luminance

For photography, brightness is going to be a key factor and in the projector world, brightness is measured in Lumens. Again the projector industry has a colossal range of choices, and lumens in a projector can vary from 50 lumens for one of those crappy iPhone projectors, all the way up to cinema stye projectors with a whopping 25,000 lumen output!

But let’s talk photography here for a moment, what does luminance translate to for us as photographers? Take a look at a page from my PDF below as it shows two photos, both of which were taken at 1/60th second, f.4, ISO 100.

The Art of Projection II luminance eg small.jpg

In the side-by-side images above, we can clearly see the dramatic difference between two projectors. On the left we have a cheap LED projector with a ‘supposed’ luminance of 1800, and on the right we have a 3000 lumens projector. The difference is quite literally like night and day.

From my point of view, luminance is the key driving factor when deciding on what projector to purchase. For example If everything else was perfect on the projector, but it had a low luminance output, I’d abandon it immediately. My personal recommendation is to look for a projector touting a minimum 3000 lumens. As you can see from the shots above, having 3000 lumens allows us to capture a projected image at 1/60th of a second at f4 and ISO 100. These are usable settings on our cameras that aren’t making compromises with higher ISO noise or blurred shots with slower shutter speeds.

2. Throw Distance

Throw distance is another term that is fairly unique to projectors as we don’t apply this same way of thinking when comparing lighting modifiers in photography. Basically throw distance quantifies the size of the projected image based on how far away the specific projector is placed from the wall. For example, let’s assume you have a small living room that is only 3m long. You wanted to buy a new projector to watch some movies on but the one you like will only produce a 1m sized image when placed 3m away from the wall. Chances are this wouldn’t be ideal, so Instead you’d be looking to purchase a ‘short throw’ projector that could project a 3m sized image when placed 3m away from the wall. A much bigger image size for the space you have.

This sounds more complicated than it is, but then again the projector world tries to complicate it further by using their universal system of ‘throw ratios’ to supposedly help their customers decide.

The projectors throw distance is often displayed as two numbers separated by a colon. For example 1.5:1.

The first number represents the projector being 1.5 feet from the screen and the second number represents 1 foot of screen length.

…exciting so far right?! So for every foot of screen length you wanted, you’d have to move your projector 1.5 feet away. As a guide; the smaller the first number, the smaller the room you can project a larger image in.

And yes, the projector world works in feet not metres to measure this metric.

Don’t worry though, I understand that there are a few of you out there that have still not passed your Differential Geometry PHD and for some unfathomable reason you still can’t pre-visualise simple shape and size in 3 dimensional space from a basic 3 digit ratio alone!!!! ….Not just me then?!

Thankfully, Mr. Hicks has run the numbers and has dialled in a few ratios and built a 3D space to help visualise some of these ratios for you. In the images below I’ve built a 6m x 5m room and placed the projector 2m from the wall in each of them. The resulting red rectangle on the wall in front is the size of image you’d get from the ratios displayed.

The Art of Projection II throw distance eg small.jpg

I’m hoping the example ratios above will give you an idea of what to look for but as a general guide; the smaller the first number, the smaller the room you can project a larger image in. So the 1.2:1 throw distance above, produces a far larger image than the 1.7:1 projector for example.

3. Contrast Ratio

Woohoo! More new ratios to learn! Thankfully contrast ratios are far easier to explain than throw ratios though. Essentially the contrast ratio is the difference between the darkest black point and the lightest white point in the image and they are displayed like this as an example; 3000:1.

A contrast ratio of 3000:1 means the brightest part of an image will be three thousand times brighter than the darkest part.

Essentially, you want to be looking for a larger number at the front as this will mean a stronger contrast within your projected shot.

But what does that look like in reality? Below I’ve pulled another page from workshop PDF where I compare a cheaper projector with a terrible (and unknown) contrast ratio, with a more expensive projector with a 3000:1 contrast ratio.

The Art of Projection II contrast ratio small.jpg

Having these side by side comparisons are a great way to actually visualise what some of these figures really translate to. Simply saying ‘this projector has a 3000:1 contrast ratio’ means absolutely nothing to most of us. Is that good? Is it terrible? Before I started looking into this, I had no idea either so you’re not alone if this is all news to you.

The image above clearly shows a pretty dark black point and fairly bright white point from the 3000:1 projector. In comparison the crappy cheap projector displays a muddy black point and a grey-at-best white point and this will ultimately lead to very washed out results.

The cheap projector I was using as a comparison was stating that it had 3000:1 contrast ratio in it’s sales jargon. Now I’m no genius, but even I know that’s utter nonsense. I won’t get into it too deeply here, but be very wary of dodgy no-name-brands selling projectors online. If the price sounds too good to be true, then it probably is. I didn’t mention it earlier, but I saw this same crappy projector being sold as a 3000 lumens projector too. It’s simply lies and they should certainly be avoided

Back to contrast ratios though and my advice is to look for one with at least 3000:1. There are a bunch of mid-range 5000:1 projectors out there too and I would assume that they would be even better.

4. Resolutions

Finally it appears that we’re heading back into familiar territory with terms like ‘resolutions’ right? The short answer is ‘yes’, resolutions mean the same thing here in the projector world as they do in the photography world. Basically the higher the resolution, the better the quality of the projected image will be.

Below I show you what two different resolution projector images look like up close.

The Art of Projection II resolutions small.jpg

The top image above shows a 1280x800 projector and the bottom image shows an 800x480 projector (native resolutions). Now on first inspection, your photo-brain may be thinking

‘huh, that 800x480 image looks pretty sharp, I think I prefer the hand icon in the bottom image’

Ultimately, this will be down to personal preference, but hear my thoughts on this. That hand icon does ‘appear’ sharper in the bottom shot, but it’s a visual illusion really as you can also clearly see far more pixels as a result. Ask yourself; ‘do I want chunky pixels to be visible in my shot?’ I’m going to go out on a limb here and say ‘no, you don’t want those ugly-ass pixels in your shot’.

As always, we have tons of choice and options when it comes to projector resolutions and here’s a few of the more popular ones. Full HD - 1920 x 1080, HD Ready - 1280x720, WXGA - 1280 x 800, XGA - 1024 x 768, SVGA - 800 x 600 and WVGA - 800 x 480.

I’ll go into this in more detail on the course, but essentially I’d advise looking at projectors with a minimum resolution of 1280 x 800.

5. Connectivity

Guys, we are gonna finish strong with an easy one, and it’s almost as if I tacked this one on the end to make it a list of 5 and not 4. Connectivity is simply referring to how you get the image you want to project, into your projector. You may have an image on a P.C., laptop, phone, USB stick etcetera. But how do we get that image from our device and onto the wall in front of us?

Below is a diagram of some of the more common inputs associated with both new and old projectors.

The Art of Projection II connectivity small.jpg

Most projectors will have way more input ports than you could ever need, so chances are you’ll be fine with whatever you get. But I will say that many older projectors do not have a HDMI input port. I personally use the HDMI input with my setup and it’s a very simple plug and play system and I probably wouldn’t consider a projector that didn’t have one.

