Michel Engelen

Is the grass really greener on the other side? NSFW

2013-01-03T23:04:00.000+01:00

Those who know me a little also know that i teach a lot of workshop about model photography and lighting with my colleague peter but i had to know if the grass could be greener on the other side...

So i did a bit of industrial espionage and followed a group workshop.

The Workshop was with 2 professional photographers who work a lot for the dutch Playboy, as i understood there are 2 teams working for the dutch glamour and nude magazine, one of them is Toonen-wientjes and the other team is the 2 guys that gave the workshop, Patrick and Rene.

We had a really good and very experienced model, be sure to check out her website if you would like to see more of her work www.dreamingofzoi.com

The group of students was a bit too big for a workshop, more than 15 photographers is really a lot for 1 model, but it created time for me to have a chat with Patrick about his work for Playboy and the way they work and create their images.

what struck me is the way these commercial shoots are organized, there's really a lot of last minute improvisation and the lighting setups are often very simple, often ambient light only or with the help of a small reflector. There's always an artistic director working for Playboy on the set, he gives a direction to every shot.

Poses are often repeated and if you check out the magazine you will see how it is in fact really repetitive between different shoots without being an exact copy off course.

The girls they shoot are often really beginners and are scouted especially for Playboy or come knocking at the door and want to get published in Playboy, every shoot is preceded by a small test-shoot with the model where they decide if the model will get cover, centerfold, non centerfold shoot or she might be rejected if the pictures do not appeal to the publisher

The most important things in this kind of shoots are =
1. A model with the correct "girl next door" look and willing to go for the full Monty off course
2. Styling of the model, even when wearing almost nothing there's always a bit of styling and it's important
3. Location must breathe "money" "luxury" "expensive"

the rest is combined talent and hard work!

I also offer you some shots form the workshop, due to the nature of the used light and the way i wanted the results to look there was heavy post-processing, something that is very usual for this commercial glamour style photography. NSFW pictures, click on read more !

NSFW part !!

Playing Games

2012-12-27T13:16:00.000+01:00

"Standing still is the fastest way of moving backwards in a rapidly changing world. Imagination is the highest kite one can fly" -- Lauren Bacall.

And so, one must move on, that's what i tried to do here, change about every parameter that I used in the past. No more Mr. Softbox and Octabox, but old school stuff, working with small and harsh light sources and using the "on-axis fill" technique to even out distractive shadows that might occur.

The harsher light sources will produce more detailed results where soft light often creates a too low contrast on surfaces making them dull, well it's what your after anyway. Photography is making compromises, always.

The Raw files from the D800 are very high in Dynamic Range so this opens up possibilities in post, it feels a bit like HDR with lots of clarity, a look I tend to use a lot more in the future.

Models: Niels de Jonck & Sara

MUA: MuaDjenien
Styling: http://www.kathyvanlooveren.com/

Project Paris 2012

2012-12-26T18:14:00.000+01:00

Project Paris,

Mission Objectives: Make at least 6 pictures 'Fashion style" of a couple on weekend in Paris, where Paris has to be recognizable without being the most important thing in every picture.

Mission Time schedule: November. Leave on Saturday morning get back on Sunday evening. Oh yes, do not forget to order some good weather!

Mission restrictions: Use only public transport or a Taxi. Take only what you can carry

So, first things first, what was i going to take with me? I had to pack very light because i already knew we were going to be walking a lot and have to carry all the stuff on our backs...

What was i going to frame in my pictures? 2 people, as a couple, standing close to each other and something in the background that is recognizable as "Oh that's in Paris", the 85mm which I love to use, is not wide enough for this or I have to stand too far away from my subject, the 35mm might be a bit too wide and it throws your background too far away so i guessed the classic 50mm would be ideal and i have to admit now it didn't leave my camera for 1 shot on this mission.

The chosen gear: 1 camera + backup camera, 1x 35mm and 1x50mm, a lightweight lightstand, white shoot through umbrella, SB-900 flash and battery pack, light meter, Hoodman Loupe and the trusted Pocket Wizards = all in 1 bag!

