Nothing to see here, just showing some personal work shot and edited with the new iPhone4.

Last fall I posted a blog on five must-have photo apps for the iPhone, at the time I was using an iPhone 3G. I’m still currently using those five apps as my go-to photo apps, so naturally when I received my iPhone4 last month I wasted no time taking pictures with it and running all the photos through some or all of those apps.

I can’t speak for anyone else using an iPhone4 but I’ve been happy with mine.

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It's been a long and winding road trying to decide where we wanted to set up our home base on this crazy adventure of being a self-employed editorial and commercial photographer. Without the safety net of a staff position we wanted to be sure we were making the best choice for us as a whole. In the end, we decided to set up our camp in the Upstate of South Carolina. Centered in the middle of Asheville NC, Charleston SC, Charlotte NC and Atlanta GA. After all, this is where our friends and families are.

So…

We've been breaking in the new studio space for the past few days. Located at 12 Rutherford Road in Greenville SC, close to downtown it's 1800 square feet, has 14-foot ceilings, and comes with two bathrooms and a dressing room. Having the space will allow us to start building sets, work when it's raining and have a place to educate and be educated. It gets us out of the coffee shops for meetings and gives us an opportunity to create our work under a controlled environment.

The above shots are from a white-seamless set up we did over the weekend with a few Upstate film and theater actors. With the exception of that last droid, that's yours truly.

Interested in a Studio Tour? email info(at)iancurcio(dot)com

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Getting big portraits with little gear isn't as hard as you might think it is. You need a little imagination, that's all. The above image took all of 5 minutes to set up and execute. It was about 5pm, a 100 degrees and we were in the backyard. The below image shows the simple set up, a "28" Westcott softbox", "AlienBee 1600", a "Vagabond" and a box of instant mashed potatoes. It was also shot with a circa 1977 manual focus "105mm 2.5" lens that cost me about $100.

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It's tough times out there. No one will argue that statement, especially not a working photographer. Jobs are far and few in-between and competition is in full swing. I shoot more assignments nowadays were I'm standing next to a soccer mom or Nascar dad with a Nikon D3 and an SB-900 hanging around his or her neck then ever before. As an old newspaper photographer I used to gaffer the name on my cameras so I wouldn’t draw attention to the professional equipment I was using. I'm still doing that today but not for the same reasons.

I poke fun but the situation is a serious one. The old "don’t take $200 assignments" truism is a painful one. As professionals and even the professionals-in-the-making we have to educate or clients and future clients on the value of great photography.

Photography is not much different that anything else out there. You have your Mazda and then you have your Mazarati. There are buyers for both. If you give your client a Mazarati for the price of a Mazda, you're not only hurting yourself but you are hurting your industry. Know how to turn down a job. We simply can’t shoot a $2000 job for $200. It doesn't matter how badly we need to pay rent.

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Anyone who reads this blog knows that I'm a big fan of using lights. I think understanding how and when to setup strobes gives you an advantage over the photographers who do not. It gives you more options and when you need to be visually creative, having and understanding your options is a valuable tool. It also gives you control; there is something to be said for being able to walk into a situation and owning it because you understand how to light it.

But not all assignments are going to require you to light them; some are going to require a different set of skills. Skills like remaining calm while being at the mercy of variables you cannot control and being able to wait patiently for the perfect shot.

While on an editorial assignment last month, it took me two days to get these two shots while it really only took me a few seconds to shoot each one. It was the prep work and waiting that took so long. Waiting for the rain to stop, waiting of the sun to be in the right location, hoping the wind would stop blowing, these were all variable that I could not control. That car you see in the bottom picture, I had to wait for that, there was no big production. Just me and a camera. The skyline shot, I asked forgivness later and not permission first as I scouted out and climbed random rooftops in Charlotte's South End to get that picture. It took patience.

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We had a great group of people come out for the lighting workshop in Charlotte this past weekend. We kicked it on the streets of Uptown for about 9 hours before calling it a day. A big shout out to Anthony and Sarah for hanging out and modeling for us while we explored different lighting techniques and to the security guard who simply looked the other way and didn’t bother hassling us.

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Here are a few images from the shoot I had with David Crow of Floracopeia a few weeks ago. David is a world's expert in the field of botanical medicine, natural health and ecological sustainability and an expert in the Ayurvedic and Chinese medical systems.

He needed a variety of different images to use for his Web sites, promo materials and press kit. He had seen the work I had done for one of his business partners (and long-time friend of mine) here on the East Coast last summer. He had a very specific idea of what he was looking for and wanted to shoot in the San Francisco Botanical Gardens in Golden Gate Park.

The trip worked out well and was considered more of a working vacation than a full-on assignment. I stayed 4 nights and 5 days with friends and family and was able to offset the cost of the trip by working for one afternoon.

Still, with no assistants and keeping true to having the trip pay for itself, I needed to travel light. No checked bags. So I carried the gear I needed, a body, a few lenses, a couple of Speedlites and the various cords and adapters in my ThinkTank backpack. The Manfrotto 6' Retractable 5 Section Lightstand, as well as the 33" shoot-through umbrella folded neatly into the bottom of my suitcase. And that was it, two bags, all the gear I needed to complete the job and I was able to carry it all onto the plane with me.

