lightGIANTS

How to build a darkroom

Tobias Gaugler — Sat, 18 May 2013 23:42:04 +0000

Recently, the LightGIANTS studio also has a darkroom as a photo lab. The purpose of the darkroom is primarily to create analog photographic prints. Since our dressing room had been separated only provisionally by cabinets and a curtain the new darkroom also doubles as dressing room. As a requirement the chamber should not appear as something disturbing in the corner, or even shrink the studio.

After a short planning phase and measuring the space we were off to the hardware store to get the appropriate materials: Wood, brackets, screws, a door, ... After 3 days, the chamber was already set up, the door was fitted light-tight and on the fourth day it was papered and painted. After that the hardware was installed - especially the enlarger, the ventilation system, the mirrors and the electrics - and the darkroom dressing room was ready for initial testing.

Equipment:

Enlargement Kaiser System V VCP7002 with color head for formats up to 6x7cm
Rowi PE paper dryer, width 30cm
Jobo Color Processor with Jobo CPA Color Drum 4202 for prints up to 40x50cm
Ventilation system by Papst
Music in the darkroom ...

Short time lapse video:

Dunkelkammer from lightGIANTS on Vimeo.

23rd lightGIANTS Friday night shoot. 30.11.2012 – “Apocalipstick”

Shot by Scott — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 11:00:40 +0000

Apocalipstick is simply a mixture of apocalypse and lipstick. The basic idea behind the shoot was to mix up a whole pile of genre based on women with weapons e.g. Kill bill, Tank-Girl, Serenity, Sucker-Punch etc. I wanted to keep the base lighting set-up simple and only change the effect lighting around the studio. So the whole shoot was done with 1 key light that stayed basically the whole shoot in one spot with a constant power output. Then we just adjusted colour gels and other lighting over the course of the night to create the desired look... there was blood. smoke. screams. blades of various sorts. Eyeballs falling out on the ground. flashes of light. guns. dangerous looking women.

Benita Kuttelwascher

John Koh

Lennart Jütte

It was another one of those late shoots. Towards the end of the night almost every one had been in-front of the camera in one way or another, especially our vidiographer Attila. He ended up in the several roles including terrorist and victim, thanks from putting in the extra effort to make it a great night for everyone.

Marco Spalluto

Markus Wochele

Originally I wanted to do this shoot in an abandoned building or car wreckers yard, but unfortunately this time the situation didn't allow it so maybe we can do something similar next summer on location.

Scott Lewis

Thorsten Rüger

and finally Attila the vidiograhers making of video.

23rd lightGIANTS Friday night shoot. "Apocalipstick" 30.11.2012 from lightGIANTS on Vimeo.

22st lightGIANTS Friday night shoot. 26.10.2012 “Handball”

Shot by Scott — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 10:00:24 +0000

When we were planning the Friday night shoot for October Marco suggested a handball team that he knows would love some pics. Great but like always we don't just want to stand a few guys in front of the flash and call it a work shop... There has to be something special and a challenge to make it worth everyone's time. The concept was to get great portraitures where it was hard to hit the exact focus point. Either through a very narrow depth of field of though jumping movement of the team.

Tobias Gaugler

Marcello Kutzner

Johannes Konrad

The first lighting set up we were shooting between f1.4 and 2.8 depending on what lenses the shooters had with them. If some one didn't have a fast prime lens then they could shoot at a higher ISO and f2.8. This kept the narrow d.o.f and we didn't have to change any light set-ups to match the shooters lenses.

Markus Wochele

Scott Lewis

Thorsten Rüger

The second part of the night was spent doing quick succession of jump shots, rapid fire, quick timing and with a lot more light. Here the challenge was to get the timing and the focus right as the guys and girls did typical hand ball jumps shots. Keeping the framing and composition usable in a confined space isn't the easiest thing to do.

Thomas Reimann

Marco Spalluto

And a special thanks the stylist and the video team and at last our world famous making of video.

22nd lightGIANTS Friday night shoot. "Handball" - 26.10.2012 from lightGIANTS on Vimeo.

21st lightGIANTS Friday night shoot “Belle Époque”

Shot by Scott — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 11:30:13 +0000

The original idea behind the 21st lightGIANTS Friday night shoot was to shoot in the style of "Belle Époque" for a CD cover. Unfortunately it wasn't possible to get the historical clothing so after a meeting with the singers we decided to shoot a few different set ups starting with a high key shoot and at least 1 more dramatic style of lighting. As always we started at around 19:30 and shot both individual and group portraits.

Benita Kuttelwascher

Christian Konrad

Jan Brinker

After the high key part of the evening was finished we moved on the a more dramatic style. We changed from soft to hard light, and a fire red background, that was enhanced with the use of a red gel on the background lighting. First off we shot each member of the trio individually just to get things going and to get to know each of them individually a bit better. Once the ice was broken we shot the first group photos.

Marco Spalluto

Markus Wochele

Scott Lewis

Some how the night few by and went quite late. Although we didn't have more models or complicated lighting we only got through 2 lighting set-ups.

Thorsten Rüger

Thomas Reimann

and finally a bit thanks to Atilla Lifeson for his making of video.....

21st lightGIANTS Friday night shoot. "Belle Époque" - 28.09.2012 from lightGIANTS on Vimeo.

Summerspecial – expired analog summer 2012 – the results

admin — Fri, 26 Oct 2012 08:32:00 +0000

After our super hot summer shooting we invited some friends to shoot with expired film on the "Bierbörse Karlsruhe". There has been enough film for everybody. Here you can find the impressing results of all shooters:

Aurora.Luna (Revueflex SC2)

Bogdana (Nikon)

Jana Deichsel (Canon EOS 1000 FN, 50mm f2)

Jörg Zablonski (Nikon FG-20)

Lennart Jütte (Kodak Retina IV)

Markus Wochele (Canon)

Scott

Marco Spalluto (Leica M6, Summicron 50mm f2, Lomo Blitz)

Wookeeh (Hasselblad 500c)