Twirl

I enjoy experimenting when shooting.  Often times, you get awful, unusable results, but it's very satisfying when your experiments yield something that makes the mind wonder and brings a smile to your face.  (Click the picture to view it larger.)

Photograph ©2011 Alex Suárez. All rights reserved.

What you see here is an image of my daughter from our recent photo session.  You can see the first image here.  We took a different approach in shooting this one.  Instead of having her progress directly from right to left ending with a rear curtain sync flash pop, we had her twirl around and I manually popped the flash at a moment of my choosing.  I then let the exposure continue a bit to fill in the frame some more.  

What are your thoughts?  Is this kind of photography too "out there" for your tastes?  Which image do you prefer?  Why?

Alexandra Gándara

I had the pleasure of photographing the beautiful Alexandra Gándara for a few minutes last week on a breezy hilltop near the Palmer Events Center in Austin, Texas.  Alexandra is a dancer who moves quite gracefully.  We plan to shoot together again in the near future.  

 

Strobist info: 

• Flash with CTO gel on white shoot-through umbrella, camera left for the first two images, camera right for the third.

• Bare flash with CTO gel behind subject used as rim/accent light on right side of subject.

• Both flashes trigged via PocketWizards.

 

Photograph ©2011 Alex Suárez. All rights reserved.

 

I desaturated the background (and the dress a bit) in the next image to separate Alexandra from the environment.  I was a bit reluctant to share this image in the same post as it will invite comparison when I feel the image should stand alone, but here you have it anyway.  

 

Photograph ©2011 Alex Suárez. All rights reserved.

 

I'm not pleased with the light and the crop of this third image, but I'm sharing it with you because I loved the pose.  This was one of the first shots I took of Alexandra at this location and it was before we moved the key light around to the other side.  Moving the light solved the problem of the shadow of her nose being cast across her right eye.  The crop is too tight for my taste as I would like a bit more space to either side.  One of the reasons I plan to shoot with her again is that, even with bad lighting, Alexandra proves that it is difficult to take an unflattering shot of her.  

 

Photograph ©2011 Alex Suárez. All rights reserved. Thanks again to my friend Steve for finding Alexandra and inviting me along to shoot with them. We always have fun assisting each other as we take turns shooting. 

 

Statuary Detail

Photograph ©2010 Alex Suárez. All rights reserved.

This is an image from the May 15th Photowalk around the University of Texas.  This particular statue was not here when I attended the university back in the 80s.  Anyway, what you see here is a detail from the corner of the base for the statue.  The statue is located on the West Mall.