Portraiture – Portrait and commercial Photography Bristol, Bath and West

Promo shoot with artist Jennie Gyllblad

11/12/2012 By David Leave a Comment

A few weeks back I had the pleasure of producing some beautiful promotional photography for a Bath-based Swedish artist, Jennie Gyllblad who is forging a growing reputation as a comic book artist and freelance illustrator.

Jennie, who has a degree in Illustration, loves creating stories and characters using traditional media such as watercolour, gouache, ink and pencil. She works on graphic novels and series like Clockwork Watch, Skal, Elysia and Bayou Arcana and can often be seen at major UK comic conventions. She is also in demand as a portrait artist costume designers and is regularly commissioned by corporate clients. Jennie’s also a keen blogger and user of social media and her online comic strip Jenspiration! has many fans.

Although I’ve never seen an image of her wearing anything other than immaculate tribal belly-dance influenced attire she assures me than sometimes she just wears jeans.

It was Jennie’s first ever promotional photo shoot and the brief was to create some great informal portraits as well as some environmental shots of her at in her home-based studio and work on some of her pieces. With clients that are new to all this I try to go through many different options and shoot variety so there’s plenty for them to choose from.

In terms of the weather day we’d set for our shoot, which in part part was to take place outside, could not have been worse, coinciding with extremely wet weather that saw many parts of the West Country flooded. Nevertheless, making use of an old open air theatre gave us a little shelter.

I shot both soft, organic natural light images and also some more dramatic work, making using of a Bowens Gemini 500 studio flash and TravelPak and my used-on-every-other-shoot Bowens Softlite beauty dish. Again, this was so Jennie could seerange of different styles and choose the images she liked the best.

It was a very enjoyable shoot, despite the British weather, and Jennie will be incorporating some of the images in a new-look website that will be launching soon.

Jennie often likes to huddle in a corner and paint life at various events. This image mixes studio flash light and ambient.

Freelance illustrator, Jennie Gyllbald, Bath

A mix of studio and ambient light.

Jennie Gyllblad, Natural light

Jennie's a comic book artist with a growing reputation in the Uk and beyond.

Jennie's watercolours.

A behind the scenes shot showing the Bowens Gemini flash head and beauty dish used for some of the images.

You can learn more about Jennie and her artwork at http://www.jenniegyllblad.com

Filed Under: David's blog, Portrait shoots, Recent photoshoots Tagged With: art, artists, bath, Bowens, Bristol portraiture, comic books, comics, flash photography, freelance photography, Portraiture, Studio Lighting, tribal belly dance, Vintage

Halloween and Christmas with Voodoo Queen Tuesday Laveau

07/12/2012 By David Leave a Comment

Due to a flurry of commercial and PR freelance shoots in recent weeks there hasn’t been much time for blogging but while archiving some images I thought a couple of a local burlesque star should be brought to your attention.

I’ve worked with burlesque and gogo performer Tuesday Lavaeu on numerous occasions over the past few years and have provide a great deal or the promotional imagery. She’s one of the region’s best known performers as can be seen regularly headlining shows in the UK and internationally in New York and New Orleans. She also edits an increasingly-read Burlesque website/ezine called Coochie Crunch. A lot of you ask me about my burlesque photography and you can gain an insight into that stuff here.

The gaveyard shift. Tuesday Laveau with a Vampira-influenced look

Tuesday’s a big fan of campy 1950s scream queen Vampira, AKA Finnish-American actress Maila Nurmi. Nurma created Vampira initially as televisions first horror hostess and portrayed her again cult Ed Wood classic film Plan 9 from Outer Space and was billed as Vampira again in the The Beat Generation where she plays a beatnik poet.

Shutter speed was such that the background could be darkened for a night time feel.

To get the right feel we used a local graveyard and here’s a couple of the resulting images. The set-up was very simple and guerilla and the whole thing was done in around 30 minutes flat – for lighting it was simply a Canon 580ex flash through an adapter through a Bowens Softlite reflector mixed with the ambient light darkened to give a more ‘evening’ feel, even though we were shooting mid-morning.

Tuesday also had a new Christmas act lined-up and I also shot a few studio images of this too.

