Photoshop video: Fjellproffen commercial editing

After talking to one of my clients the other day, I was encouraged to upload a video where I show the extent of post-processing I do with my images. Personally I concider it more to be developing rather than photoshoping, because for me it's all about furfilling the true potential of the image. My opinion is that if I don't bring out the whole potential of the image, then I'm not doing my job.

My client had a very good point: when a client is viewing the completed image, then it's hard for him to truly understand the ammount of time invested in getting it that way. It might be easy to assume that just having an expensive camera is the difference between good and bad.

So here is the video that shows how much manual laber it takes to get there. And yes - the original exposure was shot with a very expensive camera.

PS. Be prepared, it's a bit tedious video, but I have tried to move as fast as possible while including the important elements which makes the difference.

Please view in HD.



Raymond Engmark :: Fjellproffen Commercial Shot (Photoshop video) from Raymond Engmark on Vimeo.

Commercial work: Fjellproffen (Shot in Lofoten)

This week has been soley spent in front of the computer catching up on my photoshop work. The fall is here in the North 100% now, so lately I have focused on getting some shooting done before green surroundrings completely vanished. Still, it feels good to finalize some new work, there is a lot (A LOT) of RAW material waiting to be processed, and I can't help feeling a bit stressed.

I do a lot of my work in Photoshop! For me it's not that I always need to work my images in photoshop, but I have learned from some very skilled people how to improve your images (or develop as I would say), and I just can't bring myself to put my work away if I see more potential that I can bring out in photoshop. It's not tampering with it - it's developing. Just because we have quick digital cameras, it's not an excuse to be lazy.

About four weeks ago I spendt a weekend at the island of Værøy in lovely Lofoten. For a long time I have been trying to shoot some good commercial pictures for Fjellproffen (contractor), but they often do work in between houses and other not very good surroundings for commercial images of this kind. So when they got an assingment in Lofoten, I packed up my gear and got on the ferry for a five hour ride into the great Norwegian oceans.

This was not an easy assingment. There was "a ton" of gear, no assistant and this is a small island in the middle of the ocean! Wind gusts can come in without any warning, and as the behind the scenes pictures will show, it can go from blue skies to pouring down in a matter of minutes. One time i had spent one hour rigging up, and the weather turned on me, and it was just getting the gear inside the car without shooting any pictures at all.

Here are the results - hope you enjoy them!

There is a great efford behind creating these images. I spent several days planning in advance of traveling to the island (what backdrops I wanted, what light I wanted, what flashes I wanted to bring, which colors I wanted in the picture and many many other things). When I got to the island I spent one day traveling around and shooting test pictures and also testing how the flashes worked with lighting up such big objects.

I spent one day shooting the actual raw images I needed, and one day later back in Bodø shooting some elements for the pictures. In the end I developed the pictures in photoshop, and I did not punch in and out, but I certainly did not spend anything less than 40 hours, but I would guess around 50 hours.

I do not beleive in using plugins and filters to get it done quickly. Photography is a craftmanship, and I take pride in doing my work manually. I try to acheive not only photo realistic, but pixel perfect. I want my customers to be happy with my work, even if they want to blow it up to 5x3 meters. And that is the thing about those quick plugins; the give your picture a cool effect right away ... but most of the time it completely ruins your pixels, and it really looks like hell when you get up close on a big print.

This is not me trying to blow my own horn, I am merely explaining so that it will be easier for my clients and customers to understand why I want more money than a photographer that don't give a damn about how it all comes out. Check out behind the scenes pictures, it is just shot with a 5 mp mobile phone, but still, it gives you some idea on how an unprocessed picture looks in comparison.

So to my potential future customers; if you and a compeeting business were advertising in the same newspaper; which picture would you have in your ad? The one that gets the attention of the consumers and brings them into the ad, or the one that just merges into the newspaper and just makes you turn the page. And compared to the price of advertising, getting the best photographer for the job will be a drop in the ocean, no matter what.

Compare yourself - here is the behind the scenes pictures! (This is something I need to be better at, I have had a lot of crazy shoots in the wierdest surroundings that lever shows in the finished work).

Here is the weather when I arrived to the island. But I knew it would be good in between.

And naturally - this is the weather during breakfast the next day.

I needed to get up high to get the mountains in the background. Solution: Cat tripod.

1100ws flash unit. Anchored down because of the gusts on the island.

Weather struck all the sudden. Save the gear is all you can do.

Behind the camera when I shot the final picture of the day.

I love my work

A day of tragedy, Tomas Evjen has passed away

Photo: Lars Antonsen

11th September 2012 Tomas Evjen was found deceased at our place of business in Bodø. The movie director only reached the age of 39 years, and I was shocked to learn the news of his death. It still feels worng to write about it as it just seems like a stupid dream and I am about to wake up.

