Before & After with Matteo Lomonte

As we all know, often photography is more about problem-solving than anything else - transforming difficult, challenging circumstances and conditions into something compelling or beautiful or true. And this image is a perfect example of this process. Matteo took those proverbial lemons and made some delicious lemonade.

No doubt.

Matteo. You. Go!

I was born in 1983 in a wonderful town in South East Italy. Puglia. I took my first picture in 2011, at the beginning to escape from reality. Later, when I turned my camera to people, I've felt the necessity because it was like talk about me, through their emotions. Straightaway I decided to tell and talk about people on their most important day, and so I moved myself to the Wedding Photography. 

I love to travel, to discover, and say something new in every occasion, that's why I do weddings, not only in my region, but also in Italy and Europe, and soon in other continents, I hope.

By what artists/creatives are you influenced? What inspires you?

I don't know if  "inspire" is the right verb, I like a lots of photographer, but I think that taken a bit from everyone is my way to learn, even those who have a totally different way of working compared with me.

Do you have a vision in mind before going out and shooting? Tell us about about what gear you uses and your workflow, how you crafted the image, both on set and in post.

Almost never do I have an image before working. I like to feel energies and emotions and myself fully inhabit the place where I'm going to take pictures. But, if I already know some details, I start to visualize images in my mind.

My workflow has nothing special. I realize the pictures while I'm shooting, knowing what I want for later. I use lightroom for a post production - very simple and I use personalized preset films.

Now tell us how this amazing image came together, from conception to completion.

This image has shown up for necessity. We were in front of the Colosseum at 5 o'clock pm, full of tourists, full of advertising stands and other disturbing objects. I only wanted a photo with the couple and the Colosseum. Soon I  thought of a kind of reflection to eliminate the part below and to be honest I did a great job, but it wasn't enough. I was looking for more, and after that the photo popped up in my mind. As you can see from the RAW files that I've sent, at the end I only did a colour correction, contrast, and a light crop.

The final picture was what I wanted, without knowing it.

Mouse over the image for that sweet B&A magic!

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Blogged by Seth Langner, Jacksonville, FL wedding and portrait photographer. http://www.karmathartic.com/

Before & After with Jack Chauvel

WHHHAAAT!? This image is amazing. We needed to know more. To wit:

Jack. You. Go!

I am a Wedding Photographer based in Sydney, Australia. I started shooting landscapes about 6 years ago, and though friends and chance I fell into weddings and haven't looked back. I love traveling for weddings, but have fallen head over heels for country weddings (especially in different parts of Australia). I still shoot a lot of film and always have personal projects on the go as I don't think you ever stop learning and I very much enjoy bringing new things into the way I capture weddings. I also have an archiving business called The Archive Lab which looks at preserving historical film, prints, slides for future generations as well as developing/scanning film. I also co-founded an editing company last year called Plus Minus Collective to help photographers improve workflow and it is a subject I am very passionate about (I was a Project Manager in a former life)

By what artists/creatives are you influenced? What inspires you?

I love to network and meet people and through this I find most of my inspiration surrounding me. I connect with and find inspiration from artists who put a lot of their personality into their work and this is something I have always aspired to do. So a lot of inspiration is taken from within the circle of friends I have made over the years. Being able to talk with someone, learn more about them and then see how their personality shapes their work is very inspirational for me. If I had to put some names out there it would be Len from I Love Wednesdays, Aaron DuRall, Chris O'Dell, Taylor McCutchan, Dylan Howell and an awesome landscape photographer named Alex Burke.

As for other mediums.. I appreciate design and architecture but photography really captures all of my attention. It started with photographers like Gregory Crewdson and finding people like Patrick Joust through the wonders of the internet. I love all genres and am inspired by what people can see or how they can come up with a photograph from their imagination.

Do you have a vision in mind before going out and shooting? Tell us about about what gear you uses and your workflow, how you crafted the image, both on set and in post.

I generally approach my shoots with the idea idea of making the most of the location/situation and seeing how the conditions suit. I often visit landscape locations multiple times in different conditions to explore, scout and try out different compositions. For weddings I will scout locations beforehand (where possible) and in my head put together the frames I like the most and hope we get to try them all. Ultimately the conditions of what/where you are shooting will shape the end result. I think this is what keeps photography fresh for me, and especially helps me avoid getting caught up in the 'volume' that is photography nowadays. If I am shooting somewhere, I am shooting it for me and I am enjoying that moment in time. I find a lot of peace in going out and shooting and enjoying the unique scenes unfolding in front of me. They will always be mine and mine alone, because it is how I see it and how I capture it.

