Photographers in Los Angeles

Updated Fashion Photography Portfolios for Warren Lee Studios

2011-02-03T23:14:00.001-08:00

Fashion Photography by Warren Lee

The new website of fashion photography by Warren Lee Studios is live as of today with a fresh new look for 2011. This is a screen grab from the new home page of the fashion photographers portfolios. In 2011 Warren Lee is going to be rolling out several national advertising campaigns including a nationwide search for other photographers to join forces under a new business called W represents. More information to be published soon. In the meantime, please check out the new online portfolios of fashion photography by Warren Lee.

Studying Stones

2010-04-22T22:30:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I took my wife and my camera to a beach along highway way 1, just north of Santa Cruz and south of Half Moon Bay. The beach we stopped at was a spot where the wind & waves had eroded the rocks all around to the extent that instead of sand, there were millions of tiny pebbles. The rock formations at this beach are incredibly fascinating because if you look close enough, particularly through the lens of a camera, there lay millions of possible compositions.

We enjoyed hours away, studying the stones with our cameras looking for interesting ways to design photographs with unique cropping, trying to find interesting patterns or harmony within the lens and the surrounding nature. To see the beach from the parking lot, it would seem to many passers-by, to be any ordinary beach. But to us, it was a photographers playground.

I primarily shot with a hasselblad 503 cm and a fixed focal length lens on Berger film from Germany. I had only two rolls of film, or about 20 shots total, my wife had 4 gigs. She managed to shoot over 100 images while we were at the beach, but I spent most of my time on my knees in only three or four spots, studying the rocks around me. I wanted to find some order in all the dis-order around me. I was looking for some pattern or interesting composition, first I studied lines in the rocks, then the juxtaposition of the different rocks with the pebbles around. I felt as though if I looked hard enough, eventually I would find a simple and pleasing composition that was not too busy or too distracting.

I never found the ideal composition within the two rolls of film and two to three hours we spent on that beach, I believe that there is a better photo still waiting to be made at this beach and for now it has evaded me. As I scoured about the rocks on the beach, it seemed to me that all the rocks were staring back at me, all the little holes in the rocks looked like little faces, some happy faces, others looked tormented. The composition of some holes in the rocks somewhat captures the anguish I felt trying to find a peaceful and harmonious image amongst all the busyness around me. All I wanted was to find an image that was simple and balanced, in amongst a myriad of dis-organized pebbles? Silly huh? It was like I was trying to see a whole forest from within all the trees. After a while I gave up on this pursuit and then focused my lens on a piece of drift wood.

Perhaps I will return to the beach again sometime and make another attempt at finding a composition within all the random pebbles that captures the design elements that I enjoy finding in abstract photos such as these.

Warren Lee Studio | New Flickr Photo Stream

2010-02-11T22:38:00.000-08:00

Check out this new photo stream on Flickr.
Photography by: Warren Lee

This year, social media is becoming increasingly important for professional photographers.
The link above points to the Flickr profile page for Warren Lee Studio and also there are more social media network links.

You can also now get up to the minute info on Warren Lee Studio via twitter & Google Buzz.

Check us out on Twitter or Google Buzz and say Hi!!

Google Buzz @ Warren Lee
Twitter @ Warren Lee

Aid to Haiti

2010-01-18T16:00:00.000-08:00

The earthquake in Haiti was a tragically moving event.
Saddened by this disaster we made a donation to Haiti through UNICEF.
I provided a link for others who may be compelled to do the same.
Posted by Warren Lee.

Lavonne - One of LAs Top Stylists

2009-10-07T15:36:00.000-07:00

Go check out : http://www.lavonnebeauty.com/ This is the new web site / online portfolio for one of LA's best MUA. If you are looking for a great makeup artist in Los Angeles, Lavonne comes highly recommended. By the way, mucho kudos to Lavonne for using a photo created with Warren Lee (above) for the new websites home page!!

Rocks in San Francisco

2009-05-12T21:32:00.001-07:00

Photo by Warren Lee - Copyright 2009.

