Our Dear Friends

By Paul | June 16, 2008

I was able to steal our friends Ania and Maciek for couple shots today at sunset. Now that they’re in Chicago, we finally get to spend more time together. California was a LITTLE too far for a quick weekend visit.

I wonder what my neighbors think about us recently. It looks like every time there’s a nice sunset I get my off-camera flash and a softbox and we go out on the street to play with it… blocking the traffic… sometimes.

That’s what you get when you live next door to the photographer’s family who gets to experiment with different photo gear ;-).

I personally like to work with minimum equipment, be more mobile and still create a nice light around my subjects. It takes time to learn, but that’s why we try to test different setups to see what works and when it works.

These shots were taken with only one softbox positioned slightly to the right of the camera. The rest is just a balance between the strobe light and natural light. Although we had very nice colors, I like to edit my portraits in black & white or different tones of sepia. I think it helps to focus more on the person in the picture without getting too distracted by the colors. Let’s see:




And here’s the same image, strait out of camera so you can see the colors. I wonder which version do like more?

Ania and Maciek: thank you for being such a patient models and letting me experiment with the light, on the street, in front of all our neighbors’ homes :-).

Topics: personal and misc, portraits | No Comments »

PORTRAIT SESSION | CAL

By Paul | June 16, 2008

Last week I headed out to Downtown Chicago for a portrait session with Cal. It’s been a couple of weeks since my last visit to the city. Too bad we live so far away. Chicago has so many great spots for photo sessions, that every time you go out, you discover something new.

Cal needed some portraits for his actor/model portfolio. We met right by Millenium Park, but I decided to skip this spot since it was still very crowded. We started exploring quiet corners of Grand Park, highway overpasses and construction areas. It was an interesting session and we came up with a lot of different looks. Good job Cal! Good luck with your new career.











Topics: portraits | 1 Comment »

One Light practice: part 4

By Paul | May 30, 2008

Here we go again. Aren’t you tired of these “one light series”? I’m not :-). We had another beautiful sunset today and I just couldn’t resist. We were driving back home from the forest preserve where Ania had a mini photo session with our neighbors and we saw these nice colors. A camera with wide angle lens, tripod and off camera flash was all I needed. The rest is just playing with finding nice balance between available light and the flash power to freeze the movement.

Ania was in the mood for jumping so here it is: exceptional ballet performance at sunset ;-).

You should see the look on Kuba’s face. Mom, what are you doin’ ???

It was fun!!!





Topics: personal and misc, photographers | 4 Comments »

DARFUR NOW College Tour, Chicago

By Paul | May 29, 2008

Last week I had a chance to document an event called Darfur Now College Tour. It’s a nationwide tour in support of the Theodore Braun’s absorbing documentary, Darfur Now, which arrived on DVD May 27th. Don Cheadle poses a very hard question for all who went to see the movie: “How do you respond to an event as difficult to understand as a government-sponsored mass murder of part of a country’s civilian population?”

The United Nations has estimated that by 2007, 200,000 people had been killed and 2.5 million displaced from their rural villages in Darfur. Despite international outrage, not a single person responsible for war crimes against humanity in Darfur has been brought to justice.

Don Cheadle has been trying to rise awareness for the problem of genocide since 2004 when he was making the movie “Hotel Rwanda”. He teamed up with John Prendergast to write a book “Not on Our Watch: The Mission to End Genocide in Darfur and Beyond”. Recently he has enlisted several hip-hop artists to help raise awareness for the crisis in Darfur.

Chicago was of of the cities participating in the project. First there was a special screening of Darfur Now movie at Kent Chemical Laboratory, University of Chicago in Hyde Park. After that the concert was hosted by The Abbey Pub in Chicago. Performing artists included:

If you would like to find out more about the conflict in Darfur and the problem of genocide (in 21st CENTURY !!!), please visit these sites: STAND, Relief International, Take Part by Participant Media.

Here are a few pictures from that event.









Two beautiful ladies: Chundria and Nekia Nichelle from FLAIR TV.













If you would like to see more pictures from that event, please click HERE.

Topics: events | No Comments »

Chicago brick walls

By Paul | May 17, 2008

I like old brick walls a lot. They make a great background for portraits and environmental shots. Today Ania had a photo session in Chicago and on the way back we saw this nice old brick wall in the city’s famous alleys. I stopped the car and we jumped off for a quick portrait session. I think Ania in the picture below could be easily a boss of a local mafia :-).

Topics: personal and misc | 4 Comments »

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