But then i was asking myself : If you can do this with minimum gear why the hell do you need all that other stuff? #imnotaddictedtogear

Mission time : Friday evening

Charge all the batteries, check camera functions and set everything back to personal defaults
Look a last time a at Google maps and all available local information

Mission time : Saturday Morning

Arrived at Brussels Midi station to meet with Tanja Dassy our Make-up expert for this mission and take the Thalys for Paris-Nord, with a small 27 minute delay

Mission time : Saturday Noon

Arrived at the rented apartment after a small trip with the Parisian Subway and all it's peculiar entertainment. (Clowns, accordion specialist, guitar players, singers, magicians, …)
Dropped most of our gear at the reception and then we went on "location scouting" in Paris so we knew where exactly to shoot what the next day.

La Seine, Eiffel Tower, Trocadéro, Musée D'orsay, Jardin des Tuileries, Le Louvre, place de la concorde, Champs-Elysées, Arc-de-triomphe, Galleries Lafayette,… about a 10Km walk in total and we would have to repeat this the day after with all the gear and the team the next day all over again.

Mission time : Saturday 5:00PM

Arrived at the very luxurious apartment, went to the night-shop to get some cookies and drinks for the entire team that should arrive at about 11:00PM.

We had some time to go out for dinner.

As Tanja and i decided that the Lebanese restaurant was not really our thing we went to a classic Parisian Bistro, I decided to go for a nice piece of beef. The waiter recognized my Belgian accent and told me they had the best French Fries, freshly made! Really? Wow that's impressive in a Parisian Bistro.

He told me a bit about his brother living in Brussels and his history with French Fries and so on….

The red wine had been diluted with water i guess, and after some time the beef arrived, i asked "À Point" aka medium rare, but it was less than rare. The beef got served with Mashed potatoes so I asked the waiter about his super-duper-freshly-made-French-Fries?
Ah yes, but your beef is "plat du jour" and that's always served with mashed potatoes…

He made me a little curious with his publicity so i ordered an extra plate with french fries, after a 10 min wait (yeah it takes some time to bake them, so i was hoping for the best) but no, it was another gastronomic blasphemy, these Fries were not freshly cut, these were standard take out of your freezer fries. Tourist rip-off #1

Mission time : Saturday 23:00PM

Rest of the team arrives on schedule and off course they were very hungry so we had to go out again for food, but JP from Equipe Haircare already began working on the hair of both models, Nathalie and Kenneth so we had to look for some take-away food. Do not take further risks, choose right this time : Belgian based Hamburger restaurant quick on the Champs-Elysées was the place to be!

Mission time : Sunday 2:00AM

Everything ready and discussed for the shoots on the next day! Time for some sleep.

Zzzzzz

Mission time : Sunday 6:00AM

Time to get up, final check on the gear, prepare the clothes for the first 3 shots, pack everything

JP, working hard on the models hair until 9:00 AM

Mission time : Sunday 9:30AM

Ready to take the first shot, click, one shot and done!

Okay let's add our Male model for this shot too.

Done, time to move further, Pont D'Iéna, between the Eiffel Tower and the Trocadéro, let's shoot some walking pictures between all the tourists

And a little help from the sun to add some lens flare!

Keep the tempo up, time is precious so let's move to another location, the carousel is not open yet so we go up to the Esplanade Trocadéro and we'll do the Carousel shot on our way back to the apartment.

I had to bribe the operator a bit to get this shot :-p

And then some time to warm up, because it was only about 11°C, Talyssa enjoying her warm Waffle with Nutella!

Time to head back to the apartment, prepare everything for the afternoon shoot, pick the right clothes.

At this time we also had to "leave" the apartment for the next clients but luckily we could leave a lot of our stuff at the desk and we'll get it when we leave later that day...

Mission time : Sunday 1:30PM

After a serious walk we arrived at the beautifull Alexandre III bridge, first shot to check the light

Looks good, let's add Nathalie in the composition

One from the right, one from the left and done. Working with talented and experienced models makes my job a lot easier and allows for faster work rhythm.

A Little bur further, in Front of the Musée D'Orsay, there is the Passerelle de Solférino where a lot of young couples hang there "Cadenas D'amour". I knew this existed in China but this habit seems to have invaded Europe too. I thought it would be nice to include 2 girls and 1 guy on this bridge, the not so classical 'Love story'

After this we had to walk for quite a bit, i had this idea of a couple crossing the Champs-Elysées with the Arc de Triomphe as a backdrop for a picture but important things go first so we halted at a Pizzeria for a little gastronomic intermezzo

This Arc-de-Triomphe-picture-thing was a serious challenge i didn't count on the thousands spectators en the amount of cars going up and down, pretty busy place it is!