A new photograph by Warren Lee that is part of a series of images of the CA coastline. This image was made with Ilford Delta 100 black and white film behind 5 stops of neutral density glass on a Hasselblad 503 CW medium format camera.

F ArtForum Magazine Cover

2008-10-05T21:15:00.001-07:00

F ArtForum Magazine Cover

Decided to desecrate the cover of a recent issue of ARTFORUM magazine and share with all you art lovers. This months feature issue of [F] Artforum is now a tribute to farts. Okay, I was bored, and I was feeling a tad bit immature however I thought it might be a great lead-in to blog about other artists who make similar practice of appropriating the art of others. Indeed, here is an artist who has garnered an international reputation through his art. Some might say he also creatively desecrates other art and public space among other things..But check it out and judge for yourself, - click here BANKSY

Richard Prince, Barbara Kruger, Sherrie Levine are some other artists that come to mind.

My mother always said " imitation is the sincerest form of flattery".

So, homage or just plain illegal? What do you think? I'm sure Avedon is probably not turning in his grave ...

(The art below is by http://hotyoungbodies.org/)

(Based on art by Richard Avedon)

Artist portraits - black and white photography of artists shown with their art cont.

2008-09-22T23:00:00.000-07:00

(Above: Black and white photography by Warren Lee)

Artist Portrait Photography - Emrick Konrad

The portrait above is a new addition to a continuing project of black and white photography portraits of artists that can also be seen at Hotel Des Arts in San Francisco. If your into this type of photography you can also see more of this type of portrait photography on Flickr.

ART 08 - John Doffing START SOMA & HOTEL DES ARTS

2008-09-18T23:01:00.001-07:00

(Below - Some event snaps by Warren Lee from the ART 08 exhibition / party by Start Soma / John Doffing @ Hotel Des Arts in San Francisco - requires flash )

By Warren Lee:
I brought a camera and portraiture lens to the Hotel Des Arts hoping to expand upon my artists portraits project while exhibiting some work there at ART 08 event. The event was really much too packed with artists, hipsters, party goers and clowns (yes clowns) to be able to pull off the kind of artist portaits that I had in mind, so I had to take down my photobooth that I setup on the rooftop and settle for some detail snapshots of the event and some of my favorite art works that were on display.
By the way if you like any of the art that you see above, I have provided a list of links to all the artists that were exhibiting at the party at the hotel des arts so that you can check out more of their work. What was great about the exhibit was that the event creators and sponsors made the event so that all sales went 100% to the artists, So many many thanks to John Doffing, Rich, Joe and everyone involved..It was great to see such generosity these days especially with the economy being as it is.
This was also my first opportunity to exhibit my photography at an art exhibit, so also many many thanks to John Doffing for the opportunity and privilege to share my portraits among so many talented artists who's work I really to admire.
Heres the list of artists that were showing work, please feel free to bookmark or digg/stumble/delicious or find any other way to save this list of links because im sure you will find some really amazing art and websites in this list below:

John Stephenson

Ruby Roth

Julie Oppermann

R. Yauger Williams

Erik Rieth

Iggy Medeiros

SAMALA

SUGARLUXE

Tricia Choi

Terrence Hughes

Christian Wiseman

Clynton Lowry

Jean-Benoit Levy

Artist portraits by W

Peep Show Mini Golf Peformance Troupe

Mr.23

Ruby Ray

Graham Nelson

Josh Feldman

Kelty Luber

Chase Tafoya

GOLDI GOLD

Seher Sikandar

Ciaran Doyle

Zoey Stevens

Cate Corbitt

Anthony Grant

Tony Hong

Disposable Hero

Steve Javiel

d. dasari

Mark Damrel

Mark Wasyl

Max Ehrman

Ian Ross

Casey O'Connell

Ed Roth / Stencil1

San Franpsycho

Annie Galvin

Marco Zamora

Max Ehrman / Eon75

Daniel J. Valadez

PLASTICGOD

The Postcard Machine (Possibly from the Future)