The reason I mention this here is because I often recommend picking up a cheap secondhand projector on eBay. eBay often has some great deals on secondhand projectors and as an item that you may not be using all of the time, it makes a lot of sense to save some money on it. But whilst you’re searching on there, keep an eye out for those projectors that don’t have HDMI as they will likely be very old and their bulb may not be particularly bright. Older bulbs will lower luminance over time as well as the contrast ratio too so be wary of that in your purchase.

Closing Comments

So there you have it, there’s my 5 tips on what to look for when purchasing a projector for your next photoshoot.

Luminance - Look for at least 3000 lumens.
Throw Distance - The lower the ratio the better, but a 1.2:1 - 1.5:1 will be fine for most rooms.
Contrast Ratio - I’d recommend looking for a ratio of around 3000:1 or higher.
Resolution - Pixels are bad, so look for a resolution of at least 1280x800.
Connectivity - This depends on what you’re using, but I recommend HDMI as essential.

If you’re looking to purchase a projector for photoshoots then I hope this helps. As a guide, I’ve personally found that I can find all of these things on secondhand projectors for around £150-£200. Which in my opinion is a bargain.

Failing all of that, if you quit photography, you still have a half decent projector to watch the footy on ;)

Want to learn more?

As I mentioned at the top, all of these snippets have been pulled from just 5 of the 50 pages from my new ‘Art of Projection’ workbook. If you’re interested in learning more about using a projector in your photoshoots, then please feel free to take a look at my new course here.

This new workshop covers all new techniques and ideas and the potential for creative options when using projectors in photography is seemingly limitless. As a result, I can’t wait to pass them along and see what you all do with them.

ART OF PROJECTION

THANK YOU

Thank you as always for checking out my article and spending a little bit of your day with me here. If you have any questions about this one then feel free to let me know in the comments below. I can’t promise to have all the answers, but I’ll certainly do my best to answer what I can. Thanks again for stopping by.

Using a Projector in your Photoshoot - Remastered

Technique Tuesday Using a Projector in your Photoshoot 2019.jpg

Edit: Full disclosure; this article is simply a modernised version of an older one I posted a long time ago. That original article can be found here, but it still remains among my top 5 most read articles to date. This remastered edition simply updates some ideas as I get ready to start teaching my new ‘Art of Projection’ training. If you’d like to see some more examples of my more advanced projector shots, then you can find them here and further reading on the topic can be found on my ‘Art of Projection’ page.

*This shot was taken of the lovely Jaye using a projector and one other ambient light. Settings: 85mm lens, 1/100 second, f2, ISO 100, WB 3400.*

There are literally thousands of different ways to modify your light in photography, but you’d find it difficult to find one that offers more versatility and variety in look than the humble projector.

The projector is something that has fallen out of fashion in recent years what with HD and 4K T.V’s flooding the market, but in the 1960's and 70's nearly every household owned one.

Back then, one of the most common ways to take photographs was by shooting with E6 film or as it was more commonly known, slide film or transparencies. This slide film produced 35mm transparencies that would be loaded into your projector, you'd set it up on your new smoked glass and chrome coffee table and then the full glory of your Kodachromes would be projected huge onto the nearly white wall in the lounge as you gazed in wonderment from the cosy confines of your deep shag pile carpet.

Even as a child in the 80's, I remember my father digging out the projector and shining the holiday snaps up onto the screen to go through them. It was actually an incredibly impressive way to view your shots and it's crazy to think that we traded that immersive 6 foot by 4 foot viewing experience for swiping through our latest and greatest shots in the palm of our hands. Surely we missed the point somewhere along the line where convenience trumped experience.

*These are what our old photo albums looked like. A rack of transparencies ready for the projector.*

OG Projector

Fast forward to the present and very few homes still have a projector. We've all opted to view our holiday snaps on our phones and maybe sometimes our T.V.'s if we're feeling really organised. That being said a lot of people still have their old projectors up in the attic somewhere languishing in obscurity, I know my father did, and I nabbed it many years ago to give it a new lease of life as a photographic light/modifier.

Using the projector as a light source in your photography opens up a whole world of possibilities and once you start off down the path of projecting different images into/onto new images, you'll soon realise the potential the projector has to add something unique to your shots.

When I was at University studying photography, I had a lot of fun experimenting with projectors. If you get the chance, I highly recommend you having a rummage in the loft or asking your parents/grandparents if they've still got their old projector hanging about. If they do, dust it off, change the fuse and have a play with it.

*When you're using just a projector to light your shot, it's a bit easier to light your subject. You just choose the image to project, set it up, expose for that one image and you're done.*

My fathers old projector that I found in the attic when I was at Uni. Still going strong. Fully complete with that suspiciously familiar red dot ;) — My fathers old projector that I found in the attic when I was at Uni. Still going strong. *Fully complete with that suspiciously familiar red dot ;)*

The properties of a projector to be aware of when using them in conjunction with photography are first and foremost the ‘slides’.

If you want to use a projector to shine an image into your scene then you first have to buy some E6 film, find an old 35mm camera (learn how to use it), shoot your shot, send it away for a fortnight to be processed, wait around for it to be delivered and then and only then can you delicately place your precious 35mm transparency into a slide mount, pop it into your projector and finally shine it into your scene!

(…that's a lot of steps!). It’s pretty safe to say that firing up your old projector is not going to be a quick and spontaneous idea, but if you've got a well thought out shot and an awesome image to shine into it, then the results it can produce are very cool indeed.

The modern projectors are digital, they can be plugged into nearly every digital device and project any image that you want. The version you see above was old when I got it and so it still only had that VGA cable, but they’re nearly all HDMI now.

Going Digital

So what if you don't have two weeks to spare and the patience of a saint, but you'd really like to use a projector in your shots? Welcome to the digital age.

The modern alternative to the old slide projector is of course the digital projector. This infinitely more advanced projector can now literally shine any image you could possibly think of into your shot and if you have the right cable, you can shine that image from any device you like. Your T.V. your laptop and even your phone.

The digital projectors have come down in price a lot in recent years too and their main reason for existing now is for home entertainment. I've had mine for many, many years (I’ve since updated this one with a couple of new ones since then too), but the brightness is still ok.

Newer projectors are all a lot brighter as standard now than they used to be, but be mindful that you certainly get what you pay for to a certain extent, and the key thing to look for if you're in the market to get a projector is the brightness. A digital projectors brightness is measured in lumens and they vary hugely.

For example; you can currently pick up a £50 digital projector on eBay with a brightness of 150 lumens, but for a £150 you can pick up a secondhand one with a brightness of 3000 lumens. That is quite literally like night and day and the extra money for the extra brightness is definitely worth it in my opinion.

That extra brightness will allow you to shoot at faster shutter speeds and at lower ISO's, both of which are crucially important when photographing people or other moving objects.

