John W Jacobsen Photography

[UPDATE: The full set of images from the shoot are available here (requires Flash)]

My friends at Boulder Motorsports have been busy building a new bike for the 2010 racing season and they asked if I would like to come take some shots of it for them. Umm. Yeah! The F042 is a custom made kit bike that is truly a work of art. If you are a gear head, you can read more about it here.

I got to the shop at 6AM this morning and Brian Sharp was already hard at work re-building an engine for one of his Californian customers. I set up my gear and tried to stay out of the way as much as possible. Once Will Neville arrived to provide some creative direction and assistance, we got to work. My idea for the first two shots were that this truly is an unveiling of the great work that BMS does. I thought it would be interesting to have a silhouette and some darker, almost flirtatious images of the shape of the F042. As is normally the case, the first 15 or 20 shots were a lot of trial and error but I started dialing in the look I was going for and thanks to my trusty RadioPoppers, I was able to nail it.

Once the darker shots were done, we cranked up the lights and started getting some good product shots of the bike and some of the custom parts that BMS used to create the F042. I haven’t processed all of the images yet, but I can tell from a quick glance that I think that I was able to capture the craftsmanship of Brian and his team.

After we got done documenting the F042, I had an opportunity to ask Brian how this bike does on the track. He response: “it’s been on the podium every race we’ve entered!”. So not only does it look great it’s also a rocket on the track! It was an early start to the day and definitely more work than I would have thought, but hopefully I will be able to give Brian some ‘podium’ shots of his latest creation!

One of my friends recently asked me to photograph his upcoming wedding. Needless to say, a humbling proposition. Normally when I go out and take photos I know what I wish to accomplish in mind and through perseverance, I can usually come home with something worthwhile. A wedding is completely different. These people have entrusted me with providing them with the lasting memories of their wedding day. One take. No screw-ups.

I knew I had to take some “practice” shots before the big day and I also knew that I would probably need some kind of diffuser for my flash. I talked to my friend Amy and she suggested a Gary Fong diffuser. I ordered one up and it arrive via UPS a couple of days ago.

Now granted, our family pet Sammy isn’t like photographing the bride and groom. In many ways, she might be more difficult because her coat is jet black and she is kind of – no, scratch that – she’s really hyper. Using Sammy as a test subject I knew I wouldn’t be able to stage a shot and exposure would be a challenge because of her fur color. I loaded up the Gary Fong on my SB-600 and started ripping off shots.

While the photo above isn’t going to win any awards, it did give me an opportunity to work with the LightSphere II and after a couple of minutes, I really like it. I have a feeling that I’m going to be chasing the pets around the house more over the next few days to try to get up-to-speed quickly so I’m ready for the wedding – which is now only six days away!.

On of the things I often do to help grow as a photographer is to give myself a “personal project”. By giving myself a subject and exhausting all different aspects, I feel it really helps me hone my skills. Enter my friends Greg and Rachael. They purchased a small farm that has a 100+ year old barn with loads of character.

I started out slow as I was having a devil of a time getting the lighting right. Several of my first efforts were a bust. But then Greg and I uncovered an old block and tackle. I was able to shoot that from many different angles and above is one of my favorites.

We then headed down to the first level of the barn to shoot some pictures of an old cast iron tub. Greg ever the ham, ended up taking his shirt off and making a production out of it. Needless to say I had some ‘splaining to do when I got home and showed these photos to my wife! But lighting the scene was a lot of fun and definitely a learning experience for me.

I have just scratched the surface on the personal project – I don’t think I can run out of subjects in that barn so I’m sure I’ll be back to the Kras Farm as often as they’ll have me.

I have been purchasing some new gear the last few weeks and today was the first opportunity that I’ve had to spend some time playing around with it. Tara and I ran some errands this morning and in the process, I picked up some subjects in the form of Hot Wheels.

For the past three years, I’ve been using the Nikon Creative Light System for all of my off-camera flash photography. CLS is great, but it’s limited in the fact that it’s strictly line-of-sight and it’s really only effective within about 20 feet or so. One of my new purchases was some RadioPopper Jrx Receivers and Transmitter. These devices allow for remote triggering of flashes up to 300 feet away (and more!). Considering my subject, I really could have used the CLS but this was a new toy – it must be used!

In addition to the RadioPopppers, I also purchased a couple of Vivitar 285HV flashes. These are great inexpensive additional sources of light. One problem though, they use a proprietary sync port. Time to break out the solder gun! I had found some instructions to modify the flash to utilize a stander 3.5mm (1/8″) male mono jack. It took about 15 minutes and when I attached the flash to the RadioPopper, it fired the first time!

Last, I had to set up my Bogen Super Booms and 24″ x 24″ Lastolite Eazy Box softboxes (more new purchases). I know this sounds like an awful lot of gear to take a picture of a toy car, but the trick with shooting anything with a flash is to make it look like you didn’t use a flash. In order to do that, you need to modify the light source (in my case, strobe flashes) and make it appear much larger than it really is. That’s where the softbox comes in. The softbox disperses the light over a larger area, making it appear like a much larger light. Using the boom allows me a lot greater control over the placement of the softbox. The end result is a nice, softly lit image without all of the glaring reflections common when using a bare flash. Spending time learning how your gear works in a controlled environment like this is a great way to avoid those “gotcha” situations when you are out with a client.

OK, all the gear is ready. Almost. The last bit of software I wanted to try out (yes, software) was the OnOne dSLR Remote iPhone app. Wow. This is really cool tech. By connecting my dSLR to my laptop, and running the dSLR Remote server app (free from OnOne), I am able to remotely control my dSLR from my iPhone!. We’re not talking bare minimum here – we’re talking full control! I was able to change aperture, shutter speed, ISO, use live view and fire the shutter. The image that was just captured displays on the iPhone as well as transfers directly back to the laptop. After about 80 shots, I had a small hiccup when the server software crashed. A quick restart and I was back in business. Now of course, the dSLR is tethered to the laptop via a USB cable so it’s not exactly a mobile solution. However if you are like me, I love the new screens on the dSLR’s but there is a limitation to how much you can see on them. Being able to immediately view the image on the laptop is a really great way to make sure you’re capturing what you thought you were.

I spent about 90 minutes in the garage in my makeshift studio, trying different settings, learning how to use the new gear, and capturing some pretty cool images!