© 2010 Zack Arias

Day 55 :: One Piano Workshop

Sometimes you just need a piano around.

Had to move the location of the last Atlanta OneLight workshop to a hotel near the studio due to a 40 day shoot over running the whole place. Yes… I was kicked out of my own studio! Luckily we have a great little hotel/conference center a mile away and many participants of the workshop only had to roll out of bed, go down the elevator, and they were in class. Pretty easy commute I’d say.

Despite it being one of the coldest days I’ve ever held a workshop we had a great time. Yes… Columbus folks… It was colder than that day!

You would be surprised how many photographs you see in magazines that have been shot in hotels. Someone comes to town, a photographer is assigned to take a portrait of them, they usually have a few minutes and you will have to shoot them at their hotel. So… you look around the hotel to see what you can find. For this portrait it was the piano in the lobby.

How it was shot :: Nikon SB80 DX in a 60″ umbrella that was closed half way down over the flash to be a little more directional. 1/15th of second on the shutter to pull in some ambient.

Cheers,
Zack

8 Comments

  1. Mike
    Posted March 1, 2010 at 9:56 PM | #

    Looks great Zack as always. One thing I’ve noticed is that you don’t seem to gel your speedlights much. In this photo you can really see the contrast between the daylight balanced light from the speedlight and the yellowish ambient in the background. Do you ever gel?

  2. Posted March 1, 2010 at 11:46 PM | #

    Really loved the ambient you pulled in, will try this sometime =)

  3. Zack Arias
    Posted March 2, 2010 at 12:47 PM | #

    Mike – Rarely. I like the warmth. Just a personal taste thing.

  4. Posted March 2, 2010 at 4:29 PM | #

    Really like the exposure on the reflection here. And the way the hinge of the piano gently intersects the frame at an angle.

  5. Posted March 3, 2010 at 9:44 PM | #

    Zack,

    Ever think of putting a CTO gel over your strobe and setting the camera to tungsten WB? I don’t know if you were going for daylight on her skin and orange in the background, but it might be something to consider if you haven’t done so already. Sorry, it’s the Joe McNally in me.

  6. Posted March 17, 2010 at 8:57 PM | #

    the purple and the yellow is wonderful. great contrasting colours

  7. Posted March 19, 2010 at 1:37 PM | #

    and we had a blast too!

    i was looking at my shots and felt so bad for the models with their pink noses outside… quick fix – black and white… ha.

    already used a bunch of techniques to up the boring corporate daily stuff… and dropped random exposure pop quiz on my daily calendars hahaha

    THANK YOU for everything… know it wasn’t fun to stay up so late before a travel day… really appreciate it.

  8. Zack Arias
    Posted March 20, 2010 at 10:31 AM | #

    You’re welcome Puck! I had a great time as well!

    Cheers,
    Zack

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