The digital projector is what I use now and that's purely for convenience over anything else. I can find any image I like and shine it into the scene from my phone. If I don't like the way it’s looking, I can simply change it immediately. Like I mentioned before, with this level of convenience, it opens up any digital image on the planet to be immediately shone into your shot (allowing for the terms of copyright law and fair use or derivative works in your country of course…. ;) But that’s a topic for another day).

*I simply plug my digital projector into my old phone and have access to any image I want instantly.*

Brightness

So now that we understand all those benefits, what's some of the downsides that we should be wary of when incorporating a projector into our shots?

The first thing is power. The power of the light (or lumens) that most projectors put out is pretty dismal by comparison to what we’re used to as photographers. And remember that brightness will be heavily influenced by the type of image you shine.

If you shine an image of a shadowy forest into your shot its going to be very dark as an output. Alternatively, if you project a bright blue beach scene instead, it’s going to be a lot brighter.

Here's a totally arbitrary figure to give you some idea of what I'm talking about. An average brightness image shone onto a white wall may give you 1/60 second exposure, f4 at 200 ISO. Like I mentioned earlier though, you can now get a lot brighter digital projectors, but I wanted to give you a ballpark figure of brightness.

One thing to watch out for when using a digital projector is the pixels that are projected onto the skin.

The Dreaded Pixel-Problem

Another thing to bear in mind with modern digital projectors is that they shine pixels. As a result, you will literally see lots of tiny squares in your projected image.

If you’re not careful this can look awful and it’s one of the biggest reasons you don’t see more people using projectors in their shots in my opinion.

For this pixel-problem alone, I prefer the older slide projectors as they don't have this issue at all. They simply shine light through your slide film and the only thing you'll notice on the models skin is the film grain from the original transparency, and seeing as most slide film has super fine grain anyway you shouldn't even notice anything at all.

Start off using a projector with easy shots like ones with a lot of white space in them. This will not only make it easier to position the projector for a more flattering light, but it will also limit the amount of awkward white balancing you'll nee… — Start off using a projector with easy shots like ones with a lot of white space in them. This will not only make it easier to position the projector for a more flattering light, but it will also limit the amount of awkward white balancing you'll need to do later on.

Colour Temperature

One last thing to bear in mind of course is the colour temperature of the image you are projecting. It's not too much of an issue if you're shooting with just the projector alone, as you simply shoot RAW and play with the white balance and colour casts afterwards in post until you're happy.

Shooting with just the projector alone is the best place to start if it’s your first time experimenting with a projector. Choose an image that’s nice and bright, preferably with large sections of white, and just project that directly onto the model and white balance the image the best you can later on.

This shot was taken using the older analogue projector, you can clearly see that even when zoomed in that there is no pixels on the face and the projected image is far clearer.

Balancing the Colour

The colour temperature of the projector does become an issue however when you're using the projector in conjunction with other lights.

If you were to just shine white light from the projector onto a white wall, I’d advise setting up a custom white balance profile for the best results.

For example, all of my projectors sit just off the Kelvin scale, so adjusting the Kelvin alone isn’t enough to get the best results and I have to shift the ‘tint’ as well to get a cleaner, more natural white. On top of that, my results show the projector bulbs being on the warmer side (colour wise and closer to tungsten in terms of white balance). As a result, if you're using a projector as well as flash in your shot you'd probably have to use a CTO (Colour Temperature Orange) gel on your flash to compensate.

But before you all breath a sigh of relief and think that was easy… all that unfortunately changes when you decide to project coloured images through your projector. This is where it can become a bit tricky.

For example, if I was to shine an image of blue water through my warmer coloured bulb, what white balance should I set my camera to and what colour correcting gel should I use on my flash?

This is a bit of a minefield I'm afraid and there's no easy answer, suffice to say that you'll just have to do a little experimenting with each of specific images you choose. I will add that many Auto White Balancing settings on camera today are nothing short of incredible, so unless you really want to get everything absolutely perfect, AWB will get you most of the way.

Another thing that I like do is take my images that I'm going to project into editing software beforehand and add some blue to the image before I project it. This helps when I'm balancing the projector light with the flash afterwards as the projected image is already on the blue side as comes through the slightly warmer bulb. Again, this will vary on your specific projector and the more expensive, cleaner, newer bulbs will have less of this issue to deal with.

I get my projector up on a light stand and perched on a Manfrotto laptop plate. This enables me to get the projector above the models eye level.

Setting up your projector

Brilliant, so we're all set with some basic theory on do's and don'ts. We've got our image that we want to project so let's start to think about setting up the shot.

Always try to treat your projector like any other light source in your shot. By this I mean think about the angle and height of the projector placement. All too often I see people using a projector by placing it on the floor, table or chair next to them. Not only does this cast huge shadows up the wall behind the subject, but it also creates that horrendous up-lighting on models that is never flattering. Always get your projector above the models head height to create a far more flattering look.

Also remember that a projectors light is an incredibly hard light source because of it's focused beam coming from a tiny point. The least you can do is position it at a flattering height and angle to the model.

Getting the projector up high is actually harder than it may first seem, but I sit my projector on a laptop plinth from Manfrotto (essentially just a plate that screws to the top of light stands and tripods). I can then attach this to a tripod or even a light stand to give me even more height. Of course you can use anything you want though and stacking up on a table or shelf behind you will serve the same purpose.

The next thing to consider is the projectors distance from the model. This distance is determined by what coverage of projected image you are looking for on the model of course, but if you are looking to shoot a 3/4 length shot then you're probably going to have to get your projector about 8-10 feet away to cover that area. Most digital projectors are designed for home-cinema use and they are getting better and better at throwing a larger image in smaller spaces than ever before.

You can clearly see how much of a difference it makes when you add additional light onto the model to eliminate the projected image.

That's pretty much it, you're done and if you aren't planning on introducing additional lighting to the shot then you're all set to start shooting away.

But if you are looking to add some extra light in there, for example to wash out the projected light on a models face, here's where the fun begins.

First off, you’ll need to be careful that the light you're shining onto the model doesn't also fall onto the background too. If it does, then it’s going to wash that projected image out.

For the shoot I've shared here, I had my light directly above the model and literally pointing straight down onto her. The main reason for this was simply space if I'm honest. I couldn't get the light any higher because of the ceiling in the way, but if I could have, I probably would have put it a little higher and brought it further away from her to soften the hardness of light a little.

I'm still really pleased with how the shots turned out though. The modifier I had on this light was simply a reflector dish with a small grid/honeycomb attached. With this grid I can very easily control where the light goes and I can easily ensure no light spills onto the background.

For these shots I actually ended up not using flash at all, I simply used the tungsten modelling bulb on my strobe to light her. I also used a CTB (colour temperature blue) gel on this light to cool down the colour a little. It might be reasonable to assume that I wouldn't need to do this as the projector is a warmer colour already. But in reality, the image I was projecting was so blue that I had to compensate a little (like I mentioned you just have to adapt on the day and see what looks best colour wise).

I also had the model really close to the background as well to reduce any weird shadows being projected behind her, but it meant that the placement of the additional light was even more crucial for the best results.

