Myerson Photo Blog

This ninja picture is moving up to what I call a “Tier 1″ image in my iStockphoto portfolio. Many iStockers are notorious stats junkies, and I’m no different. I’ve divided my portfolio into 3 tiers: Tier 1 photos are those that sell more than 15 times a month. Tier 2 photos is anything that sells more than once a month. Tier 3 photos are the ones that surprise me by selling at all.

I have maybe 10 Tier 1 images. These are the homeruns, and it thrills me to hit one. About 40% of my portfolio (about 120 out of the 300 images) falls into Tier 2. Continuing the baseball analogy, these are the singles and doubles that win games. The remaining images are Tier 3. There’s no pleasant baseball analogy for these.

So the ninja appear to be a Tier 1 image. I say “appear” because it’s entirely possible there’s some seasonality to the image. It was uploaded at the end of September, and has sold well through October. We’ll see in November whether it was the Halloween boost that pushed its sales forward. I don’t have “Halloween” as a keyword on the image, but I do have “Costume”, so that may account for some of it.

The image itself was a lot of fun to shoot. That’s me in the costume. I set my camera on the tripod and used my programmable remote trigger to take a series of images. I set it for a series of 6 images, taken at 4 second intervals. I probaby ran through that program about 5 times, for a total of 30 shots of myself jumping, posing, crouching, and otherwise ninjaing. About an hour or two of Photoshop later, and I had this class photo from Ninja School. The black belt on the costume had some yellow embroidered text on it, so that required some editing in post-processing.

The light setup was pretty much what you’d expect: one light to blow out the background, and another light (with softbox) as the key light on me. I used a reflector to my left (image right) to fill in the shadow side.

I’m happy with this image, even if it turns out to be a seasonal Tier 1 and not a long term Tier 1. I’m planning some more multiple exposure group shots in the future. I think having the same model playing all the parts forces the image into the “humor” realm, so I probably won’t do a group of doctors or corporate board members.

We’re kicking off a new series here on the MyersonPhoto blog. In the “6 Questions” interview series, you’re going to find out why I’m a photographer, and not a journalist. In my photographic and design career, I’ve been very fortunate to have had the opportunity to meet and work alongside some fantastic photographers. In my “6 Questions” series, I’ll do my best to bring some of these people to you.

First up, out of central Pennsylvania, is Ed Hidden. Ed is a commercial photographer, a fellow image inspector with iStockphoto.com, and one half of the podcasting duo that brings “the Lightsource Podcast” to these friendly tubes known as the Internet.

MyersonPhoto: You’ve got a ton of hot-selling images in your stock photography portfolio? Which is your favorite? Why?
Ed Hidden: That would be hard to pick one. Probably my highest selling image. [shown below]

It’s hard not to love a “hard worker”. Probably the other big reason was that it was such a surprise that it would sell so well. I had actually held off on uploading this image for a while because I wasn’t sure what I thought of it. It probably taught me to trust your gut and upload images you think will do well and not debate on it too much.

MP: This year saw you set up a studio in a rental space. What can you tell us about the studio? Now that you’re a few months into that studio space, is there anything you’d have done differently?
EH: I’d be in it more often! With inspection and other responsibilities, it’s difficult scheduling time to be in it. I hope to rectify that this winter when it’s not quite as nice to be outside.

MP: You’re something of a lighting guru. Do you have any stories about a particularly challenging lighting setup, and how you tackled it?
EH: The toughest challenges for me are usually the ones where I have the least time for, or conversely, the ones that I have the most time for and over think them.

A recent successful shoot was this one. Everything seemed to gel really well. The model was fantastic and we pretty much had to remind ourselves we were working. We did a few different locations, kept the lighting very basic and got wonderful shots.

