As a freelance photographer with my residence in a rural location, the nearest commercial market is Houston. The nature of work is such that the bulk of my time is spent marketing, planning, organizing and in post-production. Only a small portion of my time is spent shooting photos.
Since I only need studio space or a location when I’m shooting, maintaining a permanent studio is impractical. When shooting, time really is money regardless of if I’m working for a client or on a personal project. For either I am paying for location and talent by the hour. To maximize productively, I rule out shooting in public locations due to lack of control. freedom of access, distractions and unpredictable weather.
Renting small blocks of time at Epic Creative Coop is perfect for many of my projects. I am able to have complete control of a large, well maintained wooded outdoor area and large temperature controlled studio with large access doors and high ceilings at the same location. With this, I can book date and time specific talent far in advance and resources. In the event of bad weather when I plan to shoot outdoors, I still have the option of working indoors without the expense and hassle of rescheduling or changing location. That’s a big deal when I’m making a 90+ minute commute to do a shoot with talent and materiel that is often traveling in from out of state.
While the woods offer nearly unlimited possibilities, Epic has an eclectic variety of other outdoor “backdrops”.
Epic’s Man Cave studio includes a large open room with high ceilings, large access doors, a dressing room, kitchen and restroom. For most of my studio work, For most people shoot, I prefer the largest possible main light source, making the ceiling height and available floor space essential.
While furnishings are sparse, there are a wide variety of backdrops, wide seamless rolls and surfaces the give me a range of options that can be utilized to create interesting effects. I often use color gels to light backdrops for a dramatic, saturated effect.
A large product or prop like a motorcycle is easily brought into the space through the Man Cave’s large double doors.
Most of my recent work (and all shown here) was done with a medium format Fujifilm GFX-100S and Fujifilm GF45-100 and GF 100-200 zoom lenses. They are my go to lenses for people and product shoots. I also use a GF 32-64 for some landscape and architecture work. The GFX 100’s RAW 102 MP files offer enormous dynamic range and resolution. That gives me the ultimate image capture for post processing flexibility. I carry my Nikon D750 and/or D850 DSLR’s and a couple of lenses as a backup.
I bring as few four lights and as many as ten to shoot. Currently, I use Godox flash lighting exclusively. I use the AC powered DP series for most indoor and the battery powered AD series for most outdoor work. My portable light kit relies almost entirely on the use of umbrellas as light modifiers because of their compact collapsed size and quick, easy set up. My favorites for a main light in studio are an Impact 7′ parabolic or a pair 45″ Glow Angler umbrellas. I bring a 40″ octobox with grid preassembled to some shoots for use with gel saturated background to control main light spill over. Backgrounds are typically lit with two or more monolights, a 6″ reflector and a gel or 40″ silver umbrellas.
More often than not, it’s windy outdoors in Texas making large modifiers impractical. For most or my outdoor work, I use simple diffusion socks over the reflectors to soften the light.
To see more of my work or contact me, visit GarryKingPhoto.com