The setup shown above illustrates where I had the models light placed. It was quite close to the model and pointed down sharply to avoid any excess light spilling onto the projected image on the wall behind her. In this diagram the light next to the… — The setup shown above illustrates where I had the models light placed. It was quite close to the model and pointed down sharply to avoid any excess light spilling onto the projected image on the wall behind her. In this diagram the light next to the camera is actually there to represent the projector. Again, here you can see that I had the projector above the models head height so that any shadows would be thrown behind her and hidden below her shoulders. I also further increased this by shooting slightly up at the model which again ensured that there were minimal shadows distracting the overall shot.

Brightness and Model Poses

Now that we've placed our extra light, we need to look at the powers of them. Although you can adjust the brightness of most projectors, it's best to have them as bright as you dare without washing out the colour and then adjust the other lights around that. I had the modelling bulb turned up pretty high on my strobe to wash out the projected image and after I was happy with the power balance I finally got to start shooting.

Another thing to bear in mind when shooting is to direct the model around both of your light sources. The key light is now your light that is shining down on the model so your model should base their posing around that. As long as your projector has been set straight on and above the models eye level, you shouldn't need to worry about it anymore.

*The modifier I used to light the model was simply a small gridded reflector.*

Final Points to Consider

Thats it, keep shooting and see what's working and what's not working, but the key here is to experiment with lots of different images and see what you prefer.

One final point to bear in mind is how much of an influence the projected image has on the overall shot. Try to tie everything else like fashion and makeup around it. In this shoot the model wore a swimsuit and was sprayed with droplets of water to match the look of the projected image of water behind her. All these little elements can really help sell a look.

When using more colour in your projected image it can get a bit colour heavy. This is what the shot looks like without any additional light on the model.

Things to Keep in Mind…

1. Start off by choosing an image with a lot of white in it and only use the projector to light your subject.

2. Get your projector above the models eye-level to create a more flattering light and to hide any unsightly shadows.

3. Be mindful of the pixels that can be produced on the models skin from digital projectors. If it's a big project where the final image is likely to be blown up big, consider using an analogue projector to reduce this.

4. Be prepared to adapt to weird colour balancing issues on the day. The colours of projected images can drastically distort white balance. Adjusting an images colour in Photoshop prior to projection may be a handy workaround.

5. Tie your projected image and your subject together to create a cohesive look. Make sure the image you're projecting makes sense with what the models wearing and the idea you're trying to portray.

Many thanks indeed to my super patient model Jaye - Go check her out on her portfolio

Good luck guys and I look forward to seeing what you all come up with.

Click on the images above to enlarge.

The Art of Projection

If you fancy taking your projector shots to the next level, feel free to check out my more advanced projection-based lighting techniques here on my ‘Art of Projection’ page.

All of the above images were captured in-camera and shot using a projector - Click here to learn more — *All of the above images were captured in-camera and shot using a projector -* *Click here to learn more*

THANK YOU

Reviewing The 105cm Softbox/Beauty Dish Rice-Bowl Modifier

Full disclosure, I am not a fan of softboxes. In terms of a lighting modifier for portraits and fashion, your average softbox is the vanilla solution. But not only are softboxes poor imitations of medium sized windows, they also have one major drawback that I try to avoid at all costs, their inherent hot-spots. This brighter centre of any modifier can make lighting feel unnatural, plus it’s frustrating to control and manage, but when I was sent this new Pixapro Rice-bowl softbox modifier by Essential Photo to test out, I was actually intrigued by a couple of its features.

Hot-Spots

One of the main downsides of softboxes that I’m wary of, is their inherent nature to always have a slight hotspot in the centre. If you’re not familiar with what that is, then it simply means the light is always brightest in the centre and gets slightly darker towards the edges. You’ll often hear many photographers contest this happens on their softboxes and most will argue that their softbox doesn’t suffer from this so-called hot-spot problem. In nearly all cases though, the softbox is brighter in the centre, and even though manufactures add multiple layers of baffles inside of them to stop this, the flash is in the centre of the modifier and it’s almost impossible to avoid the physics that makes them brighter at the source…the centre.

As a result of this, many photographers will actually choose to use a daylight window instead of a softbox, after all, this has no hot-spot and you can nearly always tell a shot taken with a natural light window compared to a softbox for this reason alone.

An alternative to all this fuss is simply to use a modifier that has almost no hotspot and my personal favourite modifier of choice is the 22” Bowens beauty dish for this very reason.

The diffusion cone/dish you see here is situated above the hole the flash fires through. This results in the light being far more evenly spread around the modifier with very minimal hot-spot as a result.

My Beauty Dish

The reason I love my beauty dish so much is due in part to its manufactured bell shape, but more importantly its diffusion cone that sits inside it. This little dish sits in front of the light that enters the modifier from the flash and bounces it around the dish via its perfect curve and then dissipates it out of the front almost completely evenly. The resulting light this gives is utterly beautiful. In fact I’ve tested this even lighting by firing it against a white wall and taken light meter readings across it only to find that its exposure is identical from centre to edge in a very wide pool. A truly remarkable design in my opinion.

So why was I interested by this new Rice-Bowl softbox?

As I began to unpack and assemble the Rice-Bowl, I noticed that this modifier also has a diffusion cone that is affixed in front of the flash opening. This means that this little metal dish will block all direct light and bounce it around the edges of the modifier first, therefore enabling a far cleaner and hot-spot free centre.

Assembly

Since we’re talking about the assembly, let’s take a quick look at what’s involved as sadly this was not quite as easy to put together as I first thought.

I assure you I’m not trying to be patronising as I take the time to explain how to set up a softbox here. My point is rather to highlight how many steps it takes EVERY time you want to set this modifier up. This time may have zero impact on you if you’re studio shooter and only intend to assemble it once and leave it up. If on the other hand you’re a shooter on the move a lot and will be assembling and breaking this down for every shoot, this process may be a consideration.

The 16 metal rods slip in and out of their pockets very easily. As a result every time I’ve assembled this, they must be reinserted each and every time.
This is the clever mechanism that allows for the softbox to be erected with one motion. Simply push this centre column down to lock into place and you’re done.
With the collar firmly locked in place, the hole for the diffusion plate is now visible.
Align the centre diffusion plate with the hole…
…and screw into position with the large thumb screw.
Next comes the inner baffle. These are held in place by these velcro tabs.
Here we can also see that the inner baffle has a double thick centre to further reduce any hot-spot that might be present.
If you look closely here, you can see just how taught that centre baffle is, but more importantly, just how stretched those velcro tabs are, they only barely reach their required tabs to hold them.
If you don’t have a softbox grid then this is the final stage. Simply velcro the outer diffusion panel to the outer edge leaving a generous about of a lip to control the light too.
This is where I attached a grid to the outer edge on top of the diffusion cover.

As I mentioned, this whole process needs to be done each time due to the rods always coming out of their holes with every use. Also, due to the easy push-up softbox mechanism in the middle, the grid, the outer diffusion and inner diffusion and the diffusion plate must be removed prior to taking it down every time.

