Brett Harkness Photography Training

This is one thing you are up against when organizing a course in another country, unless you have someone on the ground you are in the hands of the models, make up etc… to turn up! Luckily we chose well. All of the models were fantastic and made it all to the chateau on time. So our first model Anna Shteyn had only been in France a few days, all the way from Russia. She was fantastic and worked all day and into the night to give all of our photographers as much as she could. So after breakfast the photographers got themselves ready for what was going to be a very long and action packed day in and around Chateau Rigaud!

Meanwhile model  Anna, went through to make-up to get ready for her day. A big thank you to make up, Laura Cawte who did  a great job throughout the 2 days shooting.

AM session- We spent the morning session keeping it simple, using just daylight and looking at getting the best exposure for the subject. Wearing casual clothes. We then moved onto just introducing a small rear flash as the ambiance was quite dull we looked at bringing the sunshine to us. It was good that the weather was like this as every day of shooting started off dull and the sun burnt through in the afternoon giving us the best of both ambient worlds to play with!

We managed to grab  a bit of video here and there when we could. As we didn’t have anyone there to specifically shoot video we had to make do with whoever was closest to the camera at the time! Using a Lexar 32GB card we managed to cover most of what we shot over the two days.

We travel light! Guy & myself walking back to the Chateau! Carrying an Elinchrom Deep Octa & Ranger kit.

Ross leads the march back to the Chateau with all the kit!

At lunch we headed off in the minibus to a nearby town overlooking the vineyards. We all had wine, chicken & chips ( french stylie! ) After a few glasses of vino we headed off back to the Chateau to start our afternoon session. Anna had changed into a beautiful vintage wedding dress by Kate Edmondson and was met by her husband to be for the afternoon, Adam Pollard, only 18 but has it all going for him, you’ll see what I mean when the pictures come out!!

PM session: Again we started off in a doorway just to give the couple time to get used to each other and using the lovely soft French afternoon light. We now brought in one big flash off right to the doorway we were shooting at .

We then headed inside for 20 mins to use the main stairway at the Chateau. Using just one light, way off to the right we positioned the model at the top of the stairs. Using a very long boom arm we positioned the Elinchrom head into position. There was very little light coming into the stairwell but with our settings we made the scene darker to ad drama and mood.

( Thanks to Ross Holkham & Guy Levine for their behind the scenes shots )

May I also take this opportunity to make a big thank you Kate Edmondson for the loan of her beautiful wedding dresses,  & to Victoria Mary Vintage for her wonderful hair accessories. Also to Denis Hope for the loan of a great suit that fitted our male model perfectly!!

After a moment or two of touching up make up and grabbing a freshly made muffin we headed off to our next location.I grabbed a quick bit of video and a couple of stills of Anna because the light was stunning..

A nearby Winery was our next location for some fashion/wedding imagery using the architecture, light , posing etc.. starting off using just the sun as our main light source!! By exposing from the highlights and a careful bit of exposure tweaking the sun if used properly is a great light source to use head on!

We moved onto the steps of the Winery using the beautiful french architecture in our shoot. Using a mixture of natural light and Elinchrom lights we shot here for 40 mins or so. Here are just a couple of the images taken at this time. We were aware that the light was fading fast and we didn’t want to miss the last location for our shoot. So we quickly returned to the Chateau for a quick dress change and then off to the hill top church.

Image showing an Elinchrom RX speed head in a Deep Octa box on a 10ft boom stand.

EVENING SESSION: To finish the days shooting we headed off down the road to a church that I had shot my sister at a few years previous but little did we know what we were in for! This evening session was for us to make some beautiful images of the B&G and we didn’t disappoint. Working quickly we used the low sunlight first shooting into the light and then moved on to mix it with the flash. Sometimes when you are out shooting something amazing happens with the light, this was one of those times. Just when we thought it couldn’t get any better we turned around and saw the moon rise over the church. We quickly moved the light over and made the most of the moment.

Kristie giving the very hard working Anna some make up touch ups..

One of the lighting set ups showing the fantastic boom arm we borrowed from The Flash Centre

Adam doing his thing!

What a day everyone had. We certainly covered a lot of information, set ups and shooting over the day. W could have stayed upon that hilltop all night I am sure, but I think we had worn out the models! That night we all had a beautiful meal made by our our chef, Tom. It was a very special meal with lots of wine being drunk, laughter and talking about the day etc..It was great to be able to spend some informal time together also on the course, most courses people leave and wish they could have asked this or talk about that, we were able to carry it on over a drink and some great company.

So what would day 3 bring? Well, if you weren’t there you’ll have to watch this space!

I used my Elinchrom Ranger RX speed pack with a 70cm softbox with a soft honeycombe grid. The grid cut down most of if not all of the modelling light so I had to put in a naked light on the B channel so as to help me focus. The shots were taken on 200 ISO , 160th sec @f16.

