Canyons

The deep crevises of Alan Demond's back create a lyrical sense of movement.

Alan in Red Light

This photograph of Alan Demond is from the same session as the photos I posted last week. However this one was taken with infrared film. IR film picks up the warmth of the human body and makes subjects appear to glow.

Hip-Hop Dance

Still from the same shoot with Alan Demond...
Finding a way to give directions that take the model in a new direction for both of you is one of the most rewarding aspects of this type of photography.
Often you start by asking for one thing and you get something completely different, but it's even more interesting than what you had in mind AND it takes you in a different direction as well.
This shot is an example of that. I asked Alan to try a particular type of posing and noticed that what he was doing was kind of like hip-hop dancing. We worked through dozens of shots like that until I noticed that each pose could be photographed several different ways from several different angles. And if I got really creative I could move in close and slice up his body in many unusual ways. This photo is a perfect example. It's one of my favorites from the whole shoot so far.

Today I had the good fortune to work again with model Alan Demond. Alan and I worked together last summer and the work that we created was some of my best ever.
It's interesting to return to working with someone you have shot before. Sometimes even if the results and the chemistry was terrific the first time, things don't necessarily work so well the next.
Today's shoot was just as productive and creative.

Markus - Lith

This is a studio photograph of model Markus Reinhardt taken several years ago and processed with the "lith effect" described in my earlier posts.

I had the good fortune to work with Markus on three ocassions. This is my favorite photograph from all three sessions.

Another Lith Look-a-like

Another "lith look-a-like" image. (See the previous post for an explanation of what that means. It's just too involved to explain twice! :D )

This is from a photo of Yvan Cournoyer taken several years ago.

Lith Look-a-like

In a photography class I learned a printing technique using lith film. Lith film is a high contrast film often sold in sheets in sizes like eight inches by ten inches that are normally reserved for photo paper, and developed in the lab using special chemicals.

The printing technique uses a normal photographic negative and starts with using an enlarger to print on a sheet of lith film. The image on the lith film is a "positive" image, like any image you might print on paper. The film is developed, fixed, washed and dried.

Next you place the dried lith film sheet against a second unexposed sheet of lith film under the light of an enlarger. The image created on the second sheet of lith film is a "negative" image. The second sheet is developed, fixed, washed and dried.

Finally, the second sheet of lith film is placed on top of an ordinary sheet of photo paper, held tight against it with glass, and exposed under the enlarger. The final print on photo paper looks like a stylized black and white charcoal drawing. Figures are sometimes not even outlined, just suggested.

Because of the special properties of lith film, each step in the process creates a higher contrast image. Dark greys become black. Light greys become white. By carefully chosing the exposure time under the enlarger you can control the break-point in the gray curve between white and black, but because you are doing this in two steps (once when you create the "positive" and a second time when you create the "negative") it is extremely difficult to predict the final result.

Since the lith sheets need to dry each time before moving to the next step, the process takes at least two to three days, and a slight mishap at any step can ruin the final image.

A few days ago when fiddling with curves in Photoshop I realized that I could create the same effect digitally. Basically you force the dark grays to black and the light greys to white by manipulating the image with the Photoshop "curves" dialog window.

Instant lith image! Or at least a look-a-like. It's so easy I almost feel foolish for not having realized it could be done like this long before now.

Incidentally, the model in the image is Tom Lord.

This is the first of the film results from the shoot with Dwain, and it is my favorite photograph from the shoot.