Behind the Scenes

A couple months ago, we posted images from a series of portraits shot by Tadao Cern that were described as "blow job portraits". Kai and crew over at Digital Rev TV put together a fun video trying to re-create this effect using some interesting tools on a handful of models, while "keeping stimulated" by trying a new technique. Can you keep a straight face while watching this?

Back in may, we posted this story about portraits made of grass created with photosynthesis. Heather Ackroyd and Dan Harvey of  Ackroyd & Harvey were behind this idea and we now have a video that showcases how this process is done. The technique and end result is a beautiful mix of art and photography.  

I'm all about getting the shot that you need in camera as much as possible. If you can achieve an effect in front of your camera and spend less time in Photoshop then the more the better. Sasha Leahovcenco  recently shot an ad for Vater Percussion with Mike Johnston.

This was done a while ago, but Red Giant, the maker of a number of software tools to help image-makers create more realistic visual effects, created a short to showcase the capabilities of their software. The short, "Plot Device," has a great BTS video to go along with it -- they even share all the products they used. Enjoy the finished product after the break.  

Get an inside look at German photographer Jan Leonardo Wöllert's techniques, practices and philosophy as he is featured in this Deutsche Welle TV interview. Jan Leonardo Wöllert is considered to be one of the original light painting pioneers and has done work for prestigious clients such as Diesel, Nike, Covenant and The Strokes.  

Benjamin Von Wong walks us through a shoot he does with Olympic paradressage rider Natasha Baker. As always Ben goes into great detail about the shoot's subject, preparation, setup and the execution and even more detail in his blog.  

via [BenjaminVonWong]

Probably the most anticipated movie of the summer, The Dark Knight Rises, is sure not to disappoint. I have always been a long time fan of Christopher Nolan's style of film-making and his practical approach to filming special effect scenes.

The progression of technology has allowed for us to capture shots in angles that we would not usually be able to capture. Robotic cameras have the ability to fit into spaces and locations that a photographer would usually not be able to get to. These are fully controlled by remote as well. It may very well begin to change the landscape of photojournalism.

As I continue my articles on interior, architectural, and real estate photography, I thought it would be interesting to see different approaches to shooting these types of subjects. So, for this month's article, I've invited a number of professional interior, architectural, and real estate photographers to share their images and techniques with everyone who reads Fstoppers.  

Follow Pantene Hair as they film Natalie Coughlin, eleven time Olympic medalist for USA Swimming (3 Gold, 4 Silver, and 4 Bronze) in their latest ad campaign featuring Olympic athletes for their Daily Moisture Renewal product line.

We've featured architectural photographer Mike Butler before, when he shot the Intercontinental Hotel in Miami, FL. This time, Mike heads to Bogota, Colombia, to shoot  the Virgilio Barco Library using a slew of hot lights and assistants.

Jeremy Cowart is the newest photographer to be featured as a part of Profoto's Master Series. In this video he explains his work flow of his well known Imogen Heap portrait. Jeremy thinks way outside the box with much of his work and he is a true artist at heart. Hopefully hearing him talk us through this shot will move you to find new ways to shoot whatever it is you do. Enjoy!

If you've never heard of the Ronald McDonald House, it's not a house full of fast food novelties. AJ Parker takes us behind the scenes with a video showing how this string of houses helps families going through tough medical circumstances.

I've always been fascinated by technical photographs showing every single part of complex machines. And shockingly enough, most of those images are created with a lot less Photoshop than one would imagine. "Explode" photographer Adam Voorhees shows us a quick timelapse of his latest Kawasaki Moto photograph shot for ESPN. Click the full post to view the final image.  

American Photographer Art Wolfe has been making photographs for over 30 years, including work for National Geographic and authoring many books. In this video, Art talks about his beginnings as an amateur, but then explains his approach for finding emotive and meaningful photography.

Zacuto Films has produced a very well done BTS video of the documentary "Rising From Ashes" which tells the incredible story of the Rwandan Olympic Cycling team. The Zacuto production team follows Director T.C. Johnstone, Producer Greg Kwedar and their entire film crew during the last 18-days of filming the documentary. Lot's of great tips and experience is shared in this video.