But this was it, we had our shots and it was time to head back home.

We headed back to our apartment to pick up all our stuff we left over there and the guy from the reception called in a little Taxi-bus to bring us to Paris-Nord station where we took the Thalys back home.

When we arrived at the station the driver said the price was 100,00 euro, the day before the payed 16,00 euro or the same trip in the other direction; Mayor Tourist rip-off #2

I admit Paris really appeals to me for Urban shooting because of the space so i will plan some more shoots over there and probably we'll be ripped off again, but I'll be sure to pay some people a visit!

"Paris, I'll be back"

Made in cooperation with :

www.make-updeluxe.com

www.equipehaircare.com

www.facebook.com/ditofashionstyle

www.NathalieFransen.com

Kenneth Thijs & Talyssa Put

EyesCold, moving photography

2012-12-04T08:29:00.001+01:00

I've been very busy lately but i hope it will be a little calmer in 2013 and so it's been a while since I've updated my blog... but I'm going to be updating with samples from last months shoots in the weeks that come!

the latest months I've also been trying to get away from the technical approach on shooting images and focussing more on the story inside the image, the emotions, the mood, ... Telling a story with one image is a good thing and not really easy but being able to tell it in moving images is something that has opened possibilities.

EyesCold is not really a story in the traditional way and it wasn't meant to be either, it's a celebration of female beauty and elegance, a celebration of light, forms and graphic elements.

I believe every model should have a few of these "moving photography" in her portfolio, it's a modern version of the "polaroids", it makes it a lot easier for a photographer to asses a models natural talent in moving, posing and to see her real beauty.

I also love the fact that i can use "moving lights", something impossible to show in traditional photography...

EyesCold was filmed using the Nikon D800e in HD @ 24 fps and the 85mmG at f:1.4 ~ f:1.8

Model: Nele De Groodt

EyesCold from michelengelen.com on Vimeo.

Bedsurfing with a blonde girl

2012-08-31T16:41:00.000+02:00

A recipe to bed-surfing:

Ingredients:

1 model (try to find one that moves in a sexy way)
1 bed + some sheets and other "bedstuff"
1 grungy backdrop that looks like a cheap bedroom
1 camera with normal lens
1 on-camera flash
1 ambient light generator (light bulb or TL for even more grunginess)

How-to:

NOTE: My idea was that the model would be nude for this but sadly this lady does not pose nude, so I will have another go at it with a nude model later.

Place the bed against the wall so you have a backdrop. turn on the Light bulb so you create a basic light setup, measure this light in the bed.

Take your camera and put it in Manual Exposure, because one light bulb does not create a lot of light we'll be using the "drag the shutter" technique, this means a longer exposure which will lead to some natural blur in the picture.
Set your ISO / Aperture en speed to the light meter readout, you can underexpose a bit for even more grunginess.

Now place your flashgun on the camera, set the in-camera light meter to Average (not spot or matrix) put the flash in TTL mode (because we are going to be moving a lot) and set the flash gun Zoom function to manual en try something like 100 or 150mm, in combination with a 50mm lens on camera this will look like a small flash was used and it will also create a vignette.

The combination of the long exposure and flash light will give you a very grungy look.

the next step is to take the model and throw her on the bed, next make her move, crawl, rollover and look sexy

Adjust light to taste.

MUA: Sybille De Beuckelaer

Next we did some more moving on "het trukske met het krukske" , this is a small barstool and the top plate is very loose so this pushes models that sit on it to move their body, very funny and yielding those different poses.

Excuusfeesten @ Kortenberg

2012-08-31T15:47:00.001+02:00

Runners competition at the Excuusfeesten Kortenberg.

Every year we're invited to make some pictures at this event, always nice to see the difference between the people at the start and at the finish :-)

Al shot with Nikon D700, SB-900 & the AF-d 35mm f2.0 because is didn't want to use the 24-70 as i find the quality crappy, but the Af speed from the 35 Af-d turned out a little slow for sports so a few images are not "spot on" focus

Look at my watch!

and we have a winner!


First prize, not bad!

Charlotte

2012-08-31T15:31:00.001+02:00

Charlotte is still a teenager and teenagers are in the middle between being a kid and being an adult, so how do you decide in which style your going to make pictures of them?

