It's Terry!

Terry Richardson is one of my all time favourite photographers. I love the simplicity of his images which focus on the character of the person he is photographing rather than the setting or props. He is also infamous for pushing the boundaries of his photography often producing some controversial work. 

He can also produce some delicate work which makes him a very impressive fashion photographer.

 

Richardson also does some amazing cover shoots including the incredible GQ shoot featuring Beyonce as well as the extremely popular Rolling Stone cover shoot which featured one of music's most recognised women, Rihanna. 

I really love how Richarson captures Rihanna's edginess in this image and Beyonce's stunning curves in the image before. Another trait of Richardson's photography is to get the model to don his trademark glasses and take a couple of pictures as Terry himself. 

 As always thanks for reading!

About In Bristol

Hi everyone,
Here's just a selection of shots from when I went on a walk around Bristol, enjoy!

 

As always thanks for reading!

Just Say Yes

Hi everyone!

A while ago I read a really positive blog post all about how saying 'yes' to doing things you normally wouldn't do makes you learn a lot more about yourself and also makes you a much more outgoing and happy person. I came to do a shoot of some scrabble pieces and found it really difficult to find a word I wanted to use, I really wanted to stay away from the taking moody pictures of the word 'love' as well. So, after a bit of thinking I decided that it would be a nice idea to use the phrase 'just say yes' and the word 'yes' as the focus of the shoot. 

Enjoy!

 As always thanks for reading!

Bloglovin

Hi everyone!

Just like my other blog, you can now follow this blog on bloglovin, enjoy!

  Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Welcome to 'A Bit Of Photography By Curtis'

Hello everyone and welcome to 'A Bit Of Photography By Curtis', the sister blog to the original 'Just A Blog By Curtis'.

The reason I've decided to separate my photography posts from my lifestyle, fashion and review posts is because it occurred to me that some people aren't interested in those things and if all they wanted to focus on photography then they would have to rifle through several of my posts to find the photography ones and I didn't think that was very fair. 

So on this blog you are going to see plenty of examples of my own photography, posts about other photographs I really like, tips and anything I have found useful that I'd like to share and much more photography related things. 

If you are interested in checking out my other blog which focuses on music reviews, mens fashion, product reviews and lifestyle posts then I'd love you to click the link below!

http://justablogbycurtis.blogspot.co.uk/ 

You will also be able to subscribe to both blogs to make sure you are up to date with all my recent posts!

As always thanks for reading!

Pendant & Polaroid

Hi everyone!

This shoot I did a few days ago features a glass pendant resting on a floor of polaroid film. The back of a piece of polaroid film is really shiny and reflects light beautifully so I thought it would be a nice idea to use it as the base and background for a couple of images.

Enjoy!

I cropped the images in to the square shapes to mimic the shape of a polaroid picture and I also used Picasa to make up small polaroids of the images I have taken.

Thanks for reading! 

Canon Fodder (I couldn't think of any other canon-related puns) | Photography

Last year I did a small shoot of an old Canon camera and it was one of my favourite shoots ever because it was so much fun for me to do. Since then I've wanted to do the shoot again but I've always stopped myself because I didn't want to end up doing something that was too similar to the original shoot. 

Anyways here are a few of the final images from that shoot, enjoy!

All the final images from this shoot were edited using the fantastic, free editing software called Picasa and I am planning on doing a review of it so you can see all its features and that way you can decide if it's the right software for you.

Also if you have any good canon-related puns then feel free to tell me them! It seems I need all the help I can get!

As always thanks for reading!

Mert & Marcus | Photography

Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott are recently becoming two of my favourite fashion photographers, what sets them apart from a lot of different photographers is the way they collaborate when doing a shoot, bringing together ideas from the both of them to produce some really stunning work. 

This image of the incredibly talented Adele echoes a theme found in many of Mert & Marcus' images and that's the theme of sophistication. Their portraits often portray successful and sophisticated women and I think that is exactly how Adele is shown in these images. 

 

I couldn't not include this stunning image of supermodel Kate Moss for 'LOVE' magazine. I love the use of water in a shoot, it makes the final images a lot more interesting to stare at. Oh and in case you haven't noticed...Kate's naked. They've handled the nudity really well I think because it doesn't seem sleazy in the slightest and it oozes sex in the most natural way. 

  

Mert & Marcus have revealed how much effort goes in to producing the images they do. They put so much effort in to focusing on the look of the model claiming to spend "most of the time in the make-up and hairstyling rooms".  I think that tip alone is perfect for achieving a fantastic set of images because those two components help you create the character you want to see in the model making the image seem more realistic and striking. The images above of Natalie Portman are stunning and her stare is mesmerising helped hugely by the strengthening make up she is wearing around her eyes. 

As well as sophistication, Mert & Marcus consistently show powerful woman and these images of actress, Keira Knightley are no different. I don't have a lot to say about these two images, I just love them! I think Knightley's expression along with the images being in black & white make for two very confident images of a strong and powerful women.   

Well as always, thanks for reading!

Fashion Photography 101 | Lara Jade | Photography

Hi everyone!

Today's post is something for all you amateur photographers out there who are hoping to learn a few new skills or even become an impressive professional one day.

The book 'Fashion Photography 101' is written by a photographer who has dedicated her time since the age of 15 to developing her skills and producing stunning work based on her own inspirations.

This book is that it isn't just about taking a photograph. It includes all aspects of being a professional photographer to help amateurs with a passion find their way in to the industry. 

