Stage Upgrade: Hill 6 New Garland Wall

Pink and Rose flat available with Hill 6 Studio rental

Stage Hill 6 is beginning to look more like a photographer’s candy shop with a constantly expanding menu of juicy props and sweets embellishments. In the last update we have revealed these New Cool Props.

but I think it is time to sugar it up with a minimalistic pink & rose garland wall!

Have a look on our website what equipment and rates Hill 6 has to offer and book the stage NOW!

Stage Upgrade: “C” Sequin Wall

gold and royal blue sequin backdrop available with Stage C rental

Our “CYC Stage” C has already had few distinguished theme sections like a grass wall

or wood corner with antique rustic table set

and of course lots of creative space to utilize including the versatile white Cyclorama wall, positioned by East facing windows!

Besides all aforementioned reasons to book this stage here is the freshest one – double-sided “Gold and Royal Blue” sequin wall!

Try experimenting in this creative setup yourself and book the stage NOW!

FD GIFT CARD – Perfect gift for Xmas and NY !

If you are still uncertain of what to give your beloved friend photographer or girlfriend model, we got you covered ! How about the studio time at one of our numerous, distinguished stages?

Or maybe the ticket for hands-on workshop so he/she can learn how to use three light setup?

With our new GIFT CARD, choosing a present has become a breeze… Just pick your amount, give us the info of the recipient, swipe your magic card (or magic venmo, or even PayPal), and voila! Santa is on his way to drop the gift card into your friend’s email 🙂

Request the gift card by sending us an email to info@fdphotostudio.com, or give us a call 323-454-2323!

4 PHOTOGRAPHY TIPS FOR BEGINNERS! WE ASKED PROs, ep 6

“Taking pictures is savoring life intensely, every hundredth of a second.”

Marc Riboud

If you are new to photography, you might be asking yourself “Where do I start?” or “What is the best course to become a professional photographer?” These are questions we asked PRO photographers in this episode!

Thanks to all photographers in Los Angeles who participated in our monthly network mixer and shared their thoughts on camera.

The full interview is available of YOUTUBE. For your convenience, here is the transcript of it as well.

@CERLOV : … is don’t worry about the equipment. Just go out and shoot, shoot, shoot. And then that, and then if you’re a natural light photographer like me, wherever you go just look at the way light is affecting the environment. Look at the face of the person you’re talking to. Look at the way the light is bouncing around the room, the colors and everything. Those two pieces of advice I think would be the biggest.

@AYALA.CR2 : Just keep shooting as much as you can. It doesn’t matter how it looks as long as you’re practicing and you’ll see progression as the years come. You won’t really see it when it’s happening, but when you look back as like two, three, four, five year passed the line and you stay consistent you’ll see the progression in yourself. And also, shoot in raw, because you could always go back and re-edit your photos even if you’ve made a crappy edit, as time goes on you might be an expert at editing now and you want to go back to a photo you shot five years ago and then you can revamp it almost. So, just keep shooting everyday.

@AMPHOTOGRAPHY.A.M.P : So for the beginners, it’s advice … first of all learn … always learn, always try to learn something new from more experienced photographers. But always keep your signature and always have your own. Never give up, especially when you like whatever you are doing and whatever you are believing in.

@6AMLOSANGELES : Do it because you love it, not because you want something out of it. For me it was a passion and it changed my life, but it’s also just fun to do in general, so just do it for the right reasons. Know why you want to take photos and have fun. And there’s no rules. There’s no rules to this s**t.

WANT TO LEARN PHOTOGRAPHY?

Check out our WORKSHOPS in Los Angeles that teach you hands-on how to make great photos!

One of our closest workshops – Studio Lighting 101 : Introduction to Studio Lighting and 3-Light Set Up

will take place on January 9th, 7-9pm, in one of our Los Angeles studios !!!

Watch the full episode :

Lorenzo Belmonte + Elle Love

One of our most prolific photographers – Lorenzo Belmonte is making yet another hit! Now his perfect shots are dedicated to the model Elle Love!

Few words about the Photographer:

“Eye for design, so I believe my photos and graphic design reflect my artist style. Photography isolates the fundamental artistic ability to see the extraordinary. It is through arrangements of light, angle, lense and a split second decision to capture the moment that make photographs an extremely personal expression. Personally, I always try to go above expectations and push the proverbial envelope. No matter what I do – I always go above and beyond. No one is going to give it to you, you have to make it happen.”