Well you have to look at it case per case because I've seen teens that looked like 19 but where only 14, but also the other way 'round where girls at there 18 still looked like a 14 year old kid.

But by changing the setting, deciding on make-up or not, selecting the clothes, etc, you really have a lot of control on the finished product.

Let's start with some pictures out of a workshop where we worked with Charlotte and her younger brother Mathieu.

It was a sunny day, devil hour as they say. This translates into the worst conditions for us as photographers, hard contrast, hard shadows, oversaturated colors, etc... Unless you actually know what your doing it's a pretty hard getting some nice results.

There are several options, but when you look closer at it, it all boils down to "work with the light" or "work against the light". Most of the photographers will choose the work against the light and try to fill in the shadows with reflection or flashlight.

For this shot of Mathieu i worked with the light, I had Mathieu standing in the open shade of a building and the sun shined on the concrete floor behind mee which resulted in a warm reflection and very nice color temperature, It's pretty flat light but it's always flattering and works very well for kids

The next shot was also made by working "with the light", assistant holded a translucent sunscrim over the head of our 2 young models to soften out the harsh sunlight and another assitant throwed some light back in the composition using a big California bounce panel (Zebra Pro)

And now comes the change of Charlotte, I also shot her at the studio and you will see how she looks completely different by using some make-up and different poses and light.

Kenneth for Equipe Haircare

2012-08-31T15:22:00.004+02:00

A few shots from our male model Kenneth for hairdresser Equipe Haircare.

Mu by Tanja Dassy, Styling by Carine Luyck for DITO fashion&style WELLEN

Bo Stevens

2012-08-31T15:20:00.004+02:00

Some results from my first and second shoot with Bo, partly outside at Lillo and some out of our "in studio boudoir" workshop.

I've been evolving more and more into a gold look on my pictures, I'm sure to proceed with this on my future shoots

Portfolio shoot Jackie Lee Models

2012-08-31T15:17:00.001+02:00

Shoot Jackie Lee

Just some random shots out of our last portfolio shoot for Jackie Lee Models in Antwerp, made with the help and assistance of Peter Nackaerts en Marc Thys

MUA: Yinka Gboyega and Mua Djenien

In studio Boudoir

2012-08-31T15:14:00.001+02:00

New in studio Boudoir setup for the upcoming lingerie sessions this winter (renting Hotel rooms is nice but often too expensive for my clients, so this is the cheaper alternative for my clients)

Skindeep (NSFW)

2012-08-31T15:00:00.000+02:00

I really love skin, female curves, sensuality, .. this translate nicely into a form of photography often called "bodyscapes", imitating landscape photography by using the curves of the female body.

For this video, i wanted to take this idea to a new level and i hope you enjoy the results (NSFW warning!)

You can watch it on Vimeo --> https://vimeo.com/46944490

Afro-Latino 2012

2012-07-14T12:56:00.000+02:00

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Photographing musicians while performing on stage is great but in my humble opinion some things are 'a must' to deliver qualitative results, a good camera with a usable range around 800 tot 1600 ISO, good low light auto-focus (no manual focus for me please) and some good glass to put between the artist and your camera.

My chosen setup for the Afro-Latino festival of 2012, including some rented material because a lot of this stuff does not come for free, is The Nikon D800e, the Nikkor AF-s 70-200 f:2.8 Vrii and the AF-s 300mm f:2.8 Vrii.

I'm impressed, really impressed by the quality delivered by the optics regarding the demanding 36Mpix sensor in the 800e, the details are mind blowing, sometimes there's even to much detail ;-)

I'm impressed by the Dynamic range of the D800e, even at ISO 1600 it is super, the conditions on stage are ever changing, dynamic, light changes direction every 2 seconds, etc

I tested the 3D AF-C modus on the D700 last year with mixed results, so i went back to the AF-s and a single AF-point. The 800e being a new generation camera i tried the 3D following mode again and it's "wow", it's so good i used in 90% of the photos. Really great for tracking artists with too much energy.

My camera setup is almost always the same, White-balance is set to sunlight, ISO 1600 (or 3200 if necessary) Shutter speed at 1/125 and Aperture set to full open f:2,8.
I tried automatic modes in the past but they are easily fooled by the constantly changing conditions, the full manual control gives me the best ratio of acceptable results, to give you an idea on the 3 days I made about 1600 pictures and i uploaded 505 out of them which i found to be good pictures, about 30% is not bad. the trick is to not get carried away with some acts and keep photographing after you are sure you already nailed "the shots", also make sure you make the safe pictures of the main artist as soon as possible because it can happen that you are only allowed to photograph the first 3 songs or even less....

