Those who know me, I don’t have to tell that I’m fascinated with India and its culture. Few years ago I was there for 3 months, being trained by the company I work for, and trying to explore as much of Indian culture (and eat Indian food ) as I could, but 3 months would not be enough to fully sightsee this incredible country, even if you have 3 months only for that. Sometimes I think that it would be perfect if my company sent me to India, for let’s say 1 year project, so I can travel and see everything Oh well, if everything goes well, I will go there for a vacation one day, and I will capture some of so versatile Indian culture

But for now, I’d have to enjoy Indian culture here in US Few weeks ago there was Holi Festival in Naperville, IL. Very beautiful event, where people say bye bye to winter and throw colored powder at each other.

About equipment: 70-200mm L 2.8 IS with CPL filter. I was thinking of switching to 85 1.2 or 100 macro, but I didn’t want to swap lenses with all the powder around Note to self: bring some plastic bag/underwater housing next time you shoot Holi Festival, so you don’t have to shoot most of the time @ 200mm

Matt, Susie an Noelle – thanks for coming with us!!

My fellow photographer wasn’t worried about his equipment – he was shooting right in the middle of where everything was happening, check his ghetto hood tho

Thanks for stopping by, and remember: pictures don’t have to be amazing, but there sure can… www.bizior.com

You should remember Noelle from 3-months photo session – happy and adorable baby. Time files, and few weeks ago we did 6-months photo session. Noelle was rocking out the outfits and posing like a pro

About the light: for the black background I used black muslin, and cross lighting – Elinchrom Quadra + Elinchrom Strip Box and one Elinchrom Octa. I wanted black background to be black not grey, so I was sure not to throw any light on it – I feathered the subject – just enough soft light to lit the subject, but directed it the way so it doesn’t hit the background.

Then we change the scenarios – thanks to Home Depot (hard wood floor, moulding, etc), some clamps and Kamila’s creativity we came up with the setup below. Elinchrom Elinchrom Octa was the main light, and 580ex II for the background.

And here is famous peaches – dog who can lick its own nose – very useful capability

I’d have to start this post with apologies to my friends and family, that it’s been over 2 months before they got to see the pictures from our trip to Poland. I was dealing with some personal stuff for the last few weeks, but now, as I’m almost fully recovered, here they are, pictures from Poland.

A little bit about the gear: I dragged both cameras: digital – 5d mk II, and film – Mamiya 645AFD. Threw 80mm 2.8 lens for Mamiya, and 50mm 1.2 L and 24mm 1.4 II L for Canon, couple of flashes, pocket wizards, light meter, Lastolite softbox kit, reflector and that’a about it. No tripod, no stands, due to the luggage concerns – I remember when I was allowed to take 2x 50lbs suitcases when travelling long distance international flights – now it’s just one 50lbs. Because of that I had to use whatever was available for stands (chairs, tables, borrowed tripods, etc). Most of the times I shot available light, indoors I used 580EX II and Lastolite softbox for main, and another bare 580EX II for fill (bouncing from the ceiling or wall). Alright, enough about the gear, here are the pictures, first Kamila’s family:

and Bizior’s family:

And now some stuff form NYE party, I stopped shooting right before action (read drinking) started, so no one has any compromising pictures ooh it was so great to meet all my friends, thanks everyone for accommodating us and hanging out with us, and special shout out to Kornelia and her sister for allowing us to use their beautiful house for NYE party – I mean just check out the pictures from outside and inside, this place is amazing, and next time we’re in Poland we’re doing a photoshoot there – it already done deal

someone had to chop the wood before the party started, and we had so much fun doing it!

yes, it took some time before water in the hot tub warmed up, and yes we went in :0 It was awesome

Here are couple shots from Wroclaw, what an amazing city…

What  a way to kick off new 2012 year, right? Great model, gorgeous location and a backdrop, great makeup artist and assistants, what else do you need to have successful photoshoot We shot again in Pandora Studios with Jeremy (thanks dude!), this time beautiful model Anna. Kamila did the makeup and Anna’s husband was super helpful in selecting outfits and carrying the equipment around. We wanted natural, clean look that plays well with the new backdrop that I got from Drop It Modern. This is, I think the 4th backdrop that I bought from Drop It Modern, so I knew that I could only expect high quality and outstanding product, but this one – spangled backdrop – is by far my favorite backdrop (until you guys release something new ). Enjoy the pictures, and if you want to know a bit more how I lit them, description is couple of pictures below…

