I was really pleased to get a Silver Award for this monochrome male figure work of Gareth as it was my first attempt to try something like this – hey there is a first time for everything 
The key to the success of this image was feathering the light to bring out all the tonal changes and the shape of the muscles.
Something that had never occurred to me was that it actually very difficult to successfully post the male form is for the image to actually come across with strong masculinity.
Unfortunately things were getting a bit rushed by this time as heavy traffic had delays the model’s arriving and Amber had commitments that evening back in Norwich. However we were still able to get a few nice shots out. To give you an idea how rushed this was, Amber was holding the black backdrop in place in front of the white paper roll from previous shots!
Click on the image to see a higher quality higher resolution version.
Lighting was just an open beauty dish although I had intended to use my diffuser and centre grid to create a harder lighting effect. However as I was feathering the light the grid probably would not have had any effect anyway 
This portrait was posed using my posing table & stool. Lighting was a single beauty dish as key light and background light, which is only visible in the top right corner due to the tight crop. To help create the shadows and sculpt his face I used black reflectors on each side that were positioned really close.
Other Silver Award winning pictures for January 2009:
- Portraiture Traditional
- Portraiture Contemporary
- Monochrome - male figure work
- Fine Art – anonymous nude fine art boudoir
Here are some more pictures from the model portfolio shoot.
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Pat Bloomfield is your photographer / artist. Years of experience and craftsmanship goes into every portrait he creates for you.
Imke Bloomfield is your make-up artist. A keen make-up practitioner trained by professional artists; she has a great flare for creating beautiful make-up especially for you.