Location shooting can be very difficult depending on where you end up but bringing a studio to a location like the design center is usually much easier than most.

1. The guys at the Boston Furniture Collaborative are kind enough to keep a roll of 12′ seamless hung in the 20′ wide hallway for me most of the time
2. When you flip the light switch all of the lights go out
3. I have more than 150′ to back up and finally,
4. There are ample wall sockets to plug into with easy breaker (and restroom) access.

The list may seem strange to some but, combined with a hard working assistant, these things make life a vacation for a photographer. There is one window to worry about when you have to burn in ambient light, like I did for this piece:

…but it never gets direct light and it comes from a narrow spot in the hall that can easily be blocked.

Even with all of these great advantages to the location, it is still not a studio and requires a bit more post production than I would like.

Here is the original. (I have already done the basic LR adjustments)

And this is just for a side by side comparison, before and after post process.

Before

After

There are more photos from the shoot but this piece required the most effort because of the lack of a controlled studio. For this shoot I was also without an assistant and this was a rather large, shiny piece of very expensive furniture. All said and done it was a great day and the images came out beautifully.

Some locations can result in what seems like an endless effort in photoshop. The design center is thankfully not one of them but as I was walking down the 150 feet of hallway to turn out the overhead lights for what seemed like the 150th time of the day due to my lack of an assistant I couldn’t help but think of studio space and how much easier a controlled environment is.

Once a year Mass art invites NESOP over to photograph there fashion students collections. It is pretty much a free for all on location most of the day. This year I got to go and I was looking forward to getting a few location shots to add to my portfolio. I wound up in this window all day and as a result will only be able to add one photo to my portfolio. There just isn’t enough variety otherwise.

That said, I figured I would post the rest here. The outfits were pretty impressive and the lighting was quite nice. As is is usually the case with NESOP photo shoots I got paired up for the day with Ariel.

Working with Ariel for the day was a lot of fun. For those of you that don’t know, Ariel is Aydon’s mom.

We had a great time putting the photographs together and the results are pretty good. Being a Boston photographer makes fashion photography pretty hard to get into but NYC might be in our future.

    After spending ten weeks with a few of Boston’s furniture makers my project has finally come together. I am in the process of putting together  a video presentation of the images and decided to post some of the detail shots in the interim. The overall story behind the images is that of two local woodworking shops. The spaces are shared by multiple craftsmen and are located in the Boston Design Center.

    The images that I have chosen to show are of the overall space and really depict the character of the atmosphere. On days when the lighting was not so hot in the Design Center, I did my best to mimic the usually incredible window light in the building.

    Sometimes the best photos are the ones that you didn’t plan for. This photo of a furniture maker welding steel is taken from behind a protective screen. I showed up that day to photograph woodworkers, but this is my favorite photo from the day.

    The shoot started out as a day at the Boston Design Center working with some of the furniture makers who run their studios out of the building. I am putting together a ten image photo essay for my editorial project at NESOP this term. The project centers around woodworkers building unique furniture in the Boston area. My point here is that I set out with a specific plan: To photograph woodworkers for a photo essay project. Having a plan is a great way to keep yourself on track, but you can’t be afraid to stray from your plan when something worthwhile comes along.

    This particular day I was on my way out of the building to go photograph in the shop next door (Fort Point Cabinet Makers) when I bumped into Jamie (Jamie Cumming, Loki Furniture) in the hall. When he saw me he told me that he was going to be doing some welding and asked if I would like to take some photos. Two thoughts popped into my head immediately:

1. I doubt I can use this for my project.
2. I bet these photos will be pretty cool.

    I love having this photo for my own portfolio, but it definitely doesn’t fit the criteria of the project that I originally set out to capture. I am still trying to think of a way to work it into the project effectively but even if I fail to do so, I am glad I took the time to shoot it.