Planking For Really Fun Photos

PLANKING!!

Don't know what that is? Just google it.

When I first heard about this idle craze, I knew I had to be a part of it.  So today I helped to organized possibly one of the biggest group planks in Jamaica!  I was on a commercial shoot with Mike Robinson from M Squared creative studio, who is a member of the Planking Society. Yes, there's an actual organization dedicated to this.

Mike mentioned his love for planking, and I've always wanted to try but got too busy. But leave it to Mike to find opportunity on our tight schedule.

Of course It had to be done bigger and so the suggestion was made that instead of doing the usual one man-one woman plank, to do a mass plank.  We got everyone involved from the Makeup artist to photo assist, producer, talent, art dept and client.  Turns out they were just as excited as Mike and I were.

And we took Planking to the streets!

Check it out!  One of the actual photos you are viewing made it to Planking Society.

And this is a cool way to make photography fun.  Enjoy the photos guys.

first ever 8 person 4 car 1 ladder coordinated group plank 

Shooting for the heck of it!

So, recently I thought about the references I used to develop my knowledge and ability as a photographer, and there was this constant thought about why they are as good as they are. The most obvious answer is that these artists are all very talented and most dictionaries define talent as an innate ability, aptitude, or faculty to do. Nevertheless after that thought soaked in I realized that there are a lot of talented people around us, but very few are successful. So why is it that your innate ability to be good at something does not secure success? The answer boils down to constant practice. If you want to be a surgeon, pilot, engineer etc then you, without fail, must practice and it is no different if you want to be a photographer.

'Practice without fail'


It is said by so many that you are defined by what you do and its obvious why that is so, if you are a photographer then you should take photographs, edit and research in order to  develop your work beyond the stage it already is. 


Below are works from four of the artist that I reference for my work:


From left to right 
Hieronymus Bosch, Joel Peter Witkin, miles Aldridge and Matthew Barney.
There  works are pretty visually compelling and loaded with content. I think that this may be beneficial to some readers, so feel free to to research there works and share your thoughts in the comment section below.





In order for me to develop my photography I have begun a process off shooting every week for a publication or just for print.  These shoots are unrelated to the monitory part of my Marvin Bartley Photography, and is in a bid to develop new lighting tricks, concepts, and so on. Just me shooting for the heck of it. 


Below are images done while just test shooting two friends of mine, Sam and Sam. 
Sam the Teacher and Sam the Makeup Artist. I think they did pretty well. 


What do you think? 

   

     Makeup and Styling: Dexter Pottinger

     Model: Samantha Newby

       Makeup & Model:  Samantha Sergeant

Another Cell Phone Photography

Hi Everyone

I know it's been a while since I posted anything. Nevertheless, I'm back!

This post is a follow up to the last on a shoot with an iPhone. I wanted to do a photoshoot to test the idea that a camera is as good as its user, by using a cell phone camera. I thought about using the iPhone 4, but that would be easy advantage since the phone boasts having one of the best cameras for a mobile device. So I decided to go with the HTC HD2 mobile phone instead.

I also scaled down to one light source with a soft box just to keep the setup as basic and easy to do for most peeps. The next step was to get my models. Just as easy as it was to get a camera (cell phone cam) from my friend Camilla, it was just the same to get my models. The aim of the game was to keep it simple.

I asked Chevonese and Dexter who happened to be around to just let me shoot them with the cellphone cam, with no makeup or styling; just plain old clothes.

So, equipped with my camera, my models, and my one light, I got cracking.

In case you are willing to try using your phone or a cheap cam to do a shoot you need to know some of the dufficulties you will face and how to correct these problems.


Images tend to be blurry and or soft:
Secure your phone to a tripod by tape or velcro. This doesn't elliminate motion blurr from moving subjects so have your model be as still as possible. Also, be prepared to do some post process sharpening

Colours and tone may be inconsistent: 
Be prepared to do some editing to colour correct the images, if that matters to you. In relation to the images below I desaturated them a bit to gain more controll over the inconsistent colours I got from the camera.

Images may be noisy (grainy photograph) and suffer from chromatic abberation (the green and purple lines in the edge of subjects):
Post processing may help to lessen this problem, and for some people this may not be a problem at all. Lessen the colour in the image and add some blur in photoshop or whatever editing software you use.


Below are the images I did with the HTC HD2 hope you find them exciting and inspiring to go create your own images with the best camera you have, i.e, the one that's with you (Chase Jarvis).