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Transcript and Gear:

Hey there, welcome to my studio here in New York City. I'm Daniel Norton. Today we're going to take a look behind the scenes of a promo image shoot I did for Raquel Lily. Alright, so we've worked together before, we did a live stream for Adorama, we'll put a link to that. She's really fun and was coming up to New York, and she was like, “Hey, I need some promos. I'm doing this duet with my friend.” So I said, Cool. That works out really well come by, and we'll make a video. 

So this is actually a pretty simple shot, we knew ahead of time we were looking to do. We wanted to shoot kind of an editorial fashion shoot, basically where the actual fashion; the clothes, right, but in this case, the clothes and the subjects matter the most. So real simple portrait using the gray background here from Savage, and a real kind of flat light, but I wanted to add some dimension, let's talk about how I did that.  

Alright, so I have two lights going on here. What is effectively the key light is this Profoto B1X shot through a four-foot Chimera frame. This is creating a light that's covering the subject and the background giving us a nice even wash of light, but kind of a flat and boring light, which is fine because we wanted it to have a little bit of flatness to it. 

The second light, which is kind of there to shape the light, you could almost call it a second key, but it's really a fill light. Is a Profoto B1X in a 3’ Octa with a grid, that's really there to add some kind of jawbone definition and some highlights to the image because if I just went with the Chimera frame, it would have been fine, but it would have been very, very, very flat and we only wanted it very, very flat. 

Okay, the gear for this is going to consist of two lights. In this case, I'm using Profoto, B1X's. Now you may have seen me use the B10s. A lot. I like those for portraits in general. But when I'm shooting, essentially a group shot, right, there are two people. And I know I want to make it really even I'm going to back my lights up really far and use big sources I want as much power as possible, not because the B10s Couldn't have given me the right exposure. But because the B1x is going to recycle faster. So B1Xs. One here, I'm going to shoot through a four-foot, Chimera silk. And I've got another one here inside of my three-foot Profoto Octa. This actually has a grid on it, because the grid is going to help add contrast, right? Sometimes we use grids because we're trying to control the spill of light. In this case, I want the light to spill everywhere. But having the grid will add a little contrast. And that's really what I'm using this light for. The silk light is good to give us the big flat light, this is going to add contrast to the faces of our subjects. Sometimes we like to overthink our lighting. And it's easy to fall into this idea that we want to use like, you know, kickers and gels in the background, and all these other things. But sometimes very simple lighting is what you want for looking going for. So in these two lights, easy. What's important here, is the subject, their clothing, the attitude. And that's what we want to capture. And sometimes simple or light will help you do that. 

Okay, so we made a series of portraits here, these are two that really stood out to me as having the vibe we were looking for. They've got this kind of editorially fashion vibe. But at the same time, there's a connection with the subject. And of course, being musicians, you know, you're going to have fans, they want to connect with their subjects. So they're both effectively lit the same way, which is a big flat light from the front, right, creating the overall light. And then basically that three-foot Octa giving us that little bit of contrast, a little bit of shape that you can see here, and here. 

When you're working commercially, it changes the perspective a bit, when you're working for yourself, and you're doing photography because you love it. It's a hobby, even if you're doing portraits for people on some level where they don't really, you know, know exactly what they want. They just know that they like your style, and kind of do what you like, right? And they're just like, Oh, great pitches. But when somebody wants something that's going to use in a more commercial way, you've got to really consider how is this thing being used, what's going to be the best way to to put across the idea. And sometimes with a smaller client. You can work with them on those ideas. If it's a bigger client, sometimes they just give you a layout. And we've done live streams. We've talked about that before. But this is actually a nice challenge. And sometimes it might be fun if you're just starting out to reach out to people that you don't maybe and say hey, what kind of thing would you like you tell me what you want. And I will make it for you. And it's a good test to see how much you'll enjoy being a commercial photographer. 

So I hope you guys enjoyed this behind-the-scenes look, so to speak. Let me know what questions you have down in the comments below about you know how you might work through a commercial project and you know, budgeting and stuff like that because that's something that maybe was outside the scope of this video but something we can talk about if you haven't done so already. Go ahead, subscribe to the channel, ring the bell to get notifications, and I'll see you next time on set. 

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👓   DANIELS GEAR

📸   CAMERA

Nikon Z6II: https://bit.ly/33bZWrP

Nikon Z 24-70 f4 Lens: https://bit.ly/nIk24704

⚡️  LIGHTING - FLASH

Profoto Air Remote Nikon: http://bit.ly/PFAIRNK

Profoto B1x: http://bit.ly/ProB1X

Profoto 3’ Octa Softbox: http://bit.ly/PFRFIO3

Chimera 48x48 Frame: https://bit.ly/2P47q56

Chimera 48x48 full diffusion cloth: https://bit.ly/3f6LT6s

🪜   STUDIO GRIP AND SUPPORT

Manfrotto 055 Tripod: https://bit.ly/2PDOkqr

Manfrotto Hydrostatic Ball Head: http://bit.ly/MHSBH

Matthews C- Stand: http://bit.ly/MTCstandC

👨🏻‍💻   TETHERING

MacBook Pro: https://bit.ly/321OHS4

Tether Tools USB-C to USB-C: https://bit.ly/3rhV4t4

🎥   VIDEO PRODUCTION

Nikon Z6: http://bit.ly/ONESLOTJR

Nikon Z 24-70 f4 Lens: https://bit.ly/nIk24704

Nikon Z50 Mirrorless Camera with NIKKOR Z DX 16-50mm f/3.5-6.3 VR Lens: https://bit.ly/3Fuwo5J

Rode Microphones Wireless GO II Compact Microphone System with 2x Transmitters and 1x Receiver: https://bit.ly/3KnPBtB

Apple iPad Pro 12.9" M1 Chip, Wi-Fi, 256GB, Space Gray, Mid 2021: https://bit.ly/33c1sKt

Atomos Ninja V recorder: https://bit.ly/3ttLPc2

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C Stands more than a light stand