Not only is this my weekly landscape 52 shot it is also my entry for the Strobist boot camp III, Assignment 3 competition. HMQS Gayundah was a flat-iron gunboat operated by the Queensland Maritime Defence Force and later the Royal Australian Navy (as HMAS Gayundah). She entered service in 1884 and was decommissioned and sold in 1921 where it was used as a sand and gravel barge and was later run aground at Woody Point, Redcliffe to serve as a break-wall in 1958.

I had arrived at 4:45am so I had plenty of time to setup the gear and try a few compositions. I ended up using 2 Cactus KF36 stobes set at full power and positioned down the side on the ship.  These were fired with Cactus V2 remotes. It took a little time to position the lights so that there was an even distribution of light.  I started with capturing the correct flash exposure for the wreck and I then dialed in a longer shutter speed to bring in the ambient sunrise.

To really appreciate the size of the wreck and get an understanding of the light setup I have put together a small video. I would love to hear your comments and critique on both the shot and the video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

After the year of disasters Queensland has had this year, with the massive floods and cyclones, I wanted to shoot something that stood for the great work done by Queenslanders to clean up and move forward.

XXXX Gold is brewed about 10km from where I live. It is the most iconic beer of Qld here in Australia. They put some great advertisements out congratulating Queenslanders on their great fighting spirit after the disasters. What’s more Australian than a good Aussie Beer?

And as usual here is my set up image. The white paper behind the bottles made a massive difference to the colour of the bottles. Such a simple addition but so key to the final image.

I have also put together a short behind the scenes (BTS) video of the shoot explaining my lighting and set up. You can expect many more of this in the next few months as product photography is really appealing to me. So keep your eyes out and feel free to submit ideas of things you would like to learn how to light and shoot.

Click here to view the embedded video.

It has been a personal project inspired by two of my most idolised photographers, Chase Jarvis and Zack Arias. Chase and Zack have always been advocates for setting yourself personal projects to help develop your creative skills and to extend your portfolio. Chase is also a great believer in sharing your knowledge. This prompted me to create my BTS video which after just over 1 year has been viewed over  21,000 times and I really have to thank one of my favorite bloggers Udi Tirosh who featured the video on his blog diyphotography.net. His website is a great inspiration to make the most of your gear and budget.

Seamless White Background @ Home Tutorial from Scott Bourke on Vimeo.

I have had loads of emails asking for more BTS from the series. So I have decided to put together a timelapse video from my rugby shot. I’m really getting into the timelapse stuff of late.

So thanks to everyone that lent me gear or gave my words of encouragement. Whilst it is my first ever body of work I still plan on adding to it over time so stay tuned for plenty more shots, who knows ping-pong may be on its way.

To finish off here are a few of my recent setup shots you guys seem to crave.

After putting my skateboard shot off for long enough due to the fact I had no idea how to execute my idea, I finally gave it a crack and it came out better than expected. I think this could be one of my best ever Self Sportraits.

After the success of my Tennis Sportrait int he stairwell I decided to give it another go with a few modifications for my AFL shot. These setups take much longer to position the camera angle and lights and even more time to get an image I’m happy with. The shadow has been dropped-in in post.

Brief 5 was to listen to a sound clip from the Canon website and use it as inspiration for the final image.

The sound reminded me of my grandfather snoring so I had the inspiration and now I just needed to come up with how to setup the lights and camera to match my minds eye.

Once again it was recorded and edited all on my iPhone 4. Interesting exercise. Love to hear your comments.

Brief 3 was to incorporate confetti in motion. This was going to be 1 messy shoot

I wanted to capture the cleanup after the party. I put together a short video of the setup explaining the lights used and the way I rigged up the vacuum cleaner. Over a month after the shoot I have still managed to find confetti all around the house.

Once again it was recorded and edited all on my iPhone 4. Interesting exercise. Love to hear your comments.

