Bahrain Top Model 2011
Season 3 March issue
Venue: Audi Car dealership, Sitra Bahrain
Models, Anna, Hannah,Jasmeet, Kaleigh, Louisa, Monica, Tabia,
Clothes sponsored by Mango, Camaieu, Origem,
Hair by EJ Salon Supply
Make up by Simone Gannon
Stylist Laura Bale
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| Anna photo was taken totally with speed lights for this photo I had two speed lights outside the car one on each side of her face with the light on the left being the main light, added a flash inside the car to get some of the details of the interior. |
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| Hannah for Hannahs photo she chose the Audi R8. Nice car, I had brought a smoke machine with me and we put the smoke machine under the car and put a flash inside the back of the car to light up the smoke and the details. Two speed lights to light the face and body, the main is on the left side with the right side as a fill, used a golden umbrella to highlight the fill with a golden glow. |
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| Jasmeet Chose to be under the hood of the Audi A7 sportback, yet another beautiful car, To light this image, I had one flash behind the smoke, one main light with large shoot through umbrella square on the face, one light on the right with a gold umbrella to add a gold highlight. |
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| Kaleigh thought that being a mechanic was a great way to show her talents as a model, with a little grease added to the face with Simones' creative make up gives it a real sense of her working. The underside of the car is lit with two flashes one behind and one to the left, one flash straight on the face shot through a white umbrella. |
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| Louisa was thinking about changing the tire, with high heels and fabulous hair it was an easy shot to get what we wanted from her. To light this, I have one flash inside the car with a red gel, one on the floor behind the rag to light the tire, as there wasn't enough ambient light to get the details. I have one flash on her face, shoot through umbrella to soften the transition of shadow to light on her skin. |
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| Monica was right into this shoot, she had grease, vaseline added to her skin to give a nice shine and a bit of dirt to her face. To light this image, I had a flash on the floor to high light the wall and to give some sense of separation between the subject and the wall. Two flashes were used to light her face, one was placed under the hood and one to the left of the image to create nice highlights on her face. |
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| Tabea was playing in the car wash, to do this image, I didn't want my flashes to get wet, so I placed them into plastic zip bags and hid one behind her on the side mirror, to highlight and separate her hair from the background. One large shoot through umbrella to light Tabea's face and the car. |
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| The girls Season 3 round 3 March issue of FACT This image was a bit of work to light, it was one of the first images of the day and we had quite a bit of ambient light in the garage. I wanted to light under the cars, so profoto lights were used behind the tire of each of the cars. I had my D1 air Profoto light with a 5 ft Octabank soft box to light all the girls. Inside the car there is a flash triggering as well to add some depth to the photo. Photography by Jacquelinekentphotography.com lighting assistance Armand Hough thanks to the team for making this such a great day. |
Bahrain Top Model
Season 3 Episode 2
Theme for this months magazine is Recycling.
Searching for a location that symbolizes recyling, we decided on the Scrap yard down in Riffa.
it has some great locations for photography. Since this was a competition, I wanted the girls to use the same set and try and get there best shots.
Originally I had this idea that I would merge three of their best images together to give a few poses on each page. do this I had to lock the tripod down and light the bus up enough to have equal lighting through out. You can see more of this in the you tube Video that I have attached.
I put one light outside the bus with a long Chimera softbox running along the windows, this didn't work very well as the windows were painted red and created some red highlights and tones on the skin. So I then opted for a beauty dish with a window open, so I could keep the skin tones correct.
I had another light running near the back of the bus with a profoto 600 R reflector on it, I wanted this light to separate the model from the background.
The props used in the shoot, were from the junk yard, we snooped around through treasures and found all sorts of interesting things.
I think this was a great addition to the shoot.
Little bit of dusting and we were ready to get to work.
Here are the girls final images for Fact Magazine published in February issue 2011.
Attached is a you tube Video that I put together, it shows a bit of the back scenes of the day.
Equipment used for this shoot.
FACT MAGAZINE
So here we are in December down at the tree of life taking photos of our 8 competitors for
Bahrain Top model 2011.
All the girls are beautiful, from aged 16 to 26.
The concept of the shoot, was to photograph this in an iconic place in Bahrain,
that everyone would recognize.
The girls were to stylize their own clothes, make up was to be simple and natural, hair as well.
