Chelsey and I met up again at Ramaker Stables in Leader, Texas. We had about an hour to knock out some different looks and get a 17 hand horse named Bentley involved. No problem.
We started in the Small Barn, not as new as the Big Barn, but more colorful and possessing more character. I was thinking something along the lines of images out of Dover Saddlery, but prettier.
Tried working with some backlit/Ezybox combo’s, but they weren’t working for me. Ended up with an over/under lighting scheme to bring some beauty and contrast to Chelsey.
Over Under Contrast
This image has a Lastolie 24 inch Ezybox (my favorite) on top, with a big reversible umbrella on the bottom, both are off to one side slightly.
Remember in part one, when I said there were no clouds. That changed for the better.
The barn was fun, but then the sky did me a favor and went wild with clouds and color. Let’s ditch inside the barn and go crazy with the sky’s.
Fun with Skies
What is more fun that a senior and great skies? A senior, her horse and great skies!
Bentley and Chelsey
Thanks again to Chelsey for being a wonderful model.
–JB
Today we are going to talk about overcoming the best prepared plans going out the window.
I schedule a bridal session with Kylie for this past Saturday at a location in Pflugervile at a local park featuring a Green Red Barn, a nice little gazebo, and a Century Old House. I had gone there twice for scouting purposes, planned where I would want to place her and which lenses to use and where. Even wrote them down to carry with me so that I could let emotion and creativity take over once the shoot started and still get the framework of images I wanted.
Texas Weather had other plans.
On the Thursday before the Saturday session, weather.com was predicting rain. Uh-oh, start looking for back up sites. On Friday, it looked like Saturday would be nice and clear. Saturday came, and the rain I had hoped wouldn’t show didn’t, but in it’s place came a mighty wind. If you have lived in Central, we get these blue northerners coming through pretty briskly, and then a coastal south wind returns the favor. At least the skies were cool.
The winds were in the 15-20 mph range with some serious gusts coming through from time to time. Sandbags weren’t going to hold a 2 foot square softbox. Luckily for me, my second shooter for the wedding came out to help and meet the bride. Thanks Kaush and Chris!
So what to do? your favorite spots are invalid with the wind blowing.
First thing we did was keep the bride in the car while Kaush and I scouted for both look and wind shields.
The house from the top picture was something I wanted to incorporate into the pictures, so we found a corner where the wind was minimized to get the sitting down shots from the prepared list. This bought us time in hopes that the afternoon wind would wind down. (see what I did there)
The second location of the big red barn we had to move to the side to keep the wind in the right side of Kylie’s face.
The best thing was the crazy sky that added a touch of the dramatic to the photos, and with the wind speed they were moving fast enough to give us “multiple backgrounds”
The key to making this a successful shoot in spite of the howling breeze, was having a vision of the images you want from the get go. Wind can be blocked by buildings, light stands can be held by assistants, advance scouting will key you in to alternate shots. Shooting on-location portraits is always going to be a chancy game, so do your best to come with an ability to roll with the punches and make the images you want to make.
Pictures are made with cameras or crayolas, and our craniums.
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