This picture was made from about 20meter distance with the 300mm, hand-held, i was standing on a chair to shoot 'over' the public, Mr. alpha Blondy decided to give us just 3 songs of front stage access so we had to move a little further.

Alpha Blondy

I want to place a big thank you to all the people involved who made this possible and friends to make it a good weekend to remember!

Some results after the jump : (make sure you also check the pictures of the Fire breather )

BATIDA

Che Sudaka

Shaggy

Aswad

Chroma Latina

Irie Révoltés

DJ Lass & Angel Vibes

Juan Luis Guerra y 4.40

La Exelencia

Elito Revé y su Charangon

FIREBREATHER

JaoJoby


SMOD

Tommy Tornado


Zule Max

ALL PICTURES (C) Michelengelen.com & Afro-latino Festival !!!

Belgian Sahara with Natalie and Evelien

2012-06-15T19:03:00.003+02:00

Many years ago this place was only a large plane of sand around a small lake but nature is slowly fighting his way back and new plants are starting to grow everywhere, but people in this region keep speaking about "The Sahara"

In fact it's just a tiny beach around a tiny lake with a lot of pine trees around it, not the usual backdrop you would find in Belgium and that's why i love to shoot here.
There's also at least one reason i don't like to shoot here ... you have to drag all your material through the loose sand and it's a 20min walk, even my UberFantastiK Beach Rolley equipped with super extra big sand tires is a pain to pull here.

I'm not even sure why i brought all this material, oh yes, wait.. i remember now, i had a very specific shot in mind but there was so much wind and i forgot the book at least 8 assistant to hold everything in place so i went for plan B = keep it simple without flying away :-p

Evelien Van Tiggel did not only do the very nice make-up and the hair but also all the sunbouncing with the Zebra / White Pro screen as this is was the only light modifier used for this series.

So everything shot with my finger and the Nikon D800e + 85mm Af 1,4G

All pictures (c) michelengelen.com !!

I also like the black&white version, hard to choose ...

And the amazing details of the 36Mp D800 sensor, the left image is not even a 100% cropped part of the photo on the right...

Lalala-Laura-Laura

2012-05-30T23:32:00.001+02:00

Pretty girls and fast cars, i love both but to combine them in 1 photoshoot is not my cup of tea, it has been done so often and all the pictures resemble one another.

Model: Laura Theys, MUA :muaDjenien, Assist: Luc

But here we where, Laura was ready to model and the new Ferrari 458 Italia was screeming for some attention (which is off course what's it supposed to do anyway)
I watch out not to fall in the typical girl-car shoot, so i decided to keep the car in just a tiny pit of the frame, even with only a small part of the bodywork i'm sure almost 90% of the people would recognize the car is an exotic anyway

The next thing was a bit of a try-out, it's something i wanted to try for a long time but never really had opportunity to do it. 1 side is lit with the Apollo Westcott softbox (SB-900) and on the other side a simple shoot-through umbrella (Af-540-fgz). I had 1 misfire on the SB-900 probably due to me shooting faster than the recycle time but i really loved the result, it's amazing to see how much detail is retained in the shadow area with the Nikon D800e, this is also a situation where the extended dynamic range comes in handy.

and some more soft, very soft stuff ...

Wild horses

2012-05-25T22:42:00.001+02:00

The Nikon d800e, what an amazing piece of engineering, sharpness and "micro contrast" are redefined for what is possible on an FX size sensor but keep your feet on the ground, the more than 36 million pixels are unforgiving on your shooting style, motion blur is easily revealed because of the enormous amount of detail, even the smallest amount where the focus is off becomes painfully visible at a 100% view.
Only the best lenses will be able to deliver good detail resolution, so using top quality lenses is mandatory.

I have to say that the Nikkor Af-s 24-70 f:2.8 never really convinced me on the D700 (soft corners - focus shift) but it seems to perform a lot better on the D800e but i'll have to use it more before i can come to a "real world usage" conclusion, two lenses that have really convinced me so far are the Nikkor Af-85mm f:1.4 G and the ever amazing Nikkor 14-24 f:2.8.