The hair and make up were done by Elie and Jean Salon at the Ritz Carlton Hotel.
I thought of an idea a couple days before the shoot. I wanted to add some kind of sense of
life and freedom to the scene.
White birds came to mind. I thought if the girls were releasing the birds in one of their
shots and for front cover we could give that feeling.
I contacted many friends here in Bahrain to see if there was such thing as homing pigeons or some type of bird that I could rent, or borrow. No such luck... I was told to check down at the markets. So off I went with my son to find 20 white pigeons, or doves what ever was cheaper. I went to a few markets and low and behold after the third market, I found a man who has an avery at his home, and has quite a few white pigeons, resonabley priced at 1 BD a bird.... who knew. I also found the coolest old bird cage for 3BD 10 bucks... Excellent prop.
I picked them up the following day, all of them in one cage.... It was quite the ordeal taking them back to my house, in the back of my RAV4.
The following morning, car packed, with all the equipment, Honda generator the new Honda eui 20 with 2000wats of power, perfect for running two lights. Soft boxes, beauty dish, A large fan, two lighting assistants (Ross Martin) and (Bryson Kent). Lens, strobes, cords extension cords, I think pretty much most of my studio, and 20 birds in 2 cages... Yes the car was stuffed. It is a long drive down to the location, 20 minutes, in Bahrain that is a long drive. I did not want to be saying while I was out there, I should have brought. There is no time to go home.
We made our way down to the tree of life, low and behold a bus full of tourists. Can you imagine, this was going to be a challenging day.
We waited for all the girls to arrive, which took more time than we imagined. Some of the models had never been down to the Tree of Life. So, Yes were tourists too.
This first photo on this blog was a photo I took a few months ago early in the morning. The government had done an archeological dig there and it looked fabulous with a lot of texture to the ground. I really wanted to do a shot with all the girls up front for cover. But when we got there it was all filled in.
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| Jasmet |
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| Hannah |
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| Kaylie |
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| Anna |
Anna, Kayla, Natalia and Latifa were in the tree with speckled highlights and shadows from the sun casting shadows from the leaves. I had to light this enough to rid of the shadows.
The light I had perched on a C stand to keep it from blowing over as it was a little windy that day. The generator is a bit heavy and a bit awkward between the branches and it would have been quite a challenge to use a soft box at this shoot. Thanks to Ross and Bryson for all the lugging that day. Jumping in and out of the tree like a couple monkeys.
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| Natalia |
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| Latifa |
Lousia and Monica had picked a location where there was quite a bit of sun on them
most of the lighting used here was reflected with a silver reflector.
Tabea's photo was taken a couple days later, the stylist and myself went down with out the car full of lighting gear, I had brought my strobes and a reflector. Birds too. It was really windy that day, we had to tuck out of the wind to get this shot.
I thought to myself how easy and great that was with out all the gear. Although you do see a bit of shadow cast off Tabea's right leg from the flash which I had off camera to the left, reflector to the right.
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| Louisa |
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| Monica |
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| Tabia |
I thought to myself how easy and great that was with out all the gear. Although you do see a bit of shadow cast off Tabea's right leg from the flash which I had off camera to the left, reflector to the right.
The girls had the opportunity to let a pigeon free, most of the birds didn't want to leave, they hung around and some of the locals were climbing up in the tree to collect the birds. This added a bit of difficulty with the shooting as we kept having to ask them to stay out of the back ground.
This first photo on this blog was a photo I took a few months ago early in the morning. The government had done an archeological dig there and it looked fabulous with a lot of texture to the ground. I really wanted to do a shot with all the girls up front for cover. But when we got there it was all filled in.
Now to light for the front cover, it was 2:00 in the afternoon. I had set up two lights for this shot one on either side. I locked my camera down on a tripod, as the challenge to have the birds in flight and all 8 of the girls looking good in one photo seemed to be too chancy for the front cover, so I took a few shots of them posing and then we counted to three and I took a few shots of the birds being released. Later in photoshop, I merged three images together, to give a sense of freedom and flight.
Stutter speed I set at 250 as I didn't want much Ambient light to show up in the back ground. I wanted the image to look like it was shot in the evening.
I am sure the pigeons found they're way back to the market if anyone needs a white pigeon for a shoot.
Talk to Mohamed at the Isa town market.
