Charlie Buckitt – Wax & Bendiness

Posted on April 29, 2013 by Matt Christie Photo

It’s always fun to shoot with young Miss Buckitt; she’s full of creative ideas & very bendy, which is always a winning combination Plus she lives near me in East London so is handy.

The plan for this shoot was to shoot something involving wax, play around with gels ( I keep my place neutrally coloured so as to match what the model brings, but it’s nice to change things round), & to see just how close Charlie’s legs could get to her ears.

This shot involved melting candles directly onto Charlie’s chin (ouch!) It was her idea, I don’t generally go round inflicting pain on my models.

For the gel shots, I lit the room with a pink gel , & used two striplight soft boxes on Charlie, with egg crates over then to control the light spill. The overall effect seems strangely flamingo-like.

This was probably the bendiest of all shots. She doesn’t train or anything, she’s naturally this way.

Attempting to look all sweet & innocent. Almost pulling it off, the lack of clothes probably doesn’t help.

This is a shot from further back so you can get an idea of the lighting set-up.

And finally, this is George, who helps me set up the lights, & saves the model from having to stand there while I fiddle about trying to get the right effect.

Kayleigh Pearson – Sunset Shoot

Posted on April 10, 2013 by Matt Christie Photo

Here’s a glamour shoot from a while ago with Kayleigh Pearson out in Gran Canaria. Sunset is a magical time to shoot, but the window of opportunity to get the very best light is pretty small, so you have to work fast. The sun seems to set with alarming speed over there, & some days a little bit of cloud in the wrong place can leave you with no good light at all.

Also, there are a lot of environmental factors getting in the way. For a start, it’s really not at all warm, especially if, like here, you’re naked & wet throughout the shoot. Sand gets everywhere (this type of shoot is not kind to your camera!), hair & make-up get messed up, the current can be really strong which makes it hard to hold a pose, & occasional bigger waves can soak your model (or knock her over).

It’s also not the easiest thing to balance the right amount of flash with the rapidly-changing ambient light, so there’s quite a bit of fiddling involved.

All that said, it’s totally worth it & I love the photos we get. It’s great going for something to eat afterwards (we finished around 9.30) knowing you’ve done a good day’s work, then off to bed as you have to be up at 4am to get make-up done before the sunrise…

Shoot – Simona Ehmann

Posted on April 3, 2013 by Matt Christie Photo

I recently booked a hotel room for a couple of shoots; I spend the majority of my time shooting from my home studio so it’s always nice to get out & try glamourous new locations. Simona’s an outstanding model, some of my favourite fashion shots from my own work have been with her. With someone who really knows what they’re doing I can focus on the lighting, which is important as it’s kind of the point of the test.

The trick to getting great indoors shots is to balance the studio lights with the ambient light in the room. This can be difficult as studio flashes are far more powerful, even at their lowest setting, than a bedside lamp, To get round this, you can either use a slower shutter speed to let more light in, cover the flash with something to reduce its power, or, as I did here, just use the modelling lights. It’s not the most elegant solution of the three, but it does have the advantage of balancing the colours, as the lamp is much more orange than the flash, but the same colour as the modelling light.

The same technique was used here. Hotels are usually pretty good at lighting their best rooms, so I find it an advantage to capture the light as it’s meant to be seen.

For this shot I used ring flash. I’ve never been a fan of it, but it does look pretty cool with fashion models. For me it only really works when the model is right up against the background, as I don’t like the way it lights furniture (this is why I’m not keen on using it much).

As there’s no ambient lighting in this shot, I fired the flashes for a change. I’ve added some vignetting as it focusses the attention on Simona & breaks up the plain wall a little.

Finally, if there’s window light, I’ll always try and get a natural light shot. This room had a small window with hardly any light, so the best way to use it was to have her facing the window. I wanted to use the desk furniture, and by shooting from behind & into the mirror I managed to make the most of the natural light & also get the desk in. Shooting into mirrors brings its own problems, not least photos of me in the reflection, but this small mirror made it easy to fill the picture with the model so you don’t see too much of the room. Generally six inches out of shot lies a big pile of lights, camera bags, make-up artists, & various other messes, making it hard to find space for a shot without having to worry about what’s being relfected behind you as well!

Art Nude Shoot – Ember Retto

Posted on March 11, 2013 by Matt Christie Photo

I had a request on Model Mayhem from Ember, who wanted to shoot using gels. As it turned out, while she was looking through my portfolio, she recognised the church opposite my flat as her boyfriend lives there & she’d actually seen me shooting in the park. I’d seen flashes going off from that apartment & wondered if there was a studio. Small world.

It was quite a technical challenge balancing the light from the lamp behind, the gelled lights, & the lighting on Ember. This is George, who I use to get the lighting roughly right before bringing the model in.

Once I have the lighting roughly balanced, I’ll bring the model in & fiddle about some more. As Ember has a nicely toned body, I used striplights from the sides to accentuate the muscle tone (doesn’t work so well on George).

I think this type of lighting ideally suits nude, as the underwear breaks up the lines of the body.

Here’s a couple of behind the scenes shots to give you a idea of what I was trying with the lighting.