If you’re a studio shooter who will only put this up once, this is not a problem at all. If however, due to space or not having a regular studio to shoot in, you’ll be taking this softbox down after every use, this process is certainly worth your consideration.

Shape, Size and Price

Softbox Diameter - 105cm

Depth - 42cm

Shape Hexadecagon - (16 Sided)

Interior Colour - Silver

Layers of Diffusion - 2

Fitting - Interchangeable Fitting*

Price - £84.99

*According to the Essential Photo website, this Rice-Bowl has fittings for Bowens S-Type, Elinchrom, Hensel, Broncolor (Big), Multiblitz (V-Type), Multiblitz (P-Type) and Profoto.

I’ll let the images do the talking here, but the eagle-eyed among you may now start to see the similarity to the beauty dish I mentioned. That distinctive bell curved dish is one of the reasons that beauty dish spreads light so evenly and we can see a similar shape start to take form on this softbox here too.

The Results

Headshot

First off I wanted to test the Rice-Bowl up close to see how the wrap of light worked on a headshot. The image here was taken on a 105mm lens and the softbox itself was probably no more than arms-reach from the model off to camera-left. The softbox also had the grid attached.

With the modifier being so close, the drop-off of light was fairly quick resulting in some strong shadows. I personally like this more dramatic look and this is why I often have my modifiers very close to the subject. One downside of having modifiers close to the subject though is that you’re limited to a smaller spread of light. In smaller modifiers like the 22” beauty dish, you can really only successfully light a headshot, plus you also get very little spread onto the background surrounding your subject. With this far larger 105cm modifier we can clearly see we get a very generous spill of light onto the background which makes for some very easy portraits in almost any space.

3/4 Length

Next I wanted to try some wider shots so I pulled the softbox back and behind me. I had the softbox up high and about 2m (6ft) away from the subject. For this shot, I removed the grid from the front.

Even at this range, the softbox was able to spread the light quite quickly, but more importantly, very evenly.

For me, I think this is where this modifier excels. These 3/4 length or even full length body shots is where this softbox is going to be doing its best work. A 22” beauty dish excels at that short range headshot and for me, its sweet-spot is really when its in nice and close. For this far larger 105cm softbox, pulling it back and letting it light a larger area is where we see it doing its best work. This shot is one light with no reflectors of boards and we can immediately see just how even the spread of light is throughout the body, even down towards the legs where we normally see the biggest drop-off with most softboxes of this size.

Working with other lights

I personally never, ever use a single light in my shots so my next test was to see how it worked with other lighting but more specifically gels. I would ordinarily use my beauty dish for shots where I have a coloured gel fill, as I need to have a lot of control of the light to ensure I have some strong shadows to add a coloured gel to them.

With the Rice-bowl grid now reattached, I was pretty impressed by the way I was able to control this very large modifier up close like this.

Even with this giant modifier in place, I’m able to control the light enough so that I still have shadows to add coloured light to. The big softbox also has enough spread so that I’m able to throw light onto the background to simultaneously light that as well with minimal shadows being cast.

Oh yeah, and the whole thing comes well packaged in this well made and padded carry bag.

Conclusions

For me personally, I was pretty impressed with the overall adaptability of this Rice-bowl. No I am not a fan of softboxes ordinarily, but that diffusion dish on the inside, plus the double layered inner diffusion, really does go a long way to reduce any unwanted hotspots. It’s also worth noting here that it becomes harder and harder to evenly spread the light around a modifier the bigger it gets. The 22” beauty dish is tiny compared to this 105cm softbox so it has a far easier time when it comes to spreading the light. As the modifiers get larger like this softbox, it becomes almost impossible to spread the light completely with no hot-spot. After all, the strobe in the middle isn’t getting bigger and all it wants to do is send light on the easiest, shortest path, straight out the centre of the modifier.

Another example of this is stripboxes. I have a couple of 1 meter stripboxes and the light power at the edges of those is nearly a whole stop darker than the centre of them. Having an even spread of light throughout your modifier is crucial and this Rice-bowl goes a very long way to offering some of the cleanest light I’ve seen.

For my style of lighting where smaller controlled pools of light is required, it’s going to take a lot for me to turn my back on my beauty dish. But with that being said, if you’re a shooter who is looking to shoot 3/4 or even full length shots of even, beautifully soft light, I think you’d be hard pressed to find a modifier that does it as well as this one does, especially for this price.

Closing comments

Bottom line, I think you’re getting a lot of modifier for your money here. This is a decently crafted piece of kit that has clearly been designed specifically to spread light evenly. The distinctive bell design shape as well as the internal diffusion plate and double-thick inner baffle all work to provide a very clean and beautifully even light for 3/4 length and full body shots. If that’s your thing, then you could do a lot worse than this for the same money.

My only slight gripe with this Rice-bowl is the pain-in-the-ass assembly each and every time you want to use it. Sure it’s probably less than 10 minutes, and you may have a ‘domestic-helper’ around the studio to do it for you, but it’s still worth considering. Of course, if you have the space to keep this up and ready to go all the time, this is not an issue at all.

If you’d like to take a closer look at this Rice-Bowl modifier or consider purchasing one, here’s a link to the one I have by Pixapro on the Essential Photo website. 105cm 16-Sided Easy-Open Rice-Bowl Softbox

Essential Photo also gave me a discount code for you guys, but please be aware that I receive no commission on sales, this discount is purely there if you want it. The code I use is HICK5-OFF.

THANK YOU

Thank you as always for checking out my article and spending a little bit of your day with me here. If you have any questions about the Rice-bowl, feel free to let me know in the comments below. I can’t promise to have all the answers, but I’ll certainly do my best to answer what I can. Thanks again for stopping by.

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Flash Duration - How to Avoid Blurred Flash Images

Technique Tuesday flash duration 2019.jpg

‘Flash duration’ isn’t a very glamorous topic, but it’s certainly something that every single photographer that uses flash should be aware of.

When we first learn photography, we are taught that ‘flash freezes motion’, and although this is true, it is an extremely relative term. In this article we’re going to look at exactly how frozen the motion actually is, and how we can limit that motion or movement in our shots as much as possible when using flash.

Take a look at the side by side shot below of me photographing some silver cake decorating balls falling onto a metal plate. Both of those images were taken with flash, but both display very different results. Your idea of ‘frozen motion’ may be different to somebody else’s.

Click to enlarge: Both images of metal balls in motion taken with flash, but both with very different results.

What is flash duration?

Oddly this is a piece of information that is always simply assumed by many. Very few lighting companies ever explain it and when they do they simply quote a figure that holds little relevance to most of us. For example, when you see flash duration quoted by lighting companies, it looks like this:

But what does that string of letters and numbers mean?

Essentially the flash is not instant, but in fact lasts a period of time. That period of time where the flash is visible is measured in fractions of seconds. So for example we have the flash above lasting a 220th of a second at its longest point. The second, much bigger number is 10,000th of a second and that is the fastest possible flash time this particular strobe has to offer.

