I dont know if the heading is right or wrong, but one thing i do know is that whoever is working with tiny sticky products i will always be here for you when you need to vent.

Let me introduce this shoot however.  I was contacted by Foxy Foils to do some product photography for their new designs.  The breif was simple

So i set out to think about how i was going to do this.  Macro? Light Tent? Perspex shelf - great all things i didnt have.  All things which i should have? Maybe only time will tell.

So making my mind up i decide i need a light tent.  Well this i didnt have. So lets break it down.  What is a light tent.

• Seemless white background - Tick
• Light coming from all angles - Tick

Well that solved that issue i just proped up an a3 paper against my coffee machine and held it in place. 

Next - lighting!

Overhead octabox as close as i could get it to wrap, plus, plus a ringflash as a fill (however it could have been any source), and some bounce cards around the nail.  Just using plain photo paper worked a treat.  Whats better is i have just made my light tent and the results looks flawless!

Now we needed to put in the tiny product.  When im talking tiny, im talking tiny tiny.  We are talking about 7mm by 10-12mm nail foils.  these are stick on products for girls to wear over their existing nails to give their nails an extra bit of sparkle.  Working my way through many many different rounded objects (ahem) in my apartment i found that a wooden spoon was the best for the job.  Sticking the nails down on the wooden spoon then capting them was perfect!

Some final touching and cutting out in photoshop and we were done.  Attached are some setup, bts and final product shots.

Just goes to show with a little thought, gear isnt always the answer.

So i managed between all the carnage of the workshop to slip a few of my own shots in and i have come up some of these which i think are some of my most stunning images yet, of some of my most stunning models i have worked with.

They are Ashley Hayman in the gold bikini, Ally Hayward in the black and white, and Jessica Street in the floral.

Great work again on the workshop girls, i know the guys learnt heaps and cant wait for the next - again

Over the past weekend i had to essentially form an army of models, photographers, cars, makeup artists and assistants. 

7 girls in 12 hours to shoot from outback rural Sydney through to beach and studio shots.  I had my work cut out for me and managed to just keep it together apart from the massive sunburn i am currently sporting from wearing a singlet all day and being in direct sunlight.

My 2 guys who i couldnt have pulled off all these shoots without were Nathan and Wes.  I cant thank these guys enough for their help all day and aiblity to just know what to do and give input into a shoot and make the most of all conditions.  Another special thanks for Mr Hor letting me borrow a pack of his so i could run around with too many lights and enough power between all our gear to bring down low flying planes

Here are some of the BTS shots of the weekend but in short we run Elinchrom gear - generally alot of it

All in all this is what we ran around with

• 3x Elinchrom Rangers RS AS Speed packs
• 1x Elinchrom Ranger RS AS Pack
• 2x Elinchrom Ranger AS Speed spare batteries
• 4x Elinchrom Ranger A Heads
• 1x Mola Setti beautydish
• 1x Elinchrom RF1500
• 1x Hensel RF Reflector
• 5x Light stands
• 1x Light Boom
• 2x Elinchrom 135cm Rotalux Octaboxes
• 1x Elinchrom Deep Throat Rotalux Octabox
• 3x Pocket Wizard Plus II's
• 5x Elinchrom Sky Ports (Backup)
• 6x Weights to hold the gear on the ground
• Canon 1dsmk3 to capture the wrath

Shots to come soon... with a bit of luck will see some of these put in print

Stay tuned!

A fire, a 2 story house with a spa on the roof, front door beach access, 3 models, unprecidented equipment for all situations, equipment give aways and mcflurrys.

Not your standard workshop huh?

This was more a setting for some of those films that you watch when your partner is away or find in your dads sock drawer.

Ed and I met at the start of the year and have had deep conversations on shaking up the photography workshop market. It all started last year when pushing against the boundies of going from just a theory based large group sessions to personalised individual training, then we just add models, bikinis and the snow and what do you have? well... you can read about that later.. Essentially we changed the way workshops ran, we went against the grain of the standard photography courses and did it our own way. 

Was it successful? You tell us... selling out without 24hrs, having the distributor of Elinchrom equipment sponsoring our event, asking us to use their gear, them coming to us so they can provide us with give aways.  What else?  Oh the guys who fly interstate to come to our workshops and the actual true images and no secrets held back workflow.  Yes thats right, we teach you our secrets! i can hear all "pro" photographers rolling over in their egotistical graves.  

Enough of that though

We had 6 awesome photographers with direct questions and a will to listen to what was delivered. The results that were captured were simply stunning and amazing!  Proof of that had been that Sam who attended our last 2 courses has had his pictures of Jess published in Zoo many times and a full page spread at that! not some 1/4 corner page picture.

