MarioEvon live at the Apollo!!!!

MarioEvon is a Jamaican "reggae-soul" singer currently chasing his dreams in the US. He is a trained medical doctor but chose to pursue his real passion - music. He is a graduate of the Berklee College of Music and is currently doing his internship in New York. His most recent and very noteworthy accomplishment has been competing at the very well know Amateur night at the Apollo. He has so far won round 1 and round 2, he has two more rounds to go. Read more about his performances at his blog http://marioevon.tumblr.com/post/7967617114/amateur-night-at-the-apollo-round-2-m-e-again. Please follow and support as much as possible another Jamaican making strides on the international scene.

Photo info: Shot at around 7 am one summer Sunday morning in 2008 at Mandela highway, under the bridge. Only light used is the sun low in the sky.

Random Photo: Reaching

Reaching, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Taken at Strawberry Hills

Facial Expressions fashion show

My friend Kimberley (whose wedding I shot some time ago) is doing a make up course at HEART institute and requested that I cover a fashion show that the students organize. This show is aimed that displaying the students' skills at make up artistry that they have learned throughout the course. Each student has up to 3 models and they have to display 3 different looks. My job was to cover the preparations before the event, the event itself (full body and head shot of each model as they made their way down the runway) and individual headshots afterwards.

The students were making preparations in three different rooms. For this I used a speedlight on camera  bounced up on the ceiling.

Different types of make up work was being displayed so it varied from the every day to the not so ordinary:

The lone male model being prepped:

For the show itself I decided to use my recently acquired Gary Fong lightsphere. The models, by the way, were for the most part everyday people, so they varied from the very mature:

 ...to the not so mature:

This for me was the most interesting one:

This was the first i was using the Gary Fong lightsphere. A fairly significant improvement over using hte bare flash as the light was definitely diffused better. It has one end opened and you have the option of covering it, I left mine open as I actually think the cover creates harsher shadows below the jawline, which I dont like.

For the head shots I shot into an umbrella triggering a flash wirelessly. For the sake of time I had everyone do pretty much the same pose (with a few varieties). A few of the head shots:

And the perfect couple:

Sakina Deer is Daphne in "Last Call"

Sakina in "Last Call", a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Maurice Bryan is Cecil in "Last Call"

Maurice, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

One of the portraits I shot for this show. July 29-Aug 21, go see it!

Random Share: Lifeless beach

Lifeless beach, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Last Call photoshoot

A friend of mine requested that I do the promo photos for a play that he has written and directed, called "Last Call". He wanted to shoot his cast of 5, in constume and all, on a seamless backdrop. He wanted:

- the cast in pairs
- full cast
- individual head shots

Ive never done this kind of shoot before (group in a studio setting) so the idea immediately caught my interest. The first thing that came to mind was how to light a group of five? Lighting equipment that I have (so far anyway) are as follows:

- Cactus 4 wireless trigger and 3 receivers
- one vivitar 285 flash, one canon 480 EX II, and one manual flash with only two settings
- one lightstand and shoot through umbrella

Quite limited to say the least. For the group shots I decided to go with two bare flash on either side of the cast (the manual flash and the vivitar) as kickers and the canon 480 EXII shooting into the umbrella. This would also be the first time im doing anything and triggering all 3 flashes. The headshots were simpler, I planned to go with the shoot through umbrella left of the subject with reflector on the right. Keeping it simple. For the backdrop I borrowed Julian's 9 foot seamless backdrop (thanks man). Not easy to transport I can tell you, I had to use my wife's Grand Vitara, and even then it ended up going all the way from the back resting on the dashboard in the front. Venue was their rehearsal space, a large store room on a compound downtown owned by Sagicor. Nice big space to work with.

Keiran (the writer/director) wanted them shot from a low vantage point and suggested that I shoot from far away, in order to not get the top of the backdrop in the shot. This worked quite well, as such for the group shots I shot them all sitting on the ground.

I did say this was the first time doing this kind of lighting right? Yes, learned quite a bit. First off:

- Cant put your kickers beside your subjects, way too much. They need to be some distance behind your subjects. For the manual flash, even though it was quite far away and behind it was still putting out too much light so I had to feather it:

Luckily it was far enough away so there was no glare in my lens. (Oh, this is also the first time officially using the new Sigma lens :) Must say im quite satisfied.)

- When shooting groups if lighting from the side you really have to watch for shadows. I found myself doing test shots to make sure no one's face ended up being in anyone else's shadow. And once you get the positioning right, cant nobody move really, or you have to start all over again.

- opposite to the above, you also have to watch for bright spots on the clothes from the side lighting coming through the space between the subjects. Sadly I did not see this in the viewfinder, so didnt discover it until I downloaded them to the pc. Theyre not such a big deal but would still have liked to avoid them. Not quite sure how I wouldve though :/

Once we got going things flowed really well:

The actors are experienced and know what theyre doing so were able to portray their characters easily. Keiran knew what he wanted and moved them into the various positions. My longtime friend and his fiance Rae was shooting behind the scenes, see a few below:

We starting setting up at about 7:30 Wednesay night and finished everything a little after 11 pm. Here is the poster currenlty being circulated:

The poster is getting rave reviews in and of itself. It really does have a hollywood feel to it. Hopefully it helps to translate into people coming to the show.


"Last Call", a play written and directed by Keiran King, starts on July 29 and will run for a month at Phillip Sherlock on Thursday and Friday nights, and also Saturday and Sunday afternoon/night.

Flickr Blog test

Time Bound, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Just checking out posting to the blog directly from flickr. This one is titlied "Time Bound"

Rejected by JCDC :(

So my two entries did not get through to JCDC this year. I'll be honest and say im more a little surprised and confused. I read through the judges' reports for the past few exhibitions and got the impression that they did not want the usual run-of-the-mill work i.e. pretty flowers or landscapes. They want people to be more adventurous with their work, something that had more meaning behind the image being portrayed. It has to stand out, and of course that makes sense because the judges are looking through hundreds of entries, so if your work is too ordinary they will just pass it by.

So I entered the below:

 



"Down to Hades"



 



"Land of wood and ..."


Not too ordinary right? I can see with the 2nd photo, it is perhaps not the strongest photo composition-wise. But I thought I would have gotten through with the first one at least. That photo made it through to the Art Fresh exhibition earlier this year, which is a competition for more serious artists. So, yeah, puzzled that a photo that got through in a competition for more serious artists did not get through for a competition for amateurs.

So im now a bit put off from JCDC. I doubt I will have the same drive to enter next year. We'll see.