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One of my favorite modifies (or light-shaping tools) is the 45" Westcott Convertible Umbrella. If I could only have one modifier it would be this one. It’s like having several modifiers in one and it's only $27.95. You just can't beat that.

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Before heading out to San Francisco last week to work on a commercial shoot, I had made the decision to work on a self assignment as well. You know, one of those GOYA assignments that are motivated by nothing more than the urge to create what you want to create with only the restrictions you've given yourself. And I gave myself plenty.

Working for newspapers and travel magazines I've always had to go out and shoot strangers in the streets. It's either grip and grins for the newspapers or low budget magazine assignments where they need someone doing xyz but can't seem to come out of pocket for a good model. Editors and DOPs are too often saying "just find someone who's already doing xyz and use them". It doesn't matter if it's someone shopping, cycling, dining in a restaurant, whatever; nine times out of 10 it's a stranger already in that situation. And it's our job as assignment photographers to be able to approach them, make them feel comfortable and get a great image out of it. In order to do that we have to feel comfortable ourselves and that's what this project was about.

So I decide that I would get up-close and personal with the different people of SF. My goal was to shoot 12 portraits of 12 strangers in 6 hours and I did it. Knowing that I wanted to be able to light my subjects if needed and I would be moving around the different neighborhoods alone and without an assistant, I chose my lighting set up carefully. I used one Speedlite attached to a monopod with no modifier, that was my set up.

I also chose to shoot exclusively with a 20-35mm lens. I did this for several of reasons; first, I wanted to feel comfortable getting into their space and I wanted them to feel comfortable allowing me into their space, after all, that's what the exercise was about. Second, I wanted to be able to show some of the environment that each subject was in and the wide angle allowed me to do that. Third, being close to my subjects allowed me to easily light them from above or the side holding my Speedlite on the monopod. And forth, I walked around the Mission, Castro, Haight-Ashbury and Golden Gate Park without ever allowing any of my gear to leave my hands. It was very minimal, a camera in one hand and a light on a stick in the other.

It did and always does get easier as I went along. I found that about half the people I approached would say yes while the other half would say no and of the half that said no, all of them were very polite and respectful about it.

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One of the things I enjoy the most about providing a service is that I have the option to take advantage of the barter system. As a photographer, especially for aspiring photographers, bartering can be a great tool. It's a great way to add to your portfolio and it's the perfect way to hand pick your assignments. Don't misunderstand me here, this is not shooting for free or undercutting other photographers, this is a straight up trade; my service/product in exchange for your service/product. I've bartered, a year's worth of haircuts for me and my family, I've bartered a credit to some of the best farm-to-table restaurants around, I've even bartered plane tickets and vacation time across the country and they're all assignment I'm proud to show, blog about and put into my portfolio.

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1. Just because you shoot something doesn’t mean you have to show it. If you want to market yourself as a commercial photographer and you just shot the best wedding of your life – don’t show it in your portfolio.

2. There is a fine line between being a versatile photographer and the jack-of-all-trades. You don’t have to specialize but don’t let your portfolio be all over the place either.

3. Show the work you want to get hired to shoot even if you have to shoot self assignments to get it. If you show food in your portfolio, you’ll get asked to shoot food. If you show family portraits in your portfolio you’ll get asked to shoot family portraits. Don’t worry, those jobs you don’t like to shoot but pay you, will still come.

4. Don’t self edit, even the best photographers can get emotionally attached to an image that’s not their best. Everyone needs a good editor on their side and it’s not your mom.

5. Be socially active. Use social media. Talk about yourself and your work. Act like you already have the job. Create a blog and update it often with worthy information. What good is it to have a banging portfolio if no one knows about it?

6. Spend the $10 to get a domain name because an online portfolio with yourname.someothershit.com isn’t worth looking through.

7. If you have an iPhone or any smart phone and you’re not carrying your portfolio on it you’re wasting an opportunity to show your work to everyone you meet.

8. A gallery with more than 18 image is too big and less than 8 is too small.

9. Consider having multiple portfolios or Web sites if you have multiple interests.

10. Update often. Don’t be stale. Keep things fresh.

I'll be taking in Richard Ellis' lecture for the SC Chapter of ASMP at The Art Institute in Charleston South Carolina on Saturday, February 27th. After that I’m going to be taking part in student consultations beginning with a round-table discussion on the basics and techniques of what makes a good portfolio. If you live in the area I hope to see you there.

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I'll be teaching a two-part-off-camera flash workshop at The Light Factory in Charlotte NC on April 10th and 17th. First and foremost this workshop is about taking your flash off of your camera and either holding it, putting it on a stand, taping it to a wall or setting it on top of something and sticking stuff in front of it. From there we'll just keep digging deeper. It's about how to get magazine quality photographs with a minimal amount of equipment. It's about why lighting an object isn't much different than lighting a person. It's about lighting landscapes. It's about adding light, mixing light, coloring light, choosing light, shaping light….light light light.

