THE PHOTOG FILES: HELENE OF FASHION OVER REASON

I am happy to announce a new recurring post series called The Photog Files. In this ongoing series I will be showcasing my photography and some of the techniques I use when shooting and retouching. On this day I was shooting Helene of Fashion Over Reason. We shot in Williamsburg for this shoot, and it was a bit later in the day. I was shooting with my 50MM f1.4 lens at 400 ISO and I stopped up to f1.8 and was shooting in aperture priority due to the changing light as the sun was going down fast. I also used back button focus.

With back button focus you set the camera to have a button on the back of the camera be the tool that you use to focus. By doing this you separate it from the shutter release. I personally find this easier to use, and it allows you to keep your finger on the button and keep the subject in focus if they are moving closer to or farther away from the camera. This can come in very handy.

Of course the images did not look like this right out out the camera, and I have been doing a lot of research online in regards to professional photo retouching and it has been quite useful. I will be doing a post on that next week. But here I used a technique in which you create two curves adjustment layers. On one of the layers you pull the curves tool up to brighten the overall image, and then on the second layer you pull it down a bit to add in more shadows to give the image more depth. I also used a wonderful skin retouching technique I found online which I will be sharing with you next week as well. And finally I played around with a subtle light leak effects action, which I then fine tuned to my liking.

I still have much to learn when it comes to photography, but at least I am enjoying the process. And for the deets on what Helene is wearing: she is wearing Levi’s jeans, Everlane sweater,Loeffler Randall boots, Brixton hat and Ray-Bans.