when I shoot, nobody gets hurt [beta]

i know what you want
You want to geek out on some buzzword filled techno-babble, lifted from the sticky pages of Shutterbug Magazine. You came here looking for tech porn, didn't you? You disgust me a little.

Well, if you must:



Nick Koudis Shoots With Style & Humor;
A Sometimes Unorthodox Approach Leads To A Signature Style
By Jack Neubart   •   July, 2009 images © Nick Koudis
Working at Spiratone, Nick Koudis (www.koudis.com) began his photographic career designing many of those wonderful gizmos made popular by my mentor, the world-renowned Norman Rothschild. Koudis brought his knack for developing clever and ingenious gadgets with him when he opened his first studio in New York City over 25 years ago. Back then we could always find him building his own sets and large-scale models that he’d photograph for his advertising clients. And of course, he was shooting film then, with a 4x5 Sinar p, Mamiya 645, and Mamiya RZ67.

For this shot of actor Colin Hanks for Alternative Press magazine, Nick Koudis first had to photograph the tiger at a wildlife refuge, a situation where it was not practical to use studio lights. His assistant held a 550EX off to the right as the key light. As a fill light, he used a Quantum Qflash with softbox attached (with all remote lights triggered by the Elinchrom EL-Skyport), holding the flash while shooting. Hanks was photographed separately, this time entirely with 550s. The key light was a 550 inside a Chimera strip light (using a special Chimera adapter). Then there was another 550 attached to a Chimera mini-bank as fill, and behind Hanks stood another 550 to add that blue-gelled highlight. The final step was to composite the two images.
Recent years saw Koudis move his studio to Los Angeles. The pace, the lifestyle, the environment influenced a shift in the direction his work would take. He found himself shooting more editorial and portraiture, with a strong focus on celebrities. Already involved in stock photography, he now found himself shooting more for Getty Images, his stock agency, than for his advertising clients. He still shoots ads, but the tenor of that work has changed as well. Whereas in the past his advertising work was often grounded in fantasy creations, today it is more grounded in reality. However, you can still find occasional touches of one Nick Koudis trademark, namely whimsical humor.
“The shoe-mount system is my go-to solution,” Nick Koudis observes. “When you’re shooting a celebrity, you may be in a hotel room or even in your own living room" (which was the case here). Koudis first shot the sunset, which established the quality, color, and direction of the lighting that he’d emulate with his Canon 550EXs. He used a 550 inside a strip light in the front and then practically surrounded the actor with additional 550s, which included adding gels where needed. The hands reaching out for Carell belong to three separate models. And we should add that he used a black card on the right to pull back some light, giving us that dark area along the arms on that side. Koudis then composited the images of sky and actor into one final picture.
For this studio portrait of the lovely Jessica Biel, Nick Koudis employed the powerful Profoto system, matching that with the equally robust EOS-1Ds Mark III. A softbox was the main light, with additional lights on the background and a final light—a hairlight—giving the shot its finishing touches.
The Move To Digital Over the years, his work saw other changes, notably a move toward digital. Instead of building models and sets, he builds composite images digitally. Of course, not all images are digital composites, but they may still involve some digital retouching and manipulation. Toward these ends, Koudis uses Photoshop and Lightroom. When he needs 3D renderings, he turns to Luxology's modo 401. Koudis prefers to shoot tethered, and when on location, he connects the camera either to a MacBook Pro or iMac. In the studio, he prefers the Mac Pro.
Nick Koudis shot the eye close-up in the studio, using a Qflash, to which a Photoflex (fitted with an accessory that produces beauty dish effects) was attached. To that he simply added one monolight for the background.