FilmRiot has been quietly working on a series of educational behind the scenes videos over the last few months, and I think this one is definitely worth a mention (avoid the random skydiving tangent at 6:00). Aimed at beginner and intermediate videographers, this short video will walk us through some techniques for lighting people as they move through multiple rooms.  

See how the insanely skilled, commercial photographer Alex Koloskov and his passionate retouching counterpart Genia Larionova (aka AKELstudio) turnout the Google splash logo in this fun and insightful behind the scenes video. I love these two already. 

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What do you do when the product you are trying to sell is an entire state? When that state is Colorado, it's not hard to find majestic scenery to showcase the state in it's grandeur. Director Tim Kemple, in collaboration with Forge Motion and Karsh/Hagan, crafted a series of spots for the state of Colorado, all being set to music by the Colorado Symphony Orchestra.

If you haven't seen the movie Snow White and the Huntsman, then you'll want to go see it after watching this video. Filmed with the Red Epic camera, the amount of detail that went into creating the Mirror Man is amazing. The guys over at The Mill Visual Effects Studio did many tests with liquid before deciding to use cloth instead.

Projection Mapping became a big hit in the past few years, and many brands use it for making cool looking ads outside over big buildings. Basically they all use the same shticks: Changing what you see in windows, making bricks fall down, or making part of the building explode. This is why AntiVJ's "Omicron" is so different.

In another great behind the scenes video from Michael Sasser, Denver Photographer Ryan Tortorelli is shown working with three students at several different locations to capture there senior portraits. Using what seems like a single light setup in conjunction with the sun, the resulting captured images show the quality of this setup.

In this behind the scenes video, Jay P. Morgan of The Slanted Lens shows us his concept and execution for a :30 commercial shot in a single take! Jay takes you through the rigging and setup up a burn bar, and has some fun along the way. This informative video gives us a look at the lighting set up too, and how he planned this shoot to get both stills and video.

Everybody know's Hawaii can be a dream vacation. Aaron Feinberg shows us how beautiful it actually can be. In three days, he traveled around the island of Kauai and spent the best hours of the day photographing some of the most beautiful places of the island.

Watch as photographer Florian Schulz takes the shots for the "To The Arctic 3D" movie companion book. The best part of this video is seeing the exhalation and excitement of Florian when he realizes that he got "the shot", that would later be used as the cover. Don't you just love that feeling?  

Filmed on a Super 8 camera without audio or narration, this is a clip for the true Star Wars aficionado. Created by Jeff Broz, this series of clips affords us a rare glimpse into the making of an incredible blockbuster film that is adored the world over. There are a number of recognizable iconic scenes visible in their rough and unedited form. 

Love him or hate him, you can't deny that Peter Lik's got quite the penchant for getting the shot. In this video, Peter takes us deep into some abandoned subway tunnels and high over the skyscrapers of NYC as he shows us some of the locations and setups that he uses to create his photographs. We get a nice look at the finished results, which, to me at least,  are always jaw-dropping.

Here is a short video featuring Charlie Sheen commentating on his RollingStones cover shoot. No offense Charlie but I would personally love to see this video with comments from Peggy Sirota, the photographer taking the shots. Maybe if we ask nice, our very own Reese Moore could track her down for an FS Spotlight.

An idea can start small but very quickly grow into something bigger and better. Such was the case with "The Silent City", a web series written and directed by Rubidium Wu. Listen/read as Rubidium talks about how his small 3 person project grew into a full scale production.

Architectural photographer Mike Butler did not hold back at all when he was commissioned to create an image for the Intercontinental Hotel in Miami, FL. In this video, we get a behind-the-scenes look at everything that goes into a high-end commercial architecture shot. To make this one shot happen, multiple days of planning were  followed by hours of scouting and brainstorming.

Here is a short video that features The Sartorialist with Loewe in Madrid. If you're quick and pay attention there are a couple tips in this video about good approach practices as The Sartorialist discusses his process. 

via [ISO1200] [TheSartorialist]

Follow world-renowned landscape photographer, Peter Lik, as he captures one of the wettest places in the continental U.S., the Pacific Northwest. After having a record breaking year in rainfall Peter threw on his raincoat, slipped on his rain-boots and headed to Oregon to photograph the subsequent breathtaking scenery.