I have a few more things that I am working on at the moment apart from our “work” photography so watch this space for some more cool imagery over the next few months. A big thanks to Craig & Anna for letting me use their drive way for the shoot and for everyone that turned up for being such great sports.

IMAGE SHOWING THE SET UP. YOU DON’T NEED MUCH TO MAKE THINGS WORK!

So,on October 9th after shooting a wedding in Devon we headed off for the Channel tunnel and our trip down to Bordeaux in France. The Channel experience was great and we arrived in Calais only 28 mins later! A rainy and foggy Calais it has to be said but the weather vastly improved the further South we travelled. Our destination was the beautiful Chateau Rigeaud in the St.Emillion area. We had hired the chateau for 3 days for our course. We had been planning this course for many months and it was very important that we looked at all the finer details of the 3 night course. We are known for putting on a good show and have put on courses in Newcastle & 3 in London over the last year. When you are dealing with models abroad and organizing from a far it’s always hard.

I had photographed my sisters wedding a few years ago at the Chateau and we knew that this was the place to use when the right time arose. A big thank you to Anna from the chateau for helping us source flowers & make up amongst other things. Moment to thank them, flowers by Hayley Sutherland & make up by Laura.

It was the first time we had driven to France using the Channel Tunnel and it was a great experience and we will definitely do it again. Like a typical man I did get rather excited!!

So, after a 10 hour drive, a few stops, many coffees and a load of chatting and planning for future projects Kris & I made it to St.Emillion. Here are a couple of shots of our very very full car and all the kit before hand in the studio..

Most of the kit was mine but may I take this opportunity to thank The Flash Centre for loaning me some kit for the course also. They are are a great bunch and I choose them for all of my lighting kit needs. Here is a brief list of the kit that we took:

• Elinchrom Ranger RX Speed AS pack ( 2 heads )
• Elinchrom Ranger RX Speed pack ( 2 heads )
• Elinchrom Quadra pack x 2 & 4 heads
• Elinchrom Deep Octa / 2- 70cm softboxes
• Elinchrom High performance reflector 48˚
• Elinchrom Beauty Dish 44cm
• Elinchrom Indirect Lightbank Octa 190cm
• Elinchrom Snoot reflector & grid
• Various batteries
• Canon EOS 1ds Mark III & 5D mark II for video
• Avenger 10ft stand with 40″ boom / An amazing Boom arm that goes to over 11 ft
• Canon 70-200/ 50mm 1.2 / 16-35mm 28 /
• Think tank belt system & travel bags
• Lexar 16GB 600 speed CF cards

When Kristie & I arrived at the chateau we were greeted with champagne and cake!! Music to my ears!! After freshening up we went for a walk and a drive around the chateau looking for places to plan out for our shoot. Finding some very cool places. We then set up most of the kit and got all the clothes ready that we had bought or borrowed, matching up the outfits with the backgrounds that we had already scouted out.. Kristie modelling some of the clothes to give me a visual idea of how to piece things together…

May I also take this opportunity to make a big thank you Kate Edmondson for the loan of her beautiful wedding dresses, you will be seeing them in the next post & to Victoria Mary Vintage for her wonderful hair accessories. Also to Denis Hope for the loan of a great suit that fitted our male model perfectly!!

The aim of the course was not only to teach people how to use lights but also how to style, look at exposure and to create gorgeous images. We also wanted the course to be about more than learning. Whenever a group of photographers get together like this in this kind of environment it is a recipe for success. And the ingredients were all there! Everything we do at our studio whether training or our own shoots we do to the best of our ability. From our customer service to pushing the boundaries on our shoots; we live for what we do and this shows in not only the images that we produce but also how we feel when we are doing it!

Monday morning Kris & I set off in the mini bus to Bordeaux airport to pick up all of the photographers which were mostly flying in on the same early morning flight. We knew that it would have been too much to expect the delegates to start shooting as soon as they arrived so we laid on champagne and cake upon arrival and the photographers had the rest of the day to play with our equipment, take a book and a drink under the large tree at the front of the chateau, take a dip in the pool or rest in one of the beautiful rooms in the chateau, ot go for a walk around the vineyard…which many did, whilst a few made a splash in the pool!!

This is the first time I have ever used the 5d for video,we had no equipment with us for video or indeed any hands spare to do it with! It is an art by itself but we had fun trying when we could, the camera was usually left on a tripod and when people got the chance we all had a go! We also used mobile phones on occasion just to document our day, so the quality isn’t great so all you video buffs out there don’t judge us on our video skills! Next time I will certainly take a stabilizer rig with me but the course was about photography and for the time being we will stick to that!!

First group shot taken on a crappy phone, it’ll only get better!!