Here is a little about the light setup. I knew that this gorgeous backdrop from Drop It Modern will be super reflective and sparky, and at the same time easy to light. For the main light I used (1.) Elinchrom Quadra RX with 39″ Deep Octa, and thanks to that I got a some of a background light, but because Deep Octa was camera right I was getting light on the left side of the background, not so much on the right side. To fix it, I setup (2.) background light – Canon 580 EX II zoomed to 70mm. I also wanted to have some fill light and wanted it to be warm – that’s why I threw (3.) Lastolite 30″ Gold Reflector into the setup, slightly warming up Anna and also bouncing some light back to the backrop. I like the end result, it came up pretty much what I’ve envisioned, not so regular lit backdrop, but very even and soft light on the subject.

For triggering I used Pocket Wizards II. For color management – X-rite Color Passport.

Yes, I shot film here too – Mamiya 645AFD on Kodak Portra 400, the first picture is a scan from neg, rest of them are digital. I’d have to say – it looks pretty color consistent to me, but for some reason I like the look and feel of film (yes, still ).

Then we went outside the studio, took ABR800 Ring Flash. I’m sure you can easily figure it out the position of it, thanks to the shadows, but here it is anyways: left picture – shot right thru the ring flash, the right one – ring flash moved to the right side of the camera.

Ringflash for two pictures on the sides (centered), Quadra RX + Deep Octa for the “Obama in the background” picture (shot with Mamiya+Kodak Portra 400 film)

Ring Flash all the way here – it gives awesome look with that kind of backgrounds and outfit

Quadra RX + Deep Octa here, above the subject camera left. Middle picture taken with Mamiya 645AFD+Kodak Portra 400.

Then we came back to the studio, to shoot more backdrop stuff. Same setup as in the first couple of pictures.

It’s been 4 years since I’ve watched Super Bowl for the first time, and it was the same two teams playing as today: New England Patriots and New York Giants. 4 years ago, Giants won, I watched it in NYC and the city went nuts after the game. That time, I mostly watched it for the commercials, not quite understood the rules of American Football. This year, I started to watch NFL more and actually got the rules, so I enjoyed both: commercials and the Super Bowl game, and I’ve to tell you – it sucks, because there is not time to go to the restroom and take care of business :/ Only chance you have, if you don’t want to miss either, is right after the half time commercials, but just before the half-time show. OK, anyways, enough talking, commercials were – as usual – outstanding, here are my favorites:

number 8 – careerbuilder.com, some people probably will say – just another day at work :

number 7 – honda, those who’s seen Ferris Bueller’s Day Off will enjoy it most:

number 6 – doritos:

number 5 – m&ms:

number 4 – toyota, would love to get that couch:

number 3 – cars.com

number 2 – acura:

and aired after the half time, number 1 – chrysler

ooh yeah, by the way, congrats to Giants and Eli Manning, he/they put up a great game, again!

thanks for stopping by, and remember: “pictures don’t have to be amazing, but they sure can…” www.bizior.com

I had the pleasure to work with Alejandra right before Thanksgiving 2011, but then got super busy, and went to Poland for Christmas (pictures coming soon ) not that I was slacking or anything like that :/ Anyway, finally I postprocess the pictures, so here they are…

Little bit about the light:

pictures with the white background – main light Elinchrom Ranger RX + Deep Octa, two Striboxes on each side behind the model to make the background white. For the picture in the middle, we turned the background lights off, and I kinda liked the grey look of it – changes are good, right?

Below, Deep Octa as a main light, camera left:

Same Deep Octa + Elinchrom Ranger RX here, subject right slightly above, tilted:

Combined with Deep Octa,  Elinchrom Ranger RX is such a mobile and awesome source of light, that I dragged it with me almost everywhere. I think I’ve mentioned it before, but the light coming out from Deep Octa is so forgiving and soft, sometimes it makes me feel that no matter where I position it, picture will come out nice…

Here are couple of shots from medium format Mamiya 645AF + 80mm 2.8, same lighting setup as for digital. I used Seconic L-758DR Light Meter for metering the light (and my math skills to go from ISO100 – digital, to ISO400 – Kodak PORTRA 400) , Pocket Wizards remote triggering system.

Special thanks for makeup - Deanna, hair styling by Jennifer and Nicole.