Christmas burlesque booty-shaking with Tuesday Laveau

Christmas booty-shaking with Tuesday Laveau

While we’re talking things burlesque-related, a couple of my images have been used on a charity breast cancer charity by Welsh producers The Bluestocking Lounge, headed by Lilly Laudanum. It’s for a great cause so go and buy one over at their website.

Get yourself one of these fabulous charity calendars, which features two of my images, including one of Tuesday Lavaeu.

Filed Under: David's blog, Personal Projects, Portrait shoots, Recent photoshoots Tagged With: 1950s, Bowens, Bristol, Burlesque, cabaret, christmas, flash photography, freelance photography, Halloween, portraits, Portraiture, Scream Queen, Vampira, Vintage

Cave Girl pinup shoot with Marianne Cheesecake

30/08/2012 By David 1 Comment

London-based Canadian burlesque star Marianne Cheescake has been dazzling international audiences with her fun-packed routines and it was my great pleasure to shoot with her when she was in Bristol.

We’d been in touch via email discussing two different ideas and made use of Pinterest to organise our thoughts visually. The first act Marianne had in mind for promo shots was her ‘Cave Girl’ routine. While I could have done a great job using my home studio I knew the whole thing would get a huge lift by using a rocky Flintstones-esque location, so we headed for nearby Portishead where I knew of a great shoreline location that wouldn’t be too full of people on a Saturday morning.

Marianne Cheesecake pinup shots at Portishead

After an assistant had to pull out, I was lucky to be joined last-minute by by friend Bert Vessier, a Bridgwater-based photographer. Bert recently obtained a set of Elinchrom Quadra RX flash. He’s become a huge evangelist for the technology and was keen to demonstrate the Quadra’s powers on the shoot. I’m a big fan of the Bowens Gemini+Travelpak option of location lighting, and while I’m a bit reticent about going with unfamiliar gear on a real shoot, a flash is basically a flash and I was interested to see how the Quadras performed so we used them.

Although we were shooting in the middle of the day the sun was covered by clouds giving me plenty of options for shaping the light with the Elinchrom flash, which at 400 w/s is powerful but probably not up to overpowering direct midday sun with the Canon 5D mkII’s rather poor 1/160s maximum sync speed. I was keen to use ‘flash on location’ because of the ‘carved out of the background’ hyped look it gives, which for the colourful pinup vibe I was seeking is perfect. Although I had a few lenses with my Canon EF 24-70 f2.8L covered the bases – it’s not a ‘sexy’ bit of glass, but about as good as a general purpose lens gets.

Marianne Cheesecake is a fabulous model and brought some great posing despite my making her climb or all over the place for the best compositions – but needs must if you to great photographs.

The Quadras performed brilliantly and unlike a top-heavy Gemini monolight were light and easy to move around without the top-heaviness my Bowens setup often suffers – a nice touch was being able to control flash power via the Skyport triggers. As pure location lighting, the Quadras probably ‘win’ but then Geminis are a better indoors/studio option. It’s swing and roundabouts. I’ve been considering a Bowens 1500 Explorer set for some time and this would get around the top heavy problem and deliver oodles of power for those times I just have to shoot in the brightest sunlight or want to use light-sapping accessories like a softbox.

Are you a musician? Dancer? Pinup? Performer? For tailor-made promotional images packages, get in touch.

Filed Under: David's blog, Photographic techniques, Portrait shoots, Tools of the trade Tagged With: 1950s, Bowens, Bowens Gemini, Bristol, Burlesque, cave girl, cheesecake, elinchrom, flash photography, freelance photography, pinup, portishead, Portraiture, retro, Studio Lighting, Vintage

Hokey burlesque fun with Tuesday Laveau

12/07/2012 By David Leave a Comment

Here are a few images of burlesque star, Tuesday Laveau. Taking trailer park kitsch and Anna Nicole Smith as our sylistic inspiration, this is what we created.

Find out more about Tuesday and her performances at http://tuesdaylaveau.wordpress.com/

Tuesday Laveau with Fender Stratocaster

Tuesday Laveau, Voodoo Queen

Tuesday Laveau burlesque superstar

Musician? Dancer? Performer? For tailor-made promo packages, get in touch today.

Filed Under: David's blog, Portrait shoots, Recent photoshoots Tagged With: Bowens, Bowens Gemini, Bristol, Bristol Burlesque, bristol music, bristol photography, Bristol portraiture, Burlesque, cabaret, flash photography, portraits, Portraiture, Studio Lighting

Sun-kissed retro fashion shoot with Jess

20/06/2012 By David Leave a Comment

Here are some more images of actress and model Jessica Elizabeth Swanson for you to enjoy. Here we were looking to create a sun-kissed, retro pinup fashion vibe.

Hair was by Doug Hobbs at Hobbs Hairdressing, Bristol, and we used the garden at the back of his salon for much of the shoot. A brightly-painted wall full of bright oranges and blues, giving a great Mediterranean feel to the images. While it was a bright sunny day, the enclosed garden gave plenty of open shade and it was day to find great angles where Jess would be in soft, flattering light. As a contrast we also shot some images in the sun, and I had the model turn towards the light so the harsher sun would wrap around her face, rather than drag across it causing distracting shadows.

Doug Hobbs created Jess's do for our shoot.

Makeup work was done by Jasmine King, a student at City of bristol college who was able to wonders with our vintage brief.

Jasmine Rogers makeup artist with our model.

If you’re love to take part in your own fashion shoot, whether to begin a model book or just for your own enjoyment, get in touch today.

Filed Under: David's blog, Fashion shoots, Portrait shoots, Recent photoshoots Tagged With: bristol photography, Bristol portraiture, Editorial, Fashion, Fashion shoot, Freelance, pinup, portraits, Portraiture, retro, Vintage

Exposition of Cabaret, Vintage Fashion and Burlesque, Bath

05/06/2012 By David Leave a Comment

I’ll be taking part in the Bath Fringe festival on Sunday 10 June, running an amazing photo booth at this incredible 6-hour event.

The Exposition of Cabaret, Vintage Fashion and Burlesque is a Bath Fringe Festival Event held at the famous antique Speigeltent – a most beautiful tented venue indeed.

On offer will be a petit bouch of all things vintage, fabulous and delicious Entertainment will include a cabaret and burlesque show, walkabouts, photo booth, markets, workshops, fashion show and the finale which will be The Alternative Queen of Bath competition.

Belly dance superstar, Stehpi Briggs performs at last year's Bath Fringe Exposition

Baths first “Alternative Queen” competition promises to be a right royal delight.

If you consider yourself slightly bizarre and eccentric then you are most cordially invited to enter this regal jubilee pageant. Part of this years Fringe Festival, The Alternative Queen of Bath contest will form the finale of the Exposition of Cabaret, Vintage Fashion and Burlesque, in association with Smutter & Snells and Bath Fringe, being held at the Speigeltent on the afternoon of Sunday 10th June.

Taking inspiration from Andrew Logan’s ‘Alternative Miss World’ this true diamond event promises to be a right royal delight. The theme will be of course ‘60 Glorious Years’ and contestants costumes and titles should reflect a momentous event that has occurred since 1952. It could be their birth, death, punk, space travel, the digital age or they could enter simply because they are truly blue blooded!

The photo both will feature real studio lighting and enable visitors to get a taste of my portraiture work for a much lower price and learn more about by vintage and pinup makeover experiences.

Kitty Kane wows last year's Spiegeltent crowd with a high-octane burlesque act

Anglo-French burlesque performer, Lady Lace

Filed Under: David's blog, Events shoots, News, Recent photoshoots Tagged With: bath, bath fringe festival, Burlesque, cabaret, events photography, portraits, Portraiture, speigeltent, Studio Lighting

Burlesque photo shoot with Heresy Clothing

27/05/2012 By David Leave a Comment

Here’s another set of photos of Bath-based burlesque performer, Gemma Sheree for you to enjoy. Gemma models a steel-boned corset from Heresy Clothing

Heresy-Emma offers a made to measure service and has been creating designs for over 15 years. She trained as a theatrical costumier, which is reflected in many designs. Check out the website below.

http://www.heresyclothing.com

If you are an musician, band, actor, stage, or cabaret performer and require promotional photography for applications or websites and flyers then I can help. I can provide images on CD or prints tailored to your requirements. Get in touch today for a quotation.

This beautiful steel-boned corset was created by Heresy Clothing and modelled by Bath-based burlesque star, Gemma Sheree

Gemma Sheree, burlesque star

Heresy corset detail.

Filed Under: David's blog, Fashion shoots, Personal Projects, Portrait shoots, Recent photoshoots Tagged With: boudoir, Bowens, Bowens Gemini, Bristol Burlesque, Burlesque, Fashion, Fashion shoot, flash photography, heresy clothing, pinup, portraits, Portraiture, Vintage

Burlesque images in Milkcow Magazine this month

17/05/2012 By David Leave a Comment

A couple of my photographs appeared in the latest Milkcow Magazine this month as part of a feature on Bath-based burlesque star, Miss Gemma Sheree.

Milkcow is a full-colour lifestyle magazine covered the 1940s and 1950s subcultures – everything from rock’n'roll, music, big cars, vintage fashion, pin ups, Burlesque and more.

I have taken many promotional shots of burlesque, circus, cabaret and musical performers over the years. If you need to enhance your portfolio, please get in touch.

Miss Gemma Sheree in Milkcow Magazine, images by David Hammonds Photography, Bristol

Filed Under: David's blog, News Tagged With: 1950s, Bristol, Bristol Burlesque, Burlesque, cabaret, Editorial, Fashion, glamour, magazines, milkcow, portraits, Portraiture, Vintage

Alt model mini-shoot

31/10/2011 By David Leave a Comment

I enjoyed a fun little shoot with fab Bristol-Based model Chantelle last week. Chantelle had been enjoying some shoots recently and had a Model Mayhem page with plenty of ‘alt’ like images. As there’d been a lot of fetish elements in recent fashion collections from the likes of Louis Vuitton I thought shooting the model in more of a ‘fashion’ style might be fun and give her a different look in her portfolio.

I sent her a brief mood board showing some cool fashion images and some drawn from classic european horror movies, which seemed to chime with the style and had an interesting aesthetic.

The photographs were shot in my small home studio, making use of a silver bounce umbrella and Bowens Softlite reflector. Chantelle took care of her own makeup.

Black lace. Shot with Bowens Softlite beauty size and bounce umbrella.

Model Chantelle.

A hint of fetish-fashion with the 'bondage tape' tape. Fetish style hit the catwalks this season with names like Louis Vuitton appropriating elements of the aesthetic..

Chantelle has a fantastic face with elfin features reminiscent of a young Tori Amos.

Sadly, I don't get as much time as I'd like to rock out on the guitar these days. Still this custom red-and-orange Zilla Cabs amp cabinet and sunburst Gibson ES335 were great props to set off Chantelle's rock chick looks.

Filed Under: Fashion shoots, Personal Projects, Portrait shoots, Recent photoshoots Tagged With: Bowens, Bowens Gemini, bristol photography, Fashion shoot, flash photography, portraits, Portraiture

‘Dark suit’ – model test fashion shoot, Bristol

26/10/2011 By David Leave a Comment

I recently had a small test shoot with Bristol-raised model Ozy Hussian. A Computing student and part-time model, Ozy was keen to show a bit more versatility in his portfolio, which currently contained some good sports/streetwear images.

The obvious thing to do was involve a suit but dress it up in a way that wouldn’t be out of place with Ozy’s personal style.

To make things interesting, I thought we’d approach the shoot as if we were devising a small magazine feature with the title, ‘One high-street suit, four looks’ – the idea to take the same suit and go from workwear through to clubwear. A lot of young guys get their first suit for weddings, funerals, graduations and the like so our imaginary magazine feature would showcase a few cool looks beyond this. So, in other words, I turned personal stylist for the day. Gok Wan – watch out.

The four styles created were:

A sharp workwear look, where Ozy would look the part thrashing out a big deal with a top client.
A dress-to impress partywear look.
A rock’n'roll dress-down gig look.
A cool night-on-the-tiles clubbin’ look.

Not bad stuff from one inexpensive high street suit!

Lighting-wise I wanted to introduce loads of drama. The model was primarily lit by my Bowens Softlite reflector and a Bowens Gemini 500 studio flash. The Bowens Softlite a kind of beauty dish, which gives a great compromise between hard and soft light. It’s best when you can get it quite close to the model. A slight lick of fill was sometimes used too, provided by another Bowens Gemini and a ‘soft silver’ bounce umbrella.