I take this approach to weddings as well, sometimes you have new locations but often you get ones you may have been in before. The people are always unique, they are always doing things their way and the locations are forever changing and different. My vision and goal is to create something unique to them, and the way the day was.

I shoot Canon 5D3's for most of my work, with mostly Sigma Art glass and a few L lenses in there for good measure. Film wise.. I have pretty much every format, but love shooting medium format, specifically 6x7 on my Makina 67 or 6x17 on my Fuji G617. I really love using natural light in my photographs as it emits a lot of warmth and captures the scene as it was. I have spent a long time learning how to shoot and manipulate it to my advantage. Having said that, I am all about image quality so I’ll bring in my own light as required. Flashes, LED panels or torches.. whatever helps get the job done or create the look that I am after.

My workflow always starts with setting the scene, so finding the framing I want to use for the landscape/scene and then working the other variables around this. I might frame something for the lines, perspective or how the light is currently falling. After the framing then ill prepare a variety of shoots that help achieve the look I want. It might be long exposures for the scene and and shorter exposures for the people. It is a rolling variable that I will take into consideration so I don't look back and wish I had done more at the time. However sometimes everything just comes together with a single frame. I really love the challenge of trying to do this and am always ecstatic when it does.

Now tell us how this amazing image came together, from conception to completion.

I road tripped around 2000km to get to this wedding which was in a town called Deniliquin which is in country Australia. The landscape is very flat, in fact one of the flattest parts of the southern hemisphere and there is very little light pollution so this makes for great stargazing. The groom is also a photographer, so I really wanted to capture something special and knock it out of the park. One of the biggest challenges with weddings is time and location and often you have to work with the location you have or you have very little time to make it happen.

I had said to these two that I wanted to get out and use the stars if possible for a shot during the reception, so at a point where there was a little bit of quiet time I grabbed them and we headed outside. I knew the direction I needed to shoot in as I had pre-planned where the milky way would be, I just needed some elevation so I could get the angle to capture both themselves and the stars in a frame. John (the groom) suggested a concrete platform a few hundred meters from the reception (big marquee with tonnes of light). The only other light was in the distance behind where they would stand from a harvester or machinery working late into the night. I got them into position first (it was literally pitch black.. cant see your hand in front of your face). I then ran back and set up my angle. I wanted as much light as possible so I grabbed my Sigma 24 Art.. I love this lens because I am not big on distortion, so I know if I frame it will I can bring the corners in and avoid bad pin cushioning. I have my go to settings for capturing stars (also based on focal length) but when bringing people into the frame it adds the extra complexity.. two frames or just one?

I decided I would make sure I get all the frames I need with them first, then if I needed some longer ones for the stars I could simply have them step out of frame and I could finish my complimentary frames. For stars I actually shoot a higher ISO than many, mainly so I don't have to shoot wide open and I can try some shorter exposures in the beginning. I’ll then ramp down my ISO and change my other variables (like exposure time) so I can make the choice later. I always carry many lights on me.. I had 2 x LED panels and a LED torch in my pocket. I love live view, you can't beat it for photos at night. Live View on, torch on subjects, manual focus.. lights out and exposure on. I started off long, just to see how much light I had to work with. I realized I could dial it back a bit and go for a shorter exposure. When placing the couple in the frame I said stand in a way that you can relax and hopefully not much very much. Turns out these twos are professional statues and did an amazing job. I shot a variety of frames, some long, some short with higher/lower ISO's.. with the LED panels and with a triggered flash behind them. One of my early shots turned out to be the perfect one to use. It was shot at F2 for 10 seconds at ISO 6400. It captured them without moving and used the ambient light from the venue behind us to light them. I framed the shot so it included what they were standing on for context and I find it keeps the frame real, not just fantasy. The exposure caught enough of the sky that I could work on bringing out the milky way in post processing and the result is the image you see here. I generally shoot a custom white balance and then I will colour balance the image in post. This photo ended up being 4 layers for the sky in Photoshop and Lightroom adjustments/brushes for the foreground. The colour preset I used is one I use for 99% of my photographs, I usually let the light and scene dictate the final look of the photograph.

Mouse over the image for that Sweet B&A Magic!

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Blogged by LOOKSLIKEFILM Contributing Editor, Seth Langner · Jacksonville, FL and Seattle, WA wedding and portrait photographer --> www.karmathartic.com

Before & After with Justin Lee

Most of us, when scrolling past this image in our news feed, did a serious double-take. Then it drew us in with its surrealistic, almost-embryonic qualities - the very definition of compelling. So, yeah, we reached out to Justin to get all the behind-the-scenes goodness on this überclever stitch. 

Justin. You. Go!