Elaine E. Barr for Stencil 1

Ryan Stubblefield

Ben Collison aka OB1

Jason Smith

Mish Heinemann

Clay Chollar

CHOR BOOGIE

VULCAN

Keegan Roberson

Jenny Hagen

Quyen Dinh

Tanith Connolly

Mojhgan Mohtashimi

Tony Hong at the Start Soma New Art 08 Exhibit in Hotel Des Arts in San Francisco

2008-09-18T23:01:00.000-07:00

Artist Portrait of Tony Hong by Warren Lee 2008

Here is another new artist portrait that is a mashup of black and white portrait photography by Warren Lee that combine the artist with the artists own work. This portrait of Tony Hong was made at the NEW ART 08 exhibit / party at Hotel Des Arts. I highly recommend that you check out the art of Tony Hong at http://www.tonyhong.net to see more examples of his work.

PHOTGRAPHY INDUSTRY NEWS - ORPHAN WORKS BILL

2008-05-20T21:57:00.000-07:00

I received this in an email today from Phase 1. It is an urgent call from the APA for support against a bill that will impact our industry..

Please take part in stopping the Orphan works Bill. This can change the landscape of our business. Here is the link to find your Senator:
http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/ You can find the fax number on that website, it is too late to send emails. This is Urgent. See the following link to the APA website for more info and a copy / paste letter that you can send to your senator..

http://www.apanational.com/i4a/pages/Index.cfm?pageID=3875

I will be sending the letter to a CA senator, and I urge anyone who cares about protecting their copyright to look into this further and to also help spread the word.

Thanks

Posted by Warren Lee Studio

Personal black and white photography projects

2008-02-25T21:00:00.000-08:00

Photo by Warren Lee.

Here is another image made at a photographers paradise known as the Salton Sea. This is a photograph that was lightly manipulated using photo shop. The only digital manipulation involved was an increase in the contrast curve and also a slight burn on the top and the bottom (also using curves and layers). Then the sky was altered using a motion blur. The film photograph that was made at the same time would not need a digital motion blur because film is better suited for long exposures (given the correct adjustments using a reciprocity failure chart) than the digital camera. A long (7 minutes using neutral density filters and ISO 50 film) exposure on the film allows for a natural motion blur effect which is a beautiful site to behold in a gelatin silver print. This is one of the latest in personal photography by Warren Lee and Warren plans to make a few limited edition prints if anyone is interested? .. www.warrenleestudio.com

Personal black and white photography projects

2008-02-25T20:23:00.001-08:00

Abandoned Homes Series

Here is another one from a personal project to photograph abandoned homes. All the photographs were slightly styled by the photographer to help with the composition of the image and usually to keep the images from being 'too busy'. Perhaps the next image should be one that is intentionally busy, ha! less work. Well not really considering the images are made both digitally and on film. The process, or work flow, involves using a digital camera as a type of digital polaroid, then using the film camera to make a zone, density tested, duplicate version. Later the digital image is manipulated in photo shop, as it is easier to quickly play around with different creative options such as burning and dodging without having to waste paper or spend extra time waiting to see the outcome. Often there is much time spent in photo shop cleaning up parts of the image that detract from the composition and make the photos to 'busy'.. so spending a little time cleaning up or styling and arranging the scene so that it looks right 'in camera', is often worth it...just to spend less time in photo shop. Once a final digital image is made using photo shop then the film negative is brought into the darkroom and processed to match the digital pre-visualization. Here is a sample from the digital pre visualization where the image was lightly touched up, then desaturated by selecting only the blue channel and a small contrast curve was applied. This would be replicated in the darkroom with slight over processing ( +1 ) and then printed using contrasting building helpers like selenium toning and the use of some high contrast paper and filtration under the enlarger. Then there would be a burn around the edges of the photo to help create an ominous feeling in the space, fitting for an abandoned home.