Members of the crew:

photographer: Lorenzo Belmonte | Instagram

model: Elle Love | Instagram

About this location:

Stage Hill 4 is one of our largest and brightest stages. Advantageously positioned with the windows facing west and north, this stage gets plenty of sift indirect sunlight in the first half of the day and lots of direct sunbeams in the second half. Hill 4 is furnished with several comfy and photogenic couches of cream and and golden/brown leather color. As with any our other stages a standard package of three basic backdrops and three lights is available within the stage already. For more information visit stage Hill 4 on our website.

Jawn Rocha For Waterparks

Photographer Jawn Rocha had a photoshoot with Awsten Knight, the lead singer and frontman of the band Waterparks (@Waterparks). Their released photos has since been published by Rock Sound Magazine in the U.K. and all over the United States in Barnes & Nobles, Newsstands, etc.

A quick excerpt from Photographer’s bio:

“From Houston, TX, I grew up playing music with my friends in the local scene while simultaneously having a passion for documenting our adventures with my camcorder. I moved to Los Angeles in 2012 to study and pursue a career in film production. The last few years have brought me full circle as I began combining my passion for videography and history in the music world together. My production experience includes PA work for the TV shows Pretty Little Liars and The Voice. I worked as a Trainer and Events Coordinator for Apple while I attended Santa Monica College for Film critical analysis and production. I traveled around the US with Waterparks during their tours with All Time Low, Good Charlotte, Never Shout Never, and the Vans Warped Tour 2016.”

Check out participants of the project:

photographer: Jawn Rocha | Website

model: Awsten Knight

At the location:

The crew has chosen Stage A due to its size and affordability. Nevertheless, this Stage provides outstanding natural lighting conditions where there is a direct sunlight in the morning through north and east-facing windows, and beautifully soft indirect light as the day goes on. Equipped with all of the same great gear that’s included with all of our studios – strobes, light modifiers, radio trigger, and paper backdrops – it’s a wonderful place to be able to achieve different looks all in the same place. Visit Stage A on our website to learn more.

Become Better Photographer: Winter Portraits in the Studio with Gavin Hoey

Ready to take winter portraits in a studio environment? Wanted to capture that vicious winter blizzard but it never snows in LA?

In this episode the photo guru Gavin Hoey with Adorama TV is going to share a handy trick – creating an outside winter environment inside the studio!

Today we are meeting Gavin Hoey in his small home studio with amazing model Lauren who will sit on a “park bench” – as a part of the photo scene. Behind the bench we’ve got a black background. The lighting for this is going to be a multi light setup which means three lights.

Let’s see what each light individually does and work them out one at a time, starting with our key light, which is an eVOLV 200. Gavin continues: “Now I’ve got it off to the side because if it was centered it would give really flat lighting which isn’t what were going for here.

I’ve also got it in a 70cm soft box with a grid and its the grid that really makes a difference because that means I can get direction and control of the light, very important in a small home studio.

Look at the contrast between the lit side and the shady side and in my mind this is light being cast by a lamppost which is off to the side and elevated up in the air.”

The second light for this setup is around the back and its another eVOLV 200 and its going to act as a separation light. It would put a little bit of light on Lauren’s shoulders, on her hat and just separate her off of the pure black background. It will also put some light onto the smoke when we will use a fog machine.

There is a blue gel on that light to imitate the winter’s evening, nighttime type shot – a cold blue feeling going over her shoulders and hat.

The third light is the optional light. Gavin explains: “you don’t necessarily need it but it can add a little bit of something to the shot because at the moment, we’ve got a key light thats putting light on Lauren and on that side of the bench but the right side is really dark and in shadow, I kind of like that especially with the separation light, but because we’ve got some shadows there we can use this third light with another blue gel to add some blue color into the shadows for that real cold winter feel.”

Now let’s do the shoot!

In some shots, as you noticed, Mr. Hoey used “fake snow” spray can – a very handy tool to spread snow flake-like dust around the subject.

But to add a vast amount of snow in the picture we would require help of Adobe Photoshop. And Gavin’s special plugin!

To get the plugin head over to his blog at www.gavtrain.com and find the Instant Snow V2 photoshop action [free download]

Lets have a look and see how it works. There are four types of snow with this action. We will choose ‘heavy snow’ type.

Gavin continues: “I’ve already got the picture of Lauren ready to go, so all Im going to do is click on the play button and let the action do its thing. What it does is to create three different layers of snow. Its all automated and it just takes a minute or two to complete but once its done, I can control how the snow appears in front of Lauren, so if I choose the top layer and I go get a paintbrush with a nice big brush, I can just paint away any bits of snow that are in front of Lauren on that layer. Then the same for the middle-sized snow and the small snow from her face.”

Once you’re done and you’re completely happy just go up to layer and then flatten image.

