Since opening the studio this summer, I've had the good fortune to cross paths with some creative and interesting people. One of those folks is Diana Pickett.

Diana owns Hair Plus salon here in Lincoln, and she's been cutting, styling, and coloring hair for decades. She's a pro who knows her stuff and she's continually learning and growing.

Diana and I have a couple of projects in the works; here are a couple images from one of them. We had Hannah in the studio recently to make some photographs showcasing Diana's coloring work.

Two different approaches were used to light these images. In the photo above, I used a three-light Alzo Digital Pan-L-Lite setup. These are continuous fluorescent lights (AKA "flos") and the key advantage is that you can see the light. It's very easy, then, to make adjustments to get exactly what you want. One downside of the flos, however, is that they don't have the same "oomph" as strobes, so there's less depth of field. Sometimes this works OK but, in the future, I think I'll want deeper focus for the fashion images.

The second photograph (below) was lit with my typical portrait setup: a single Paul Buff Einstein in a 60" Photek Softlighter II umbrella positioned directly above the subject. This large light source provides a lovely, flattering light on Hannah.

Diana and I were very pleased with the images we made from this session, the result of real collaboration between the model, stylist, and photographer. More to come...

If you're in central Illinois (Springfield, Bloomington/Normal, Decatur, Peoria, Champaign/Urbana) and interested in learning about how I approach business portraits (AKA, headshots) in the studio, you'll find descriptions, videos, and testimonials on the Business Portraits page.

Hannah, Springfield, Illinois, fashion and hair model :: Michael Gowin Photography, Lincoln, IL