St. Louis, Missouri,  photo copyright Erik M. Lunsford

The womens’ fashion shoot that I alluded to in a previous post just published, capping off the summer fashions just in time for July 4th. It comes as a perfect time as my features beat rotation at the paper wanes back into general assignment work.  This year we chose to work at the Ritz-Carlton St. Louis, which worked out very well with a good blend of great locations and a super-friendly staff. Usually it’s a push-pull game of access and permissions for shoots — not the Ritz — they were fantastic and kept things super smooth. While we had several locations, here are two that standout for me. For this photo, I had our model lay on one of the booths at the hotel restaurant and lit her with a bare bulb on a strobe perched high above my position. Bouncing the light into the ceiling and a large mirror above the booth gave the whole scene a “cold light” feel which contrasts against the dark leather texture of the seats. On the other hand, the photo below was a bit more complicated. I had to shoot through a thick window in the fitness center overlooking the western side of the hotel during a specific time in the afternoon when the shadows fell perfectly on the room balconies. To light the photograph,  I used an Alien Bees Beauty Dish mounted high and on my left, shooting through an adjacent window. Next to it was a second strobe on a reflector giving things an extra punch of light. Inside the hotel room was a pair of two lights on softboxes painting the interior and windows. The goal was to shoot a “white hot” feel to the room and clothes without sacrificing too much detail in the clothes and sky. One of the quirky consequences of this composition and location was the rather odd South Florida feel to it — maybe it’s the stucco-like look of the front, the curvature of the balconies, and the sweeping vista of rooms that lends itself more to Miami than St. Louis. Either way, the graphic feel of the entire image kept me coming back.

Summer has definitely arrived in St. Louis, and it doesn’t take a sideways glance at the thermometer to realize it’s smoking hot. You could say the sugar cane fields of Belle Glade in Florida were hotter, but at the confluence of two rivers and a focal point of humidity, St. Louis is definitely sweltering. That’s one of the reasons I steered the summer mens’ fashion shoot for the Post-Dispatch into interior locations of the Four Seasons hotel, with the exception of a few necessary outdoor sets. Above, Christian models a Hugo Boss suit set against an amazing tile wall that reminds one of a subway metro station. Assistant and fellow staffer Chris Lee — of whom this shoot would have been impossible if not for his help — made the strip light positioning an easy task. The tilt gives it an edgy feel, and Christian’s look is mysterious and complex.

The trio shot works thanks to the men posing under some pretty bright and sweaty conditions. We used multiple Alien Bee and Calumet strobes to focus the light and keep the background dark. The reflection off the Four Seasons exterior windows contrasts nicely against the sky. The building lines seem to help the overall graphic feel of the image. Ted (center), Matt (left) and Christian (right) kept going despite the hot clothes and even hotter weather. While this set didn’t allow much time for shooting due to the temperature, there’s something about the break between building and sky along with the cascading set of looks that does it for me when looking at the relatively short raw take.

Vincent models some hot-weather-wear out of a cabana on the terrace of the Four Seasons. We used an Alien Bee B800 mounted with a Beauty Dish low to the right and a Calumet strobe on the far right rear to fire into the canvas cabana cover. I wanted a slightly overexposed look with some medium shadows — you could say hot white light, but then it would be a disgrace to Alex Webb’s Hot Light/Half-Made Worlds book, where the hot light is anything but white. Speaking of which, I hope Alex hoarded as much Kodachrome as he could before Kodak pulled the plug on production early Monday. There isn’t a replacement for that film’s color or historical value, and nothing Canon or Nikon develops will live up to that same look. It truly is a sad day in photographic history.

Anyway, there’s more at the Post’s site including the full gallery — these three images are favorites from the shoot.  On Wednesday, we’re shooting a womens’ fashion shoot at the Ritz-Carlton in St. Louis, so please consider coming back for those photographs, which hopefully will be up by July 4.