{"id":395,"date":"2009-05-24T09:10:12","date_gmt":"2009-05-24T14:10:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/?p=395"},"modified":"2009-05-24T09:10:12","modified_gmt":"2009-05-24T14:10:12","slug":"the-shot-mark-in-the-studio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/2009\/05\/24\/the-shot-mark-in-the-studio\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;The Shot:&#8221; Mark in the Studio"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I thought it might be fun to start a new series on the blog.  I calling the series &#8220;the shot.&#8221;  The idea is that I&#8217;ll choose an image, past or present, and give a little insight into it.  I might talk about how I shot it, where the idea came from, or what I find meaningful about it.  Sometimes it&#8217;s nice to be presented with something more than a &#8220;purdy picture.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>For the first image in the series I&#8217;ve selected an image of my young friend Mark.  He and his girlfriend Danielle were visiting me in the studio&#8230; just hanging out and killing time.  That turned into a bit of a photo session, but not a particularly formal one.  I have one or the other sit in front of a background and then just carry on a conversation with them.  When I&#8217;d see an interesting expression or reaction to something said I snap a photo.  <\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;d asked Mark to put on my driving cap which I though would be a good look for him.  Also, I&#8217;d asked if he had a cigarette he could place in his mouth.  There was a shot I had in mind that had been done by Atlanta music photograper, Zack Arias (zarias.com, usedfilm.com, onelightworkshop.com), as inspiration.  In that shot Zack had the musician sitting on a chair, smoking a cigarette and exhaling smoke.  Shot against a darker background I really enjoyed his shot.  Zack and I share a love for white seamless backgrounds and not surprisingly, that&#8217;s what I was working with that evening.  As it happened, Mark&#8217;s cell rang as I was setting up the shot.  If memory serves, it was his sister on the other end.  I grabbed the shot while he chatted away.  While the shot was partially staged (hat, cigarette, lighting, background), it also captured a real moment &#8211; his expression while having a phone conversation with his sister.  It has a nice, natrual feel to it.<\/p>\n<p>Technically speaking:  The subject&#8217;s face is placed on one of the vertical lines of &#8220;thirds,&#8221; a classic portrait placement.  The position of his arms form lines leading the viewer&#8217;s eyes to his face.  The black shirt provides a nice contrast agaisnt the seamless white background.  Mark was lit with a single studio strobe shot through a medium sized softbox.  The background was &#8220;blown white&#8221; by an unmodified studio strobe mounted overhead and aimed at the background.  An additional hot-shoe flash on the floor behind the subject helped to keep the background lighting even.<\/p>\n<p>I hope you enjoy the image.<\/p>\n<p><center><br \/>\n<img src=\"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/images\/08_Dec_Mark_01.jpg\" alt=\"First in the series \"the shot,\" where North Carolina based photographer Bob Decker discusses some of his favorite images.\" \/> <\/center><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I thought it might be fun to start a new series on the blog. I calling the series &#8220;the shot.&#8221; The idea is that I&#8217;ll choose an image, past or present, and give a little insight into it. I might talk about how I shot it, where the idea came from, or what I find [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[86],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":400,"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395\/revisions\/400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rddeckerphotography.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}