TESTED: BRON LITEPIPE • PHILIPS 40-INCH MONITOR • SAMSUNG SSD
CLASSICAL LOOK HOW THEATRE AND ART INSPIRED CHRIS KNIGHT’S PORTRAITS
ISSUE 139 £4.75
MOVING ON UP How to take your business upmarket
101 MEGAPIXELS!
PHASE ONE XF
Aside from big resolution what does the £43k Trichromatic give you?
Warm to winter
WEDDINGS PRO LABS: HOW TO MAKE THE RIGHT CHOICE
Insider advice that will help you come to the correct decision PP139_001 (COVER FINAL1) rp.indd 1
WORLD’S SMALLEST STUDIO LIGHT TRIED & TESTED Don’t miss our illuminating review of Profoto’s tiddly A1
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AN AVALANCHE OF IDEAS TO HELP YOU SHOOT SEASONAL CEREMONIES
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© Brent Stirton
WE LCOM E /CONT E NTS
Welcome
© Vernon Wiley
OUT OF ALL THE ANNUAL COMPETITIONS, THE ONE I ALWAYS look forward to seeing the most is the Wildlife Photographer of the Year (WPOTY). I never fail to be impressed by the winning image, which is normally as technically stunning as it is visually mind-boggling. So imagine my disappointment when I saw this year’s winning shot by Brent Stirton. His graphic shot; a black rhino with its horns hacked off by poachers (above) is undoubtedly a strong image, but for me it signals the competition following the lead of so many others before it in insisting that a successful image is beyond a simple celebration of outstanding photographic skill. Naturally, there are plenty of other images in the competition that depict photographic dedication and I’m not for one moment suggesting that Stirton doesn’t possess all these abilities, nor am I questioning his skills as a photographer. My beef is more with the judging panel – both of WPOTY and other major competitions – who seem to feel a need to push a political or ethical agenda through its choice of a winning shot. The World Press Photo Awards? Yes, absolutely. The Environmental Photographer of the Year? Undoubtedly. But the Wildlife Photographer of the Year? Personally, I don’t think so. Most photography awards should just be about rewarding photographic brilliance, nothing more, nothing less. Enjoy the issue.
ROGER PAYNE | EDITORIAL DIRECTOR rogerpayne@bright-publishing.com @RogPayne
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Issue #139 8
INTERVIEW: JB & DeETTE SALLEE
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WHY CHOOSE A PRO LAB
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LIGHTING SECRETS
26
WINTER WONDERLAND
33
BLOG FOR VICTORY
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PHASE ONE TRICHROMATIC
45
BRONCOLOR LITEPIPE
49
PROFOTO A1
52
MINI TESTS
57
SHOOT LESS, EARN MORE
63
ASK THE EXPERTS
66
THE SELECTOR
Meet the husband and wife team on a mission to change the world of wedding photography
The low-down on selecting the right lab to produce your work
Chris Knight talks us through the lighting set-ups behind three of his trademark theatrical portraits
Pull on your snowboots and gloves as we head to Poland to capture a white wedding – in the purest sense!
Why a lively and engaging blog will land you more clients and more work
Aside from the headline grabbing resolution – 101 megapixels! – what does Phase One’s latest offer working pros?
Will you be clearing out your modifiers to make way for bron’s latest bit of kit?
Let’s find out if this tiddly light is as impressive as it is small
Hands-on reviews of a huge Philips monitor and a tiny Samsung hard drive
Insider advice on charging big bucks for your wedding photography
The ins and outs of copyright, backgrounds and IS/VR lens care
Photographers explain why they chose that particular frame
Subscribe to PROFESSIONAL PHOTO by Direct Debit and pay just £13 every six months See page 61 for more info on our special offer...
