A cinematic effect

Piper; Sydney, Australia; 2009 © Gabriel Ponzanelli

Earlier this week I did a photoshoot with Piper for my People of the Globe project. After shooting the black & whites I needed, we headed into Circular Quey to try something different. We wanted to use the city lights as a background as I've done many times in the past, but this time I wanted to get the feeling of a movie scene. The idea I had was to get a photograph that seemed to be a still from a film, but with Piper looking at the camera, which wouldn't normally happen in a movie!

Because it was just the two of us, I didn't want to set up any elaborate lighting. It's usually a pain in the ass to mess with lightstands, umbrellas, and reflectors without an assistant, so I decided to go with an Orbis Ringflash as the only extra light source and up the ISO a bit to get a good exposure from the available light. This is only one of the frames we got and it has only minimal editing. I think it worked pretty well. I'll definitely be doing more of this style of shoots.

Piper was great and really made the shot. She's a great model and a really nice person. I love it when a model is so laid back and friendly that things just click.