One day NOT in america

Where did you take this ? - you will ask.. The answer is simple. This image was taken in Bnei-Brak, the orthodoxal neighborhood of Tel Aviv. It was taken in 2007. Yes, they still live like that (unfortunately)

Good place to take a rest and may be have a breakfast (or more...)

One of the most hot days of this summer (2007) me and some photography-freaks friends decided to "go out the house" for some model shooting. We've agreed on 8:30 AM to meet up in the oldest part of Tel Aviv - Newe Tsedek. It has lots of very authentic houses, painted with all kind of different colors and tastes. Looks very attractive I must say, especially the first time you visit the neighborhood. But when it's the 10’Th time - it's boring I must say. Same houses, same grass, same trees... I can't do it... need a new wind to blow into my sails. Never mind, my friends decided that it's "the" place to photograph the models so I couldn't argue anymore... So I was there at 8:24 and thought - YAY! I’m at place just at time (I hate to be late) and the people are coming very soon... I took my lens out the bag and cleaned it with the LensPen, then I took the camera out and cleaned it, then the other lens, then I took a smoke break, then I viewed all the images from one of my CF cards, etc.. etc... The next time I’ve look on the clock was 8:55 and no phone calls and no people around me. I was like - WTF??? I call the man, who was supposed to pick up the models and bring them all there and the guy says - "Sorry mate, we are still at the house of the model, she's doing the makeup now and she has to drink her coffee...” I was amazed... What should I do??? I said... nada. I was sitting in the car (thanks much to the god of air conditioning) and looking at the people, who passed by the car once in 10-15 minutes. It's, like, Friday... and still early in the morning... and people didn't wake up yet... I end up meeting the models and the "driver" at around 9:30 in the middle of Suzan Dalal center and we started the shooting (i hate warm weather BTW) and it was so HOT!! The temperature was about 35C and the humidity was about 85%!!!! And I was carrying 3 bags! My shoulders were screaming - let as back to the car and the air conditioner! "NOP" I said... we are here to photograph! So we photograph here, and there and there and there and there too, and here too and here, and here and there and finally - here... WOW! My t-shirt was no t-shirt anymore but a wet rag. my body wouldn't listen to me anymore. My back lost its voice 2 hours ago since it was screaming in pains for more then 3 hours... I couldn't move, I couldn't sit... Nothing... so we decided to take a rest and go eat something before we all eat each other. We enter a very small but a beautiful cafe - "Nana" (Ehad Ha-Am 1, Tel Aviv). The sofas are very comfortable; the tables are low and nicely designed. The waiter is nice and patient with us (remember the way we all look like?). The food - MMMMMM excellent! Very good, everything is fresh, excellent salad that was just made (yeah, you can see that by the way it looks and tastes), the omelet is amazing! The coffee... the bread... Everything there was just in right place at right time. It made my day! My body took this food sacrifice and said - OK, you can go now... The last click of my camera was made about 5 minutes before we left the cafe. You can see the result on top of the page here. The girl name is Vlada BTW.

Almost every photographer wants to be a "strobist" one day

Well, this is the end result of a 3 hours work with a colleague photographer and a very cute model Olya. The whole session was shot for a final project of Katya (the colleague) at her photography study but the idea of shooting on the floor was actually mine.
We used:
1 Visatec 1600 strobe with a small soft box on the front right.
1 Small 35W strobe with a paper snoot (home made) from the back left.
1 Small 35W strobe from the front center (behind the camera) bounced from a silver umbrella.
1 Sigma 500DG Super behind the model on 85 degrees to "burn" the background.
The background is a huge piece of testing paper, that being used by the professional photo printer (those prints the huge billboards on the building fronts).







Here is the light setup and, actually, Katya is taking her shot from upstairs :) the final results are almost the same, so there is no need to show another shot here.

The whole thing was done in my living room and 3 out of 4 strobes are very very simple, so are some parts, like the snoot.

All I wanted to say - don't be afraid to improvise, if you really want to create - you will do it with whatever you have handy :-).

The full size final image (700X700) is here.
The detailed explanation of "what is what" can be seen here on my flickr page