I only had the chance to know Tomas for the last months, but still I owe him a great deal of gratitude. When I arrived back in Bodø I had little connections in the media industry here, and I had no place to do my photography. Tomas invited me to share a studio with him for the bargain price which was critical for me as I had just finished my studies in London. And he made it very clear that no matter what I lacked in equiptment, it was no problem to lend it from him - free of charge. 

During these months I also had my moments where I disagreed with Tomas, but we quickly understood that we were both ambitious and quickly settled our differences. He gave me the push and help I needed, when I needed it the most. And I have a feeling that almost every successful person within media in Bodø owe him some gratitude - either directly or indirectly. 

Today I decided to take the day off, as I did yesterday. I spent the day just hanging around, spending time with my girlfriend, mingling with friends and traveling to Kjerringøy and stopping to enjoy the nice weather. Because when something tragic like this happends it just reminds me to live in the moment. You never know, the next one could be me our you - it does not matter how old you are.

Tomas lived a lot, and that is somewhat a comfort. I am sure that most people in their 80's have experienced less than Tomas did in this 39 years. Living my life on a daily basis, that will be my way to honor your memory Tomas.

Rest in peace, we will all try to finish the good things you stared.

See beyond your fence

I've been working like a mad man for the past weeks, so my intention to update this blog every week went down the drain. There has been some personal work on location, but due to the moody summer up north I've been forced to do most of my commercial work in studio to be able to plan/book ahead.

Last weekend was spent on the island of Værøy in lovely Lofoten, shooting commercial images for a contractor. Due to the once again moody summer, one out of two days was spent waiting for the rain to clear, the next one was spent setting up everytime the sun came out, and rigging down in panic when the rain came back. But I got the images I needed, I will post them later.

By the way; after some conciderations I will continue to write this blog in english as I am trying to connect with international clients as well, so I hope the norwegians kan bare with me. 

Usually I think the time is best spent promoting yourself when you are trying to start a new business, but I feel like talking about a colleague that deserves a lot of credit, Jens Haugen at Jens Haugen Photography. If there is a new path in norwegian photography, he is very often the first one to travel down it. And most of the time with great success.

You would presume that he then have been a assistant for one of the world leading photographers, have a masters degree in art, is in his 50's and lives part time in London, part time in Oslo. You could not be more wrong.

Jens Haugen have never gone through any formal photographic education, he resides in the small and sleepy town of Hamar near lake Mjøsa and is in his mid 30's. But he has something more important than all the other things; creativity, taste and tenacity. And a lot of it!

When I first saw this picture, I had absolutly no idea who Jens Haugen was. Never heard the name. Never heard about Tim Walker, LaChapelle or Albert Watson either for that matter. This was only 3,5 years ago, and I had just realized that there was actually people out there getting paid to do photography. Myself, I had only been doing the occational sunset picture with my film based Canon.

But when I saw that picture, I thought damn, someday I would sure like to be able to do something like that. I did not know how or when, but I realized that this is actually possible to do with an image. Eye catching creativity, hell yes!

So why do I feel the need to share? Well, I am hoping that Jens Haugen with all his creative commercial work can open your eyes, like he did with mine. You need to see beyond what you know from before to create something new, and this is something Jens Haugen does more often than anyone else I know in Norway.

To my knowledge I am the first and only commercial photographer north of Trondheim, so the potential is humongous. The counterweight is that the trends are stuck in early 90's, so there is a real struggle to dare people to think outside the box, and do creative work that stands out. Basicly, what the local newspapers have been churning out for the last 20 years is concidered the blueprint up north.

Please visit Jens Haugens homepage at www.jenshaugen.no and be inspired. See how creativity can bump you to the next nevel, and how his commercial work is part of what made him "Photographer of the year" three times in a row.

Commercial pictures should give YOU the attention amongst so many other commercials. So when people are opening their newspapers next month, who do you want to be? The one with the ad on the left getting everybodys attention, or the ad on the right that everybody skips past? 

How to be flash - Story of a Saab

If your name is Raymond Engmark and you are an educated photographer, there is a big chance that your mind is somewhat analytical, actually borderline to crazy. I simply beleive that if something is worth doing, it's worth doing it thorough.

After my return from UK my Saab 900 on English plates was just sitting there and I needed the money. The sensible thing to do when you are asking about 300 quid (3000 NOK) is to snap some shots with your phone, and just place a quick ad. Again; not if you are Raymond Engmark.

