Oranges

One of our 4-hr. studio blocks this week was Commercial Studio (again)....we flip-flop between commercial, portrait, and what they call "location" studio. This week's commercial assignment was still life. We had to come to class with 8 images from our Idea Book (a catalog we had to develop with - you guessed it - ideas for work that inspires us, or work that we'd like to create ourselves). The purpose of bringing these images is to give us some help when deciding what to bring to studio time...what props, what main subject, how we may possibly want to set up our lighting, etc.

I found a picture on another photographer's blog with a bowl of oranges. It looked so gentle and airy. I knew it was simplistic but I just kept thinking about the image and wondering when I'd have an opportunity to do something using that image as inspiration. So I went out and bought $8 worth of oranges (I don't even like oranges), not knowing how many I'd need for my shoot. I had some bowls in mind, but didn't know which would work best. I also knew that if I didn't have one, the prop room might. We have a prop room in the studio with all different kinds of things....from wood pieces to glassware to fake flowers, fabrics, trinkets to serve as additional props. So I was all excited to do this shoot and then go into the studio and nothing was working right. This giant camera we use in the commercial studio now is really hard to navigate. Since I wanted to get a high perspective, we had to move the camera into a position where I could look straight down onto my subject. My subject was on the floor, the lights and camera above it, and my partner (Rikki) and I were trying to navigate through the bay to figure out how to best shoot my oranges in the bowl.

I finally gave up on the bowl, changed my background, and started from scratch. Rikki had brought some flowers with her, so we tried using those as an additional prop. We finally got something I was pleased with....although really simplistic, it took me almost the entire 4 hours of studio time. Good thing Rikki had shot hers the night before.

So here are my little oranges...



And in case you're curious, this is what the camera looks like. It's called a 4x5 large format camera. Imagine this accordion-looking contraption sitting on a larger-than-life tripod....oh and did I mention that this little piece on the back of it, called a digital back - so crucial to the functioning of the camera - is near $11,000? Yeah, so imagine having to move this thing at ALL....we near die every time we need to make a major adjustment. And then today to shoot straight down means moving the camera into a very vulnerable position. Oh, the nerves!!