In the big shot, I wanted to keep the lighting bright and pleasing for a strong commercial look. So I took two Alien Bee AB800s and bounced them into the corner of a ceiling and let it fall around like natural light. I was pleased because it looked very natural but it was totally artificial. The green elevator shot in the comp card was done with a large modifier that allowed for an easy setup and helped give the “Mens Health” style cover shot I was going for. And the image on the left of the comp card was a quick concept. We were done with the shoot and wanted to do a shot of “calling it a day”. I took the big modifier again and positioned it to camera left for some hard light even though I was using a very large modifier (4ft octobox). I removed the light that was bouncing around the room to fill it and that brought down the lights for the “closing time” effect and positioned it just over the cubicle wall with a grid to allow it to just hit the back of his neck to give him some separation from the background. This is the biggest thing I’ve been playing with lately is separating the subject from the background to give them more importance.

MP: Your podcast remains one of the few I’ll make time for in my listening week. Aside from the big bucks and fame that podcasting brings, what spurs you two on to bring us such great content?
EH: Bill (goCrawford on istock) will physically beat me if I don’t. Don’t let that nice guy persona fool you.

Actually, it’s the joy of getting to speak with all these guys first hand and get to know them. That’s the biggest thing I value in photography, getting to know your subject. I think the podcast is an extension of that for me. Another thing, helping educate people is an excellent way to focus on techniques you might not be conscious of that you are doing. It’s a way for me to further what I know as well.I’m just glad that someone actually listens to them. [MP: Don’t let his modesty fool you. They have a huge listening audience.]

MP: The Lightsource podcast has had an impressive array of interview subjects and guests. Any memorable stories or favorite interviews?
EH: There are so many great guests we’ve had. Clay Enos will always be one of my favorites for a few reasons. He’s such an easy going guy. He called us from a tattoo magazine premiere party to give us a few minutes of his time. One time I was in NYC and sent him and email about meeting up to say hello and he was doing a shoot for Full Throttle energy drinks and invited me to the studio to hang out for the afternoon. That was a lot of fun.

Christopher Grey will be a favorite of mine for the simple fact that he wrote the book on lighting that I studied for so long. He was such a nice guy and another guest I got to meet in person.

Mark Robert Halper is another favorite. He always shares so much when he comes on and is very easy to talk to. We have a great rapport with him and know when he says he wants to be on that we are going to get lots of ideas and techniques to play with.

Surprisingly, some of the interviews that Bill and I have said, “oh, that just didn’t go very well” and thought it was out weakest shows… have been some of the more heavily praised and commented on. So. What do we know, right?

MP: We did a lighting workshop at a recent Tucson Photography meetup. Do you have any advice or resources for people who are looking to make the plunge into artificial lighting?
EH: Start with one light. Focus on what that one light can do. Learn about the quality of the light and how to make that single light soft or hard, where to place it…etc. Always watch your nose shadows, they will make or break an image. If your nose shadows crosses the cheek line, it will look odd and less attractive. Watch your eyes so you don’t get too much shadow on them.

Use a modeling light. It’s for more then to help focus by, it help close the subjects pupil as well so you can get as much color in the eye.

And lastly.. practice, practice, practice, study, study, study. And don’t be afraid to make mistakes.

Many thanks go out to Ed, for being the first to suffer through “6 Questions”. Ed’s website can be found at http://www.edhidden.com. His iStockphoto portfolio is available here.

Philadelphia photographer Andrea Gingerich has a very cool offer going on right now. In support of Blog Action Day, she is giving away an 11×14 mounted and matted print of one of her nature photos. Andrea is a magnificent photographer, and this is a heck of a cool prize. To enter the random drawing, you need to do nothing more than sign up for her email newsletter. And, I suppose, not be totally opposed to the aims of Blog Action Day, which is to raise awareness of issues related to the environment.

Find out more about Andrea’s cool random giveaway, please check out her blog post on the topic. Read more about Blog Action Day here.

Yeah, I bought a smoke machine. Here’s a frame from my first test shoot using it. “Smokey” probably will not find its way into regular rotation for my commercial or portrait work, but I’m sure that we’ll find a way to work it in to a job now and then.

Found on the inestimable Strobist, here’s a link to a somewhat dated look at professional photography.

Careers in Photography