The numbers in brackets after that means something else which I wont be covering in this article as I’ll be focusing on practical tests not charts and graphs. Essentially the T number refers to the amount of power dissipated at certain points of the flash duration. You’ll most commonly see T0.5 and T0.1 listed. T0.5 measures the time it takes for 50% of the total flash power to be dissipated and T0.1 is the time it takes for 90% of the total flash to be emitted. Essentially I believe you need to be looking at the T0.1 number as this best describes the actual flash duration in my opinion and be wary of readings that don’t show any T value or only show the T0.5.

PRO TIP: If you ever want to check the flash duration of a potential strobe, simply Google ‘pdf manual of strobename’ then simply scroll down to the bottom of the pdf in question and look for ‘Technical Details’ and it’ll be listed in there.

Should I care about flash duration?

The short answer is; ‘maybe’. If you’re shooting weddings with speedlights at a venue of people, then flash duration is hardly going to matter at this level. Your flash will most certainly freeze aunty Susan as she tries to mount the cake table at 2am. If on the other hand you are a still life shooter that will be photographing liquid in motion and trying to focus stack multiple frames that need to be painfully accurate then yes, flash duration is absolutely critical.

For those of us somewhere in the middle like me who photograph fashion or portraits, yes flash duration is important and I recommend you being aware of it, but most of the time you wont notice it. I only worry when the subject is dancing and/or I have a wind machine stripping the colour out of a models hair at full blast. Most strobes will have shooters like us covered, but I still think there are things we can be doing to ensure we get the cleanest and sharpest results with whatever strobe we’re using.

Testing flash duration

This is a pretty basic test and anybody can do it. Yes there are plenty of very precise ways of measuring flash duration with sound triggers and infrared gates etc…., but here I’m simply dropping silver cake decorating balls from a height of 3 feet onto a metal plate below and pressing the shutter with my finger. I tested a variety of strobes including a speedlight as well and I took shots with all of the flashes at max power as well as lowest power to show the differences.

My objective was to see movement in the objects so I kept my aperture at a consistent f22 to show as much in focus as possible. As a result of this high aperture I adjusted the ISO dramatically on the camera to compensate for exposure differences in the strobes at max and min power.

The Results

The Old

First off I tested a very old flash head that is about 20 years old. This is an extreme case and you’re unlikely to see results like this with any modern strobe, but I felt it might be useful for comparison.

The strobe in question was an old Bowens Esprit 500w head.

Many older strobes like this will produce movement blur at any strobe power, but in many cases, you will get a clearer image at maximum power. If you look closely you’ll see that at max power you get a ball outline and then a tail of motion. This is where the flash dumps a huge amount of power at first and then as the gas in the tube subsides, you get that tail of movement that slowly disappears.

In the minimum power shot, the ball doesn’t have a clean edge that then tapers off, instead you simply get nothing but blur. This is how many older strobes dealt with lower power outputs. You simply got the gas burn over a period of time compared to a quick, short dump of a little bit of power.

Like I mentioned, this is rare, as most modern strobes do not have this same way of releasing power gradually anymore. What I will say is that you will start to get this consistent blurred look with old and tired flash tubes. Essentially the xenon gas within the tubes is getting tired and less efficient. If you start to think your images are blurred a little at the edges, then consider doing a test like this to see if it’s the bulbs that need replacing.

The New

Now let’s look at some more modern strobes and see how they perform.

First up, let’s see one of the standard Godox heads, or in this instance, the Pixapro Citi 600 TTL.

The resulting images are a little more inline with what we’re used to seeing with flash, especially the minimum power shot. In that image the balls have been captured relatively cleanly and there is minimal blurring, especially when compared to the max power image.

In the max power shot, there is some blurring and although nowhere near as bad as in older strobes, I’d still consider that a problem for anything that is moving at any speed in your image.

If you were curious, here’s the official number on flash duration from the online pdf for the Citi600. They very kindly show us min and max power durations and they tell us it’s T0.1. -Top marks Godox for your transparency on this info.

The New-er

Next up, I tested my everyday workhorse strobes, the Bowens XMT’s. These heads are 500w which is a fairly standard power output for most monobloc style strobes. In fact all the strobes I tested here are monoblocs and if you’re not sure what I mean by that then take a look at the power pack explanation below.

To the well informed among you, you’ll likely already know that the Bowens XMTs are made by the same company as the Citi 600’s mentioned above. The Chinese company Godox makes both of these strobes albeit that the Bowens manufacturing requirements were a little different and in my opinion a little stricter resulting in a slightly more consistent head, but then the higher price would also reflect that.

Regardless, take a look at the resulting images below to see how it faired in this flash duration test at max and minimum power.

power pack eg.jpg — Powerpack Flashes

Monobloc strobes are all in one units that sit atop light stands. These are in contrast to power pack heads that are generally split between a block of power on the ground that is powering a separate head that sits on a light stand. An example of a power pack head would be the Profoto Pro10 and the Broncolor Senso.

As always, I’ll let the images above do the talking, but as before, the max power shot shows significantly more blur than the min power shot. I’d argue that the XMT was marginally more consistent in producing cleaner, crisper shots at both max and min power, but like I said, it’s marginal.

If you were curious, here’s the official Bowens statement from their online XMT pdf regarding flash duration. Naughtily, Bowens only quotes the fastest duration (lowest power) and they omit the T value. This usually means that it’s the t0.5 as that’… — If you were curious, here’s the official Bowens statement from their online XMT pdf regarding flash duration. Naughtily, Bowens only quotes the fastest duration (lowest power) and they omit the T value. This usually means that it’s the t0.5 as that’s often faster and makes the strobe look better.

The… Speedlight

Seeing as I had everything set up, I thought I might dig out my old speedlight to also run the same test just to see how it faired. Full disclosure, I’ve not used a speedlight in decades so this old Nikon SB 600 is a little out of date, albeit, hardly used. My point being that I have no data to say how much better speedlights are today compared to what we’re looking at here.

Either way, with that knowledge in mind, take a look at the resulting images and take from them what you will.

As with the strobes, the max power shot produced a very blurred shot, but the min power shot was surprisingly crisp. The only other element worth mentioning here is that the speedlight at max power acted like the older strobe did. It releases a lot of power over a period of time, not a big hit of power which then tapers off as modern strobes do. This results in a more consistent blurred image compared to a crisp one that tapers off to blur.

If you were curious, here’s the official flash durations on the SB 600 from the Nikon online pdf. Here is where I struggle to believe the data as my tests showed a very different result to this. Apparently at its lowest power M 1/64) it has a flash … — If you were curious, here’s the official flash durations on the SB 600 from the Nikon online pdf. Here is where I struggle to believe the data as my tests showed a very different result to this. Apparently at its lowest power M 1/64) it has a flash duration of 1/25000 which is over twice as fast as the strobes we previously tested ….hmm. Plus, at its highest power (M1/1) it has a flash duration of 900th of second. The resulting images I took sadly do not look like this is 3 times faster than the previous strobes at full power either.