Thanks for stopping by, and remember: “pictures don’t have to be amazing, but they sure can…” www.bizior.com

Here is the 2nd part of the Pandora Studios shoot I did couple weeks ago. I will still have one more post to do, and that’ll be it for this year Anyway, meet Willow, our second model for that day. Makeup was done by Deanna, hair styling by Jennifer and Nicole. Oooh boy, we got so lucky to get to work with such awesome people! Thank you guys again for your time

Lighting was quick and dirty, it almost felt like cheating – Elinchrom Ranger RX and Deep Octa on extension pole. Light coming from DO is so soft and forgiving, it makes you feel like no matter how you position the Octa, picture will look great – even monkey could do it !

Thanks for stopping by, and remember: “pictures don’t have to be amazing, but they sure can…” www.bizior.com

Me and my photography friends – Jeremy and Rio shot in Pandora’s Studios 2 weeks back, it was an epic shoot. I would have to break the whole thing into 2 or even 3 posts, because I’d like to keep posting pictures and don’t want you guys keep waiting and then post 40 pictures at once So here we go, let’s start with Vanessa, she’s very talented and beautiful person, she’s a trooper too – was putting up with us for over half a day, and it was pretty long day. I have to also add that 3 of us are not so easy to tolerate, especially Rio, lol just kidding !

Big thanks to Deanna for doing makeup for all 3 models (different looks for each model), and Jennifer and Nicole for doing hair. Thanks to Lover’s Lane we got to shoot Vanessa wearing gorgeous lingerie. All that together along with awesome people and location made one awesome shoot! We got lucky and got access to 1st floor gallery, so this post won’t be about boring white seamless.

For main light we used Elinchrom Ranger RX and Deep Octa on extension pole - you can easily figure out the position where it was placed, either based on the catchlight, or the shadows. Usually we placed it high above or at the eye level. All triggered via Pocket Wizard. For last set of photos – just ABR800 Ring Flash

I also took my Mamiya so I could get different look and b&w. It was a little bit tricky, because I was shooting my digital either ISO 50, 100 or 200, and my film was rated ISO400. We were also limited by the time, so I had to do the math in my head pretty fast – thank God I graduated from Technical University Same light source – Deep Octa and ABR800. FILM used: Ilford XP-2 400 C41 for B&W and Kodak PORTRA 400 for color.

Thanks for stopping by, and remember: “pictures don’t have to be amazing, but they sure can…” www.bizior.com

I didn’t think that I could post pictures from both: film and digital in the same post, and then I was like ‘what the hell, it might actually work’. We mixed both digital and film in the studio and outdoors. Both natural light and strobes, as I mentioned my Mamiya syncs up to 1/125 so it wasn’t a problem. Amber showed up with red hair and more importantly, great attitude.

Inside the studio I used Elinchrom Ranger+Strip Box for main light, 580ex II + Lastolite Softbox for kicker and fill, and sometimes ABR800 for fill. Also for some pictures – that should be pretty easy to figure out which ones – I used ringflash as a main light and strip for background.

Side note: never strangle the model, always try to ask model to do impossible things, and then after some time she will strangle herself

Thanks for stopping by, and remember: “pictures don’t have to be amazing, but they sure can…” www.bizior.com

I’m not gonna lie and tell you cliché stories how I got into photography when I was 9 years old, and I picked my film camera. Because I didn’t However I do remember when I wasted roll of my fathers 35mm Zenit (I think it was Zenit), thinking that I’m creating something special. And then I was waiting to see the results, and when they showed up – I was, to say it nicely, quite disappointed And after that I never shot film, ever, until now. Yeah, I’ve seen people doing it and getting excited about, often mis-focus, b&w pictures (if you follow my blog, you could find only handful b&w pictures – not a big fan), and I simply thought that it’s not worth it. When I saw my “fb friend” shopping window mannequin pictures taken with film camera, I thought to myself – jeez that’s just not my thing, I’m not gonna shoot film! But when I came across Jonathan Canlas’s FIND (Film Is Not Dead) guide, I again realized, that picture is as good as person taking it, and I wanted to try to shoot film and medium format. When I saw another friend’s work (Lukasz Piech), shot with film, I knew it – I need to send my 120 roll asap

So yeah, I picked up Mamiya AFD 645 with 80mm 2.8 off ebay and went on Halloween weekend to shoot with Kamila. I got files ftp’ed just last Friday (remember – developing film takes time), and all I can say – it’s fun, fun, fun! I’m gonna shoot more film from now on I tested it – it syncs @ 1/125 of a second, so it’s like my 5d mk II and for sure it will be interesting to mix both – strobist techniques and film

Thanks for stopping by, and remember: “pictures don’t have to be amazing, but they sure can…” www.bizior.com