The Af-s 70-200 Vrii that performed very well on the D700 seems to be able to justly keep up with the demands of the D800e, if you don't need a zoom in this range i would certainly recommend switching to primes like the 85 f:1.8G or f:1.4G, i don't own one but i wonder how the 200mm f:2 would perform on this body...

About Moiré = not really an issue until now and not much worse than the regular D800 from what i've seen

Obvious question = Will a client see the difference between a 800px downscaled photo from the D700 or the D800e? No probably not, neither will he see you had to crop to 25% of the original and still have about 10Mpix files, that's at your advantage, so is sharpness and the really comfortable dynamic range a low ISO

Enough of the technical mambo jambo, time for some real life results i would say:

This is a "landscape crop" downscaled to it's websize:

You can find the full resolution file on my flickr stream, >click here for 20MB of detail<

But if you don't feel like going for a walk on my Flickr stream here is a crop!
I had to downscale it to 75% to be 800px wide.. just a tiny amount of wtf goes around when looking at these files i can tell you!

But Mike wouldn't be Mike if he didn't have a model to shoot ;-)

Model is Julie Ghoos (She got a pretty score at the latest Miss Belgium contest. )
MUA / hair : Sophie Adam.

All was shot with the Nikon D800e + Af85mm 1,4G and Af50 1,4D

Details, details, details ...

This was a soft-focus technique to show the difference between a "normal" picture and the less contrasty one, feels a lot like a David Hamilton and that was the purpose because i was going to need some similar effect for my next shoot

BigBag Bigmicmacbag a sosobag by bigsoso

2012-04-23T20:07:00.001+02:00

BigSoSo, the transport Bag for your Apple!

So it is advertised on the WorldWideWeb, as i needed a transport protection for my 21.5" iMAC i ordered one and today the packet arrived from LaPaz Bolivia.

It looks really well built, good first impression, quality materials and the iMAC fits perfectly

Plenty of protection mousse all around, but i would not try to throw it to see how far it can fly...

As i was a big soso lazy today i made the pictures with my phone :-)

Follow the white rabbit

2012-04-22T20:29:00.002+02:00

Steffi, MUA Evelien Van Tigghel

Just follow the white rabbit, crazy stuff is sure to happen :-)

Most people are pretty sure that my pictures are almost unprocessed, don't know why, maybe they look to natural? But i don't really care what people think, i just follow what i feel is right for me, commercial or not i really don't care, just shoot what you are comfortable with, i've done it now for many years ;-)

But unprocessed, they are not.

This is to give you a little idea of what i look at during post:

It doesn't always come out, during post i can change my mind and i decided to add a bunch of warmth to this one

let's go on with the rest of the shoot:

We went in the car park and tried out some more out of the box stuff, just let go of everything you know and go with the flow ...

3 girls and a couch

2012-04-22T18:53:00.000+02:00

3 Girls (Sandro, Clea, Sarah), 1 amazing stylist (Glen Franssen) and a great Make-up Artist (Sybille De Beuckelaer) and a couch...

I'm not gonna go very deep in the lighting setup, it's pretty easy, ring flash with beauty dish = on axis light at his best :-)

body Curves (NSFW)

2012-04-22T18:43:00.000+02:00

I love skin, real skin, perfect skin, unclothed skin, skin is amazing...

Made during one of our Workshops where we go into a deeper approach of controlling light...

One more after the jump (NSFW!!)

Bodyscape or Erotic, it's up to you !

The Nikon dudes.

2012-04-19T13:19:00.004+02:00

No really, what is wrong with the Nikon dudes, "Dark to see the logic" would be the words of master Yoda...

I understand that the earthquake, Tsunami and flooding in Thailand caused some problems and delayed the arrival of the nikon D800, but we had great cameras at our disposal for some years, like the D300(s), D700, D3, D3s, D3x,... so it was no problem waiting for the upgrade (not for me anyway)

But a few months ago things started moving, oh-oh-oh big Nikon announcement !!

Nikon D800, D800e and the D4 are announced, D800 with 36Mpix, wow! Nikon D4, the new low-light king, nice job Nikon!

But for me what follows is the weird and illogical part :

I think i can say that Wi-Fi has become a pretty well established standard over the last years, hardware and drivers readily available, to prove this 99% of every laptop, notebook, smart-phone, tablet, ... has on-board Wi-fi and I've seen the chips, they are small, the antenna is another question.

