[Contest Entry] How To Shoot Fashion By Nick Fancher

A few weeks ago we posted a video by Nick Fancher that became a huge hit. Nick showed us what it was like to shoot for an online clothing store that required over 10 unique looks shot and edited every day. I was hoping that Nick would create another video for our Behind The Scenes Contest which ends on December 31st and lucky for us he did. With a camera and a few on camera flashes, Nick creates some fantastic shots.

December 5, 2011

Lee Morris

2011 BTS Contest

Commercial

Fashion

Location

Strobe light

Anonymous

This guy is a shutter soldier. I love how he gets little to no prep and he just guns it down because he knows he HAS TOO. His post production choices are spot on. I really enjoy this guy.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Fernando-Garcia/705346784 Fernando Garcia

So far, Nick’s video is one of my favorites entries. Thumbs up!
http://www.distrasdesigns.com Mike Distras

I wish he sounded a little happier though!
Anonymous

Cool. Would love to see how he does post. Given his extremely streamlined approach to shooting I’m sure we could all pick up something on how to quick-edit on the go. Excellent video and well done Nick.
http://www.facebook.com/nicholas.gonzalez3 Nicholas Gonzalez

My favorite photographer this year. I see his videos and it makes me pick up my camera, ready to shoot.
http://www.facebook.com/mads.eneqvist Mads Eneqvist

So inspiring and cool. Less is more. Creativity wins. Supern bts.
mark peel

Cool guy, give him the brief and he just does it.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Bram-Berkien/640803000 Bram Berkien

Awesome entry, more where this came from please :) I love how he works with what he has, improvises and creates a cool look/style/composition/lighting set up on the spot. True skill.
http://www.facebook.com/derrel.hoshing Relzlife Ho-Shing

dope video, dude hustles… shout out to that Ice Cube shirt… top 5 fav albums
Anonymous

Man what a way to build up your port in a hurry huh?
http://twitter.com/Jwainesworth Jayge Dreier

This was a good video. In the days of daily deal sites and digital cameras, a photographer has to have an extremely streamlined workflow in order to keep up. I know this from first hand experience photographing for a daily deal site.
http://www.qnetx.com George Quiroga

Very well done. Demonstrates well what a BTS video should be.
Anonymous

Great BTS video!

I like the way Nick is keeping things simple, just shooting on location with strobist gear and not showing up with a truck and tons of generators, light and reflectors.

What I additionally got from this video was, that you don’t need high end equipment like a middle format camera to survive in that kind of business. There is no need to buy a 85mm f/1.2 L / $ 2,000.00 lense. The cheap 85mm f/1.8 can do the job as well. Sure, I need to keep in mind, that the pictures are just for web presentation and not for print.

And I got the proof, that there must be at least one Canon 27-70mm f/2.8 L which produces sharp images (different to my copy). ;-)

It would have been interesting to see his post production workflow and to check out his LR presets as well!

Thanks!
Andreas
(Germany)
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_IVI3FLN6JDN6UZCOIYYTSN26IA A7man

what a great straight forward behind the scene video. As the readers above I loved it! great workflow!
Zack W.

Great BTS video, I love the fact he just goes with the flow of things and keeps his lens choices simple. The final look of the images is great too, right in line with the tone of the website. Definitely one of the better BTS videos thus far.
http://www.malcolmdebono.com Malcolm Debono

Definitely one of my favourite videos so far! Very effective workflow.
http://www.facebook.com/nickthomas125 Nick Thomas

I nearly fell asleep. No excitement in his voice at all. It sounded like he wanted to sleep as well ha.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Jose-Reyes/100002249712265 Jose Reyes

Nick is awesome love his work. Im really surprised nobody asked but at 3:58 how do you dial down ambient light using aperture?
http://twitter.com/JPGodwin John Godwin

That was a brilliant video. Surely a top placing in the contest…
http://twitter.com/JPGodwin John Godwin

You mention the 1.2/1.8 – I might be the only one, but I’ve found that beyond f2.8, the 1.8 is actually sharper and produces nicer images than the 1.2!
Nick Fancher

Instead of a wide open aperture like I used for Andrew Marc (f/1.8), I opted for an aperture of f/8 or so. This nuked the ambient light. I just had to have the flash output fairly high. Also, you can reference the lighting diagram in the video with the EXIF data.
http://www.facebook.com/bterlegard Björn Terlegård

Talk about creativity on demand!
http://www.facebook.com/people/Jose-Reyes/100002249712265 Jose Reyes

Awesome thanks for the update. Great stuff man and thanks again for taking time out of your busy schedule to post….those little things is what make you stand out from the rest!!!
http://www.facebook.com/people/Dave-Clendenan/100003062639195 Dave Clendenan

I get more out of Nick’s videos than any ten other contributors. Love the streamlined approach. 5:05: “we just decided to shoot available light and were back in the car in 3 minutes” == awesome.
http://twitter.com/seanyeo Sean Yeo

Awesome video and information. In the Levi’s shoot, the speed used was 1/800, are the flashes set to use High Speed Sync?
matthew young

At 03:57 “I dial down the ambient light using my aperture”. Hmm, shouldn’t he using shutter speed for this? Because for a set amount of flash power, if you vary the aperture, it will affect both flash and ambient. But if you vary the shutter speed, the flash exposure will remain the same but the ambient is different, correct? Just wondering if I have this straight.
matthew young

At 03:57 “I dial down the ambient light using my aperture”. Hmm, shouldn’t he using shutter speed for this? Because for a set amount of flash power, if you vary the aperture, it will affect both flash and ambient. But if you vary the shutter speed, the flash exposure will remain the same but the ambient is different, correct? Just wondering if I have this straight.
Nick Fancher

Yes they were
Nick Fancher

You are correct. What I meant to say was that I dialed down all the light with the aperture. I was not in high speed sync mode and was maxed out at 1/200th of a second.