Photographer #217: Peter Granser

Austrian photographer Peter Granser, 1971, lives and works in Germany. He will release his book J'ai perdu ma tête at the end of 2011. It will contain images of a psychiatric institute in France. Granser was not interested in the outer manifestations of insanity, he approached the subject from an interior perspective. It will be his sixth book if one does not include his special editions. Amongst his earlier books have been Signs, landscape images taken in Texas that give us an insight into the contemporary US identity through words, signs and other expressions. His earliest book is Sun City, about a retirement colony in the American southwest. The following images come from J'ai perdu ma tête, Signs and Sun City.




Website: www.granser.de

Photographer #216: Timm Kölln

Timm Kölln, 1976, Germany, lives and works in Berlin. For many years he has been following cycling races as the Tour the France, Paris - Roubaix and the Giro d'Italia. He is not your ordinary sports photographer, unlike his colleagues that photograph and register the various races with digital equipment, Timm still shoots everything on film. He sees cycling as an aesthetic sport and brings that back in his, mostly black and white, photography. In 2010 he released his book The Peloton. It contains strong images of the riders several seconds after they crossed the finish line. The photographs from the series Lo Stelvio are made with a pinhole camera. The following images come from the portfolio's Dolomiti, The Peloton and Lo Stelvio.




Website: www.timmkoelln.com

make it fabulous!

wow, i can't believe a whole week has gone by since my last post!  i have been meaning to post more frequently, but time just keeps slipping away from me!

however, i have my 2nd Make It Fabulous post ready to share with you today...and hopefully some of what i share will help you out!

this image was shot in my tiny little apartment, using the light from the window, and a black blanket as a backdrop...

I used a 50mm prime lens, at f1.4, 1/80 and ISO 800 (it was actually quite dark b/c it was late afternoon, that is why i used a higher ISO)


After opening the image in Camera Raw, this is what I adjusted:
Bump up contrast to +40
Bump up clarity to +15
Bump up vibrance to +5

Adjust curves to “Strong contrast”

Then, open in Photoshop.


To get rid of that bluish spot at the top, I Used the Clone Stamp Tool at 100% opacity and sampled a spot that was completely black (alt + click on the area you want to sample) 
and then I brush over the bluish spot and turn it black.

OR

Just crop it – I personally like how it looks cropped better anyway.  
 There was just too much black at top and bottom before. 


 
I already knew I wanted this in black and white, so I then I go to Image>Adustments>Black and White.  Then I adjust the reds to 10% and yellows to 75% -- this darkens the reds a bit and lightens the yellows, making his skintone more even and less splotchy in black and white.

TRA Boring Sepia at 25%

Flatten, sharpen and save!


Photographer #215: Wayne Lawrence

Wayne Lawrence, 1974, The Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis, works and lives in Brooklyn, New York. He left St. Kitts in 1994 and started working as a carpenter. He swopped carpenting with photography several years ago. Wayne's work focuses on "individuals and rituals within communities otherwise overlooked by the mainstream media". His work has been shown at various exhibitions and has been published in magazines as Colors, Newsweek and the New York Times Magazine.  The following images come from the series Orchard Beach (The Bronx Riviera), Jouvert (Labor Day in Brooklyn) and MIA (Urban Beach Week).




Website: www.waynelawrenceonline.com

Photographer #214: Aaron Huey

Aaron Huey, 1975, USA, has done a vast amount of projects. In 2002 he walked 3,349 miles across the United States. He regularly shoots for the National Geographic magazine, The New Yorker and Harper's amongst many others. He was named one of PDN's top 30 emerging photographers in 2007. In 2008 he was awarded a National Geographic Expedition Council grant to hitchhike across Siberia. Aaron has covered stories on Afghanistan, Pakistan, Georgia and the United States to name a few. He was planning on doing a story on poverty in America and ended up at the Pine Ridge Indian reservation. Pine Ridge became a long-term project on it's own. The following images come from the series America, Pine Ridge and Afghanistan Drug War.




