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pin-up style photo session – Jessica – a hot day

September 22, 2010 Neil vN 16 Comments

pin-up style photo session – a hot day

Continuing on with the pin-up series with Jessica, we decided on the concept for this session as ‘A Hot Day’. Skimpy summer holiday clothing; ice cream; a fan (with the blades made whirly in Photoshop) .. and incongruously, one of my cats walking through the set, looking for attention …

OllieKat came and went for a few photos, but only that one really worked with him in it.  But there was one other moment that had us in hysterics.  Like any other cat, he has a wild imagination, and at some point came charging through for no real reason, determination on his face, effectively “photo-bombing” us.

That expression on my cat’s face is just priceless!

The setup is exactly the same as shown in the previous post – a Profoto 3×4 softbox nearly in line with the camera to provide soft even light.  Two Quantum flashes to the side to light up the background.

Equipment used during this photo session:

Nikon D3;   Nikon 24-70mm f2.8 AF-S (B&H);
Profoto AcuteB 600R power pack (B&H);  Profoto 3×4 softbox (B&H)
Red-Wing light-stands;  Pocket-Wizard Plus II Tranceiver (B&H)
.. and a bunch of Quantum gear.

Filed Under: flash photography, photo shoot, pinup photography Tagged With: pin-up photography, pinup photography


 

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Neil vN

Books by Neil van Niekerk


 




16 Comments, Add Your Own

  1. 1Dragos says

    September 22, 2010 at 5:12 pm

    Oh, boy…

    Reply
  2. 2Stephen says

    September 22, 2010 at 6:06 pm

    Neil,
    Are you and Jessica working towards that full-year calendar for her D700 fund? :-)

    Nice work, as always.

    Cats love paper and setups. They’re always curious.

    Reply
  3. 3dave says

    September 22, 2010 at 7:08 pm

    hey, where’s the sunglasses jess?

    Reply
  4. 4Ten says

    September 22, 2010 at 7:28 pm

    A bit OT, but why is there no VR in the Nikon 24-70mm?

    Reply
  5. 5Robert Gordon says

    September 22, 2010 at 7:53 pm

    meow

    Reply
  6. 6Jess says

    September 22, 2010 at 8:16 pm

    Stephen, yes, these pin-up sessions will hopefully bring a 2011 calendar to fruition, all in the name of camera gear!

    Dave, the sunglasses were probably what OllieKat was charging after ;o)

    Reply
  7. 7Arnold says

    September 22, 2010 at 11:58 pm

    The only thing I would make a comment on is that the fan looks like it is not part of the photograph it just kind of hangs in the air because it doesn’t have a shadow of any kind.

    Reply
  8. 8Neil vN says

    September 23, 2010 at 12:04 am

    Arnold, I’d agree. I cloned out the electric cable from it, because it was just a distraction. But it does need a hint of a shadow under it. But I would have to create it .. with the cat and with Jessica, there was some residual shaded areas to work with .. but with the fan I would have to create it since the fan was so close to the background lights that the shadow behind it was entirely blown out. You can see this in the 2nd image as a comparison shot which is nearly straight out of the camera.

    Neil vN

    Reply
  9. 9Pasquier says

    September 23, 2010 at 12:08 am

    Love the photo bomb tool video – thanks for pointing it out – great start to the day.

    Reply
  10. 10Dan says

    September 23, 2010 at 7:43 am

    Love these shots, the cat is great! The fan appears as if the cable is running behind her if you ask me. Great shots, does Jess ever show off her photography on here or her own blog?

    Reply
  11. 11Jess says

    September 23, 2010 at 9:43 am

    Hi Dan – Yes, Jess does have her own blog. While it’s I find it a little inappropriate to hijack Neils site for the showing in of my own work, secretly, if you click my name, it’ll take you to my blog (still in it’s early stages). But, shhhh, don’t tell Neil. ;)

    Reply
  12. 12Chell says

    September 23, 2010 at 2:24 pm

    The photo bombing cat is hysterical. Glad you caught that.

    Reply
  13. 13Amy says

    September 23, 2010 at 4:16 pm

    The cat was doing you a service, making sure that you didn’t leave out the most important subject! ;)

    Lovely shots!

    Reply
  14. 14Dan says

    September 23, 2010 at 4:26 pm

    Thanks Jess, I didn’t want to ask and hijack his site either but I didn’t see a link anywhere and I like to follow a couple of blogs to see various techniques. Thanks again, you are very photogenic.

    Reply
  15. 15Jessica says

    September 23, 2010 at 5:25 pm

    Wow, thanks to the video I posted on the Photoshop Bomb Tool, this site is tossing my blog a lot of traffic.
    I just wanted to say hi and thanks.

    The work here is great BTW.
    If you all don’t already have a tumblr site you need to get one.

    ciao!

    Reply
  16. 16Bogdan says

    November 12, 2011 at 2:25 pm

    I LOVE the cat’s face! Mine does similar darting thru the household while holding his ears in “trans-sonic flight” position. The speed of my guy is unbelievable. It covers the length of the first floor, jumping over sofas and other obstacles in less than two seconds.

    Reply

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