Now the D800 has no networking onboard, if you want to connect it trough Wi-Fi wireless connection you have to purchase the (older) Nikon Wt-4(a), extra cost of about €700 and it's bulky

The D4 has an Ethernet connection, very nice Nikon but if you want to use it trough Wi-Fi, Nikon has the new Wt-5a for you, extra cost about €800, good morning to you sir ...

So if you buy like a D4 and a D800 you got to buy both wireless transmitters because they are not compatible...

But ok, the Wt5 is going to be the new standard? It's smaller and probably faster, so that's a good thing!

( The fact that the D800 uses the older Wt-4 solution proves that this camera should have been released at least 6 month earlier, if it was developed by the same team as the D-4 it would also make use of the newer Wt-5 )

And than a few days ago Nikon announced their new entry-level Dslr, the Nikon D3200.

Oh yes and they did it again... the Nikon D3200 can be connected by Wi-Fi using an EXTERNAL connector, wtf? And logic would assume that it's going to be compatible with the rest, but no, again it's a new design, the Wu-1a, sold for about €50.

I guess the dudes in Sendai just think "oh those clazy plofessional photoglaphels make enough money to spend mole on geal"

Wtf, logic this Mr Spock!

upgrading co$ts

2012-04-18T19:17:00.003+02:00

After working for 3 years on the same Windows based system i finally decided to upgrade my system and went for an "Apple".

My first idea was to go for a MacBook pro because i wanted a system i could move to the studio for tethered shooting, after doing some research i found that the MacBook screens are not IPS based technology (almost no laptop has an IPS screen), so if i wanted to get the most out of it i had to buy an additional screen like an Eizo or something = additional costs + more cumbersome setup but easy if i wanted to take the MacBook only..

My second idea was to go for an iMac 21'5 and this is what i finally bought, I ordered a big carrying case at Bigsoso to take the system with me between my working place and the studio, maybe i'll add a MacBook pro next year or so, but for now i got a pretty good solution that went easy on my bank account. (Well easy...)

But (there's always a but) at the studio i used to work tethered on my Windows Machine, for this i bought 2 simple 3meter long USB cables that i connected together (one cable was male -female, second cable was male - male, usb B ).

A perfect 6 meter long connection between the Windows computer with Lightroom and my Nikon D700 :-)

So i tried the same, 2x3m USB cable between the iMAC and the D700 = no connection

hmmm... maybe i should add a powered USB hub?

So i tried = iMac -> powered USB hub -> 2x3m USB cable -> D700 = no connection

hmmm... €20,00 spend on a useless USB hub...

So i tried = iMac -> 1x3m USB cable -> original Nikon USB cable -> = Hallelujah! Connected, but only a working radius of 4 meter :-(

Then i tried connecting this to the USB connector in the Mac Keyboard to win 0,5m but this again resulted in a "no connection".

I'll try using an active USB cable in a future setup but thought i'll put this online, maybe it's useful for somebody or maybe somebody can explain me why the 6meter solution works on a Windows machine but not on the iMac machine ...

EDIT:

I received a 10 meter active USB cable, works like a charm on the Windows PC, but on the iMAC i can not make a connection, the camera is detected by the system as you can see here :

Edit 2. (18-April-2012)

I was in contact with TetherTools.com about this problem and according to their experiences one should never attempt to use passive USB cables longer than 5 meters on the iMAC.

I ordered pretty expensive USB 3.0 cables, 2 x 16 ft with 2 activators, these shoud do the trick for the D700 and the D800.

At this moment i'm pretty sure my next laptop will not be a Macbook but probably a simple Windows machine with USB 3.0 support, time will tell...