Now let’s add some warmth in the picture – light the lantern! To do that, lets go to filter and then Camera Raw filter and from here – get the adjustment brush now to light the lantern. Put the temperature, tint, exposure, highlights and clarity all the way to maximum. Everything else is zeroed out. Then with a nice small brush with one or two clicks, we can light the lantern!

Mr. Hoey continues: “Now if the lantern was lit there would be a nice warm glow around it, so lets add a warm glow by clicking on the new adjustment brush. This time I’ll leave the temperature and tint alone but bring the exposure down to just under a stop. I’ll lose the highlights and I’ll lose the clarity and with a bigger brush we can just add a sort of a nice warm glow around the lantern like that.”

To emphasize that “street light” we mentioned earlier – the one on Lauren’s face, let’s apply a small lighting effect. Go to layer -> New and layer -> OK. Get a nice big paint brush and do a single click in the corner to add the glow from the light.

With a few more tweaks and adjustments the snowy winter bench picture is completed!

WANT TO LEARN PHOTOGRAPHY?

Check out our WORKSHOPS in Los Angeles that teach you hands-on how to make great photos!

One of our closest workshops – Studio Lighting 101 : Introduction to Studio Lighting and 3-Light Set Up

will take place on January 9th, 7-9pm, in one of our Los Angeles studios !!!

Watch the full episode with Gavin Hoey and Adorama TV:

Become Better Photographer: Playing with Bokeh with David Bergman

So how do you get these crazy shapes in your images? And how is it even called?

In this episode David Bergman with AdoramaTv will show you how to shoot “Bokeh”.

So what is bokeh? It’s actually originated from a Japanese word that means “blur” or “haze”. Photographically it refers to the out-of-focus areas in the foreground or background of an image. To get a pleasingly smooth bokeh, it’s best to use a fast prime lens wide open.

That makes your depth of field really narrow, and throws the background out of focus. The further away your subject is from the background also affects the look of the bokeh.

The number of blades that make up a specific lens’s aperture affects the bokeh as well. Higher quality lenses have more blades, so you usually get a rounder shape in your out-of-focus areas. You can really see this when you have small bright points of light in the background. 8 or 9 blades is generally considered to be a nicer look than five, because pentagon shapes in the background can be distracting.

But here’s where it starts to get interesting… since the aperture shape affects the look of the bokeh, you could actually create your own shapes and use those for interesting effects.

In this video David uses “bokeh masters kit at Adorama” it’s made for lenses with front filter threads of 62 mm or less, but you can make it fit onto a bigger lens by simply cutting out some black construction paper.

The kit comes with shapes like hearts, arrows, stars and more, by placing them in front of the lens, it actually makes those out-of-focus lights take the shape of the cutouts.

Make sure you shoot on manual or aperture priority when you’re doing this. You also might want to use a tripod, or boost your ISO, because you block a lot of light from coming into the lens, and your shutter speed is gonna drop way down when shooting this way.

The coolest thing is that you can also cut out your own shapes to create anything you want. Bokeh is an important concept to understand, and if you want to play around a bit you can create images that are limited only by your imagination.

WANT TO LEARN PHOTOGRAPHY?

Check out our WORKSHOPS in Los Angeles that teach you hands-on how to make great photos!

One of our closest workshops – Studio Lighting 101 : Introduction to Studio Lighting and 3-Light Set Up

will take place on January 9th, 7-9pm, in one of our Los Angeles studios !!!

Watch the full episode with David Bergman and Adorama TV:

Multi-Model Shoot In Pro Stage I

Italian photographer Valentina Bottan had a fun shoot inside our versatile stage PRO I. Working with three gorgeous models for a bikini brand, the quartet came out with clean and vivid pictures.

A snippet of Photographer’s story:

“I’m a 24 years old italian photographer from Treviso, Italy (close to Venice). I have a college degree in photography from a Milan Art University. My photoshoot at your studio, Pro I Stage, was for a bikini brand called Caribbean Strings and my models were from all different nationalities: one from Norway Kelsie Smeby, one from Ucraine Julia Mindar, and one from the US Sophia Marie. We had a lot of fun in these “all girls” photoshoot, we were a total of 6 young women all working hard for their dreams! My goal was to put all these creative women together and create a GREAT project, and that’s what we did! ”

This session’s crew comprised of:

photographer: Valentina Bottan | Instagram | Website

The stage:

Pro Stage I features a large seamless white cyc wall, as well as standard photo backdrops of black, white and grey color, and studio lighting for stills. Make sure to catch the perks of the space with your photo and video cameras and book with us NOW. A few recent cool additions were introduced to the stage such as a red wall section and a silver lounge chair.