First of all, I wanted to try to light a car properly, and to edit commercial style once again (this being a used car for sale, I could not retouch it, only adjust light and so on). Second of all, I strongly beleive that there is always someone who will remember you for your worst picture - so keep even your worst pictures good.

I washed the car good since I could not retouch it, and I took a quick drive to find a decent location, and after a while I found a nice spot with good texture and tonality that would work with the car. Most of my equiptment was back in the town, so I did this shot with a Canon 580 EXII (on camera flash), transmitters and a 15 year old plastic tripod that barely can hold my camera (shivers like hell).

The picture is made up from 12 different flash settings, making the "RAW" file 1,7 GB before I started to edit. I have not received my new iMac yet, so all this was done with the cheapest Dell Laptop you could buy 4,5 years ago. I spent about 3 hours shooting an preparing, and roughly 8 hours editing.

Before:

After:

It must have worked, because just a couple of days after the car was gone for 300 quid. But then again, 300 quid for 11 hours of work in this business woun't even pay for the batteries in the camera. But hey, the shoot came out pretty nice, I could renew my skills and if this is my worst picture - it's pretty good.

This blog will have more updates in the future, but the fact is that I am working my ass off these days just to get started with my company. But I will try to get something in here at least once a week even now. Here it is more easy to publish things rather than to evaluate if it should go into my portofolio on my webpage or not.

Fun fact? I am working my ass off, but still it does not feel like a job. I guess it's ment to be.

Slowly becoming a studio

I have been working around the clock just about every day since I returned from London, but I have to admit that I have been very fortunate as well. I have been back in Bodø for just over three weeks now, and it just feels like I've hit the jackpot every day.

News on Request which is a big movie production company took me in to their place and rented me a studio on extremely fair conditions. And if as that wasn't enough, I had a meeting with the bank today, and they decided to finance my studio and my company on the spot.

Having secured the finances was a big relieve. This mean that I don't have to cope with equiptment that will barely do, and even though I am not anywhere near rich, I can get what I need to secure that my customers will get a good experience from working with me. Shooting alongside clients and having something act up is a situation I need to avvoid.

This picture does not lie, the studio needs a lot of tidying up. But I am making progress every day, and I am expecting to be there full time from August 1st. The studio is about 9x5 meters, and the only downside is really the height which is about 270 centimeters. But with the average model I will have bout 90 cm to work with, and that should be enough. I may also have access to a studio with about 5 meters height somewhere else in the building if I need it for a task or two.

Sparebanken Nordnorge (the bank) did treat me so weell today that I really need to mention their name. With the financial backing I got Raymond Engmark will be a corporation rather than a freelance photographer.

The only thing missing now is more jobs. When you are trying to start a business it's not any good that July is a public holiday in Norway. That means a lot of out-of-office replys to mails I need people to read. But I know there is a humongous potential in these areas, it's just a matter of working hard to get a toe inside one door - then the neighbours will follow.

First job : Trygg Luft AS

When you are trying to start a new business it is important to have both good friends and a network that beleives in what you do. Luckly I got both in my friend Aleksander Jakobsen who also just started a new business in Bodø called Trygg Luft AS (English: Safe Air). I wish to thank him for giving me the first assingment to get started in a "new" place.

Trygg Luft deals with the air most people breathe most day; the air inside your house. There are big advantages for both your health (specially asthma and allergy) but also preventing fungus and other humidity problems inside your house. After living in London, it is very easy to understand why you would need it.

The company have been installing a system on a building site in Bodø which benefits everyone in so many ways. It saves space, keeps dust and humidity to a minimum and keeps the whole building warm. When you have a construction site efficiency is important, and they wanted some pictures to show how little their system intrudes with the activity inside the building.

Aleksander first tried to take his own pictures of the installation while rushing between important meetings, and much like driving your car with only your feet; just because you can doesn't make it a good solution. Most of my lecturers have a rule - make every effort to make your next picture your best one yet. You might not acheive it, but it is a matter of professional pride.

I spent a total of 13 hours on nine pictures in total. It was about one hour of driving, just below two hours of planning and shooting, and ten hours processing the images in photoshop. I am sure that Aleksander would have been pleased with just a quick process, so we agreed up front that he would only pay for three hours of work.

I think that is a good system that we both benefited from. He gets better pictures than he paid for, and I get to push myself and know that I milked the last drop out of those pictures. It's all about professional pride.

Nowadays marketing is more important then ever, and it is really about finding that small leveredge that will make you stand out in the crowd. It's about getting your customer to pause at your webpage or ad instead of the one of your competitor. Below you can see the before pictures taken by Aleksander, and below there is the after pictures taken by myself.

If these were ads, which one would you pause at?