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Year Long Valentines
By Gary Bernstein
As photographers we use our talent to express love for third parties. A portrait is the perfect example, and is
perhaps the ultimate valentine. Photographic expression, however, covers a lot of territory and we have at our disposal
an abundance of creative options that allow year-long valentines. Here are expressions of love from my archives:
The high-key portrait of a mother and baby…
High-key means "white background" to most photographers. In reality the only true high-key is a portrait of a person
dressed in white who is either bald or has hair that is lighter than their face so that the face becomes the darkest
part of the image; as opposed to low-key portraits in which the face becomes the lightest part of the composition,
meaning the subject is wearing medium to dark clothing…with a medium to dark background, etc…
So much for definitions…
Image Number 1 of mother and baby was made in my studio against a piece of white no-seam paper. It was taken with a
35mm slr on Kodachrome (www.kodak.com) with 2 lights. One strobe is to camera left; the second is behind the
subjects pointed at the background, and delivering a half-step less exposure than the main light. Each are in
umbrellas. To the right of the subjects is my silver reflector-a necessity. Check out my own design at
www.chimeralighting.com. As long as I'm plugging my own product, I might as well mentioned that this example
comes from my Marathon Press book "The Glamorous World of People Photography;" so Marathon is not only my P.R.
source but also a major publisher (go to www.marathonpress.com).
Image Number 2…
Was made in Switzerland on Lake Geneva (outside of Montreux). The image was made with a 500mm lens-on a tripod with an orange filter.
Image Number 3…
It doesn't get much simpler than this-and this was a Valentine session. The couple is sitting on two adjustable stools
in my studio; an adjustable posing table in front of them. I asked them to put their arms around each other and tip
their heads together. Two lights were positioned exactly like the lighting used for the mother-baby shot above. On
the table in front of them is my reflector from Chimera giving that glow to the skin, secondary catchlights to the eyes,
and softening the shadows. Use a short telephoto lens for an image like this.
Portrait Images 4 and 5 depict an amazing couple. This is Michael and Rose Moye. Rose is a successful actress, and
Michael is the co-creator of the legendary (and hilarious) show Married With Children, and the Producer of the The
Jefferson's. Shot in a rental studio in L.A., the entire story of this photo session appears in my Marathon Press
book as well.
The photos were made with one light on a boom stand. The first image was made against a painted background canvas,
and the second against a white cove where I allowed the light to fall off about a step and a half creating the medium
gray background. I used short telephotos and a 35mm camera for the shoot.
When you're posing your subjects, make the poses real. I always try them out myself first. I'll get into the guy's
position. Then ask him to take my place on the set. Then I'll get in the girl's position, and she takes my place.
If it doesn't look right, I'll suggest that they "play" with it. If it still doesn't look right, we'll go through the
process again. Bottom line, it has to look elegant and natural. Also-regardless of the composition-I try to keep
heads close together-so you tend to see both faces at the same time as you look at the image-but I try to keep the eyes
at different heights for a more interesting composition.
Photograph Number 6…is an image I made recently in Beverly Hills and is part of my new Beverly Hills Collection of
Limited Editions. More images in a future article. It was shot digitally and recorded on a Lexar Professinoal SD card.
I did some playing around in Photoshop (www.adobe.com). FYI-every form of capture and
protection is on my Lexar Media Flash Cards and SD's (even my text files).
By the way, I make my own prints-and go as big as I can. I have been using the exceptional HP Photosmart 8750, but most recently (over the past month), I have added the remarkable (and I mean REMARKABLE)
HP 9180 that is a pigment printer (8 separate inks) with archival permanence of 200 plus years. For my Beverly
Hills Collection, I will be printing both water color and canvas versions; and the 9180 does both beautifully. A
ccurately and quickly. Gotta love it.
My beautiful wife and I celebrate 30 years of marriage this week! On that special day so many years ago, I had a
studio staffer (then in New York City) shoot my marriage, and due to a processing error at the lab-none of the
pictures came out (a true story). That'll teach me not to hire a wedding photographer! Fortunately the day after
our wedding, I took this self portrait in the dressing room mirror in my New York studio. Kay still looks the same
way (the evidence is in this column). The shot was taken with (what is now) a vintage Nikon camera on Tri-X Pan…and
exposed by the florescent lights above the dressing room table.
Photos Numbers 7 and 8…
Below is the cover of Kay's new book that just came out. Her acting name is Lena Harris, and that's the name she
writes under and teaches under as well. Her acting school is on the lot at 20th Century Fox in Beverly Hills
(not bad). The very same shot that was used as the box cover of my Chimera Reflector Kit we used for the
cover of her new book. The image was actually made a few years ago for a Hasselblad advertisement.
The original shot was made against a grey painted background using two lights-one on a boom giving the hair a step
and a half more exposure than the main. The image was made on a Hasse with a short telephoto lens on Plus-X exposed at
125 E.I. (you remember film, right?).
Gary Bernstein Bio
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