We got some amazing shots…but I was also able to shoot a little bit of fun behind-the-scenes video. My new Konova K5 slider came in the mail, so this was the first opportunity I had to really use it. I’m pretty impressed with the quality of the shots I was able to get. Let me know your thoughts. :)

This past month, as many of you probably already know, I photographed several bikini contests for all of the Hooters restaurants in Southern California. At one particular contest, I got to the restaurant early, set up my equipment, and was sitting down to a little bit of editing and dinner before the contest started. A gentleman who had watched me set up decided to come over for a little bit of conversation. He was a photographer as well; and he started to talk about how anyone could be a photographer these days. He also went on to say how Photoshop makes him a better photographer. He said, “It doesn’t really matter if you take a bad picture or not…you can always fix it in Photoshop.”

I let him talk for a few minutes before I said anything… he went on to say how cameras are so good these days that even if you take a bad photo, you can still make it look good in Photoshop and he admitted that oftentimes he really didn’t care how good the pictures were coming out because he knew he could fix them later.

I’m about to tell you what I told him… I’m not really sure about you, but I’m pretty damn lazy. I don’t like doing more work than I have to. If you have ever seen me on a photo shoot, I’m usually sitting on my ass. Well, not really…but sometimes.

Fact of the matter is if you get something done right the first time, you don’t need to go back and fix it. This is why I strive to get it done right in the camera the first time. That means making sure my lighting is set up correctly. Making sure everything is metered and color corrected. Making sure my camera has the proper settings activated. Basics.

I feel like a lot of times, photographers use Photoshop as a crutch. All of the things you can do in Photoshop are pretty snazzy… and they just keep getting better. Technology is awesome. But we shouldn’t have to depend on it to be a good photographer. You should just BE a good photographer to begin with. And if you know what you’re doing and put forth a little bit of work at the onset, your pictures will be all that much better when you bring them into Photoshop.

Listening to that man talk, I couldn’t help but wonder what his photos looked like. I wonder what he sees when he looks in the back of his camera. More often than not, people are amazed at how good the photos look as they are flipping through them on the back of the camera; pre-Photoshop. Oftentimes, photos don’t even NEED to be retouched. Sometimes people say, “you have an awesome camera.”

lol.

I’m sure a lot of you photographers have gotten that before. Yes, my camera is nice…But it’s not the camera. The fact that I know what I’m doing. :)

And that’s the goal: making your photos look good from the start. Know what you’re doing. And put forth the time and effort to get it right the first time.

Here’s a little video I shot at the beach a while back on what I do to get prepared for a beach shoot, weather-wise.

Here are some links to some of the things I mentioned:

• Oakley Surf Report
• The Weather Channel
• Surfline.com

The fact of the matter is even though photography and modeling is fun, it is still work. A lot of people don’t understand this concept… a job can be fun, but it is still a job. Step in my shoes for just one day and you’ll see just how much work it can be. Don’t get me wrong, hanging around beautiful people all day is enjoyable…but if you’re serious about what you’re doing, then it can be hard work. And people should be paid for hard work.

So the question still remains, “how much should I charge?” The basic answer is that it varies from job to job and a lot of factors come into play. The one constant between everybody is time: how much is your time worth? When you begin to start throwing other variables into the equation, is where it gets interesting. Several factors such as the various products you provide as well as how much skill and experience you have compared to others in your field are all factors in determining how much you should charge.

I stumbled upon this video on the F-stoppers website and thought they did an excellent job at breaking down the various factors in calculating your rate. I also like how it can be applied not only to photographers, but to anybody trying to figure out their rates… including models, for that matter.

Spend a few minutes and check out this video. If you want to get some basics on the business of photography, you’ll be glad you did.

• F-Stoppers.com | A Photographer’s Guide To Pricing Your Work And Services

A few weeks ago, I was shooting with my homie, Monica Renée. About halfway through the shoot, I started to get bored. I say that in a good way, of course… Monica is amazing to work with and I knew we were getting awesome shots… it’s just that I felt like trying something new. I was inspired.

Most the time, when I shoot on the beach, I use a combination of artificial light and natural light. I use the natural light as a secondary light source, positioning it as a rim light. I use my strobe as the main, or “key” light, positioning that in front of the model. However, those of you who shoot with natural light know about the “golden hour” and how the sun is in a sweet spot around that time. The light is soft and warm…but, it’s also low enough to the horizon to act as a main light source and not create any funky shadows.

