I was asked to shoot an editorial for the Los Angeles Fashion Magazine, Genlux. Genlux Magazine uses me on a regular basis to shoot for them and they are one of my favorite clients because of their extreme trust in my vision. In other words, they give me a lot of freedom to shoot what I want to shoot, which makes them a dream client! I’m going to take you step by step through the process of this shoot, giving you my technical info and the background details on how I planned and set up this shoot. You can click the link above to watch the video first, or you can Read on!

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(4.81 stars, 16 ratings)

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“How I Stay Sane in a Critical World”

Photo by: Steven Meisel

____You talk to them on the phone. You deal with them on shoots. You meet them at parties. You read their blogs. You visit their sites. You see them on TV interviews. They are the critical fashionistas who you will see pointing to some poor girls new skirt while exclaiming: “Ohhhh, that’s just so last season’s hemline!!!” as they roll their eyes and cluck their tongues. You want to despise them but you find yourself sounding just like them in no short time! Why?? Because we’re in the fashion industry, kids, and that’s what we are exposed to on a daily basis!
____________++_

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(4.75 stars, 16 ratings)

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“A Look at the World’s Top Fashion Image Makers”

So who catches your attention? I’d like to know which fashion photographers my readers follow and why!

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(5 stars, 17 ratings)

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Learning Fashion Photography From the Masters

In my first year of art school, in 1982, I had to take an Art History class as a requirement. I was pretty unhappy about this, feeling like it was a waste of time as I wasn’t going to learn anything about photography. I remember the class to this day. The teacher used a text book and showed us slide shows of the art as we went through the different periods of time and the art of that period. I was bored, restless, and just plain annoyed with being “made” to sit in this class. I arrived late where it was usually dark because lights were turned off to see the slide show. I sat in the back, slouching with generally a bad attitude. Until one day, up came a slide of Donatello’s sculpture, David, and I nearly fell off my chair.

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(4.7 stars, 10 ratings)

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Fine Art Photography

I love exhibiting my work. I love having a project or a theme and building a body of work within that theme with the end result of a show! The first time I exhibited my work was in 1993 and I’ve been passionate  to continue with exhibitions since.

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(5 stars, 21 ratings)

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The Glamourous Side of being a Fashion Photographer

People have written me recently wanting to know what my take on the “glamourous” side of the business is. Do I love the parties, do I get invited to events often, how do I handle the social aspect of the fashion industry??  I live in Los Angeles, home to the never ending Red Carpet entrances, celebrity fueled events and paparazzi photographers. You sort of HAVE to be a part of it because choosing NOT be a part of it is somewhat of a strong statement. So I have had to learn how to “survive” the party side of being in the fashion industry. Don’t get me wrong: fashion photography is a serious business just like any other and you have to keep the upmost of professionalism at all times, even when you’re not shooting. But when you are invited out to a ton of events where there is a lot of free alcohol and potential clients lingering around you, you need to learn the balance of suiting up, showing up and making a quiet exit. I know there are photographers out there that party all the time. They hang out with their young models, they go to every event they’re invited to. They make it a priority to get on the guest list of every event thrown by the “elite”. They have a reputation of being “crazy” and “out there”. In my opinion, there’s a fine line between taking advantage of the “perks” and using social events in your favor for networking.

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(4.83 stars, 12 ratings)

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“My Life as An Artist”

We all go through it. Times when we are more inspired to shoot than others. Sometimes we’re just bursting with new ideas and concepts we have to shoot! Other times it seems like nothing comes to us. We pour through magazines, we search through websites. Still, there’s this empty void and we experience something similar to “writer’s block”. I go through this too, sometimes. We all have lives to live and sometimes our personal lives have a little too much stress in them to think creatively. For some, that stress is actually a catalyst to create. Some people are more driven when shit goes down in their lives. I know in the past that some painful experiences have led to some hugely motivated and productive times in my career. But for the most part, stress isn’t what I search out when I’m trying to inspire myself.

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(4.85 stars, 13 ratings)

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Using Photoshop to Enhance Your Photography

I have received a lot of personal emails over the last couple of weeks from readers wanting to pick my brain on my use of photoshop. I think the most common question has been is if I decide before I even shoot how I will want the images to eventually look like and the steps I take to get from prepping a shoot to the final result. I can begin by reassuring everyone that I absolutely consider how the final images will look before I ever fire off a single frame. It is absolutely essential to have an idea of how you want your images to look so you can take that into consideration on how you will shoot. Will you need a lot of room around the subject to drop in walls or objects? Are you going in and doing major special effects on the model? Are you going to trick out the color and distort angles?

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(4.82 stars, 17 ratings)

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The Portfolio

Ice Nine Porfolio

Seems strange in this current internet age that photographer’s still need portfolios to show prospective clients in order to solicit work. One would think that with websites and email marketing campaigns, we wouldn’t need portfolios anymore. But it isn’t true. We still need to have a portfolio to show off our prints and tear sheets. It actually gets me a little irked, to be honest. I need a website, a portfolio (actually I need 2 portfolios…one I keep and one my rep keeps), a promo card and a business card. That’s a lot of money and a lot of time and energy to put into your marketing tools. But it’s an industry “must” and so I must conform. And you must too if you want to compete in today’s highly competitive market.

I intend to write a lot about the business side of fashion photography, with marketing yourself a main subject. Today I will start with the Portfolio! I have had one since graduating from college in 1987. “Back in the day”, can you believe I wrote that?, we all had the same style of book. 11″ X 14″ black leather Brewer-Cantelmo book (shown below).

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(4.6 stars, 10 ratings)

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Before I begin on what lenses should be used for beauty shooting, let me just point out that I am a Nikon shooter. I started out in 1980 with my dad’s old Canon AE-1 but pretty quickly jumped to a Nikon in about two years. I like the feeling of a Nikon in my hands, but they both are great SLR cameras. I won’t bash Canon because they have great cameras and lenses. But Nikon is my SLR camera system. And I pretty much can guarantee it always will be. And I’m a fairly passionate Nikon enthusiast. I won’t get on forums and fight with other tech freaks on the ol’ Nikon Vs. Canon debate. But I stand pretty firm on them being my SLR, and now DSLR, camera of choice! That said, I only will use Nikkor lenses! I will not put a lesser quality lens on my camera. It is my belief, and from experience, that the camera has little to do with image. But the lens has everything to do with it. Nikkor lenses are top quality lens. And I won’t sacrifice my image quality for a less expensive solution. Also I will admit that I am a huge advocate of fixed lens because of the quality of the glass. I’m not a fan of zoom lens, even though Nikon makes some great ones, and I’ve used them from time to time. However, I don’t own any zoom lenses. I’ve only rented them on the occasion I have felt I needed to “zoom” back and forth. For instance, when I shot a band walking across the street earlier in the year and I had to shoot them 300 times walking back and forth across that street, it was easier for me to capture that with a zoom lens.

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(4.6 stars, 15 ratings)

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