My hot friend, Monica Renee, and her kick ass dude, Jason are a couple of THEE coolest people I’ve ever met. So, when they asked me to come up and do a shoot with J’s 69 Chevelle, how could I say no? I mean seriously…hot girl…sweet ride…automatically makes for some sweet photos. :)

So I headed up to Temecula for the shoot. Funny story…we had the cops called on us.

Now, it wouldn’t be an Aaron Riveroll photo shoot adventure if the cops didn’t show up…so we can definitely tuck this shoot under that category. But the cop (who was a lady) was a little confused as to why she was called since, after all, no laws were being broken. She gave us her blessing to continue our shoot…so we did.

“It’s not against the law to take pictures in your front yard in a bikini…” the cop informed us.

Tell us something we don’t know. :)

Monica even helped out by sharing,”My clothes have been on the whole time!”

The cop just sort of looked at us, not amused. :)

Anyway, it was fun…and we got some great car washing shots…but if you will notice, Monica got a tad bit wetter than the car did…actually, I don’t think we got even one drop on the car…

J’s uncle, Tim, was kind enough to let us shoot at his place…and he has the house and backyard decorated pretty sweetly…complete western theme, with tractors and a faux outhouse which he built himself. So we had to do some sexy western shots…

Anywho…for the nerds…did some standard glam lighting in these shots…

For instance, the ones of the car, I used the typical two-light deal…threw a third light with a blue gel under the car…used the 6 ft octa as the key light.

The western shots were pretty simple too…high key light angled down and then a light on the door of the outhouse, un-gridded.

Now, a lot of you know I’m a booty guy. I also am a brunette guy. However, sometimes brunettes are difficult to shoot in front of a dark backgrounds because their hair blends into the background. You need to have some separation otherwise it just looks funny. If you have the means and the gear, by all means use a hair light. Duh. But if you are a minimalist, or limited by your gear or circumstances, a tip is to rock your light up a little higher and angle it down. You still get coverage on the front of your subject…but you also get coverage on your model’s head, thus giving you a little separation between her hair and the dark background.

Enough said. Enjoy the shots…and hope everyone had a rockin’ and safe Halloween. :)

I’m not gonna lie…this foxy lady has quickly become one of my absolute favorite people…

Sol is super smart, sexy, sassy, curves that bring grown men to their knees….not to mention TOTALLY sweet and fun to work with.

We’ve done a couple shoots together…and each one has been an adventure…

For our first shoot, we decided to do a beach shoot…on what was probably the gloomiest and nastiest and most humid day ever. One of my strobes decided not to work…so I ended up busting out my 580 EX II for a little Strobist action…did a little natural light work…and we made some pretty pictures anyway…

Our second shoot was at my friend, Elisabeth’s…and right around the time my camera was having issues. :/ But we still got some amazing shots…

The bottom line is we’ve had some bad luck with weather, equipment, and all sorts of stuff…but we have still managed to get amazing shots. We are pros, what can I say?

Stay tuned…more sexyness coming soon in a few weeks.

Add Sol on Twitter if you are into that sort of thing. :)

She’s also on myspace…

I got to thinking about the things we can do to make our photo shoots a better experience for the models we work with…and it all boils down to one thing: stepping in their shoes for a bit and realizing what things are like on the other side of the lens.

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So lately, photographically speaking, I have had a boot fetish. I’m not gonna lie…boots are totally hot. So it doesn’t help when I see pictures of Audrina rocking a seriously sexy pair.

Damn, girl! :)

I enjoy watching House. Hugh Laurie is brilliantly sarcastic and calls people out on their stupidity…something I really wish I could do on a daily basis.

But sadly, I don’t watch House for Hugh. Sorry man. One of the reasons House is so enjoyable is the über sexy Olivia Wilde.

Exhibit A….

This is a shot from the most recent GQ Mag. I had no idea Olivia was so scandalous…or hot…but here she is. This shot caught my eye because of my recent fascination for models in shoes…and nothing else. Don’t ask me why, but it’s attention getting.

And I’m also really surprised that she models. Who knew? She’s done stuff for Maxim, FHM, and Abercrombie and Fitch. And in addition to her role on House as Thirteen, she’s been on the OC and the short-lived show Skin, whom I was a huge fan of before they yanked it off the air. On the big screen, she was in Alpha Dog and The Girl Next Door…again, two smaller movies which I really enjoyed.

So there you have it. Hotness. And you gotta love the shoes too. :)

While a popular technique for wedding and event photographers who shoot indoors using hot shoe flashes or speedlights, I gave this rather basic technique a try with bigger studio strobes.

Here’s a shot of Nikol bouncing the light off the ceiling of her home studio…

I also used the bounce flash technique with this shot of another Niki…

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Links:

• Chase Jarvis | Making Subtle Light

Honestly, I have been ridiculously bad at posting on this blog. I feel like I’ve been a horrible friend and neglected it. I blame it on Twitter.

So many times throughout the day, I have stupid things to say…or I just think of ridiculousness that I have to share with someone. Usually, I’m not with anyone…so the responsibility of listening to my ridiculousness falls to the poor souls that follow me on Twitter.

Before, I would think of a few ridiculous somethings and just make a blog post about it. However, Twitter makes it way too easy to share. What can I say, I’m weak!

So, anyway, the point of this blog post is two-fold. For one, it’s an apology and a public announcement of my goal to be a better blogger. And two…

…an invitation to follow me on Twitter.

:)

Twitter.com/aaronriveroll