Executive Portraits

For the last few weeks I've been working on a series of portraits of executives. These are top officers in corporations around the Pittsburgh area who all have won awards of achievement (more on that in the coming weeks). Everyone has been incredibly corporative and excited about the pictures so the images have been a wonderful collaboration between artist and subject. I was going to hold off and splash these all at once but I was so jazzed about my Friday afternoon shoot I couldn't wait.

The hardest part of this shoot was getting there because the late winter snow storm really made driving a mess. What is normally a 30 minute drive took almost an hour. The ride home was no picnic either but I think the results were more than worth the effort. Besides, I have 4-wheel drive for just this reason!!

Technically the shot was pretty simple. A single Dynalite flash head with a 20 degree grid spot lit the subject at 62 watt seconds with a wink of fill provided by another Dynalite head at 62 watt seconds in an extra small Chimera softbox feathered off at an extreme angle. The back light was provided by a third Dynalite head and red gel powered up to 250 watt seconds. I captured the image with a Canon 5D and the 16-35mm lens at around f/8. Because of the fabric in the shirt a moiré pattern developed when shot at certain angles, light straight on. To counter the moiré, and to add drama, I angled the camera off axis. The whole shot took about 25 minutes including lighting set up.

I hope you like this shot as much as I do. When the project is complete I'll share the rest of the images.