I live in Portland with my beautiful wife and 2 cats.  I am a medical sales rep by day and photographer by night.  I love both of my jobs and if I were independently wealthy I would do them both without pay!  I met my wife when I sold her a cell phone when I was in between jobs several years ago and consider it to be my biggest sales achievement to date.  I could probably write a book that people would actually read about how this unlucky and undeserving pauper got the girl of his dreams.  I am a hopeless romantic.  I feel ridiculously blessed to have found my passion in photography.  While I have been a passionate person for most of my life, I was never a perfectionist until I discovered my love for photography.  Before my career began, I learned by forcing myself to shoot in manual with an old Rebel DSLR just 4 years ago.  I started to practice shooting any opportunity I had as if it were as important as someone's wedding.  After lots of coaxing and convincing 3 years ago, my wife bought me my first full frame camera which I had dreamed about for almost a year.  Similarly, I recently acquired a real tilt shift lens that I've been dreaming about for at least the past year and it's easily my favorite lens now.

By what artists/creatives are you influenced? What inspires you?

I was first inspired by my own wedding photographer, Ely Roberts.  To this day, I can't be more grateful for the beautiful photos he took.  I was then inspired further by Dennis Berti, who shot my best friend's wedding in Cabo, Mexico.  I found out he was considered to be one of the world's top 50 wedding photographers.  I then discovered Junebug Weddings as well as Jeff Newsom, who I consider to be the most creative person in the universe!  Around this same time I discovered Sam Hurd, who of course needs no introduction and is a huge inspiration to me.  I am inspired by the love that two individuals find for each other and vow to have and hold for the rest of their lives.  Weddings are such awesome events in which family and friends gather to witness and support this commitment.  The thought that my photos will be shared to kids, grandkids, and future generations is quite humbling and inspiring to me.  I thank God for this ability and privilege.

Do you have a vision in mind before going out and shooting? Tell us about about your workflow and how the vision comes to life before shooting and in post.

I always have a vision in mind before any shoot.  There are only 3 settings that you can give to the camera, but what really makes the difference is the direction you give to your subjects and perspectives you choose.  I typically choose the aperture first to get the depth of field I want to achieve.  I then choose the ISO that's as low as possible that will allow me to shoot with a high enough shutter speed to get a sharp shot even if my subject moves.  One other important factor of course is the lens and focal length.  I tend to use mostly primes since I am forced to compose a shot before I put the camera up to my eye.  In fact, I currently own these prime lenses and each has its own useful perspective:  20mm, 24mm, 28mm, 35mm, 45mm, 50mm, 55mm, and 85mm.  I plan on purchasing a 14mm and 135mm lens in the near future.  In the distant future, I will shoot for the 200mm!  For convenience and maximum compression, I like to use a 70-200mm and zoom in as close to 200mm as often as possible.  My editing workflow consists of individual editing of RAW files in Lightroom from white balance, contrast, tone curve, individual color, sharpening, noise reduction, and both auto and manual lens profile corrections.  I sometimes use Alien Skin Exposure and Photoshop in addition to LR.  When shooting in manual mode and manual white balance, I have found it easier to batch process photos since a given scene should not change much in regards to exposure or white balance.  

Now walk us through, step-by-step, how you created this killer image.

There is a story behind this image that demonstrates the importance of networking and always being prepared for the unexpected!  It all started when I befriended Nikk Wong, inventor of the successful Kickstarter product, Fractal Filters (http://fractalfilters.io).  His product has been endorsed by famous photographer Benjamin Von Wong (no relation) and he's working on a collaboration with probably the most well-known vodka company which I probably should absolutely not name.  It turned out that Nikk was also a wedding photographer while he had lived in Seattle, so we hit it right off from the start.  He is now an app developer and entrepreneur in San Francisco and I have had the chance to hang out with him on my many trips to SF.  This particular night we were just hanging out on the rooftop of his office building where there was a gym and jacuzzi.  We thought it'd be fun to take pictures of his break dancer friend doing a handstand on the rails of the jacuzzi.  Nikk wanted to try it for himself and after a couple attempts his hands slipped and he crashed into the jacuzzi!!!  It was LIT-ER-ALLY the funniest thing I've ever witnessed.  Since he was completely wet, he decided to be a sport and posed for me at the bottom of the jacuzzi.  I used a 20mm lens to take the shot and stood at the edge.  As you can see, the original image has a lot of distortion as one would expect with a wide lens at an angle.  The corrections were made manually in Lightroom to straighten out the edges of the pool.  The image that has 4 photos flipped and rotated was made in Photoshop.  

Bonus pics!

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Blogged by LOOKSLIKEFILM Contributing Editor, Seth Langner · Jacksonville, FL and Seattle, WA wedding and portrait photographer --> www.karmathartic.com