Edit 3 (06-June-2012)

Today I received 2 brand new USB3.0 gold plated active cables from Tethertools.com

1)
Imac <-> usb 2.0 port <-> nikon usb 2.0 cable <-> Nikon D700

Import Works
Tethering Works

2)
Imac <-> usb 2.0 port <-> Tethertools 5meter USB 3.0 cable <-> nikon usb 2.0 cable <-> Nikon D700

Import Works
Tethering Works

3)
Imac <-> usb 2.0 port <-> Tethertools 5meter USB 3.0 cable <-> Tethertools 5meter USB 3.0 cable <-> nikon usb 2.0 cable <-> Nikon D700

No Camera detected

4)
Imac <-> usb 2.0 port <-> nikon usb 2.0 cable <-> Nikon D800e

Import Works
Tethering not yet supported bij Adobe Lightroom

5)
Imac <-> usb 2.0 port <-> Tethertools 5meter USB 3.0 cable <-> nikon usb 2.0 cable <-> Nikon D800e

Import = Camera appears for 1 or 2 seconds in the Lightroom interface and than it disappears = No Camera detected (very weird)
Tethering not yet supported bij Adobe Lightroom

6)
Imac <-> usb 2.0 port <-> Tethertools 5meter USB 3.0cable <-> Tethertools 5meter USB 3.0 cable <-> nikon usb 2.0 cable <-> Nikon D800e

No Camera detected

To be continued ...

Kelly (partly NSFW)

2012-03-29T22:11:00.000+02:00

This is Mission #1 part 2 "Thy Shall only use available light, again"

It was such a nice warm en sunny day, the light was just perfect for what we had in mind but the problem was that our chosen location was not available because of some festivities.. So: change of plans and improvisation @100%

One thing about this shoot was easy, the styling! Kelly agreed to pose nude for me and i have to say her body made my job easy. Images are out of cam, just pumped up the saturation a bit and shot on the cloudy white balance to warm up the skintones.

NSFW warning if you take the read more jump :
I loved the tree as a backdrop, sorry if you do not like it :-$

2012-03-25T21:53:00.002+02:00

The more you photograph the more you realize it's not easy. It's not easy to make "wow" pictures every time, it's not easy getting what you thought you should get, it's not easy dealing with light that sucks, but the most difficult thing is growing, growing in what you do, getting better at it.

So to grow sometimes you have to take a step back and try to look at things from a different angle and therefore I assigned myself a mission!

Mission #1 "Thy shall only use available light"

This Lady was very helpful and lend me some of her precious time to go out on a photo-shoot from which we did not know the outcome and I have to say that at first I was not pleased with the results but I've taking enough peace with it to share them with you and add my thoughts about this Mission.

Please keep in mind: we had no Makeup-artist and there is no retouch on the pictures, I only used the D700 with the 85mm f:1.4 lens.

The day started out sunny, then we got a little bit of rain and too end with some beautiful clouds in the sky ( I love looking at clouds)

The Sun as a light source: it's not too bad when the angle is low (less than 30°) and you can position your subject looking straight in the direction of the sun (to steep angles like 45 of 60 will result in ugly shadows and probably too much contrast for the sensor to deal with in an elegant way)

The Clouds as a light source: if the clouds are too equal, the light sucks, really, there's no contrast making everything evenly lit, it's boring and gray, so you have to look for natural elements that will force light to take a direction, an opening in a row of trees could be a perfect example, but still you have to look out that not too much light is coming in from right above because this will cast shadows in the eye sockets, under the nose and the chin, also you will probably have to much light in the bridge of the nose and the forehead.


Look, it's my shadow :-p

The trick is too look out for directional light and to place yourself and your subject accordingly, the directional light is the same as the light coming from a soft-box but far less consistent. If the quality of the light allows it I found that placing the light source at 5 to 15 degrees behind you works best (working with the direction of the light) everything behind your subject will normally be lit in the range of your sensor, some white clouds might be a bit overexposed nonetheless

I wonder what could be Mission #2...

Lotte

2012-03-18T09:09:00.006+01:00

Today we had a great team, Lotte Feyen, MUA Evelien Van Tiggel, Hairstylist: Hanna Lauwers.

I'm thinking about having these images printed in really large size, they were taken with the modelling lights at ISO1600, 1/125th, f2.8 so they contain a nice amount of grain but also lot's of tiny little details which get lost in these very small websize samples.

If I say, Angelina Jolie in The Changeling, you say yes or no?

Same goes for the next picture, Evelien placed so much little details in the make-up it would be sad to see them get lost and not print it on large format.

We kept the make-up but changed the scene from low-key to high-key.

White seamless, 2 500Ws heads at full power nuking the back at f:32 + 1 head directly behind the model aimed directly at the camera for some extra lensflare, no light in the front, just 1 white reflector V-Card to push back some light on Lotte's face ...

And a few relaxing fun series, ringflash at totally freestyle apertures.

ALL images (c) atmikes.eu! Have a nice day!