…and some other lighting options, including gels on Ember

Finally, just for fun I brought the glitterball in to see if I could get two completely different colours, which I managed, but I’m not sure if the results actually make a photo worth looking at!

& one of George to finish as I’m sure you’re bored of all those naked women. Well done to Ember as George can be quite a diva to pose with

Art Nude Shoot – Jessica Forth

Posted on January 8, 2013 by Matt Christie Photo

Jess is one of the most creative models I’ve worked with, which always makes for a great day’s shooting. It’s hard not to pick up the energy of the people around you, so if a model understands the process and is happy to be patient while you’re fiddling about trying to get a great photo, it really helps.

Things I learned from this shoot :-

1) Paying homage to great photos, then putting your own twist on it, helps you get something different (we used a Kate Moss pic with a spiky helmet)

2) Oiling a model up & spraying water on her makes the skin look great in photos. No I don’t need anyone to do it for me

3) Lens flare can look cool if used right.

Shoot – Ashlea Louise O’Mara

Posted on January 2, 2013 by Matt Christie Photo

Happy New Year! I hope that Santa was kind to you & that your plans for 2013 are going well. I’ve been beavering away over the festive period to start the year with a bang. It’s true enough that your life always starts today, & you don’t have to wait for a new year to make changes, but I do find that the combination of being relatively quiet (in December everyone’s saving up for Christmas, in early January everyone’s fat & poor after too much turkey!) & the year ending, gives me an excellent chance to take stock & look at where I want to be in a year’s time.

Anyway, one of my resolutions is to be more consistent with my blogging, so here’s the first of many. Ashlea was recommended to me by another model I’d shot, so I didn’t know too much about her before she arrived, so her spectacular legs were a very pleasant surprise I enjoy shooting tall girls, & find myself able to do more with them photographically, but it does present a side problem of them being too tall to fit on some of my furniture! Clearly I’m going to need a bigger house.

This is also the first shoot to feature this lovely chest of drawers & wardrobe. Make the most of them, I only have them for a short while!

Shoot – Scarlet Duggan

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Matt Christie Photo

I’m always interested in shooting edgy girls, & Scarlet was a great example of that. She has a great ability to convey a mood by looking away from the camera, & then when she does bring her eyes back to you, it’s really fierce.

My favourite of these are the ones in the lift. I had to use black & white, as the colours in the space around the lift are pretty bad (blue carpet, yellow walls!) but I think it helps with the mood of the shots, which is also why I’ve added some grain.

In all these shots bar the one in the window, Scarlet is lit with a 6 foot soft box. I’m using it more & more as it gives a really great light if you get it close enough (you can actually see it reflected in the mirror in one shot, it’s that close!)

Shoot – Emma J

Posted on July 25, 2012 by Matt Christie Photo

Here’s a shoot of the fabulously-tattooed Emma J. She keeps getting new ink so it’s always nice to shoot her again as there’s always something new to discover She also brought some fabulous rings from The Great Frog which made me very jealous, but they’re a bit out of my price range.

Model: Miss EmmaJ
Make-up & Hair: Lisa Harris
Accessories: The Great Frog London
Shot at my studio in Shadwell, London

Shoot – Ruby True

Posted on June 19, 2012 by Matt Christie Photo

I’m always keen to shoot alternative & fetish models as they bring something different from day to day glamour, Ruby being no exception.

We started off with some natural light shots. As this is what I do most, it’s ideal to have as a warm-up. There’s no setting up of lights & I know exactly where the light works so it’s a great way to get models relaxed before I do anything experimental.

When we moved into the studio, I did something I pretty much always do & forgot to change the camera settings over from natural light, resulting in a very bleached out image. I had a mess around with it in photoshop as I liked Ruby’s expression & ended up with this oil painting, which I really like.

This was what I was aiming for once I’d set my camera up properly! The fairly strong contrast seems to complement the outfit & gives the photo a hint of Marlene Dietrich.

With this shot I was trying to light the shoes to show that they, the bracelet & the tie have matching teeth, but as it turns out, the shots that showed that didn’t show Ruby off as well, so I chose this one & used another pose to showcase the outfit…

…this one.

Model: Ruby True
Make-Up: Tabitha Adams

Shoot – Becky Rule

Posted on June 6, 2012 by Matt Christie Photo

This shoot at The Hempel Hotel was the first time I met Becky, & we’ve become good friends since. She was a make-up artist before she started modelling, so now she’s coming to the end of her modelling days she does make-up on many of my shoots (not dressed like this). Her positive attitude & general bounciness mean we’re always in for a fun day when Becky’s in the house

As a large part of what I do is making the models relaxed & comfortable, it’s vital to have a make-up artist who I get on with, & who also puts the models at ease (& is also great at make-up!) With Becky having gone through all this for several years, her experience is really helpful to the models. Also, you need a certain amount of energy for a successful shoot so if the model’s a bit on the quiet side, Becky & I vibe off each other, which tends to wake the model up a bit

NB my other make-up artists are also great to get on with, they just haven’t posed like this for me so they don’t get a blog yet