Stairway to Heaven

I was on location yesterday in Huntington Beach. If you're somewhat unfamiliar with Southern California, HB is nestled against the Pacific Ocean about ten miles South of Long Beach, California, and about 70 or 80 miles South of my digs in the San Fernando Valley.

The house was interesting to shoot in: Everything was white! There was lots of ambient daylight coming in from its many windows and skylights. The carpet was an off-white, that is, a very light beige color. All the uncarpeted floors were white marble or something akin to marble; white stone of some sort, anyway.

I brought along two monolights, stands, umbrellas, and a big, round, reflector: White on one side and gold on the other.

Mixing so much ambient daylight with strobes presented a few challenges: With everything in the home being white or near-white and reflecting and scattering so much daylight everywhere, the ambient light was pervasive and, although it was quite soft, it was also VERY flat. It almost had a hazy look to it, even to the naked eye. There was also a long atrium-like entryway at the front of the home that was even whiter. One of its walls is entirely comprised of French-windows. I took some shots of another model in that area as well, on both sides of the French windows, and I'll post a few of those in another update where I might blather about reflections and window-lit shots.

I certainly could have shot these images without the benefit of strobes--there was plenty of ambient light for exposures in the ISO 100 range--but even if I bounced some light in off the reflector, the images would have been too flat. I figured, in addition to fill, the strobes could provide some amount of contrast in the shots and help give them a little extra punch.

I also could have performed a custom white balance, considering I was mixing the strobes with so much daylight, but laziness and time dictated my approach to these shots so I opted to go with Canon's daylight preset. I also decided to keep depth-of-field somewhat on the shorter side so I shot the stairway series at f/3.5 with a shutter speed of 125th.

The lovely model is Alexis. My "Aziz" (assistant) for the day was Tim. I forget the MUA's name but I'll amend this post if I remember it-- It was my first time working with her and I'm not so good with names. I could pick her out of a police line-up, though. I never forget a face, especially one as cute as yesterday's MUA. The client was a new company called FrictionX. I'd never worked with these guys before but they seemed satisfied with my work and they gave me plenty of autonomy to do my thing. Plus, the Chinese spread they ordered was really yummy! Good food is always a big plus for hardworking pretty girl shooters! (And you thought it was all about the women.)

Tech info: Canon 5D w/85mm prime, ISO 100, f/3.5 @ 125th capturing large JPGs. Here's another shot of Alexis below.