'Client' - Musicians Portfolio

I was contacted by a music student at UCLAN to see if I would be able to produce some studio images of him and his drumkit. The images were to be used for self-publicity in both web and print format.


After discussing what he required, we agreed that we would need to use the infinity curve for the shots  in order to be able to fit the kit in and still get wide angle shots. Dynamic lighting was needed as he didn't want a flat white background and wanted to make things more dynamic by introducing shadow into the shot to give the images more depth. After some experimentation with different lights I used the combination of a large softbox and a set of barn doors. The barn doors were acting as the main light while the softbox provided a bit of fill. I shot at f8 to allow some depth of field and the fill light was set two stops lower at f4.


Mikey wanted to use different outfits throughout the shoot and we did a lot of action shots while he was drumming as well as more staged shots. We repeated this for each outfit.

The shoot was successful and I produced the images that he wanted. I think the images work well and will look good in print an online. The dramatic shadows add impact and the combination of 'live action' and staged shots ensured that Mikey had a good selection of images from which to choose his final ones. Once he had chosen the final images from each set I processed these in CS4 and provided him with full-size and web-size versions of each image.

Here's the emails from Mikey:

"Hello Chris,

I am writing to see if it would be possible to book you to do a photo shoot for me to aid in my professional development. I am a musician and I need some high quality images taken for use in promoting myself in various areas of my work.

If possible I'd like to have a blank room with just myself and my drum present in the pictures as well as dynamic lighting. As for the pictures themselves I'd like some catching me playing the drums in various outfits and some shots that are more artistic, posing by the drum kit.

Thank you, Look forward to hearing from you.

Michael J. Keefe

(michael.j.keefe@hotmail.co.uk)"

"Hello Chris,

I have received the final edits of the pictures from the shoot and I am very happy with the results, they look great! It's been a pleasure working with you, I'll be sure to contact you for future shoots.

Thank you, all the best

Michael J. Keefe

(michael.j.keefe@hotmail.co.uk)"