Georgia Football Preview

Georgia Bulldogs'running back Knowshown Moreno on Tuesday, June 10, 2008.

Well I also had to go out and get some stuff for the Georgia football preview. Here's a peak behind the curtain and a look into the Buttes-Mehre photo studio.

I generally shoot on the racquetball court with 4 White Lightnings. Keep in mind, this is all a one-man show. I'll go for two on full power in the corners aimed at the center of the wall and completely blow the wall out if i want a white background. I'll softbox one side and grid spot the other. The grid spot generally has a 1/2 CTB blue or full CTB blue taped to be able to flip up and down. Also put up an SB-80 for a rimlight behind subjects. When you have a black background, you really need a rimlight behind the subject to keep the subject from blending in to the background, especially when it goes to print, else it will just turn into a gob of black ink and look bad.

For the Knowshown shot, i had a home-brewed beauty dish with a CTO'd SB-28 on full. It wasn't balanced good enough for me, or moreover the sidelight from camera left was too intense.

To be able to do things on the fly, i have two SB-28s sitting next to the white lightnings (either 1/2 or full power) that a gel'd a color (blue in this case, different from the CTB blue) to have a third choice for a background - white, black or blue.

For the Georgia shoot, they wanted everything shot on white and i wanted everything moody. I'd shoot the white and then I'd try and get creative. I'd walk back, turn lights on and off and go from there.


I really like being able to do something interesting and conceptual but most of our photo requests on the topic are very last minute. Being a daily shooter, i do what i can. The one thing i would like to change and need to change is to plan these sportrait concepts out more, both College and Prep. I get about 15 minutes with a player on average and that's always been fine.

With Knowshown, i had an overnight to think on it, but it was for the magazine and they wanted something with a blown out white background. After talking it over with the art director, we decided to go for this if we had five minutes left, and this is what they ended up using as part of a double-truck spread.



Georgia Bulldogs defensive lineman Kade Weston on Thursday, August 14, 2008.



Georgia Bulldogs wide receiver Mohamed Massaquoi on Thursday, August 14, 2008.



Georgia Bulldogs quarterback Joe Cox on Thursday, August 14, 2008.



Georgia Bulldogs linebacker Akeem Hebron on Thursday, August 14, 2008.