foto Priority

So maybe we need a bigger venue, perhaps ANZ stadium, or Acer arena !? Ok that might be a slight exaggeration, but in all seriousness the Attic bar was packed to breaking point last Tuesday night. The best turnout so far.

The topic was “Flash Dance – Natural and Creative Flash Techniques”. This topic is one of my favourites and is obviously the favourite of many others as well. These days, most photography enthusiasts own a speedlite, but do they know how to get the most out of it? Do they know how to use it off camera in a creative and fun way?

Well hopefully most of the students have now gained a better understanding and have been inspired to try some of the techniques covered.

Scott McGale was our special guest on the night. Scott showed off some of his work while explaining the different light effects used to create that particular image. He also shared a little story about his experience shooting Naomi Campbell – and yes, apparently she is the Diva that everyone in-the-know says she is!

see you next time
Jose

Welcome to the wonderful world of the plastic camera. If you like surprises and an unusual look to your photos, the Holga may be a great addition to your kit.

So, what is a Holga? It’s a medium format camera that happens to be all plastic. Yes, even the lens is plastic. They are a very basic camera with one shutter speed of approximately 1/125 and bulb, two f/stops of approximately f/8 and 11, a 60mm PLASTIC lens with adjustable focusing, Built-in flash and uses 120 colour or black and white film.

You never know what you’re going to get with your Holga and no two Holga’s are the same. It’s a great camera to experiment with.

After trawling many Holga websites for the best deal, as well as checking out as many holga “fanatics” websites I could find, I finally ordered my first little toy, in fact is was the first film camera I had ever owned.

As soon as it arrived in the post, I ripped opened the box, loaded some film and grabbed some black tape, yes black tape and started sealing all the joins and cracks, anywhere where light could get in.

This camera is about fun, the unexpected, and the unusual. What you get is a look you can’t really achieve any other way and it is always a surprise to see your images when you get the prints or files back from the lab

It’s now been a couple of years since I first opened the box to my shiny (ok the plastic isn’t really that shiny) new Holga 120s, I haven’t used it in a while, but after writing this post, I think I have just inspired myself to roll on some Kodak 120 ultra colour 400 UC!

Oh and one word of advice – DON’T FORGET TO REMOVE THE LENS CAP!

Well known wedding photographer Graham Monro from GM Photographics has been known on occasion to pull out his holga, giving his clients the choice of something different.

Graham has a shiny new website where you can view all his fine art images, some of them using the plastic fantastic camera!

Checkout Grahams website for yourself at GM Photographics

For more information on the holga and an endless amount of reading and inspiration check out these websites dedicated to this little gem.
lomography
holgamods
Flickr
Holga Inspire

Jose

Congratulations this week to Andrew Code for taking out the “Shots @ The Arthouse” Shot of the Week, selected from the Shots Flickr Group. I asked Andrew to pen a few words about his inspiration along with some of the technical aspects of it’s creation.

‘The shot was inspired by one of my favourite TV shows Supernatural. The purpose was to focus on creating a simple but effective composition using a couple of lights to light the model. It was taken in my warehouse, hanging from a window on the second floor looking into it.

The lighting was a couple of cheap flood lights from Bunnings behind a diffuser. The wings were added post (after experimenting with drawing it on the floor). Taking the photo from above using the floor as a back drop really created the different look i was after. It would have been much easier to take it standing against a wall – but the result would not have been as effective.’ – Andrew Code