Website: www.aaronhuey.com

Photographer #213: Osama Esid

Osama Esid, 1970, Syria, lives in Minneapolis, USA. He hand colors his black and white prints. His work is often about "Orientalism" and the social preconceptions and stereotypes that have been created in the past and still exist today. For his series Cairo Street Workers, he created a studio in the streets of Cairo, Egypt. By doing this, he gave the impression of being a mobile businessman, just like the other people in the street. This gave him the opportunity to photograph the working men. Due to the backdrop of fake palmtrees they step out of reality, but their clothes, expressions and gear tell the true stories of these men. The following images come from the series Cairo Street Workers, Orientalism and Stereotypes and Marie.




Website: www.osamaesid.com

Photographer #212: Newsha Tavakolian

Newsha Tavakolian, 1981, Iran, is a self-taught photographer. Her work has been published in magazines as Time Magazine, Newsweek and Stern. Her main focus lies on women's issues. She started out as a photojournalist, covering stories in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon amongst others. Slowly her work has shifted towards a more documentary and creative approach. In her series "listen", she photographed six female singers who are not allowed to sing solo, perform in public or produce CD's due to the Islamic tenets. She then created six images and turned them into CD covers for these singers. As a statement she left the CD cases empty. Newsha's portfolio is filled with interesting stories. The following images come from "listen" and Mother of Martyrs.



Website: www.newshatavakolian.com

Photographer #211: Billy Kidd

Billy Kidd, 1980, USA, is a fashion, portrait and celebrity photographer. He grew up in Phoenix, Arizona but currently works and lives in Brooklyn, New York. Since 2007 he has been shooting commercial and editorial work. In 2010 his images of Paul Dano were selected for the PDN Faces contest aswell as the shots of Pharrell Williams and NERD for PDN's The Look contest. Billy's images are soft and rough at the same time, it is young, edgy and rebellious. The following images come from his portfolio's Portraits I, Portraits II and Celebrity.




Website: www.billy-kidd.com

make it fabulous!


I've been wanting to describe how I edit for a while...for any of you out there who wonder how I get to my final product...there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes once I stop shooting and you go home from your session.

I'm usually so excited to see the images that I browse through them on the LCD screen on my camera before I even make it home! Then once I'm home, I upload them to my hard drive and then I select my favorite images to edit.

I don't always get it exactly right IN CAMERA, so thankfully I have an amazing tool for post-processing called Photoshop CS5. :) I also shoot in RAW which allows me a bit more wiggle room as well.

So, every Friday I am going to post a "Make It Fabulous" image from start to finish to show you how I edit. I am NOT a photoshop expert, however, I have learned a lot in the past few years and would love to be help any of you if I can! I learned a TON from all of the friendly photogs out there who take the time to share their knowledge online...and I hope that I can give back, even just a little bit!

So, here's how I took this underexposed (but still beautiful!) image to it's final edit:

1. In Camera Raw I adjust a few of the sliders...

exposure: +0.50
fill light: 10
blacks: 5
brightness: +45
contrast: +50
clarity: +15
vibrance: +12

I also warmed up the temperature a little bit.

2. Next, I open the image in Photoshop. I usually adjust my levels first. Go to the Image menu, then choose Adjustments, then Levels. Here I just very slightly lightened the midtones and darkened the the shadows.

3. I use a lot of Totally Rad Actions so from now on I will just refer to them as TRA + the name of the action.  TRA Yin/Yang -- Yin=lighter, Yang=darker. I used Yin with a soft brush on a very low opacity (about 10) under her eyes and then even lower at about 2 over her entire face and neck. Then I used Yang at about 25% opacity to darken the grass/weeds around her so that she would pop out a bit more as the focus in the image.

4. TRA ProRetouch -- I try really hard not to make people look like they have plastic skin or alien-sharp eyes...so I use pro-retouch sparingly. I put it on about 10% opacity and used it to smooth out her skin and then used the eye bump to highlight ONLY the highlighted areas in the iris of her eye...I think this gives the eyes just enough light to make them sparkle!