If you're into apparitions or anything spooky, this interview with former commercial photographer, Claudia Kunin, will captivate you. Without giving away much, check out the interview. Her work is extremely unique in what she does and where she's come from. She says she loves ghosts because she's been fascinated since she was a little girl.

In case you missed "Hugo", the Oscar winning film from last year, the last cut of the movie is about 2 minutes long, and is seemingly a single steadicam shot. In this behind the scenes video, we see the point of view from a small wide angle camera mounted on top of the steadicam itself, and you can see how something like this is pulled off.

Here's a behind the scenes look at sports photographer Kelly Kline's recent shoot for Under Armour. She photographed Deandre Jordan of the LA Clippers for UA's Summer/Fall campaign. Now, it's not exactly instructional, but you'll see a little bit of the setup. Her task was to capture action images based on the sketched out ideas for the campaign. What do you think?

Within the Mission District in San Francisco lies an amazing tintype photography studio called Photobooth. The best part is that you can just walk in and get a tintype portrait for yourself. Co-founder, Michael Shindler, not only talks about how it all got started but gives us a look into the process from start to finish.  Check it out the next time you're in San Francisco!  

"I've shared a rope with 19 people who have died." The haunting voiceover in Tyler Stableford's latest short film "Shattered" really drives the drama, while introspective conjecture and nail-biting visuals keep you on the edge of your seat. Tyler also has released a 3-part behind the scenes video series on the making of this film, which used the Canon 1DX. See the full post for all 3 videos.

What have you done to get the shot today? Parked your car, walked into a studio? Plunked down a tripod on a sandy, tropical beach? Fiddled with some macro rails? South African aviation photographer Justin de Reuck unstrapped a good deal of his harness, slid open the canopy, and took photos at what I'm guessing is 100 knots, mere feet from the ground.

Have you ever been going through the magazine rack of your local book store and just stood staring at the cover of a car magazine? No? Ok, well maybe that's just me. But when I see a photo of a blazingly fast sports car clinging to the corner of a race track it certainly piques my interest. Even if you aren't a "car person" chances are you have at least wondered how these cover shots are made.

A few days ago Drew Gardner gave a presentation on celebrity portraiture. Throughout the talk, Drew will share some of the high points of his shoots, as well as teaching us how he applies the leasons he learns in his day to day work.

This is a long video, but it's definitely worth checking out if you have the chance.

You might remember Coco Rocha from her past ELLE controversy that we recently posted. She's definitely one of the industry's top models. This time, we take a look at the making of a cover for Target Style. How many shots does it take to get 'the' cover shot when you have a supermodel as your subject? Take a look and find out.  

Ken Burns is somewhat of a a legend when it comes to stories and film making. His documentaries cover some fantastic issues within the U.S. and have a fine tension throughout the film which keeps his audience captivated. In this short interview by Redglass Pictures, Ken shares what he feels the key elements of a captivating story are.

Check out this behind the scenes video of Alex Koloskov shooting a very complex image of a girl holding an orb of water. In the video you'll see his lighting set up, and how he interacts with his model and if you're interested in how all of those splashes of water became an orb, check out this link to all of the images he used in the final composite HERE.

Although the creation of the upcoming horror flick "Dark Harvest" has less production value than what you would get from Hollywood, it might relate to the average photographer a little better for that reason. In their behind the scenes, Tim Tabke and Joel Hinojosa team up to show us a glimpse of what it took to kick off the new indie film with a teaser poster.

In this behind the scenes video shot by Cinepro Studios, we see Michael Sasser working with a High School student to shoot her senior portraits.

Here's a fascinating video of 44-year old photographer Qalam Nabi. He is one of two street photographers left in the capital city of Kabul. The son of a street photographer himself, he started shooting at the age of eleven. Watch as he demonstrates how to use his instant camera. He does all of the developing inside the box, and repeats the process to turn the negative into a positive image.

This is a very detailed video from Atlanta based photographer Alex Koloskov as he shoots a very complex commercial image of a bottle of Windex. Definitely worth checking out if you have any interest at all in commercial photography, the process is a lot more complicated than you might think.

Check out more of Alex's work HERE.