]]> http://www.thephotojourney.com/2010/12/09/confetti-cleanup-bts-video/feed/ 1 http://www.thephotojourney.com/2010/10/22/incense-brief/ http://www.thephotojourney.com/2010/10/22/incense-brief/#comments Fri, 22 Oct 2010 03:37:52 +0000 Scott http://www.thephotojourney.com/?p=1037 Here is the 2nd in a series of videos on how I took my photos for this years Canon Photo5 Competition. Check on the other photo5 blog posts here. For more information on the competition check out the website.

Brief 3 was to be a black and white shot capturing smoke from the supplied incense stick. I had shot smoke before but this time I wanted to engage the viewer with a message not just have them think, “Hey kewl smoke shots”. I wanted to get a message out about the effects of smoking to a persons health. I had been searching for an empty packet for the shoot for about a week when Anna managed to come across a drenched packet in the middle of the street near her work. It has been raining 2 weeks solid here so the packet had certainly copped a beating. It was perfect for the look I was going for.

Check out the BTS video on how I setup for shooting the smoke and a few tips of taking your own smoke shots. You may want to check out a older blog post I did on this with post processing video also. Check it out here – Smokin…Tutorial

Once again it was recorded and edited all on my iPhone 4. Interesting exercise. Love to hear your comments.

]]> http://www.thephotojourney.com/2010/10/22/incense-brief/feed/ 1 http://www.thephotojourney.com/2010/10/18/bubble-gum-brief-video-tutorial/ http://www.thephotojourney.com/2010/10/18/bubble-gum-brief-video-tutorial/#comments Mon, 18 Oct 2010 05:27:23 +0000 Scott http://www.thephotojourney.com/?p=1022 So this is the first in a series of videos on how I took my photos for this years Canon Photo5 Competition. The way the free competition works is Canon send out a couple of thousand brown boxes with 5 random briefs for the entrant to complete. This year Canon announced a portfolio category that got me really excited to complete all 5 briefs. For more information on the competition check out the website.

Brief 2 was a portrait that had to include some bubble gum that they had supplied. I hated the stuff as a kid and I still do. I was very depressed to see it in the box at first. I wanted to capture something that showed the bubble gum inflated and then popped. My initial idea had been done by numerous other competitors so I wanted something totally different and eye catching. Then it hit me a double exposure would capture both states of the balloon, but first I had to work out how the heck to do it on a digital camera. I did some research and came across an article about an international fashion photographer called Joe Oppedisano. He took some amazing double exposures on film back in the 80/90′s in a series titles “Inner Self”. They were amazing and instantly I pictured my shot. Now I just had to work out how to do it in camera. There was to be no Photoshop here.

I was wrapped with how the final image turned out. I couldn’t have pulled it off without my wife Anna who put up with my directions of moving an inch this way and an inch that way. She managed to blow some great bubbles. Especially considering we were up till midnight shooting.

Check out the BTS video on how I did it. It was recorded and edited all on my iPhone 4. Interesting exercise. Love to hear your comments.

For these shots I decided I needed to come up with a way of blowing the ground white as well at the wall. Something I had not previously done. I have adapted my technique from that of Zack Arias who has been shooting portraits on seamless white for years. He has used a technique of positioning the subject on tile board that is sort of glossy to give some grounding to his subject by providing a reflection. It is a great medium for blowing white and it is also very cheap. I picked up 2 sheets of white melamine mdf (1200 x 900) for $14.50AUD each at my local hardware shop. I think you can get it in larger sizes also.

Here is the setup I used for the latest Bike shots. I have 2 Cactus KF36 strobes pointed at the back wall both set as 1/4 power. They are also both an equal distance from the back wall to give an even coverage of light. The wall will now become the 4th light source as it reflects light back at the camera and onto the floor.

The bike must be positioned further from the wall than the 2 cactus stobes so that no light from the strobes directly hits the bikes frame. You may need to flag your strobes like I have on the right hand strobe.

Another Cactus KF36 is used to expose the bike with the use of a shoot through umbrella. This will give a nice wrapping light to the bikes components. This would probably be best positioned directly behind the camera. The lower to the ground your camera is the better the reflection you will get from the mdf boards.

For the close up component shots, like gears and derailleurs, keep your camera settings the same and zoom in or move yourself closer to the components. The lights will work the same as long as you don’t directly stand in the path of the umbrella.