Copyright 2007 Black and white photography by Warren Lee

Personal black and white photography projects

2008-01-17T13:15:00.000-08:00

Abandoned Homes Series
Black and White Photography by Warren Lee

The past three months for professional commercial advertising photography have seen a slow down from large commercial advertising photography projects and have allowed for some time to work on several personal black and white photography projects that are geared towards being published or used as a new portfolio to market to the book publishing industry. Now there is time to update this blog with some samples of the personal black and white photography projects of photographer Warren Lee. One such black and white photography project is a series of black and white photographs of abandoned homes. Here are a few photos from that series.. stay tuned if you are into black and white photography more to come soon. Next week I will be adding a tutorial explaining some of the techniques used to make these photographs which were captured both digitally and on film.

New Advertising Photos for Stessier Jewlery Designs

2007-10-07T23:20:00.000-07:00

New Advertising image for Stessier - Copyright Warren Lee Studio 2007

Heres a new photo by Los Angeles Photographer Warren Lee for Stessier Jewlery Designs. This is the second year Warren Lee has provided advertising photography for Stessier.

Digital Composit

2007-06-25T22:32:00.000-07:00

Photography Copyright Tony Garcia - Retouch by Warren Lee

This image is a sample of work provided by Warren Lee made in conjunjuction with Tony Garcia. The client for this image was AT&T and the image is part of an international print ad campaign. Tony Garcia photographed the same model within different locations in the room and Warren Lee provided the digital composit service. 18 photographs were combined to make this final image. www.tonygarcia.com

The Busy Month Of May .. and June!

2007-06-21T09:43:00.000-07:00

Photography and Retouch Copyright Warren Lee Studio

Warren is busier than ever, and has not had the time to post work samples in a while. Last month Warren was in Manhatten helping photograph a billboard for an Ad agency called Harrison and Star, and was in Dallas working on creating some direct mail pieces for international advertising usage for AT&T. These work samples will be online as soon as possible, but for now check out this recent retouch sample which will be a part of the new websites retouch section shortly. The main focus with the retouch here was to take away emphasis on the models breasts which were bulging out of the dress in an unflattering way. Warren chose to add more shadow in problem areas and also this helped create more mood in the photograph. There was plenty of detail in the original photograph so Warren chose to keep only a bare printable detail in the shadow areas. The new website is 95% complete and is online now at http://www.warrenleestudio.com.

The Art of Hair Styling

2007-03-27T12:18:00.000-07:00

The photography of Los Angeles based freelance photographer Warren Lee is often an exploration into the worlds of many other artists or musicians with talents ranging from traditional mediums; such as oil and canvas, wardrobe design, or musical instruments, to the art of hair styling, makeup artistry, and performance art. Recent photography has involved collaborations with these talented artists including a most humble and talented freelance hairstylist by the name of Fransico Pinto, who had managed to sculpt spheres of hair upon this models head for a recent fashion show based in downtown Los Angeles. See more Fashion Photography by Warren Lee by following this link - click here.

Recent Fashion Photography by Warren Lee

2007-02-18T18:46:00.000-08:00

Recent Fashion Shoot by Warren Lee Feb 2007
Rooftop photo shoot with new wardrobe by Daniel Franco. Model - Sophia Bui.
More images from this soon to be published series comming soon.

Emmeric Konrad - Artist Portraits Continued

2007-02-18T18:34:00.000-08:00

"fear no art"
(Above) A performance installation art piece in progress by Emmrick Konrad @
“Grease meets Gronk: Downtown Artists Go To The Movies” Exhibit curated by Bumdog. Photo by Warren Lee.

Portraits of Los Angeles Artist Mark Acetelli

2006-12-18T09:22:00.000-08:00

Photographer Warren Lee made a series of portraits of painter Mark Acetelli (Shown Above ) after discovering some of his work on a great new website for artists called Aesthetic Refuge.
Also to those artists that were photographed at the most recent exhibit with Phantom Gallery in Pasadena, THANK YOU, a Cd is going to be delivered to Liza Simone at the end of this week.
Or Email Warren at Warren@warrenleestudio.com to receive a copy direct. Warren is holding the bulk of these images back for a potential submission to various Art + Culture magazines at the end of the month.