5. I'm done! Sharpen and save!!! At this point I will usually convert to black and white when I'm editing a gallery....so, here's the black and white + a hint of sepia...



Are there any shooting or editing tips you'd like to hear about?  I will do my best to answer any and all questions you have!  Or at least point you in the right direction!

xoxo!  Happy Friday!

Photographer #210: Jason Nocito

Jason Nocito, 1973, USA, is a rock, lifestyle and fashion photographer. At a young age he started taking pictures of bands and his friends hanging out at concerts. He studied photography at the Parsons School of Design and graduated in 1996. Nowadays Jason shoots campaigns for big clients as Apple, Nike and MTV. He has seen various celebrities and musicians in front of his camera as Emile Hirsch and Mary Kate Olsen. His photography is full of vibrance, youth and a sense of freedom. The following images come from I Heart Transylvania, the campaign Skins and various other portfolio's.




Website: www.jasonnocito.com

Photographer #209: Richard Renaldi

Richard Renaldi, 1968, USA, is a photographer with a large portfolio of projects and several monographs. He travels across the United States to find his images. In the book Figure and Ground he went from coast to coast. Together these images make a portrait of a population and a country. In his project 49 and 50 he went to the 49th and 50th state, being Alaska and Hawaii. It is a tribute to the character of these secluded places. In his project Touching Strangers, Richard asked complete strangers to pose for a picture with one condition; they have to touch each other in some manner, introducing an unpredictable variable in the traditional portrait. Renaldi uses a large format (8x10") camera. The following images come from 49 and 50, Fall River Boys and Touching Strangers.




Website: www.renaldi.com


Photographer #208: Jörn Vanhöfen

Jörn Vanhöfen, 1961, Germany, is a landscape photographer. He will be releasing his book Aftermath with images from his Disaster series in April 2011. In 2009 he released the book Südafrikas Küste (South Africa's Coast). His large prints have something that makes the viewer uncomfortable and question reality. Jörn plays with the elements such as wind, snow, light and carefully chooses perspectives gaining tension in the photographs. Jörn has exhibited extensively throughout Europe, but also had several overseas exhibitions. He has been published in various catalogues. In 2000 he released the book Die Elbe (The Elbe River). The following images come from the series Disaster, Südafrika and Elbe.




Website: www.joernvanhoefen.de

Photographer #207: Pep Bonet

Pep Bonet, 1974, Spain, is a photojournalist who has won various awards throughout the years. He has covered many stories throughout Africa, amongst which are Somalia, Darfur, Angola and Ethiopia. His most known project is Faith in Chaos, an ongoing photo essay on the aftermath of the war in Sierra Leone. Pep also concentrated on HIV/Aids for long periods of time within Africa, but also in India and Honduras. In 2008 he released the book One Goal, a long term project on the Sierra Leone's amputees soccer team. During the civil war in Sierra Leone, amputation was used as a weapon of fear in order to get young men to stop fighting for an opposing side. The following images come from One Goal, Orphans Zwaziland and Somalia 04.




Website: www.pepbonet.com


More videos on Pep Bonet and Darfur in the news section, press here.

i need music to edit

When I'm editing photos, I always listen to music.  I mostly listen to my playlist from my personal blog...but I also really enjoy all of the FREE dowloadable playlists from Urban Outfitters. 

Music helps energize me and also keeps my creative juices flowing...I think it can also break up the monotony of resizing proofs and uploading galleries. 

I'd love to find out what sort of music gets you moving!  And if you have a minute and are curious, go check out my playlist and the free ones from urbanoutfitters.com. 

Photographer #206: Cig Harvey

British photographer Cig Harvey, 1973, lives in Boston and on the coast of Maine. She uses photography as a means to tell stories. Often her work is a reflection of her own life and the things she has experienced. This is why she often uses herself as the subject in her images. She is also fascinated by vintage dresses which often end up being used in her photographs. Cig has exhibited extensively throughout the USA and several European cities. The following images come from her portfolio's Thoughts Like Five Fingers Spread, An Archaeology of Distraction and The Impossible Tasks.




Website: www.cigharvey.com