“Shop the Shot” is a regular series on ALC where we highlight some of our favorite images taken by photographers from all over the world and reveal the gear and settings used to create them.
Photographer: Jim Lafferty
The Story:
I shoot a lot of dance editorial work, which puts me in the path of some truly amazing people – Chalvar, pictured here, is no exception. I’d seen him on Instagram, and we met first when I was producing a Dance Teacher cover article announcing Robert Battle’s lifetime achievement award, and then again when I was at Ailey covering Kyle Abraham’s rehearsal of his piece Untitled America for Dance Magazine. In both instances it was clear that Chalvar had a mastery of movement, balance, and power that I find remarkable in dancers, and I hoped we could work together in a more intentional way at some point. I knew that if I could just arrange a time to get him in front of the camera, place him in a unique context, odds were in our favor to make something great.
And this is how I like to work in general: get an exceptional person, put them in an interesting place, and push and pull each other creatively. It’s enough structure to know you’ll make an interesting set of photos, but leaves room for unknowns so that the shoot is open to spontaneous chance, with both photographer and subject participating in creative play. The day of the shoot, I made it a personal challenge to carry a single light to play off of the available natural light, and threw most of my gear in a simple shoulder bag, with a stand, umbrella and bracket held together for easy transport with a couple small bungee cords.
Chalvar and I connected, and I proposed we do something outside – to my excitement, Chalvar was game. I had scouted the location a couple years ago, and it sat in my phone, occasionally reminding me to get my head out of the typical grind of post-production, emails and invoicing, and go out and do something fun. We got to a coffee shop near the location, and made our way over.
When you first arrive on location, details emerge more clearly, and as a photographer you begin working over how to contend with reality, and whether or not it will meet up with your initial vision. This building in lower Manhattan is a truly strange structure, recalling for me the Sandcrawler rig in Star Wars. The angle of Manhattan, and how this building sits relative to the setting sun is unfortunately oblique, so the hopes I’d had of interplay of light and shadow, shape emerging as light raked across the surface, was not happening. Instead, the building was pretty broadly lit and a little flat. That was the first kink in my plans, then it started to rain. We jogged to nearby scaffolding for cover, and waited it out, but the already flat light was made even flatter as clouds moved in and hung out for much of our time together. So, what to do to give this image some depth?
I had a single light with me – the Flashpoint Streaklight – which at the time I’d just gotten and hadn’t yet experimented with under real circumstances. This would be its first test. Even though I’d packed minimal and streamlined, I knew without a Hollywood budget for lighting and crew, no light would manage to light the building, so I left the ambient to do that and figured I could drop the exposure on the building a little, and push it in post to bring out its shape. My Streaklight would be reserved for lighting Chalvar only.
One of the great things about the Streaklight is that, through pressing a combination of two buttons (on the manual model; the TTL model does this automatically), it can be set to “high speed sync” (HSS), and you get 30 or so frames to play with at shutter speeds of up to 1/8000th before giving the light a few minutes rest to avoid overheating. You’ll see a lot of noise on the net from people who insist 30-50 frames is a deal-breaking limitation, but frankly we shot maybe 30 frames total, 10 were solid, and 5 were awesome. When you’re working with talent who can deliver repeatedly, and you control the pace of the shoot, 30 frames is plenty to work with. If you hit thermal protect, power down and disconnect the light – you’ll be back shooting in a couple minutes, and can go again for another 30-50 frames.
Camera settings for this shot series ranged from ISO 80, to ISO 500, and I played with ambient exposure moving shutter speeds around. I brought the Streaklight in sculpt more shape in the light falling on Chalvar, trying to keep ambient and Chalvar well balanced. The aperture was set to f/5.6 with an attempt to keep Chalvar sharp from head to toe, but also provide a little separation from the background. The combination of my distance from Chalvar, the focal length of my lens, and the aperture, created a scenario that walked a line of just sharp enough and just soft enough simultaneously.
As for the lighting, I strive to craft an image that has the look and feel of something polished, giving it mood and some drama, without going overboard with showy or bravura lighting that calls attention to itself. To this end I’m always looking to keep the light simple and integrated – here it’s just shot through a small white umbrella, about 15 feet from Chalvar, set between 1/4 and 1/2 power. I hung a camera bag with spare gear on the light stand to keep it from being tipped over in light wind, and the whole thing takes minutes to setup and is easy to reposition. If you’re shooting something similar, play with distance – light to subject, as well as subject to background – and also alternate between umbrella or bare reflector to play with softer or harder highlight to shadow transitions. Your lighting style, over time, becomes part of the signature look and feel of your images, and there isn’t just one right way to make a photo compelling.
The final image shown here, one of my top three or so selects from this part of the shoot, has the following settings: ISO 80, f/5.6, 1/2000th second shutter speed.
The Gear:
CAMERA
SanDisk Extreme Pro 32gb CF card
LIGHTING
Flashpoint Streaklight 360 Manual
Bungee cords for umbrella and stand
CARRYING BAG (for D810 and Streaklight)
The Settings:
ISO 80
f/5.6
1/2000th second shutter speed.