So the first day ended with us all having a great meal cooked by our own personal Chef Tom who also has his own great business The Flavoursmith! Who we all thank so much for feeding us over the 3 days, it was amazing.Waking up to a great breakfast every day, cake & cookies in the afternoon followed by 5 star food & service  every night. The talk was not only photography based but also many other topics floated around the room. The atmosphere was very easy going from the moment everyone arrived at the airport. With a great mixture of photographers and characters.

May I also thank Fiona and her team for looking after us at the chateau and for making our stay even more special. The night was spent drinking, chatting , laughing and planning the first days shooting to come….. Some chatting into the night with numerous bottles of wine being drunk! Here are some of the video highlights from the first day. I will be posting soon on day 2, our first shooting day!! Watch this space….

Using a 50mm lens is not for the faint hearted as with things and people so far away it forces you to think more about what you are photographing. Making you look around each corner of the frame and deciding whether to include or not.

It isn’t easy, especially if you are used to using a zoom lens all the time but it does make you stop and think and look to make an image , not just take a photograph. Documentary shooting is a large part of what I do on all of my shoots; weddings, commercial , lifestyle and having the ability to create an image out of something very simple or to see something in a crowd or a busy street is another string to your bow.

A big thanks to Guy, Tony, Mike & Karl for joining me on a great day.

We do have some places left on our last courses of 2011 , so don’t miss out. Take a look at the COURSES PAGE for a full list of the courses left. You can also pay through the site or via the studio by calling Kris on 01706 340792.

Here are some of the images from the day. If you get chance, leave a message or if you have a question you can leave one on the message board on the right hand side.

A couple of shots of us all in action & a little video from our documentary day out.

Watch out behind you!

Getting down with Blackpool’s donkeys…

Patience is key when waiting for the right moment to shoot..
A few little snippets from the day shot by Guy..

We then moved into Manchester where we enjoyed some time around the Salford keys & Lowry Theatre area. Thank you for the shoot time. Our courses are very relaxed and we try and give out as much information as we can , we also try and make sure that everyone has equal shooting time also. We want you to leave with the knowledge of how to do this and also some great shots, then turn it around, practice and learn how to make the shots your own. Creating your own style is the most important thing in your own photography. It is important to know that flash is only part of our weddings, a big part yes but we mix it up at weddings, bringing in the flash for drama. I love shooting this way but we balance the flash usage to suit the time of year, clients and venue. Remember there is no substitute for practice!

Also if you haven’t seen our ” Real Wedding ” DVD, following Kristie & myself at a real wedding with over and 80 mins of footage + director’s cut with voice over and top 20 images. CLICK HERE to buy.

A big Thank you to everyone that made it down to the course. Thank you also to our MUA, Zan Atkinson and to our models, Josh, Jennie & Tori. Last but not least , big thanks to Novaks for gorgeous dresses as usual!

We also have some great courses just released, CLICK HERE to see more, including ” Speed light for Weddings”, ” Winter Weddings ” at Knowsley & Fanham’s Hall. ” Street Fashion ” and ” Two documentary days! ( dates coming soon)

We started off the day talking about flash guns and how to use them, manually & ETTL; then after coffee we took to the streets using first 580EX II flash guns in Lastolite Ezy boxes, we then moved onto Elinchrom’s Quadra kit and then finished off with the bug guns, Elinchrom’s Ranger RX Speed kit. So much info was shared on the day not just about flash but about our business, working with models, clients and so much more. A big thank you to Henry Aarvold for his assisting skills and for the little bit of video he managed to take whilst multi tasking! Much appreciated! Here are some images from the course.

Our new SEP-DEC 2011 courses will be released next week. Watch this space as places are limited.

Henry holding an Elinchrom Quadra A head with a 70cm softbox.

A little bit of grabbed video:

It was a very hot day , we even had to carry around umbrellas it was so hot! Starting off inside we went through our wedding process , looking at a mixture of imagery taken from our own wedding collections. We then after coffee started shooting around the interior of the beautiful Fanham’s Hall, looking at light, exposure, posing, and encouraging interaction between Bride & Groom. Using flash for creative effect, shooting in the sun, shade and so much more. A big thanks to our fabulous Make up by Katy. Great job. Also a huge thank you to Novaks Bridal shop for the loan of some beautiful dresses. We have some great new course dates coming out this week! So watch this space. Here are some images from the shoot:

Here are  a couple of images from behind the scenes at the course:

Here are a couple of videos shot behind the scenes by Ross:

Our 1-1 sessions are very much tailored to you , the photographer. We can cover whatever you wish, from business and your studio image to flash usage, equipment or a mixture. We also keep details on file if you don’t want to do a 1-1 as we run bespoke 1-1, 2-1, 3-1 & 4-1′s. For more information please CLICK HERE. Here are some images from the session: