JAMES HODGINS PHOTOGRAPHY

Dan came all the way from North Bay to have his business portrait created in our studio today.  Dan has become a sought after speaker on saftey and health issues in the past few years and his schedule is quickly become booked with future speaking engagements with www.cannamm.com. 

Today I had the great privilege of photographing  Louis L’Allier PhD  Associate Professor, Classical Studios at Laurentian University.  Louis needed a photograph of himself to grace the next cover of   www.avoslivres.ca/magazine.  He also wanted something for himself to use as his own bio pic on the back of his published books and works.    Louis picked a great room attached to the L.U’s Library that provided some great ambient light along with some warm incandescent backlight.  I opted to mix the ambient with some Off Camera Flash to create an image where Louis would “pop” out of the frame, but still have the background compliment the rest of the image without being distracted.  I’m not sure which image the magazine will use for their cover, but the below image is one that Louis and Myself liked for his own use.  The book in the portrait is a  very old (hundreds of years) Greek Book that is part of the Greek History Louis Loves and teaches.

Here is a photograph I took while presenting a live webinar for Photography Schoolhouse on how to “pose” a female.  Along with everything else “female” posing is just as hard to understand.  It takes practice and when done correctly, should look natural and comfortable. You would never know that these to beautiful ladies just met a few minutes before I setup this shot.

When Marissa came into our studio for her portrait consultation  last week she made the mistake of telling me that Sean wasn’t one for pictures.  Especially since the session was going to be held on his birthday.  Me being me, I sent her home with some “smiling” exercises that I jotted down on a piece of paper to give to Sean for practice until the session.  Of course, there was nothing on the paper, but boy I would have loved to seen his face as she explained it to him.  LOL.    We had the pleasure tonight to photograph Sean & Marissa along with their beautiful Husky “Willow” on their 75 acre lot West of Sudbury.  Fields, creeks, trails, this property had it all.  After getting the tour from Sean we quickly jumped right in to the portraits making sure we got Willows attention from the squirrel, wind, smells and everything outdoorsy.  As the sun was starting to set, we found some great spots with nice lighting and backgrounds.   Marissa & Sean, thanks again for having us out at your house.  You have a gorgeous property and we both enjoyed photographing the three of you.

Here is one from Emily’s “Urban Session” we photographed early this month. Sometimes your subjects don’t even have to smile with their mouth. I saw the way she was looking and quickly grabbed this image.

Here is another image that I photographed for Larry Berrio.  I took inspiration from my Xbox game Medal Of Honor as the cover had this kickass image on the front.  I couldn’t figure out how to tell Larry how it would look so I just showed the xbox game.  He wanted something a bit different, darker (in tones) with some impact lighting.  I photographed him in my studio on a grey background and played around in photoshop to get this.

Well back from my fishing trip (video to come in a few minutes) and it’s back to work I go.  I just finished photographing Tyler’s Cap ‘N’ Gown portrait as the one he and his family were not happy with the images taken at the school.  We used our kick*ss Color Smack background “Acid Rain” from our good friends Travis & Paula  of Silverlake Photo Accessories to add a little color to the standard Cap “N’ Gown portrait.  Tomorrow we are photographing the Lasalle Secondary Prom and we have another Color Smack that we just got in today to use for this event.  Stay tuned!

Phew!!! We just finished shooting our first session with Famed Country Music Singer Larry Berrio.  Larry is doing it all with a new Website, image portfolio and and in the future a new CD to keep the music rolling.   We just spent close to 4 hours (most of that time was us goofin around) in the studio today creating the Story Board Images for Devin Kinsella of Shift 4 Solutions who will creating Larry’s new website.  I can’t post to many images as the website and photography will have a release date, but I did manage to get this image through the cracks so I can at least give you all a sneak peak.  There are many more images  with a wackload of different looks, so stay tuned!  Thanks again Larry, I had a blast today and as you can tell, time just flew by.

You can see more photos of Larry on his Facebook Fan Page

Well I just finished my first Live PSH (Photography School House) Ditto Cam presentation where I showed viewers how to create some professional Business Portraits.   I have been doing business portraits for years and I personally think I have my system dialed in.  Creating a professional business portrait should take no more than 5 minutes if you have everything setup and ready to go before the client steps foot in your studio.  A few minor adjustments should be all you need to fine tune the portrait once your client steps in front of the camera.  I would personally like to thank Brian & Natalie for taking the time out of their busy schedule and allowing me the chance to create an updated business portrait for their business.

Here are 2 images from the Webinar.

If you didn’t read my last post about Nicole then I should tell you that this quote by “Vandon” could not fit more perfectly.