An insight into how my shots were taken regarding the elements of wardrobe, hair and make-up, lighting, mise-en-scene, camera positioning and setting.

1. 18/02/16
Photo-Shoot

2. Shot List
• Front Cover Shot (Gabbie’s attic, full body, Polly holding LP)
• LP Shot (studio shot, close up Polly)
• Contents Page Shot (Gabbie’s attic, Gabbie lying on the floor)
• Double Page Spread (Studio Shot, Jacob looking at records)
• Double Page Spread (G.Attic, Polly smoking)

3. Wardrobe, Hair and Makeup
Polly: Pale complexion; golden smokey eye;
thin, winged, black eyeliner; light bronzer
to bring out cheek bones, deep red
lipstick.
Dark clothing, dungarees, stripy top,
yellow jumper, red dress.
Straight hair, Space buns.
Gabbie: Natural makeup, not covering
freckles, mascara to lengthen & darken
lashes and eyebrows filled in.
Dark clothing, Band t-shirt.
Hair down, loose waves.
Jacob: Natural face.
White t-shirt, black jacket, black jeans,
glasses.
Messy hair, gelled.

4. Front Cover Shot
I set up the shot by positioning the Arri on the left hand side
of the camera and the soft box, turned upwards on the
right of the camera. This set up allowed me to light Polly
in the foreground, whilst keeping the background in
shadow. Furthermore, to highlight the symbol in the
background, I placed a golden reflector opposite the Arri
to reflect some of the light back onto the symbol and
add another point of focus in the background of my
image. This gives the photo depth.
To increase this effect, helped blur the background out by
using a smoke machine to obscure the clarity.
The green square that Polly is holding works as a green
screen in which I can comp in the LP album cover with
her face on. This way I can match up the shoulders to fit
perfectly to create a effective illusion.
Additionally, I closed the blinds to prevent natural light
entering the shot. This helps give the image an
‘underground’ feeling and helps create a stronger
contrast in lighting.
I used Gabbie's attic for this image as it has a great brick
wallpaper background which adds to the grungy,
alternative style of my magazine.

5. LP Shot
I wanted this image to be striking, yet soft and
beautiful. I achieved this by only using the soft box
with flash and Arri filling to soften Polly’s features,
whilst still getting a well exposed image.
Due to the fact that the duration of electronic flash is very brief,
it’s important to adjust a DSLR’s shutter speed so that the
shutter is fully opened and all areas of the frame are open
simultaneously. To ensure this, I set my shutter speed to
200. Any lower and the image would be overexposed,
however any higher and the shutter would not have fully
opened, leaving a black unexposed band at the top or
bottom of the image.
Nevertheless, I used the 125mm macro lens so that I
could get a short depth of focus. This allowed me
to get Polly’s eyes in sharp focus, whereas her
hair and neck were out of focus. This brings out
her eyes and gives the image more depth, making
it more detailed and interesting to view.

6. Contents Page Shot
This was a tricky shot to take as it’s looking down on the
subject. To achieve this shot, I adjusted the legs on the
camera’s tripod so that the front two were as short as
possible, whereas the back leg was extended to it’s
longest length (and weighed down so that the camera
didn’t fall directly onto the model’s face).
I lit this shot mostly by placing the soft box on the left to make
sure her features remained soft and flattering.
Nevertheless, I also used the Arri by facing it away from
Gabbie’s face and simply reflecting it back towards her
with the golden reflector. This brought out the golden hues
in her ginger hair and also helped to add colour to her skin
tone.
I used a basic 25-75mm on this shot as it gave me a good
range of zoom to play about with.
I put Gabbie in a Pixies T-shirt, adding to the mise-en-scene to
create a consistent theme to the magazine.

7. Double Page Spread (Jacob)
This was probably my easiest shot to take. Although, I did play
about with the framing of the image quite a bit. I had
planned to simply take a landscape shot, which worked
fine, using the same standard lens as I used for my
contents page and a basic light setup of the Arri, soft-box
and natural light.
On the other hand, I tried taking this image in a panorama
format to produce an unusual portrait shot. I used my
125mm Macro lens to take multiple close up shots of
Jacob, which I then stitched together to create an image
with a very short depth of focus.
Natural light

8. Double Page Spread (Polly)
This was the most simple, yet potentially the hardest shot I
challenged myself in taking. I used the Arri (shining
horizontally from the top right hand corner of the view
finder) to back light Polly. Furthermore, to ensure that
the smoke was visible and in focus, as well as her face
(but keeping the heavily back lit appearance) I only
used fill-in to light up Polly’s face. It was extremely
difficult to get the exposure and aperture correct in this
shot as I haven’t taken an image like it before.
Nevertheless, once I had exposed for the fill-in, I was
left with a product to be happy with.
I dressed Polly in a red dress, to match her red lipstick. This
red, against the white smoke and black background,
keeps the magazine’s colour scheme consistent. This
consistency gives the magazine a uniform appearance,
letting the reader know that they are reading ‘EDGE’
throughout.
Additionally, to make sure my background was dark enough
to recreate the look of a stage, I used a black screen to
absorb any light.
Trying to get the exposure correct…