Klyment.com - Journal

Two months before the shoot date Nikolas informed me that he had intentions of entering the 21st Contessa Awards in the makeup artistry category. I was pleased that he was aware of the time and effort required to pull together the models, materials, and time needed to do this shoot properly and that he was still interested in competing in spite already-established recognition for his work amongst my clients and in some parts of the industry in general. I never pass on an opportunity to work with Nikolas and we immediately started creating our list of models that we wanted to work with for this project. The list included many people that we have worked with before and we would have liked to have worked with them all but scheduling prevented us from having more than a single day of shooting. July 20th was our scheduled shoot day. The competition required a day look, a night look, and a look that could be whatever the makeup artist wanted to do. In the end, we didn't produce a night look from this shoot that we felt was strong enough for submission and while we had other options, Nikolas decided not to submit the photos for the competition and I supported his decision. We'd do better work next year and this time we'd have the ideas for the competition brewing in the backs of our minds until summer 2010. Still, I felt that we created some solid makeup-oriented images even though most shots were with very natural makeup. Furthermore, I felt that my yield from this shoot contained some of the best shots of Julie's face that I have ever shot.

Thanks again to our models Whitney Grace, Julie Gillespie, Alteira Evans, and Stephanie Calihoo, photographers Corey Thompson (Yellowjacket Photography) and Rob Lim (Rob & Lauren Photographers) and set designer/prop master Christina Ignacio-Deines (IDBohemia) for making this possible and also to all of the models who agreed to work with us but we were unable to shoot. We will work together sometime soon.

Many more photos after the jump.

The 2009 wedding shooting year wrapped up for Dong and I at the end of September. I'm still working through some colour and silver halide black and white film from the last few weddings and I came across some photos from Vivian's and Aaron's engagement shoot in the mossy forest introduced to me by Cody Tait and Mike Isaak. I started shooting with the Zeiss Ikon at first and then backtracked to pick up my Sinar X and subsequently got lost. Not just a little lost . . . so lost that I had to follow the noise to the high way and then find my way back in, eating up about half an hour of daylight. It was an interesting experience and we got our shots but I'm definitely not wearing sandals into a forest again.

One of my favourite parts of being a photographer is being on another photographer's set.

As one Avenue art director moves to Vancouver another is moved back from Vancouver to take his place. Curtis Comeau recommended me to Paige Weir during his meeting with her sometime back but we were all too busy to meet up until shooting had started for the October issue of the magazine. By the time we met, fortunately there was still a story to shoot. I was commissioned to shoot for a story about a company called Mural Mosaic based on an acreage north of St. Albert. The full story is available on Avenue's website. In spite of having to fight with clouds when using the Sinar X and the 75/4.5 for a formal group shot, the shoot went fairly quickly. Most of the shots were exposed with existing light. Ethan Oblak who is spending a University of Waterloo Engeering co-op term with me also snapped some photos, one of which was published. Paige was kind enough to credit him also in this issue.

This day's shoot for Avenue magazine was my first shoot for an editorial publication. I met with Rob Machida and our subject, the renowned tailor Sam Abouhassan before shooting to look at his store and to discuss ideas for the shoot. Rob knew that we needed a photo for a double page spread and we were also shooting with the intent to generate a few options for the cover. Admittedly, nothing went as I had expected (including the issue for which we thought we'd be shooting) but after seeing the published piece I was pleased with the finished product and how Rob put the design of the pages together. Rob was there to do art direction and Nikolas Seyhatheb imaged Sam by helping to piece together some of his outfits after Sam had picked out the major items. Nikolas also handled hair and makeup allowing me to deliver the photos unedited save for a minor eye tweak and the removal of an electrical socket in one photo. Sean Traynor, Corey Thompson, and for a short time, Lillian Patz, were on set to help out with the photography end of shooting.

I brought along my Rollei 6008AF w/ Phase One back and Schneider Xenotar and also the 75/4.5 Calumet Caltar-N II and the 210/5.6 Schneider Symmar-S but all photos selected for publication were shot with the Nikon D3 and either the 24-70/2.8 AF-S Nikkor or the 135/2 Defocus Controll Nikkor. Shots with the 135 were done at ISO 1600 or above and still looked really clean.



Immediately after the first day of shooting I vented to Corey over supper with some of my frustrations from the first day of shooting. There were some judgement calls that I later realized that I should have made but failed to. I should have insisted on a different location and I should have recognized that the subject would be more comfortable shooting in a different location. I am glad that we were able to reshoot and will know better for next time. Shooting in Sam's home was so easy. The subject was fully relaxed and we weren't distracted by the high volume of pedestrian traffic crossing outside his store. Surprisingly a photo from the first day of shooting made it to the cover. To be completely honest I was a bit disappointed by the selection at first but after seeing the finished layout for the cover I was very impressed with what Rob managed to pull off. This issue would be Rob's last with Avenue. Shortly after completing this issue of the magazine Rob relocated to Vancouver with his fiance. A huge thank you to Curtis Comeau for introducing me to Avenue. At time of blog posting, Curtis has referred me to two Avenue art directors. Curiously, as a photographer competing for the same market share, Curtis has done a better job promoting me than I have done for myself and I will always be grateful for that. =)