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I N T E RVI EW _TH E SAL L EES
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I NTERVIEW
THE SALLE E S
Sal le e army WORDS TERRY HOPE IMAGES JB & DEETTE SALLEE
Dallas-based husband and wife team JB and DeEtte Sallee are on a worldwide mission to share the story of how they grew their awardwinning wedding and portrait photography business
C
reating a successful photographic business from scratch is a serious back-breaker, as anyone who has ever attempted the feat will no doubt confirm. However, it’s doubly hard if you’re trying to do it all on your own, perhaps against a background of a partner who is wondering why it is that, since you turned professional, they never seem to see you anymore. For Dallas-based husband-and-wife team JB and DeEtte Sallee, the journey was made slightly easier by the fact that they took it on together. Having met at college, where JB was DeEtte’s freshman orientator, the pair have been inseparable for the past 18 years, and they got their business off the ground through working 80-plus hour weeks for a full six years to get it established. “I majored and minored in photography,” says JB, “and DeEtte majored in psychology and minored in photography. IMAGES: Left: “The bride and groom wanted something spectacular to hang up in their house from the wedding; together we created this”
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While I was at college I was a black & white lab instructor for three years, hence my love for helping others to find their passion and to learn how to be a better professional photographer. Ultimately, there is no easy way to start up a business and I would never have considered starting out on this career if I hadn’t had my wife working alongside me.” Three children down the line, the couple still work as a team and between them have now photographed around 400 weddings, sometimes individually, at other times together. “When we do cover weddings together we each shoot as though we are the only photographer there,” says JB. “We consider that the results are twice as good and the bride is always overwhelmed.” JB and DeEtte’s philosophy is to take an informal approach and, above all, to wear a happy face at all times. Both are keenly aware that they are covering an occasion that might be the most important day in their clients’ lives and they consider it an honour to be asked to take on the job. The relaxed feel they take into an assignment
is reflected in the imagery they achieve: there’s no question, for example, of guests smiling awkwardly into the camera for the group portraits that so many wedding photographers profess to hate. Rather, the pictures that result are full of life, energy and the sheer joy of the occasion, and frequently tap into offbeat props that happen to be at hand, such as a line-up of children’s swings or a brightly painted stretch of wall. Similarly, the shots of the bride and groom fully utilise the location that’s been chosen, whether that be bobbing boats on a Venetian mooring, the majestic lines of a high-class vintage car or a set of grand windows that have clearly been built to impress. JB and DeEtte also happen to be rather good at spotting unusual angles, whether that be looking straight up or directly down on their subjects, and they’ve even been known to employ a touch of the jokey surreal, asking a bride and groom to pose with lampshades over their heads…
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L IGHTING _S E C RE TS
Li gh t i ng se c rets reve ale d WORDS KINGSLEY SINGLETON IMAGES CHRIS KNIGHT
“I
grew up in theatre,” Chris Knight tells us of his background “and old paintings are definitely a huge source of visual inspiration for me. I love the Baroque period probably the most – Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Vermeer – they just do it for me.” Clunk. That’s the sound of a penny dropping. Not that you didn’t already know right where Chris is coming from; his style is distinctive. It’s right there in the frame. So, how important is a distinctive lighting style in being successful, does he think? After all, he has a look that’s propelled his images into magazines like Vogue and GQ, and on screen with MSNBC and ABC. He’s also an instructor at the Pratt Institute and the New York Film
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Academy, and this year published a book, the aptly titled The Dramatic Portrait: The Art of Crafting Light and Shadow (Rocky Nook, £27.50). “I don’t think a strong personal style is the be-all and end-all of success,” he says, “rather that success can follow the development of a strong personal style. That’s to say, the strongest work is driven by a purer sense of intentions. Pros shouldn’t create work because they think it’ll be stylistically successful, but instead produce work that’s their own. If that speaks to others, you’ll be sought out because of what you bring to the table.” Pure portraiture wasn’t always Chris’s thing though. Starting out he wanted to be a film director, and then saw a
path in fashion photography, though at the latter he says he was “competent at best”. Over time, he realised his interest wasn’t so much in clothing or poses as it was faces and expressions: “It took a while, but I finally realised that portraiture was what I was interested in all along. But I learned a lot of lighting styles and skills that I can incorporate into what I’m doing now.” So, what can we expect from his book? “It’s designed to help develop portrait skills, especially when shots are thematic or concept driven. But it’s about the whole process: not just lighting, or retouching, or any one part. It’s how all the little pieces work together; all of the decisions that help you get to the goal.” See more of his work at chrisknightphoto.com.
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ONL IN E_ BL OG G I NG
Blog your way to
extra business WORDS TERRY HOPE
Reach out to clients, current and future, with a blog, but make sure it’s lively, readable and up to date. Here’s how BLOGS ARE NOTHING NEW. BY NOW, we should all be aware of how useful they can be in terms of promoting a business by reinforcing key brand values in a subtle and understated way, while providing more background on what a client can expect should they choose to book your services. Choosing a wedding photographer is a personal thing and brides and grooms want to be confident they are hiring someone that ‘gets’ who they are and who will fit right in on the big day, and so anything you can do to show them more of your personality will go down well. Not all blogs are created equal, however. Some undoubtedly do a much better job than others. For your own peace of mind, impartial feedback gives you an indication of how well you’re faring, and a site such as Feedspot ranks blogs by genre
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according to search and social metrics. All those we spoke to for this feature are in the site’s top 100 wedding blogs and websites, meaning that they’re some of the hottest sites in the world, and we set out to discover just what makes them so successful. SOCIALLY AWARE Mark Seymour is a long-time user of social media of all kinds, running a blog that he updates around three times a month, while he also posts images up on a regular basis to the likes of Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. “The various sites are great for enabling me to highlight some of my favourite individual photographs,” he says, “but my blog gives me the opportunity to show ‘an album’ and to share my wedding photography in the context of my couples’
unique stories. My fellow professional photographers respond to posts of images, but the blog goes further and creates a conversation with my potential clients.” Along with regular blog posts about the weddings he’s covered, which usually take the form of a selection of images and the story of the day, Mark also features news of events, projects he’s involved in and reviews of equipment. “It does take time to write, format and add the images,” he says, “but I get the blog actually written up quickly so that I can ensure it has all those special details from the couple and their day.” Each new blog post is then promoted across all of Mark’s social media posts to make sure that as many people as possible are aware that it’s up there. “I choose around 20 key images to tell the story of the day,” he says,
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