Here’s an image I made last week with Maya. I met her at a party and couldn’t resist asking to take her portrait. So glad she obliged!
Jul 092012
Robert Lobetta for Hair's How Magazine
Robert Lobetta
Robert Lobetta
Last month I had a great shoot for Hair’s How magazine with legendary hair stylist and artist Robert Lobetta, though nothing went as planned. We had been aiming to shoot at the LA Louvre in Venice, but when we arrived I wasn’t happy with the limited access they were allowing us. So, we started looking for another space and were fortunate to be able to arrange use of the Canal Club, a nearby restaurant, as our studio. With the restaurant not yet open for business, we had the run of the place and were able to produce some creative shots. Robert was a great subject, comfortable in front of the camera and willing to work with me to make the shots unique. And when I offered to show him the back of my camera – something I’ve become accustomed to doing either because everyone asks, or as a tool to help me describe what I’m aiming for – he refused to look, saying that doing so would make him want to take control and he wanted to trust in my vision. It was great to work with someone whose business revolves around image, but who was still trusting enough to let me do my work as I see fit.
I had also brought all my lights with me, expecting to use them. Robert has a great look and I had a preconceived vision about the type of portrait I was aiming for. But once we were inside I kept being drawn toward a couple of wonderful natural light sources and, despite unpacking my stands and a couple of strobes, left them untouched, opting only to use a reflector. I think it worked out well.
If you’ve got some time, hop over to Robert’s site. He does it all and has a ton of great work on display.
Fashion shoot in front of The Brig, Venice, Calif.
I’ve been doing a few portfolio shoots lately, teaming up with models, stylists and makeup artists and just seeing what we can come up with. This is from a recent collaboration with model Keira Kitagawa and makeup artist Dee (last name to follow). After doing a number of shots in the studio we went out around Venice to find interesting locations. We ended in the parking lot of The Brig, a popular bar and landmark along Abbot Kinney Blvd. I had noticed the lights before while scouting for locations and thought this would make a great place to shoot. Our timing wasn’t great though. We finally made our way to this location just as the attendant was starting to charge for parking and cars were starting to pull in. He tried to charge us to park, but I told him we were looking for places to shoot my friend and asked if we could quickly take a shot and move on. He agreed, but was probably surprised when I pulled a big light out of the trunk. Dee helped Keira get ready in the car and we literally shot for less than 5 minutes, popping frames between crossing cars and pedestrians. Hard to get a clean shot! Finally it all came together and as an added bonus, a car that was turning in to park provided a nice edge light on her legs, giving it something the other frames were lacking. Overall it turned out pretty well I think. Nothing like working on the fly and under the gun! Thanks Keira and Dee for a successful collaboration!
Feb 122010
I’m excited to announce that the second issue of SoCal Scene magazine was just released and features a fashion spread shot by yours truly. We had a great team and a great time putting this shoot together and we’re happy with the results! The magazine is online at socal-scene.com and should be on magazine racks around L.A. next week. In order to pull this off we put together a great team of people and put in a full-day’s work and then some. The shoot took place north of Los Angeles in and around the town of Piru. I’ll follow up later with some behind the scenes photos I took for Erika Stanley’s SNOB Style site.
Credits:
Photography by David Zentz
Styling by Erika Stanley
Clothing by Black Label by Planet Blue & Planet Blue Boutique
Hair by Kyle Mathis
Makeup by Robyn Fisher
Photography assistant – Matt Levitch
Please continue after the jump to see the rest of the series!
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Nov 032009
Fashion Week L.A. at the Petersen Automotive Museaum
Backstage during Fashion Week L.A. at the Petersen Automotive Museaum
Last week was quite fashion-heavy, with Thursday spent doing an all-day editorial fashion shoot up in Simi Valley and Friday night spent shooting the final night of Fashion Week L.A. at the Petersen Automotive Museum on Wilshire Blvd. Both were done in collaboration with my friend Erika Stanley for her fashion website, SNOBStyle.tv, and will appear there soon. I’ll be sure to add links when they do. Although the editorial shoot came first I’m posting the Fashion Week images now, as it may be awhile before the first shoot publishes. We’re also hoping to publish it in a new upstart magazine, SoCal-Scene, with which Erika has recently become affiliated. More on that later.
For this event I stayed away from shooting the standard, down-the-runway shots in favor of shooting more of a behind-the-scenes piece. It was the second of two nights of Gen Art’s Fresh Faces in Fashion show and featured a variety of designers I’m not personally familiar with. I was really just curious to check out the scene. Fortunately, Erika was able to get me a backstage pass to facilitate this and I came away with some decent images. I surely outshot Ashton Kutcher at least.
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Jul 102009
I recently produced a few slideshows for a popular LA fashion blog called SNOB Style. The blog is the passion project of Erika Stanley, pictured at top and bottom right, who writes and shoots videos about all things fashion. For this project she was demonstrating, with the help of makeup artist Robyn Fisher, three different looks for summer makeup. Definitely one of my tougher assignments! What with the wine and cheese and Robyn’s studio, which is at her Studio City home on a high hill overlooking the valley. The full project can be seen here.