When it comes to the post processing it is much the same as I explain in my video blog post about white seamless shots. Simply up your exposure so that more areas are blown out white and then bring back some of the detail in the bike by increasing the blacks. Then run a curves adjustment layer and do a sharpen to the image. In the end I decided to delete the reflection the mdf boards gave me on the entire bike shots as they didn’t fit in with the eventual advertisements my brother will use the shots for.

If you have any further questions or want me to do a post processing video on the bikes let me know. I’m more than happy to do tutorials on anything you guys want. Just drop me a line on the contact page.

I was approached by Donnie Bishop’s Co-Owner Jason Sandhar to come up with a theme for a shoot with Reinaldo. With Donnie Bishop Clothing being such a casual/dressy urban style, and Reinaldo being such a skillful professional footballer, I wanted to bring the two elements together with a Street Football feel. Brisbane has some great alleyways in the city, and these provided us a great environment for the theme. Anna and I inspected the alleyways the week before the shoot to formulate some ideas. Its amazing what you can learn about your city if you just go for a walk with your camera and get lost in the back streets.

We decided to do the shoot on a Sunday afternoon as A) Reinaldo had time to recover from him Friday night match and B) the streets would be a little quieter. The majority of the shoot was done with 1 Cactus KF36 strobe on a shoot through umbrella mixed with available light. Oh and here is a tip for if your planning on doing a shoot in alleyways anytime soon. Take a towel to lay or sit down on as there can be a fair bit of broken glass and generally yucky stuff in the alleys.

Reinaldo was a champion subject for the whole shoot. He had a very relaxed attitude to the shoot and it is apparent in the photos. His football skills are amazing, the ability to juggle a football with those square toed dress shows was awesome to watch. I was somewhat star struck to be shooting such a great athlete.

Checkout more pictures and the clothing @ – www.donniebishopclothingco.com

So I went about drawing up my idea that had developing in my head over the previous week. I wanted to do a not so pleasant family shot. More of a chocolate lover treating the basket like Gollum and his precious ring. It would need some harsh lighting on my face and a deep red gel behind on a wall giving some separation and mood. As you can see in the setup shot below it deviated a little from my initial sketch.

I used my reflective umbrella with a Cactus KF36 @ 1/16 but pointed up so that just feathered light fromthe edges of the umbrella would fall in the basket. Then I positioned a Cactus KF36 with a red gel @ 1/4 on a seat behind the basket. I would straddle this seat for the final shot. After a few test shots things were looking good. I was time to introduce another KF36 @ 1/2 power with my short snooted grid positioned directly above the camera and pointed towards my face. It was secured with a Nasty Clamp which took a few attempts to get positioned correctly as the gridded snoot gives a very narrow light beam. Any wider and it would have ruined my red gel from behind.

So other than the lighting I melted 2 small eggs in a cup and went about pouring it on my face and napkin. Then drank the rest and quickly went about bursting off 30 or so shots before the chocolate had set on my face. I had hidden my remote shutter release behind the basket and set a 2 sec timer. Camera was set at f20 for a dark environment and shutter speed on 200th of a sec for syncing with my remotes. ISO was at 400.

Post Processing was rather light on. I boosted the contrast with a basic curves adjustment and added a little more darkening to the edges of the frame. Little bit of dodging and burning to the chocolates.

Anna wasn’t so keen on the final image, actually she had seen all 30 shots and was disturbed by my eyes in each of them She said I looked like Gollum or a Zombie which was exactly the look I was going for so I guess its a winner.

]]> http://www.thephotojourney.com/2010/04/01/happy-easter/feed/ 0 http://www.thephotojourney.com/2009/12/03/capping-off-a-big-weekend-product-shoot/ http://www.thephotojourney.com/2009/12/03/capping-off-a-big-weekend-product-shoot/#comments Thu, 03 Dec 2009 01:49:09 +0000 Scott http://www.thephotojourney.com/?p=697 After a massive weekend of photographing babies one day and a formal themed Christmas party the next, I finally had time late on Sunday afternoon to do a few test shots of Hats. A Queensland clothing company has approached me to shoot their hats and shirts for advertising and online sales. I needed to present them an idea of what we can do for them.