His digital cameras of choice are Canon EOS (www.usa.canon.com), currently the 5D Mark II and 1Ds Mark III. Interestingly, he favors the 5D for its overall performance and uses it on location. “I like portability. I like to shoot from the hip. At the same time, it’s got the muscle and the full-size chip.” In the studio, however, Koudis observes that the 1Ds makes its mark—based primarily on appearance: it has more of the look of a professional studio camera, and with clients sometimes looking over your shoulder, appearances are everything, he points out. And, he further notes, the 1Ds seems to work better when tethered to a computer, compared to the 5D series. The lenses he normally uses include the 24-105mm IS, 70-300mm IS, 50mm f/1.4, and 50mm macro. When needed, he employs Live View on the 5D Mark II. And he often carries the camera gear in a Lowepro SlingShot 100 or 200 (www.lowepro.com), or a Kata bag (www.bogenimaging.us), turning to Lightware cases for the big lights (www.lightwareinc.com). His tripod of choice for location work is a carbon-fiber Induro, with matching ball head (www.indurogear.com).
Koudis’s Lighting Takes Many Forms In lighting, Koudis relies on a broad range of gear—whatever does the job effectively and efficiently. That includes a number of Canon 580EX and more recently 580EX II shoe-mounts and a Quantum Qflash (www.quantuminstruments.com), along with AlienBees (www.alienbees.com) and Profoto (www.profoto-usa.com). The situation dictates the lights used, but essentially location shooting may involve a mix of shoe-mounts, Qflash, and AlienBees. He chooses the AlienBees “because they’re small and portable and have enough power for their intended use, namely portraits. I don’t need to fight daylight, such as on the beach, where you’d need a stronger light. Also the accessories for these lights are very practical.” The Profotos are strictly reserved for studio work. Also, there are various lighting accessories that come into play with the AlienBees. “I needed to find something portable while at the same time giving me the effect of a beauty dish.” That turned out to be a small Photoflex MultiDome (www.photoflex.com), available with an oft-used accessory that simulates the effect of a beauty dish.
Here Nick Koudis made use of Canon’s ST-E2 wireless device to trigger the remote 550EX shoe-mounts, working in FP (High-Speed) Sync mode, manually timing the spill. Four lights were used. And to finesse the lighting, Koudis adapted commercially available barn doors to the shoe-mounts, thereby controlling spill light.
Shooting a GPS stock image for Getty required Nick Koudis to photograph the device and then composite his own map drawing (created in Photoshop—owing to copyright restrictions). He used three Canon 580EX flashes. To simplify the background and soften the light coming in from a second flash outside, he laid a sheet of vellum over the windshield. That enabled him to drop out the windshield easily so that he could drop in (composite) the shot of the palm trees. There was another light coming in from the left. The final light was located on the back seat and fitted with a Chimera mini-bank, and aimed at the arm and dashboard.
Profoto lighting came to the fore in a studio shoot at Miauhaus Studios in Los Angeles with actress Jessica Biel, for her agency, Icon International. Koudis shot this portrait with an EOS-1Ds Mark III. He positioned one Profoto head inside a 3x3-foot softbox as a frontal light, just a little above head height, a tad to the left. “I was aiming to get practically straight down the nose line to flatten the shadows on the face.” There were also two lights directed at the white sweep backdrop, with an additional kicker light on her hair. On another shoot, for LasikPlus, Koudis employed a mix of lights on location, in the facility’s Atlanta-based eye surgery room, which featured a Lasik machine. He used an AlienBees monolight for frontal lighting, with a medium Chimera strip light on the key figure. (A strip light produces a more defined sliver of light compared to a regular softbox.) Then he added two Qflashes to light the area in back, plus a 580EX on the left with a gel. Koudis shot the eye close-up separately in the studio, with a Qflash (with that Photoflex “beauty dish” mentioned earlier), plus one AlienBees monolight for the background. He used the EOS 5D for the location shot, the 1Ds in the studio—all part of a two-week shoot.

One more thing. Koudis, along with many other pro photographers, has turned the use of dedicated shoe-mounts into a passion of sorts. He has joined up with fellow shoe-mount aficionados on a website devoted to this aspect of portable and studio lighting: www.strobist.com. Two portraits of celebrity/actors Colin Hanks and Steve Carell reflect this dedication to the highly portable and equally versatile shoe-mount flash.