Midday Campaign Photoshoot Tips

As you guys may or may not know, I am a big fan of Annie Leibovitz. Her work has had a huge influence on me.

The Rihanna Vogue cover she did is one of my all-time favourites.

The thing about inspiration is that you are inspired by someone, but when you go out and shoot, you should always create something different. Because at the end of the day, your image is about who you are, not who you follow on Instagram.

At the beginning of the day, I originally wanted to create a series of images to pay homage to Annie’s work. 

Then I was quickly distracted by the beautiful purple weeds. It has been raining for about three weeks, I guess the gardener hadn’t had time to mow them yet. Well, a bonus for me!

My thought was: I can’t repeat Annie’s work better than Annie anyway, so why not take a risk and try something new?

So rather than using a beautiful soft light as I originally planned, I put the model under the Sun, as a harsh light source.

Even though soft light can be safe and pleasant, to me, the harsh light and shadows deliver a sense of “living in the moment”. Through the images, I can still feel the wind swaying the flowers, and the sun kissing her skin.

Because I live in Sydney, the sunlight can be very harsh. 

When you compare the image with and without flash,  you can see that in this context it is very critical to have a fill light in place. So that with all the highlights and deep shadows going on, her skin still looks pleasant.

What do you think? Do you prefer the soft light or harsh light?

This is your mate Aries Tao. I will see you in the next video.