Photo Manipulation | Elements [EARTH]

Behold:  The epic[ish] conclusion and recap!

This was actually the first basic concept that solidified in the brainstorming process, as well as the first set-up we did.  

Since I knew we'd be shooting in an abandoned area, I thought of how to use the space for "earth," even if now, I realize it would've been a ton easier (and made a lot more sense) if we'd just gone out and shot in the woods somewhere.  Ha.  Groundbreaking, I know.  But at the time, considering my surroundings, I loved the idea of the outside growing in.   

"...as the editing progressed, I loved even more the idea of a "Tree of Life" in the midst of dead surroundings."

And there ya have it.  Here's Earth!....and Air, and Fire, and Water.

[ E A R T H ]

*Behind the Scenes and Photoshop breakdown*

[ A I R ]

*Behind the Scenes and Photoshop breakdown*

[ F I R E ]

*Behind the Scenes and Photoshop breakdown*

[ W A T E R ]

*Behind the Scenes and Photoshop breakdown*

The Models:  Rachel Carithers, Gloria Dortch
The Stuff:  Canon 5D Mkiii, Canon 580 EXii Speedlite, Westcott Rapidbox w/ beauty dish reflector plate, Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop
The Partners in Crime:  Aimee Burchard, Nathan DeWild, Logan Foll, Matt Hadley, Jonathan Morua, Ricky Oliveras, Brandan Roberts

Behind the Scenes | Photoshop Breakdown [FIRE]

This one breaks the mold a bit, since I didn't actually use the Rapidbox in the way it's intended (which was the whole point of this exercise).  

But we quickly realized that with it pointed at them, the lantern's entire ambience went kaput...you couldn't tell the thing was even lit.  'Dey gaw'geous' but it wasn't what I was going for...

Rachel & Glo

At the time, Jonathan was running around with his LED panel (came in VERY handy, particularly when we did "AIR" and didn't have the lantern light to help with focus), so we popped it behind them and got a neat warm/cool effect.

Photo Credit:  Logan Foll

As much as that helped the ambience, it didn't put off enough light to get some exposure on their arms, etc.  (Not that I was thinking anything along those lines at the time; remember the had-no-concept-yet dealio?  Yeah at that point, Aimee handed them red flowers and a lantern on fire, and that was all we had, lol.)  

Still, I went with the above photo, not thinking about the flames I would try to add in later.  Lo and behold, it made no sense because there was no ambient light on their arms...wommmmp.

"...Soooo I ended up scrapping the idea after about 7 hours of trying to make them fit inside a dark, hollow Redwood...in a forest fire...No go."

Back to the drawing board.  Or rather..."Mommmmm!!"  

Yes, I called my mom (and trusty fresh eyes) to look at it.  I could only sit there and sulk because it wasn't coming together.  I'll spare you what it looked like, but she had an awesome suggestion of them coming out of a sea of fire, and THAT'S when the idea struck that they should be surrounded by lava.

"CUE HARD-ROCK ACCOMPLISHMENT MONTAGE."

Went back and found this one to start with, where we'd stuck the Rapidbox behind them and gave that backlight a little bit more umph.  Even though I took the rim-light out of the final product, it popped enough light into their arms to where it would make sense to have another light source besides the lantern.

AND THERRR YA HAVE IT, FOLKS.  And yup, it most definitely evolved.

Btw, shout out to Leigh Hilbert — in doing Google searches for lava photos, I realized he'd taken a lot of them!  Check out his stuff, seriously, he's incredible.

*Click here if you haven't seen [A I R] or [W A T E R]  yet*

Photo Manipulation | Elements [FIRE]

Apologies for the wait on this one.  Lesson learned:  have a concept in mind before you shoot.  Sweet Mary, this one was hard.  Totally worth it.  But dang....right-brained agony for days.

Despite the shoot being ever-so-slightly thrown together in the first place, we were pretty solid on concepts — except for fire.  I thought it'd make it easier if we just took out all the surrounding elements and figured out what to do with it later.  W R O N G.  For the love of all things awesome, have a concept in mind and your post-production will go infinitely more smoothly, lol.

Still, it was kind of cool to see this one take shape.  I've found that instead of merely adding to the environment and actually having to fabricate it, the concept evolves with every passing hour.  This can be a pro and con, but meh, I digress.

Herrr it is!  Three down, one more to go...

[ F I R E ]

*Behind the Scenes and Photoshop breakdown*

The Models:  Rachel Carithers, Gloria Dortch
The Stuff:  Canon 5D Mkiii, Canon 580 EXii Speedlite, Westcott Rapidbox w/ beauty dish reflector plate, Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop
The Partners in Crime:  Aimee Burchard, Nathan DeWild, Logan Foll, Matt Hadley, Jonathan Morua, Ricky Oliveras, Brandan Roberts

Behind the Scenes | Photoshop Breakdown [AIR]

*Click if you haven't seen [A I R] or [W A T E R] yet*

Somewhere along the way, we thought that tossing flour in the air would be a fantastic idea for this one (and we still might do that one day) -- but this one would've been an obese nightmare had we done that.

Reason being, there wasn't a completely solid background for me to drop off, so in post, it would be near impossible to isolate.  At least with my present shkillz.  This one actually took much longer than the [WATER] one -- lol, to spare you, the video doesn't show how much refining, sitting, and staring I did.   Mondo more attention to refining edges and details.

I've come to the conclusion that with much chaos comes more leeway, but in a cleaner design -- oofa.

So it's good we just went with Aimee's umbrellas :)  She's gotten her blog post up so totally check out her take on the day!  

To test this, we had to get in front of the most plain background we could find (to make things easier in post).  In this case, it was the hallway.  Jonathan (who also has his photos up from the day), was kind enough to rock the test-shot.  Look at that form.

Got la modelas in, and we were off.

Yup, Rachel's hanging onto Gloria -- originally that's how the finished product was supposed to be, but once I got into post, I couldn't get the spacing to look right.  

"Soooo I pulled what I call a "PCO" (Professional Cop-Out) 

and just had them apart :-D"

Earlier, Logan's fearlessness got me venturing outside (He got a good cover of the events too, if you wanna see).  There was some pretty awesome space right next to the house that I decided to use for this one.  Originally they were supposed to be going off the roof of a house, but this just looked so awesome.

And without further ado: 

Photo Manipulation | Elements [AIR]

I know it rolls off the tongue easier to say "Wind" -- Earth, Wind, Fire, etc. but the more I looked on sites, it said "air" which I suppose makes a little more sense.

Still, I knew regardless that I wanted them to be airborne in a cleaner design.  There were some plans that we didn't end up going with, like feathers and flour but in hindsight, I'm elated that we didn't.  More on that in the Behind the Scenes.

Welcome to the second Element.

[ A I R ]

*Behind the Scenes and Photoshop breakdown*

The Models:  Rachel Carithers, Gloria Dortch
The Stuff:  Canon 5D Mkiii, Canon 580 EXii Speedlite, Westcott Rapidbox w/ beauty dish reflector plate, Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop
The Partners in Crime:  Aimee Burchard, Nathan DeWild, Logan Foll, Matt Hadley, Jonathan Morua, Ricky Oliveras, Brandan Roberts

In case you didn't see [W A T E R]