The God of Mischief in Glory - Why I Love Parking Garages

A long overdue post, I shot these images of Thalie Boucher wearing this stunning costume by Sara Wilkinson, of Loki, the God of Mischief, from the Marvel Comics movie series, way back in November, after Hal-Con. Sadly, I got tied up in work in December at my part time job and the holiday and never got around to posting this on here.

So a bit of history, I know Sara from college and she is a wonderful fashion and costume designer, this Loki costume being her latest labour of love I was more then happy to help document it. The model, Thalie, was more then a perfect fit for the look and feel of the character she is cosplaying here. So the hard part was trying to find a good location to match this incredible work. I decided I wanted an industrial location, with some shelter (cause it was very cold out) and I'm a huge fan of one of the parking garages here in town for just that look. I've used this location before, with mixed results in lighting, but now I have a good grasp on those issues. I knew I wanted strong shadows, and some colour splash in the background to help add to the mood. when I think Loki, I think green, so green became that colour gel to use. Also she needed some close ups and well lit details for her portfolio, so I took some without the modelled lighting and colours as well. I didn't use too many tricks in this setup, it was basically two lights, one in the background and one main front flash with a softbox. All and all it was very successful.

So now on to the images.

On a technical side there was little editing, just a few background adjustments removing signs and the parking lot lines and so on.

-Larry M. Holder

East Coast Comic Expo 2013 - The Report

It's be a while since the one day, wonderful time that was East Coast Comic Expo in Moncton, NB. It happened all the way back in May and I'm just getting to write about it now. Let me tell you all, I am super excited for next year's return event, ECCE did not disappoint. This was the first convention I attended just as a regular attendee. But lack of a booth did not stop me from taking pictures.

First thing I'll applaud was the layout of the convention, it was mostly contained to one room, it's layout streamlined and easy to move in. There was a lot to look at on that end. In the middle of the room was the signing table for guests, I almost wish there had been more room around them for lines to form. The only time I was in line was for the artist, Nick Bradshaw, of Wolverine and the X-Men fame and Brenda Hickey, a newer up and coming artist that was working on the new My Little Pony Micro Series of comics. I got her to draw me a "Crackle the Dragon".

Minus the long wait in lines for promo items, I did get some shooting done. I did a few candids for Saint John Iron-Bat, my friend Phillip Vautour, during his display of his Iron Man suit. I also got to meet actor and former WWE star Robert Maillet (whom you shall see later again). All around it was a great time.

Just before leaving, we got some people together for a big group shoot and some other fun shots. The outside of the building we were in was pretty old and run down, so I made plans in post to replace the background with some images I made and add some effects in. I shot most of them with natural light with some fill flash in some shots. It was a bit cold and wet that day, but there was a beautiful overcast sky, making a nice even light. Here's a comparison of the group image.

This also was where I completed the final calendar image for HCF and made one of my all time favourite cosplay images to date, The Civil War tribute.

I'm super pumped for next year, and I hope to be able to set up my services next year during the convention and really make some epic work beyond the awesome stuff I got this year. 

-Larry M. Holder 

  

Long Over Due Update - Shooting Iron Man

Hey everyone, sorry for the absence on this blog. No this update isn't about my calendar, but I am one model away from finishing it, then I'll have a blow out of processes to go though. In a way this shoot I'm talking about today took a lot of experience in processing the images from the calendar images. On May 3rd, 2013 I did some images for Phillip Vautour and his newly constructed Iron Man suit. You may remember Phil from the Harbour Con-Fusion images last year as Batman. He's an amazing talent that I hope to continue working with into the future. Now, on to the images. Originally I was going to shoot against my black backdrop, but the walls of the Empire Theatre we were shooting in were fairly solid and neutral, so we just went with that. Why were we in the theatre you ask? Well Phil was helping Harbour Con-Fusion with promotion on the opening night of Iron Man 3.

Now on to the images. After adjusting my lighting in Lightroom, I started by carefully cutting Phil away from the background in Photoshop. Once that was done I applied lighting for the lit pieces on the suit from my candid shots I was taking earlier in the evening. From that point he was ready to be pasted with whatever plate images I could find and match lighting up too. In some cases I went for a far more graphic design look. All and all I'm fairly happy, next time though I'll try and use more practical elements from the time of shooting and design the lighting a little more with angles in mind.

Iron Man Suit Edits

Example of the Candid Images Used Editing the Lights

Collection of the Final Edits

What a great experience, I look forward to making more images in this style after East Coast Comic Expo this coming weekend, May 18th, 2013 in Moncton. 

And of course a Big Thank You to Phillip Vautour!

-Larry M. Holder