Conclusions

Was there anything to learn from all of this? What does this mean to you as a flash shooter? Should you be looking out for certain flashes in the future? Should you be shooting any differently?

All of these questions are valid, but you firstly need to know where you stand in all of this. Are you a still life shooter that needs to capture crisp water splash shots for focus stacking? It’s unlikely you’d be reading this if you were, but if that is you, flash duration is one of the most important elements in your image. In fact, I’d argue that the flash you use is even more important than the camera you use. But for the rest of us, yes flash duration is important and it’s a serious factor that needs to be considered when taking an image, but no it’s certainly not a deal breaker.

If there is one major thing we can all see immediately from these test shots, then it’s the fact that lower flash power shots produce FAR crisper and sharper images when compared to the max power versions.

In this digital age of incredibly impressive cameras at low prices, this info that movement in a shot is so heavily affected by flash power is actually very useful. Cameras are now so good that even at high ISOs, the image quality is excellent.

But let me explain…

Let’s say you have a model shoot and she is wearing a flowing dress. Let’s also say that she is dancing and you have a fan blowing her hair and dress as she moves. This resulting shot will have a lot of movement what with her moving, her dress moving and her hair moving. Catching the sharpest possible image is likely going to be a priority so what should we set our camera and flash to so we can achieve the sharpest shot?

We can set our camera to ISO 50 for the best possible image quality in camera, but we would then have to turn our strobe power up quite high. Yes we could open up the aperture, but with her dancing around, we don’t want to miss focus at f2.8. We want at least f5.6 so as to get her all focus.

This image was synthesised in Photoshop for illustrative purposes, but it does show that the decision between strobe power and ISO is a very real one when considering the sharpness of moving elements within a shot.

One option here could be to shoot at ISO 400 or even 800 quite comfortably in terms of image quality (especially for any decent camera made in the last few years) and then turn the power of our strobe way down so as to ensure a crisp and sharp image.

Can you now start to see how this knowledge of how flash duration works can actually aid you in your decision making? When you buy a digital camera now, it may not be simply a case of switching your ISO to 100 as soon as it leaves the box and never touching it again. Playing with your ISO and flash power may now enable you to get sharper images in the future and it’s definitely worth your consideration no matter what you’re shooting.

Closing Comments

Of course, there are ways around all of this. There are ways to shoot at ISO 50 and have the flash pumping out at full power and get some crisp shots….. it’ll just cost you the same as a small bedsit in central London.

For example the rather impressive Profoto D2 boasts some very eye-wateringly fast flash durations thanks to its specific ‘freeze mode’… (albeit recorded at (t0.5) not (t0.1) -naughty Profoto.)

The slightly complicated, but very comprehensive flash durations at min and max powers of the Profoto D2.

But like I said, this incredibly fast flash duration comes at a cost…

The £1,875 price tag of the Profoto D2 is for ONE head by the way! — The £1,875 price tag of the Profoto D2 is for **ONE** head by the way!

If ultra-fast flash durations is your priority, then you would do very well with this strobe if you can afford it. For the rest of us though, being aware of where our strobes falls short in flash duration is useful and if need be, we should be willing to adjust our ISOs to get a crisper shot without fear of losing too much image quality when we inevitably upload the final shot to Instagram anyway!

THANK YOU

Thanks as always for checking out my article and spending a little bit of your day with me here. If you have any questions about flash duration, feel free to let me know in the comments below. I can’t promise to know the exact flash duration of your specific strobe, but I’ll certainly offer any advice if I can.

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Stay Inspired - Inspirational work from 10 Photographers and Artists 007

Foreword

"Stay Inspired" is a weekly post on my Facebook Page where I share the work of an inspirational photographer or artist every Thursday. I've been doing this every week since 2013 so there is now a vast number of outstanding creatives from all genres and disciplines that we've looked at over the years. In fact, I’ve been sharing these for so long now that even I have forgotten some of these great artists I share at the beginning. Because so many of these have been lost to time, I thought why don't I try and collate them all into one place for not only myself, but for you as well.

This is the sixth compilation, so if you missed the previous ones and are interested in an inspiration overload, here’s the links to them;

Stay Inspired - Inspirational work from 10 Photographers and Artists 001

Stay Inspired - Inspirational work from 10 Photographers and Artists 002

Stay Inspired - Inspirational work from 10 Photographers and Artists 003

Stay Inspired - Inspirational work from 10 Photographers and Artists 004

Stay Inspired - Inspirational work from 10 Photographers and Artists 005

Stay Inspired - Inspirational work from 10 Photographers and Artists 006

These new posts will look at a collection of 10 artists each and they should prove to be an excellent resource for not only inspiration but motivation as well. With each artist shared, I will include a short overview of their work including things to consider and look at whilst on their portfolio.

Please bear in mind that these opinions are mine and as such are clearly very subjective. I could just share a link but I believe a more personal point of view of another artists’ work may be of more value to you over simply stating their name and age for example. But this does mean you may not always agree with me and I would encourage that. Art is subjective and like music, the best art does not appeal to everybody.

Inspirational Work from 10 Photographers and Artists 007

Prepare to be crushed.

This evening we visit Milan and meet the amazing work of 21 year old fashion photographer Daria Zaytseva. Thats right I said 21. Daria's work is very polished and focuses primarily on the beauty and stunning lines of her models. A lot of her work is colour toned beautifully and the palettes have a velvety feel to them, imagine Amanda Diaz's work but less fairytale and more sensual.

Be sure to see what this young photographic prodigy is up to as she will certainly be one to watch in the coming years.

Edit Aug 2019: Although I first shared Daria’s work many years ago now, I’m very pleased to say that she’s still shooting incredible work today. Her current website is more of a blog but as you scroll down you’ll be met with stunning image after stunning image.

Daria Zaytseva

You may have heard of other photographers referring to a somewhat arbitrary term called 'clean lighting'. If you are still unclear as to what that actually looks like then take a look at one of fashion photography's biggest hitters, Chris Nicholls. Although a lot of the his work is shot on location, he appears to use a lot of supplemental lighting to make each and every image perfect. If you want to get your work in the big name ‘glossies’ then you really need to get your lighting to look like this as they are all over this style at the moment.
On first impression his images might not look too tricky, but I guarantee that's the skill staring right back at you. It's very difficult indeed to get shots to look like they haven't had additional strobes or with multiple light sources creating ugly shadows.
His site is massive and although the opening page just shows a few teaser shots there is a slightly hidden section to the right that opens up the genres he shoots as well as an amazing archive of his past work.
If you're interested in the slightly more commercial side of fashion editorial then definitely check him out.

Chris Nicholls

Normally I like to share an individual photographers work, but tonight I wanted to highlight a media production company called ‘Zeduce’. Many thanks to J. Tuliniemi Photography for sharing their work with me. Although they haven't done any ground-breaking projects, the reason I wanted to showcase their work was because its really very creative. They have some awesome shots that have been orchestrated with what appears like a multitude of mirrors and the effect looks amazing. It also looks like some of the photographers they've used shoot with a lot of gels and also shoot through giant crystals!