Monsters Are Waiting

2006-11-23T21:56:00.001-08:00

Portrait of the artists known as Monsters Are Waiting. Photo Copyright Warren Lee.

I literally had two minutes to pull this off before they went onstage, which I must say was an incredible show! They are very talented artists and I feel so blessed that I am recently getting the opportunity to work with and be inspired by such talented people. This portrait came about as a result of being asked to help my wife photograph the band for a Seattle based magazine. I wish I could share more about the actual photos we made for the magazine because we had a little more time to put into the production of them and I'm proud of the final result. The location was absolutly amazing! But in the interest of the magazine we can't share the main photo story that will be published until after the magazine publishes that issue. If your interested , check back at the end of next month and ill be sure to post a link to the magazines website.

If you are looking for music to help inspire your creativity or great beats for chillaxing I highly recommend the Fascination Album by Monsters Are Waiting, and if you can- check out their show in LA @ Safari Sam's on December 6th it would be time well spent! More info on their website, MonstersAreWaiting.com

Clockwise from the Top: Annalee Fery (vocals/keys), Jonathan Siebels (guitar/bass), Eric Gardner (drums), Andrew Clark (bass/guitar)

Portrait of Jeff Soto

2006-11-20T23:00:00.000-08:00

Photograph and Montage of Artist Jeff Soto by Warren Lee 2006

This is a portrait of an amazing artist by the name of Jeff Soto, I met him at his sell out exhibition a few days ago, and I'm not sure how he is going to react when he sees this. The last three photos I have made have been montages of artists with their work, where I hope to show the relationship between a persons art as a reflection of that person. I believe that all artists reflect a huge amount of their personality within their work, and so a portrait of an artist should include their work. I highly recommend that everyone go check out his website, JeffSoto.com

'SLOW BURN' Exhibit Opening with Phantom Gallery!

2006-11-14T02:54:00.000-08:00

Ryan Garton 2006

Portrait of artist Ryan Garton at the "Slow Burn" exhibit opening reception on 11/10/2006. Photo copyright Warren Lee. For More info about the exhibit check out the Phantom Gallery website. More photos from the Downtown Art walk comming soon. Also i'm building a newsite. ArtMusicFashion - it is now two days old today.

"Look In"- Dan Van Clapp Exhibit with Phantom Galleries L.A.

2006-11-13T11:10:00.000-08:00

ART OF WAR - WEAPONS AS ART (well not really)

Artist Dan Van Clapp had a second reception in association with McLean Fine Art and Phantom Galleries in Downtown Los Angeles. For those who have not yet discovered his style of sculpture / installation art, it may appear that he is exhibiting vintage weapons of mass destruction within the confines of an art gallery. As I drove past the gallery before the opening and viewed the 'weapons', my initial reaction was outrage that an anti-aircraft weapon was on display as art. I wondered how many people had been killed by the weapon, and assumed that the artist was attempting a post-Christo, art that kills type marketing ploy. However this is not the case. Upon a closer inspection I discovered that most of the art was made from recycled materials, kitchenware, and children’s toys. There is even a rubber snake and a miniature elephant incorporated into the body of what at first appears to be the remains of a crashed warplane, but is in fact made of everything from Tonka truck wheels to the ice cube holders that you find in your freezer at home. The photograph above shows a portrait of the artist standing beside one of his art-works that also functions as a lamp. You can click on the photo above or [here to see more] photographs that were made at the opening reception. I highly recommend a visit to see this exhibit as the photographs do not show all of the creations on display. Stay tuned as I'll be posting more artist portraits with their works from the 11/10/06 Downtown Los Angeles art walk and also I'll try to include links to the artists and galleries websites. Photography copyright Warren Lee 2006.