My Latest Model Photoshoot
As part of my goal to do some more model photography this year, I invited a friend over for a test photoshoot. I recently moved to a new location where I have an office and some more room to do my photography. I guess you could call it a small studio where I can just unpack my equipment and leave it all unpacked, ready for shooting whenever I feel like it.
So I invited my friend over for a test photoshoot. She’s not really a model, and she has no ambitions in that area (or so she says) and just decided to do it for fun. Overall I think the results were quite good, even though it was a test photoshoot and very little preparations went ahead of it. I usually do these tests with a model to get to know each other before actual work, and to explore the good angles to capture the model as best as possible.
She was very generous with her time, and brought over a lot of stuff to experiment with, and I am very grateful to have had this opportunity. She even did her own makeup 
. One thing that most people notice immediately, apart from her eyes, is that she has very beautiful hands and natural nails.
Below are a few pictures from the session.
Putting on makeup before the photoshoot
Sample Picture
This is one of my favorites
Here I turned on my.. uh.. smoke machine 
Sample Picture
No comment
For the photo geeks and others who are interested, the equipment I used are the Canon EOS 40D body with the Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8 L USM lens. The resulting images were very sharp, and I am very satisfied with the quality given the technical limitations of the equipment (mostly the 40D in this case). Below are 100% crops of some of the images above to give you an idea, all with very little sharpening.
100% Crop
100% Crop
100% Crop
This entry was posted
on Thursday, March 12th, 2009 at 10:19 am by Karel Donk
and is filed under 
March 12th, 2009 at 4:04 pm
Nice cropping KD
coloring with black overlay layer etc right?
i`ve seen very few graphic designers mask hair this good!
i’d like to work with you on a project sometime
i see that i can learn allot from you!
March 13th, 2009 at 4:36 am
Great set of Shots Karel!
The sharpness is excellent on the crops.
March 13th, 2009 at 6:41 am
Very nice pictures! Props to the model and photographer!
I have no experience with DSLR’s but I was thinking about buying one this year. Would you recommend the 40D, because you wrote something about “technical limitations” of this camera.
March 13th, 2009 at 7:01 am
Thanks Jurgen, Debby, Enver.
I can highly recommend the 40D. Good value for money at the moment. The 50D has issues (see elsewhere on my blog).
March 13th, 2009 at 7:52 am
Yo Karel,
Thanks for your inspiring phone call. You ROCK as a friend and I appreciate it. It seemed like a little thingy, but …that’s what a true friend is. THANKSSS!
Regarding your new set of photos: The ‘model’ is okay and I set myself to see more of her, but you decided to treat us with some kind of anti-climax. Why post such a small number of pics?
The smoke machine is awesome (where did you buy it? H.J. de Vries?)
I like the color rendition and the overall creativity that is shown in the images.
The combination 40D and 24-70/2.8 is my dream combi.
I would be in a heaven-like mode if I had the same combi for my wedding shoots.
A lot of Kudo’s for you, my man.
March 13th, 2009 at 8:04 am
Mario, thanks for the comments. I’ll probably post more pics in the future, I just don’t have a lot of time do process them all now
The smoke machine is AKA photoshop
March 14th, 2009 at 9:09 am
The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources
Karel, those picutes are great. Keep it up…
March 15th, 2009 at 7:10 am
Nice going Karel.
Great smoke.
Neat masking.
Mask Pro, Knock Out or PS?
Cool repeating of the blurred mask in the background.
Cute model…even better with some more coaching.
Keep it up!
PLU
March 15th, 2009 at 8:18 am
Thanks for the comments PLU.
I use some manual procedures for masking in Photoshop using channels. I tried some of the plugins but I found that they just don’t work that well in every situation. Ofcourse manual takes longer but then you have more control. In my opinion at least. Check this page: http://www.russellbrown.com/tips_tech.html
Check the masking tutorials.
April 8th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
I was just reading your blog about your loath of the new canon. Could you post some pictures so I can understand your credibility as a photog. Your latest model shoot pics are kind of lame.
May 3rd, 2009 at 6:52 am
Wow Karel…. Your creativity is simply wonderful!! Your third down from the top, where you express your satisfaction, is totally, “World Class.”
Thanks for sharing your tech. info. with us. That’s the best way for all of us to learn, and of course, the teacher learns more than the rest…. Also, the world is so big, that only a tiny portion of the population will ever tune-in to, and understand, these, shared insights.
You have a gift for putting your model at ease, when you shoot…. Exceptional!
Above, you say, “Of course manual takes longer.” True, but you forgot to mention that nobody ever got a prize for doing great art, quickly…..
Your photographs, “Made my day!”