Another thing about this book is that because it is written by someone who has 'been there, done that' it feels more genuine because it's so personal to her that you know you can trust what she is saying.

The book begins with a few starter tips, helping the reader choose the right camera. Then selecting the right lenses, including an in-depth description of what each lens can be used for and which one would be most appropriate for you. Software is something I have always been baffled by because you want to make sure you choose a decent editing software but you don't want to end up spending in some cases hundreds of pounds on one. 

 I thought I'd include the contents here because you can see all the things included in the book so you'd know whether or not you would benefit from buying it.

After the basics have been laid down, Jade then begins to teach you how to manage the pressure of conducting a shoot in the most professional way possible. She begins by talking you through how to prepare for your shoot, finding the right model, finding inspiration and finding the most suitable location. It's not written in a simple form but it's extremely easy to understand which is such a good thing to find because the confidence you build from something like this makes you so much more experimental as a photographer.

Tips on lighting are also provided to help you make the best of your shoot along with Jade's own tips on how to tackle any tricky aspects that are often difficult to control. 
  

Throughout the book, nearly on every page there are a selection of images taken by Jade which show the techniques she has described in the paragraphs before in use. Again, that's a really useful thing to include because if you were nervous about trying these tips out for the first time you have something you can use as a reference to see if you're getting the technique right. Then again how could a photography book not include photographs!

The book is almost set out in chronological order, taking you through the preparation for the shoot, the shoot itself, and finally the editing of the final images. This book provides a really simple step-by-step guide on how to edit your images properly making sure they are beautifully enhanced without looking too creamy and overdone. 

Editing using programmes like photoshop can be daunting because there are so many options and buttons you can click to alter the appearance of your image. Thankfully Jade's book offers an easy to understand set of instructions you can use to do things like: cover up model's blemishes, remove any skin imperfections and remove any stray hairs form the shot. 

The book is relatively new and is available form a whole host of retailers. However, I found it cheapest at amazon.com for just £9.59. If you haven't guessed by now I would definitely recommend it!

As always thanks for reading!

Happy Mother's Day...Sort of | Photography

Along with a couple of presents for mother's day, I bought my mum a huge bunch of roses. Although that seems nice, I did have an ulterior motive. I wanted to get away from the whole perfume bottle series I've been doing lately and photograph something a bit more simple. I also wanted an excuse to use the editing software, Picasa. I'm also planning on doing a review of the software soon because it's really amazing and free!

So I'm not going to keep you waiting here are my final images from my roses shoot!

As always thanks for reading!

 

Hugo is the BOSS, *Insert orange related pun here*...

It's been a slow week for me but on the bright side I've managed to become more productive and I've also thought up several post ideas that I'm really excited about so I'm pretty much set for the next few months!

Continuing and finishing my recent collection of perfume bottle still life photography is this little shoot featuring the Hugo Boss 'BOSS Orange' fragrance for women. I really liked the shape of the bottle and thought it would be an interesting thing to photograph. As well as this I think it's the night version and so the glass becomes increasingly more saturated with colour the further down the bottle which really appealed to me. 

As opposed to my previous perfume bottle shoots, this one is in colour. I felt that because of the colour of the glass it would be a shame to make these images black and white. I decided to make the theme of the shoot 'orange' surprisingly because the name of the perfume is 'BOSS Orange'. That's just the kind of creative nut I am!

The editing was also really simple, I raised the brightness & contrast levels slightly to bring out the strength in the colour. Enjoy!

 And as always my favourite image from the shoot appears last.

Thanks for reading, viewing or even clicking on the page by accident!

Tommy, Calvin and Little Angel | Photography

Hi everyone!

Now I'm not sure if any of the people who read my blog posts actually go on to reading more of my posts but if you do then you'll know that last week I posted some of my photography featuring a Tommy Hilfiger perfume bottle. Since then it's been bugging me that you can see the wick of the perfume bottle in the image (you know, the plastic tube-like thing that is used to pump the perfume up & out of the bottle, yeah you know). Well because of this I thought it would be a good idea to do another shoot of the bottle this time without that pesky wick. However, in order to stop me from looking like I have a touch of OCD, I decided to collect a couple more perfume bottles to shoot aswell. Enjoy!

Here are the final images from the Tommy re-shoot!

 

 

To make sure the lettering really stands out, all I did was darkened the blue tones of the image (because the lettering is blue) after selecting the 'Black and White' editing tool on photoshop.

It's Calvin's turn!

 Escape is a fairly classic Calvin Klein fragrance that has a really calming, yellow colour which I originally wanted to keep in the images. Sadly the silver coloured lid reflected all the colours from behind me including the red from the tshirt I was wearing! This meant the images wouldn't have been very good so I decided to make them into black & white images and add a tint to them as well. The tint was added with only 9% saturation, this means you get a subtle hint at the colour without it being overpowering and you also get an antique feeling. I chose the yellow/sepia colour to almost mimic the yellow of the perfume I liked in the first place.

Finally we come to the last perfume bottle from this shoot and it's the infamous 'Angel' by Thierry Mugler. The bottle I used in this shoot was a sample size one hence the name of the shoot being 'Little Angel'. I know I'm so creative...

I loved the shape of the lid from the Angel bottle so decided it should feature in the shoot. As well as this the shape of the bottle reminded me slightly as broken glass which is why I thought it would be a nice idea to feature it in the background. I have done this a few times before though so I think I'm going to have to give the glass a rest!

I've got a few really good blog posts planned for the next few weeks which I'm pretty excited about but until then this is it from me this week. As always thanks so much for reading!