It's about walking into a space and lighting it from the ground up. I come from a background in editorial -assignment photography. I'm usually alone, rarely do I have an assistant and I've almost never been to the place or met the person I'm about to be photographing. I assess the environment, person and/or object and the lighting quickly becomes subject and location-driven. It's about coming up with epic ideas and executing them on the spot.

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I've been looking at photography like music lately. I've heard musicians say they can hear the sound in their heads but they're not satisfied until they can get that same sound to come out of the speakers. Well I feel the same way about lighting a photograph. There are times I can see the light in my head and I'm not satisfied until I can see that same light in my prints. As photographers we need to learn to "feel" our light, much in the same way a musician "feels" their music.

No doubt we need to have our technical skills down. A musician doesn't just pick up a guitar or sit down at a piano and start producing timeless music without an understanding of the chords or notes, without knowing what A, B, C, D, E, F and G means. A photographer isn't going to pick up a camera and start creating mind-blowing images using flashes without an understanding of shutter speed, aperture, ISO, flash power and flash-to-subject-distance.

And in the same way musicians forget about all those technical aspects of music when they're grooving along and feeling the music, photographers need to be able to put all the technical aspects aside when shooting and groove along as they're feeling their light. You don't think Jimmy Page or Elton John knows each note by name as they are hitting them do you? They feel those notes, they feel what is coming next, they aren't always thinking about it. It's true that not all great musicians can read music and I don't think it's necessary for all great photographers to be able to spit out math equations all day long either. We need to learn our tools and then we need to feel with them.

I understand that can be easier said than done. I cannot tell you how many times I've been trying to find my groove when lighting something and I just keep failing at it miserably. It's during those times I start to doubt myself as a photographer. I think I suck and I have no business trying to put my name out into the industry's wave of professional photographers. But the truth is that not even the best musician can walk into the studio and complete a Grammy-award-winning album in one take. Hours are spent trying to perfect those sounds, tweaking those rifts, changing this and changing that and lighting anything in photography whether it's a person, building, plate of food, whatever, is exactly the same. It takes time, practice, trial and error and in the very end, even the most perfectly-technical lit picture isn't going to resonate with your viewers at all if you aren’t feeling your light.

Disclaimer: I shot the above photograph of Radiohead’s frontman Thom Yorke at Bonnaroo in 2006 and did not light it. Those are stage lights and I was one of about 50 photographers stepping on each other for the first three songs.

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What do you do when you have an assignment in Chattanooga on energy and the Tennessee Valley Authority's 800-megawatts of electricity-generating-capacity expansion? You light it. I drove by the power grid the evening I arrived in town and figured out the sun was going to come up behind the grid in the morning. I don't always have time to location scout before shooting but when I do I try and take advantage of it. I decided to get up early and use the sun to silhouette the grid. I was trying to get an image that showed a massive amount of power. My thinking was that by lighting the rocks using a blue gel it would create a feeling of electricity and energy.

Here’s how it looked on the page:

Here’s a link to the virtual magazine: Southeast Resource

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I've been working on an off-camera lighting workshop geared towards subject-and-location-driven lighting, which simply means working with what you have. I took artist Bailie out with me and we scouted a few locations. You can find interesting and cool places to photograph people just about anywhere. This location is not much more than an abandoned warehouse off of a four-lane highway in small town USA. It's bent and broken, grown over and spray painted. Most people would have driven right past it and not given it a second look. But when you start pulling lights out you can turn almost nothing at all into something worth looking at in a matter of minutes. This shot took about 15 minutes start to finish.

The white balance is set to Cloudy and it’s a basic two light set-up using Nikon Speedlights. The main light is set to quarter power with a grid spot, it's four feet above the subjects face and the light stand itself is about three feet away from him.

The second light, the back light, is set to full power with two CTO gels on it and simply stuck in the back of the sliding-metal door. I did have to flag it with a Tupperware top to keep the spill under control on his face. I wanted the separation but not a flood of orange light on his face.

It's all trail and error for the most part. I started with the ambient light. It's about 3 stops under, flat and kind of gray in the open shade. Once I was happy with the ambient light I worked on the back light. One CTO gel wasn't strong enough so I added a second gel. When the light on the inside of the sliding door was rich enough and the exposure was correct I added the subject and placed the main light. While working on the main light I noticed a good bit of the back light spilling over onto his face so I went back and added the gobo. A few more test shots while moving the main light up and down until I was able to control the shadow under his chin and I was ready to shoot. I came down off the dock after about 20 or so shots and started shooting through the overgrown weeds and trees coming out of the parking lot.

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I shot for the official 2010 North Carolina Travel Guide which came out this week. Whenever on assignment I'm always looking to grab the safe shot. I tuck it away and it keeps me from worrying during the rest of the assignment. Now I'm ready to shoot something different, something more creative, something I really want to run on the pages. Sometimes the designers will go for it and sometimes they won't but I always try. If nothing else I might end up with a portfolio piece and that's what happened this time. The above shot is what ran in the magazine and the shot below found its way onto my Web site.

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