The BTS video and other photographers pictures will be up soon, but thanks again to everyone who attended and be sure to keep an eye out on our next workshops if you would like to be emailed for these as soon as they are published.

Thanks again to my little partner in crime mr ed hor, couldnt have done it without you.  Thanks to the models, Ashley Hayman, Jessica Street and Ally Hayward for modeling and Makeup.  

MAssive thanks to the photographers who attended and their kind words at the end about the quality of the course.  We really do appreciate it and we hope that you really did learn everything you said and look forward to seeing your images go forth and hit some covers soon!

Yeow!

Dave / Captn Tanny.

Ever though about selling stock / microstock photography?  Well surely then you must have heard and admored Yuri Arcurs.  Just take a look through his site [here] and then check out the video link which was twittered to me (@davidreidphoto) by @norbs.  Essentially gloating on what he is able to do, but really, if i were in his situation, i too would be doing the same

Please remember to wipe up your drool after you leave

Tristan Jud (@tristanjud) has been a twitter follower of mine for a while now and we have exchanged the odd tweet here and there.  Well little did i know Tristan was creating a website of interviewing photographers in his travels.  Luckily enough, Tristan asked if i would like to be on it!  Sure! so dusting off my comedy routine i started to be interviewed.  

So how did i go?  No, i mean my comedy routine how did i go?  

Hit up the read link for the oh so funny lulz (end sarcasm).

[READ]

Be sure to follow @tristanjud and also check his other interviews out on his site (clearly not as funny as mine though..... are they!!!!)

Walking through Toys R Us and shooting Ally with foam darted Nerf guns gave me one hell of an idea  

LETS DO AN ARMY SHOOT!!!

<continuas shooting down the isles>

So the task was on to try recreate a war like styled shoot in a glam form, of course.  With our new foam guns in check, we sorted out the rest of the theme getting down to blood design for Ally to do in makeup.  Ebay became another helpful addition and lots of walking around random costume shops through the local shopping centres.  Next we needed to find a location.  I live in Sydney CBD - not many trees out there... lots of roads.

One of my good mate Rob has thrown me over a location at homebush stadium and we got into the forest (or atleast 3 rows of trees) and setup our shoot.  I had 2 assistants with me Wes Hawkins and Brendan Daniel which are always welcomed and we did a basic 4 light setup.  Unfortunately it was a little tight to get any BTS shots but each tree would have been no more than 40cm's away from each other.  It was like shooting through toothpicks in a jar.  But the boys managed to set me up a lighting rig that worked perfectly and here are the results that we got.

Credits are to goto both Ally and Heidi for a top job of modeling, creating their outfits and makeup.  Was really appreciated.  Wes and Dan being a great help and the Homebush Rangers (both green and security) being fair to the situation we were in and not using their rule book to kick us out.  Hopefully next time we are as welcome as we were this time.

My first landscape shoot for 2011 and it was a stinker! hot hot hot! 

Australia day is a public holiday here in Australia (funny that), so i headed out to Long Reef off the northern beaches with my mate who is leaving for the US in a couple of months to take some quick snaps with him.

At 4am i was wearing shorts and a singlet and it was just about to make me start sweating.  We were headed to push close to 46degrees over the day and there was no way you were catching me out in that heat.  Give me the snow of minus 20 and im good to go.  

As you are all well and truely aware, i dont do alot of landscape photography but when i do do it, i enjoy it.  Anyhoo here are some shots from it

I have said it before and i will say it again.  Im a Calvin man through and though.  That was until a couple of months ago i started shooting for Mosmann Australia.  I was lucky enough to receive some of their underwear as a gift and i can only say that im finding it really hard to not only not buy Calvin, but not recommend Calvin buyers into Mosmann's gear.  This stuff is seriously comfortable.  Even as i type this blog post, id be lieing to you if i said i wasnt wearing them.

Coming in the future releases of some of the Mosmann packaging is the underwear coming in boxes.  Its to be fun, active and not in your face hot sweaty man all over the packaging.  This is the second style of shots we have done for this and here are some quick snips from the shoot.

Be sure to check out Mosmann's site http://www.mosmann.com.au here and tell them that Dave sent you

With great pleasure a returning model Fallon has got back in contact with me for a shoot but with a beach twist instead of the style we shot in the studio.  We organised a shoot date and luckily enough the clouds opened up and the sun shone down on us.  

Well that was till we actually decided to start shooting! Driving around it was great! as soon as we setup the rain came.  Thank god for my gear being waterproof and Fallon being able to model under all conditions otherwise we wouldnt be able to capture what we got.

Downside is that we turned up for our location, and the beach was HORRIBLE.  Taking a few gulps, i walked around the beach about 20 meters and found the front of a house.  Carefully checking to see if anyone was home and looking, we took up camp and started the shoot.  

Hope you all enjoy

Dave