March « 2010 « Jurgen Doom

Nikon D3x – a closer look

29 March 2010 om 11:38 door Jürgen geplaatst in de categorie Camera,Flashlight,kids,Portrait

In my previous post I published 2 photographs of my kids, to celebrate the arrival of my Nikon D3x. But it is indeed impossible to assess the quality of a camera and/or lens on a tiny image in a blog post. Therefore, I’m herewith posting a 100% zoom of a detail of Myrte’s head.

The image is photographed with a 85mm Tilt/Shift lens, so it’s manual focus. Although I probably would have wanted the eyes to be a little sharper, I think it’s still pretty acceptable considering we’re looking at an image at 100% magnification (which comes down to roughly the size of an A2 for the intire image).

Nonetheless, look at the sharpness and crispness of the image, especially Myrte’s hair and eyebrows. I also don’t notice any color fringing at the edges (also thanks to the great lens used).

100% crop of Myrte's headshot, by Nikon D3x

Needless to say I’m happy with the results and I’m looking forward to the journey with my D3x.

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Nikon D3x

25 March 2010 om 15:38 door Jürgen geplaatst in de categorie Camera,Commercial,Portrait

This post is to celebrate the arrival of my newest digital camera, the Nikon D3x.

After having photographed the last 2 years with a Nikon D3 camera – much to my satisfaction – I purchased its successor – the Nikon D3s – in December 2009. The Nikon D3s has the same amount of pixels – 12 Mpix – as the D3, but performs even better in low-light situations than the Nikon D3. Since I’m a versatile photographer, encountering many lighting conditions and having to shoot under extreme circumstances, the upgrade from D3 to D3s makes perfect sence. In addition to these features, the Nikon D3s also has a sensor cleaning mechanism, which keeps your sensor fairly dust-free and it also boosts an HD video mode.

As a professional freelance photographer, based in Belgium (near Brussels), 12Mpix sometimes isn’t enough for the clients’ needs. Although fantastically big prints have been made with files created by my Nikon D3 and Nikon D3s sometimes you just want some extra “air to breathe” ….

With the arrival of the Nikon D3x, I have complemented my lineup with a fantastic camera that is specifically designed for the demanding and versatile photographer who wants some extra “umpf” out of his digital files. The Nikon D3x offers 24.5 Mpix, creating 27Mbyte RAW files (uncompressed, 14 bit) with an amazing range and tonality of colours and with a sharpness that is unheard of for DSLR’s.

In order to take the Nikon D3x for a test-drive, I dedicated my first shoot with my newly acquiered camera to my kids, Myrte and Johannes. I took them outside for a quick portret shoot. They were lit by 3 Nikon SB900 speedlights, one of which was softened through an eazy light softbox. The two other flashes were aimed straight at them without any diffusion. The images were post-processed in Lightroom2. The shots were photographed in daylight, ISO100, 1/250, f/12 with a 85mm perspective control lens (Tilt/Shift lens).

Johannes during the Nikon D3x portrait session

Myrte during the D3x portret session

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Architectural photography

23 March 2010 om 10:18 door Jürgen geplaatst in de categorie Architecture,Commercial

It shouldn’t be a big surprise that a construction engineer-turned-photographer is still in love with building and architecture. Indeed, one of my main interests in photography lies in architectural photography. I can always enjoy good architectural photography and I strive to, when I’m photographing buildings and architecture, seek interesting angles, compostions and colors.

One of my clients designs brochures for Philips Lighting and upon completion of a project, I’m comissioned to photograph the building with the integrated lighting.

When the new building for Mercedes in Brussels was finished, I had to photograph the interior of the building, which needed to show its lighting. It finally ended up in print as follows.

Architectural photography - Mercedes building in Brussels

Architectural photography - Mercedes Belgium/Brussels

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Photography and pregnancy, a match made in heaven!

22 March 2010 om 12:00 door Jürgen geplaatst in de categorie Flashlight,Portrait,Studio

As a photographer, one of the most beautiful things to photograph is a pregnant womam. Woman in itself are already beautiful (man too, but that’s a different story alltogether), but a pregnant woman is a pleasure to photograph and to look at. Most of the times, when pregnancy goes well, these woman are so proud of their little bundle of joy inside their body, that they come accross on photographs in a self-confident way.

It wasn’t any different with this lady, who I photographed in her own house. Photographing a belly on location, that is in the comfort and cosyness of someone’s own house, holds many advantages. The pregnant lady doesn’t have to move herself towards a photo studio, but she can stay in a well-known environment, which ultimately helps to gain even more confidence to pose for photographs. In order to explore the through possibilities of pregnancy photography, often people want photographs of the naked body (which, indeed, shows the changing outlines of the body very well). But as you will see in the photographs below, it doesn’t always have to be naked.

With the help of a black background, which I brought along, and a few of-camera reportage flashes (type Nikon SB900) I created different images. In order to respect the privacy of everyone involved, I can only show a few images, but they serve to prove my point. Woman are beautiful, pregnant woman are stunning!

Beautiful shape of a lady's torso.

Outline of the beautifully shaped belly

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Guerilla event photography for Play Station’s Heavy Rain

10 March 2010 om 17:53 door Jürgen geplaatst in de categorie Commercial

Recently I was commisioned to photograph a guerilla event in Brussel. The aim was to capture the mood of a “film noir” of people walking through pooring rain. The rain was created by a rain machine. People leaving Brussels north railway station were given an umbrella in order to keep dry through the heavy rain, created by the rain machine. They had to walk towards me whilst looking into the camera.
The lights we used were cinematographic floodlights (2 times 2000W and 2 times 1000W) and were positioned in such a way that the rain was visible in the photograph.

The event took only about an hour during which time had quite a number of people walking through the heavy rain.

Using a Nikon D3s, wich is a camera designed to use in the field in the most difficult circumstances, I was able to capture the images using a 70-200mm lens at ISO3200.