Marie Man – documentary & fashion photography by Bristol photographer

Tag: Strobism

In the mood for…film noir

I’ve been kept quite busy with wedding documentary and fashion photography recently, so it was great to be invited by Rob Heslop to something that was ‘just for fun’. He invited me to a film noir shoot where the photographers got to play with lighting and directing, the models got to act and that post processing was easy!

We could have done with a smoke machine but this was still brilliant fun and took me back to my days as a media student, making films.

I love that the film noir tradition uses very simple light setups to show shape, form and character from out of the shadows. Characters that we all know well – the jaded detective, the femme fatale, the mafia boss and his moll. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves, but I love that these images are alive with their moodiness, atmosphere and mystery.

With thanks to:
Rob Heslop
Cam
Peter Tecks

Models:
Conner McKenzy (www.connermckenzy.com)
Kate Davies (www.modelmayhem.com/1777728)
Iain Gorrie (www.modelmayhem.com/1701420)
Helen Drew (www.modelmayhem.com/611129)

22 May ’11
Lighting Workshop with Alex Beckett, Goldbrick House

Last year, Cambridge-based photographer Alex Beckett (www.alexbeckett.co.uk) asked the Twitterverse for tips for his impending trip to Mongolia. Of course I obliged. Fast forward 6 months later and he is living in Bristol, down the road from me!

In March, his trip to Saudi was cancelled and decided to run his very first off-camera flash workshop. It was a multi-level workshop with photographers who were totally new to lighting alongside experienced professionals. I decided to go along to wrap a formal approach around my existing knowledge and to see some photographer friends!

Alex took us through the basics of flash photography, his kit, a demonstration (posing Martin Pemberton as The Godfather!)and we all got pitched in. I’d been involved recruiting the pilot group of attendees and models so knew most people attending the day, but there were a few new faces too. We all had fun and even the attendees with more advanced knowledge learnt a few tricks. A great day all in all and in a great venue. Alex will be running future workshops so keep an eye out for more workshop goodness.

With thanks to our models Jane (http://purestorm.com/profile.aspx?id=lady_galaxy92), Danielle (http://www.modelmayhem.com/676727) and Juliet.

Here are my pics of the model that my group worked with, Jane and my fellow photographers.

Lighting practice:

These ones are natural light:

Britain’s next top model, James Bailey

Reluctant model Lizi

Ian Francis & Lizi Cosslett

Martin Pemberton striking a pose as The Godfather

Matthew Roach strikes his own pose!

Neil (RattyBoots on Flickr)

Martin Drake

Caroline Alexander

Martin Gillman

James Bailey

Benjamin Edwards

Kristy Field

Lizi & Ian

Nicola Ferguson

7 May ’11

Tag: Strobism

In the mood for…film noir

Lighting Workshop with Alex Beckett, Goldbrick House