Rachel Kenny – Richie.ie

September 8, 2013July 21, 2018

Ray Byrne in Studio

Ray Byrne is back with a bang on the blog. Ray is another DIT buddy of mine. We have seen Ray before on the street and the beach. Now its time to shoot in studio. He came down with his partner in crime, Rachel Kenny for a fun filled day in studio. The main aim of this shoot was to try out try out some different shoot ideas and to update Rays book. He current portfolio on his agency website still only has the old photos form my last shoot with Ray, so these shots should really help improve it.

We done some shots in studio as well as outside the studio to take advantage of the nice weather we had that day. It’s always good to get out of the studio to take some shots out doors. The shot up top is one of my favs from that particular set.

Back in studio, we got down to business trying some portraits and high-fashiony poses……. mostly just messing around, but it was fun. If you follow my work, you will notice that I am not generally into fashion and the art side of shots. My current style of shooting is to keep things simple. However, its is sometimes good to step out ones comfort zone and try something different. The last time I done something similar was with Ricky a few months ago and that turned out pretty good.

After we finished doing the fashion stuff, we went back to spend a few minutes shooting some headshots. Although not an actor, its always good to have some headshots for a commercial book. My style of headshots that I am working on is with a plain background in a horizontal / landscape format. I may do up a post on my headshot techniques at a later date when I have more time and when I perfect it a little. But for now, you can see a setup shot below.

As you can see above, I shoot headshots on a 70-200mm lens, roughly around 100m. I shoot at F4.0 as at F2.8 at 100mm on that lens, the depth of field is so small that getting the eyes in focus along with the tip of the nose is tricky. Another thing you will notice is that I use light panels on the left and right of the face for light. I have a light behind these to turn them into a nice big soft light source, along with creating big catch lights in the eyes.

Thats all for now, don’t forget to get in touch to book your shoot if you’re looking for headshots, model portfolios or general portraiture.

September 8, 2013July 12, 2018

Rachel Kenny in Studio

Galway Girl Rachel Kenny gets another feature on the blog now. Rachel who we first met as a model in the DIT fashion now, is now studying to be a make-up artist ( https://www.facebook.com/RachelCKMakeup ) We got in touch again to do a fun shoot in studio a while ago and this is the result. Both Rachel & Ray came down from Dublin for the day. It was a chilled out day, all about the fun and the excellent Fried Chicken afterwards 🙂 You can Check out Ray’s shots in the next post.

Being a Make-Up Artist, Rachel done her own make-up on the day. She also done her own hair and styling for this test shoot. One thing you will notice about her hair is that she has the side of her head shaved off which I think really suites her. It suited this shoot too as we were doing for a sexier look.

One of the things that work with on people is the eyes. I say a “Hint of the Squint”, some people say “Smile with the Eyes” and some know it as “Smouldering” …. it has lots of names. The end result is to try to get that twinkle in the eye, that look of confidence. Nailing the look can be hard for most people, it can take a lot of practice. But once a person nails it and gets that muscle memory, they can nail it on demand!

Below is a shot of Rachel with one of her proof prints from the shoot just before she headed home…… one happy camper 🙂

June 2, 2011July 12, 2018

Rachel Kenny – Beach & Street

Rachel is another one of the many DIT models I have shot. Rachel was involved in the DIT Fashion Show. Rachel is currently signed with Catwalk Models in Galway. Rachel has a really nice look and it was great to shoot with her on two occasions. She has catwalk experience and has done a good few fashion shows. Working with experience models always make things easier when it comes to posing and general atmosphere on set.

The two shoots were a fashion shoot on the streets of Dublin at night and some beach shots. For the Dublin shoots, we were aiming for a dark look. Ann-Marie Carey was on MUA duties with Danilo Tavares was on hair. Both did a fantastic job. I was assisted by Cameron ( Snapt.eu), who was a big help in the location scouting and the lighting on the night of the shoot.

This shoot has its lighting problems in that the areas is lit by ugly, yellow sodium vapour street lights. This alone was not that big a deal from an ambient light point of view. A custom white balance on the Nikon D7000 worked a treat and produced a nice result…. almost cinematic feel, which is what I was hoping for. The problem then came in trying to use fill light. I do not have big reflectors to reflect back enough of the light. My initial reaction was that I wanted to used flash, but with this custom WB setting, normal white light was shifting to dark blue.

I knew that I needed to balance to my flash with the ambient. This is a trial and error process. You basically need a lot of CTO and 1/2 CTO gels with you and keep adding them to your flash until the light from your flash looks good on your subject. I think I ended up with an equivalent 3 1/2 CTO gel, which was made up of 5 or 6 individual gels. The main problem with this is that each gel added decreases the power of the flash…. power that is already scarce due to the distance from light to subject and I was wanting to keep the ISO low on the body to keep noise down. But it all worked out in the end.

The other set of shots are from a beach shoot with Ray Byrne. It was a great day on the beach and we got some great shots. Here are the best ones. I really like the portrait below of Rachel. I like the expression on here face and she has amazing eyes.

I hope to shoot with Rachel again soon over the Summer to get a wider range of shots. If you’re reading this after 2011, then click to see more shots of Rachel and Ray.