The setup for this was very easy.  Obviously for the actual shoot I will use a table and not my super comfy lounge.

I made use of all 3 of my lights. 2 bare bulb @1/4 power and the other shot through my umbrella @ 1/4 power.

Using my large white foam core boards I setup one as the base and the other about 2 feet behind the hat as my background. This board will provide fill-light that will bounce back at  the hat.

I shot from underneath the right corner of the umbrella. This gave me a nice angle on the hat with its leading logo on the peak of the hat.

I achieved a black shadow inside the hat by rolling up my black reflective umbrella material into a ball and sticking it inside the hat. Not sure I will go with this in the actual shoot as the hats will be the truckie style.

I then headed off to Photoshop to cleanup the image and make sure my white backdrop was pure white.

1. Added a Levels Adjustment Layer, and made sure my surrounding white areas are pure white
2. Added a Curves Adjustment Layer with a slight S Curve
3. Added a Colour Adjustment Layer to improve the yellows and greens
4. Added a Vibrancy Adjustment Layer and boosted the colours a little
5. Cropped the image to a tighter fit

The Client is very happy with the results of the test shoot and has set me up with 9 different hat designs to shoot and a heap of Mens shirts. I will blog about the actual shoot soon and let you know who the Clothing company is.  Oh and BTW the designs of their gear are very funky.

]]> http://www.thephotojourney.com/2009/12/03/capping-off-a-big-weekend-product-shoot/feed/ 1 http://www.thephotojourney.com/2009/09/10/maternity-shoot-call-to-action/ http://www.thephotojourney.com/2009/09/10/maternity-shoot-call-to-action/#comments Thu, 10 Sep 2009 02:28:53 +0000 Scott http://www.thephotojourney.com/?p=627 Last week I shot, processed and delivered my first ever maternity shoot. It was partly due to a friend recommending me and the other part a kick in the bum from Zack Arias and his recent post – Call to Action. Zack has been inspiring us photographers that have been sitting on the dock to make the jump and push ourselves photographically.

Our friends Jayne and Simon are expecting the birth of their first child this Friday, September 11th 2009.  And before its a little too late we headed out for a maternity shoot.  Not only was it my first maternity shoot but it was also my first non family shoot and well my first ever outdoor strobist attempt.

Zack Arias has challenged us to Serve someone with our cameras, in such a way that we as photographers will break free from our self criticism of “ I’m not good enough yet.”

So after a little research online at flickr looking at maternity photos and sending links to Jayne to gauge the style she was after, I needed a location. My wife and I had spent the previous weekend scoping out general landscape photography locations at the Brisbane Botanic Gardens at Mount Cootha. Turns out its also a great free and very diverse location for such a shoot.

I decided to go with a 1 light setup. A Vivitar 285 with a 43 inch shoot through umbrella setup on my monopod. Anna my wife helped out as a voice activated light-stand and more importantly she continued to encourage me throughout the whole process. I doubt I could have pulled it all off without her support.

We had 6 distinct locations selected at the gardens and we started in the Japanese Gardens. It had great natural light that I wanted to make good use of first. To tell you the truth I was absolutely terrified and didn’t know where to start. once we reached the gardens. Where should I sit them? Should they sit? What angle will I shoot from? How do I make them feel comfortable? So I just sat them on some open grass and just began shooting. I just asked them to sit and talk and ignore me. About 30 frames latter my brain clicked, I was checking my backgrounds, composing frames with the rule of 3rds in mind, making sure they didn’t have trees or other objects jutting out their heads. The months of reading about what to look out for while shooting just became 2nd nature. Then I found myself conversing with them encouraging them and hopefully making them feel comfortable. I guess its just like Joe McNally says “The Moment it Clicks”. That book has been a great resource of mine since August. Well recommended no matter what your level of ability.

Here is a small slide-show of shots from the afternoon. I ended up presenting them with just over 100 processed image. All post processing done in Adobe Lightroom and a few minor edits in Photoshop.

Stay tuned for a blog on my voice activated light-stand monopod rig.