Shawn is a magician!  Yay!  He came into the studio last week to do a promo shoot so that he’d have some cool photos for his new website.  We tried a bunch of different concepts, but this concept was my favorite.  I used to be really into playing cards way back when, and nothing beats a good card trick.

Yay magic!  Shawn actually did some magic tricks on-set and it was crazy!  I was taking photos of one thing, and then suddenly it would turn into something else.

Thanks for coming into the studio, Shawn!  And thanks for entertaining me while I took your photo – I will never ceased to be amazed by magic tricks, even after they are explained to me really slowly.

Will dropped by the studio last week with his friend Mehran.   Will is a local comedian too, so we decided to take some promo shots since we had some extra time!

It was the first time Will posed for headshots, but it seemed to me that he was an old pro.  We probably shot for like five minutes total and managed to get some great stuff!

This next photo is my favorite:

I had the honor to photograph some promo shots for the fabulous Mehran again this past week.  It has been absolutely impossible to pick my favorites.   We had a blast collaborating, and tried a zillion concepts and ideas!  So here are just a few of my favorites, in no particular order.  Enjoy!

This next one is my favorite from the entire shoot – I don’t really know why.

This is a Stereo Telescope, a Boston-based band that is so into photography that they did a shoot on the beach, in the snow, in the water, wearing short sleeves, on a really cold / rainy / snowy / windy winter day in December.

Here they are lying on the sand waiting for a wave to crash over them.  Did I mention it was like 30 degrees out with a wintry mix?

This next shot is from after they were crashed upon by a wave.

The original concept for the shoot involved sunset and fireworks, but since there was no sun we had to improvise.

This next shot looks like it was taken on another planet – I LOVE IT.  An empty beach covered in snow and the flare of fireworks – not what I originally imagined for the shoot, but awesome nonetheless.

Nikki and Kurt were amazing – it was cold, miserable, and yet they totally rocked the shoot.  The crazy conditions were totally worth it, and I think we got some good stuff for them to use as part of their promo materials!

Annie came in yesterday to have some headshots made.  You may remember Annie from her recent role in Zombie Prom.

I did my rough edit yesterday, and from around 400 frames I got it down 275.  From 275 to 175, and now I am just stuck!!!  There are 175 great shots of Annie and my goal is to get it down to 50.  Wish me luck!

This last shot is my favorite from the sitting – this would be my pick!

Thanks Annie!  You did a great job yesterday and have therefore made my job of narrowing down the photos very difficult.

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And now… Brendan’s headshots!

Again, impossible to pick.  These are only a few of my favorites!

I really like this last one and I’m not sure why.  It’s more casual that the others, and Brendan’s expression seems to have a story behind it.

Katrina (and Brendan…. stay tuned!) came in this weekend to have their headshots made!  The photo above is my absolute favorite from the session.  As usual, however, I am really struggling with editing them down!

It’s so difficult to edit down when you have clients like Katrina -  her skin totally glowed under the light and her hair looked absolutely gorgeous!

So there you have it!  I could have shown like ten more but I will leave it at three for now.

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Andrea came into the studio yesterday to get some headshots made.

Andrea is awesome for a number of reasons, the main reason being that she arrived with a book of tear sheets!   Marvelous!!!  She wanted something with a bit more edge than traditional headshots, so I tried my best to give the photos some fashion.

The ads she brought in were largely black and white images that were really gritty and grainy.  Some had dramatic lighting, others were flat but with models with really intense expressions.

Sometimes people ask me why my job takes so much time.  One of the reasons is the editing – editing and retouching does take a ton of time, but editing down the photos can often be the biggest challenge.  I shot a little over 200 frames of Andrea and it is proving impossible to narrow them down.  One of the photographer’s most important jobs is to make something overwhelming – like 200 frames – into something more reasonable for a client to choose from.  I am really struggling with Andrea’s set – there are just too many!   She only blinked once – that is unheard of.

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Late last Tuesday night, I got an email from Jessie’s mother asking if there was any way I could take Jessie’s headshots on Wednesday because… drum roll… Jessie was going to send her photo in to audition for the next Twilight movie!  Luckily I was free (although, if I wasn’t free, I’d probably have dropped everything because how exciting is the possibility of Jessie’s being involved with Twilight?), and we got together to make some photos.

This next one is very Twilight-y and is the photo we all agreed was best to send in for the audition.

Jessie is a natural.  She was amazing!  We tried a few different looks because Twlight-y may not be the best look for every audition (such as auditions for High School Musical, which Jessie is also pursuing).

The next shot is my personal favorite (and Jessie’s too!).

Everyone wish Jessie the best of luck with sending in her headshot!   Because then she can get her dear old photographer Robert Pattinson’s autograph and make her the happiest person ever.   Although, if I can allow myself to get carried away for a minute, maybe what will happen is that Jessie will meet him and he will be so WOWED by her promo shots that he will INSIST that he meet with her photographer to have his photo taken.  And then he will come to the studio and I will totally freak out…  Everyone wish Jessie TONS of luck.