What’s not to love?

Zeduce

Many years ago photographic agencies were nearly the only way a professional photographer could sustain a commercial career. The agencies had all the contacts and the clients knew they were a one stop shop for guaranteed results. By todays standards, agencies were perceived as an expensive way to achieve those same results. After all it’s not hard to find a great photographer yourself online these days and I don’t think you can blame agencies for overcharging. I just feel that it’s todays market that has cheapened the work, not that agencies ripping off clients in the past.
I personally never went down the route of being agency represented myself, but that's not to say I don't respect what they do and it's still an idea I entertain from time to time.
My point this evening though, is that agencies like individual photographers, have a style. If you find a photographers work you like, see if you can track down their agency as you’re sure to find many more photographers on their books within that same niche.
Take a look at global agency ‘Streeters’ here, they have several photographers from around the world on board, but they all have a similar look and feel to their work.

Edit Aug 2019: Ironically, when I wrote this years ago, this agency still had plenty of photographers on their books. Today, they don’t strictly have any. They have a few ‘multi-media’ artists, but that’s it. Again, this just reiterates what I wrote years ago, photographers with agents are a dying breed. Either way, head over to the agency site and take a look at the multi-media artists they promote now.

Streeters

I'll open tonights photographer spotlight by saying that I am rarely drawn to this genre of photography, but I think it was something about the sheer volume of colour in Bella Kotak's images that caught my eye.

Bella's self professed style is 'a mix between fashion, fantasy and portraiture', and I would say that every image she takes pretty much embodies that description. Beyond the fact that every image in her portfolio is utterly breathtaking, what also caught my attention is that on her Facebook page she also shows some 'before and after' shots where Bella lays bear the original unedited image and then how she transforms them into her works of art. It’s great to see a photographer at this level embracing the fact that this is art, and not simply a photograph.

I know a lot of you already follow her work and I even recognise some you modelling for her but the rest of you should definitely take the time to check out Bella Kotak's work and especially make a trip to her Facebook page to see her process.

Bella Kotak

Today we revisit the work of a photographer that has more followers than some religions. You may know her as Zemotion but now goes by her given name of Zhang Jingna.

Many moons ago, way back when online social photography blogs were a new thing, the likes of Miss Aniela, Lara Jade and Zemotion were leading the charge on the antique social networks like Deviant Art and Flickr. This was a time before specific online photo communities had any traction and long before the term TFP had any meaning so the aforementioned trio made their mark with self portraits.
Several years on, Jingna's work is world renowned and although this young fashion and beauty photographer is still in her mid twenties she has exhibited her work all over the globe.
I mentioned right at the start that we were going to revisit her work because although that same ethereal style is still present from those Deviant Art days, the new and refined work is outstanding, well polished and definitely worth a fresh look, especially her current project Motherland Chronicles. In this project Jingna seamlessly blends her love for drawing, painting, anime and photography to capture a truly stunning body of work.

Zhang Jingna

Today I wanted to take a look at a slightly different style of fashion photography. We are used to seeing the sort of work that adorns the likes of Vogue and Elle, very polished and saccharin results of the tops names in L.A. and New York. That work is outstanding of course, but sometimes it’s nice to look at something a little more raw.

I was drawn to Yuji Watanabe's work for this very reason and although on first impression some images might not look finished, I think it’s our indoctrination of the current fashion photography that is giving this impression over the personal and seemingly bare and natural work of Yuji Watanabe.

I love a lot of his work and I like how he uses a huge range of techniques to create his style. Take a look yourselves and see what you think.

Yuji Watanabe

We hear a lot of talk at the moment about 'how to develop a photographic style', in fact it’s a question I get asked a lot, but although I think it's valuable to have an overarching theme or look to your work, I think it’s also just as important to show diversity.

With that in mind then, I want to highlight the exceptional photographic work of Lindsay Adler. In her 'fashion' portfolio on her site the work may seem very broad in technique and style, but this is why I have followed her work for so long, it keeps me coming back to check out what she's up to.

As well as being commercially prominent in the industry, Lindsay is an incredibly accomplished trainer and educator, and she’s definitely given a lot more back to the community than most, so this passion for learning is probably the catalyst of her ever developing style.
If you haven't done so already, definitely head on over to her site and check out her work and let me know what you think. If you're interested in how she achieves some of her shots then her store has a huge amount of content to keep you focused.

Lindsay Adler

Steven Meisel who was born in New York in 1954 has been involved in the fashion industry for most of his life in one way or another, and although he originally started out majoring in fashion illustration, he quickly picked up a camera.

Following in the footsteps of Penn, Avedon and Stern, he quickly became the go-to guy for all of Vogues photographic needs, in fact so much so that he has now shot every cover for Italian Vogue for the past two decades!
Personally I find his photographic style a little dated (here comes the hate mail - please address all correspondence to the blasphemer@judusmail.com), but if you're after outstanding visual dialogue within a fashion editorial, then look no further.

For me, visual dialogue is Meisel's true photographic gift and it’s something that I have seen very few other fashion photographers even attempt to come close to at this level. On his site take a look at 'Makeover Madness' and 'State of Emergency' to see what I mean, here you will see true high fashion as pictorials.
For those of us that have tried this, it is damn near impossible to pull off at this level as you have to turn fashion models into actresses and this is certainly something that I hope to pursue, and one day achieve.

Steven Meisel

Looks like it’s time for a quick re-visit to the outstanding Kristian Schuller portfolio. I think I shared his work about a year ago and back then he was and still is, famous for huge grandiose set pieces where nothing is too crazy or over-the-top. And this includes scaffolding, swings and ball gowns on the beach, to elephants and parachutes. Really, nothing is too crazy for a Kristian Schuller shoot.

It would seem that in recent shoots he has scaled back the drama and gone for more of an analogue and character driven style. I thought his work was pretty impressive before, but I think I may actually like his new take on fashion photography even more.
Take a look at the projects 'l official italia' with Coca Rocha and his New York streets 'french revue ny doll' to see his amazing blend of traditional techniques like long exposures and shutter drags with his newer hyper real colours and extravagant set designs.

Kristian Schuller

Closing Comments

As with all of my posts, I welcome your comments and thoughts on the artists I've shared here today. But although all of the photographers and creatives I've mentioned above come from my own personal tastes and appreciations, I still feel they are all incredibly varied, which ultimately means there will be at least one persons work here that you'll love.

Granted we've really only looked at 'people' photographers including, portraits, fashion and editorial shooters with none of the other photographic genres being covered, but it's still incredible to me as to how varied this single discipline can be.

I think one of the core things I want you to take away from this series is how another person interprets their subject into a photograph.

Sure you can simply reverse engineer the lighting or copy a pose of an image, but I hope you take away a lot more than simply the mechanics of a photograph.

Look at their style and see how that is impacting their work for the better. Look for similarities in pose, expression, subject, lighting, theme and colour. All of these things play a role in any image and by appreciating that in others work we can be better equipped to express it into our own images.

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