On this particular day, I flipped Monica around, shooting towards the shore and away from the water, using the sun as the key light. To add a little “something special” to the shot, I added a little artificial rim light. I placed my strobe directly behind and to the left of Monica; the strobe was modified with a diffused beauty dish. To add a little bit of “warmth”, to the strobe I added a yellow gel directly to the middle of the beauty dish. The effect was subtle…but I think we got some pretty awesome shots. Here’s the diagram:

And here are some shots of surfer girl, Monica, using this lighting setup…

I always encourage people to try and see things a different way and to not be afraid to try new things. And when I say “people,” that includes me as well. :)

He’s been playing around more and more with artificial light…and I remember when I first dabbled with off camera flash and strobes. I remember it being overwhelming; even though I had a pretty good grasp of lighting of the natural variety, a lot of things went over my head. What sort of lights do I use. Where do I put them? How far away do I position them from the model? How many lights do I use. How do I trigger them? What are modifiers?

The fact of the matter is a lot of these questions will never be answered definitively. There are so many different combinations and possibilities that there is no one right answer.

Anyway, my cousin started telling me he heard about this thing called “the Triangle.” He was told it was a pretty basic lighting set up and that he should learn it.

It’s true, in glamour photography, there is a staple. A go-to lighting scenario, if you will. It’s no secret: you see it everywhere in glam mags…and the best glam photographers use this set up in different variations…but it’s essentially the same. This is what I believe the Triangle is, in its basic form…

The idea is to sandwich your model between two light sources by placing your lights opposite of each other. For instance, imagine a box and your model is standing in the middle of the box. You position your lights across from each other like so…

And if you happen to be using one light and the sun, you would position your model so that the sunlight hits the back/side of the model at a 45 degree angle…and then you would position your key light diagonal from the sun.

The other day, I had a fun beach photo shoot and here’s a perfect example of the Triangle light set up…

During this location shoot, I used two lights: my key light was a strobe into a diffused white beauty dish on a boom arm, and my accent/rim lights were the sun to the left of the model and a strobe to the right of the model into a bare reflector.

I find that accent/rim lights add a little something special to an otherwise boring/ordinary photo. They key is using rim lights correctly. But, I’ll save that for another blog post when I share some of my photographic pet peeves. :)

Sophie is a Hooters girl from Hooters of Mission Valley… And we got the chance to shoot last May at the beach. Seriously, I totally lag!

She has a real girl next door look about her… Not to mention, she’s a total sweetheart! The weather was a little gray and cloudy, which is typical for here in San Diego, but we got some awesome shots regardless. Hope you enjoy!

First, let me just say that I haven’t had the best luck with Vegas over the years…it seems that every time I plan on going out, I get sick. And not just mildly not feeling well, but really really sick. But, I came out anyway since I thought it would be fun…and it was, despite the fact that I was feeling under the weather.

Any who…so I hooked up with Terah, a local model from Vegas…and she came out for an evening shoot in the suite. She was a blast to work with…and even though the shoot wore me out, we got some amazing shots. Here are a few…

I always get myself into trouble because when I do actually get into these spring cleaning moods, I start finding old pictures, CDs, letters, and a bunch of other stuff and before you know it I’m doing a little more reminiscing and a lot less cleaning. It’s not a rare sight to see me reading old letters while sitting in the middle of a pile of crap. :)

Well, I was over at Ennis’s place today and he came across some old behind the scenes footage we had shot while shooting our homie Candace…almost TWO years ago! It was the first time we had shot with Candace…and we got some pretty sexy sunset shots together (click here to see the shots).

But I threw this video together from the footage we found…hope you like. :)

Photo shoot with Candace from Aaron Riveroll on Vimeo.

So Angelica came down to LA for a spell last year for some gogo-ing and such…and she hit me up for a shoot. We ended up shooting on a very HOT afternoon in Laguna Beach. But let me tell you, the conditions could not have been more perfect.

We played around with some cool outfit sets she brought…did a little natural light stuff as well as some with the strobe. most of these shots were taken with one light or just the sun…but the last few actually used two lights; one key light and another unmodified strobe just to the right of the model (left of me). I’ll have to share more shots later…but these were taken towards the end of our shoot.

I was starting to get a little burned out with beach shoots and I was excited about how this shoot turned out. I got to play around with different techniques as well as adding different/more lights to the mix. I really dug the results…especially since I know you gotta change things up sometimes to keep things interesting. :)

We finished off with some killer sunset shots…the sky was off the hook that day. Several people, including one lady who lived in the area, were down there as well – right next to me, as a matter of fact – taking pictures of the sky one way or another.

But these are definitely some of my favorite and sexiest beach shots I have done…everything worked out great…I hope you enjoy.

Check out Angelica on Twitter too. :)