Commercial Food Photography

I'm shooting for The Georgetown View Magazine, in well, Georgetown, Texas. It is a magazine about the community with interesting stories and because it is free, financed with ad sales.  Every once in a while an advertiser or business owner wants additional photos for their portfolios or to be used in future ad designs.  I have photographed food for a few restaurants.

There is a different approach to attractive food photos that make you salivate. Without going into the technical set up, I'll provide a few photographs.

I'm getting hungry as I write this...

And thirsty !

That's the idea for these ads, to rattle our sense of hunger through the sense of sight. Make sense ?

RSX Studios - Gallery included!

RSX STUDIOS - What's with the name change? I am a photographer, and I photograph many things, events, portraits, editorial photography, street photography, landscapes, architectural, commercial, weddings, births, and one funeral.  But, what does a photographer DO with all those photographs on the hard drive ?  Well, I sometimes create art. More accurately, composites. Now, in additional to photographs I also have a growing inventory of art pieces that are framed and ready for delivery. Some of the pieces are photographs that have retouches to bring out the best light and shadows to make the images worth looking at, and more importantly, WORTH BUYING.

Here's a few samples:

There is more artwork available online at http://rximenez.smugmug.com/art

Lightenupandshoot with Mike Thompson

I was extremely fortunate to come to a tag along workshop with Michael Thompson, owner of Lightenupandshoot.com,  in Austin 9/14-16. His workshop covered some basics before heading out to shoot different folks on the streets of downtown. I was particularly impressed with concepts I thought I understood explained the "Mikey" way, and then after ALL THESE YEARS, I "connected the dots"!
It was interesting to be taught basics so differently. I have taken so many other workshops and seminars throughout the years, and it's pretty much taught the same way. And yes, I got it. But, during Mikey's brief review, some questions were asked that I should've quickly answered, but, I froze.
   I had been lucky to calculate my lighting to create my images. There are a few that I really liked, and looked similar to  Mr. Thompson's style. Yet, I felt I couldn't pull it off all the time, or at any time. It had to be in the 'golden moment' of light.  Well, my confidence to create this style of lighting improved greatly. Now, it is time to practice and improve the technique, without taking too long to calculate the lighting. Here are a few samples from that weekend.

   The idea of the workshop is to get the light correct in the camera so that no Photoshop is needed to fix the creation.  Lightroom is used here to further darken the clouds and soften the contrast a bit.

A couple of years ago I came up with a design
for a logo, RSX Digital Images. It was fashioned
from a rangefinder camera and my initials. I just
realized that much of my work was done in a studio type environment both indoor and outdoor.
The other part of my work is creating art from my photography. It only made sense to change the name from RSX Digital Images to RSX Studios.  I am using "plural" studios because the "other studio" is the gallery part that comes from the art creation.

Without further delay and bla-bla, I present the updated logo for RSX Studios.

So, is it HDR ?

A few years ago HDR or High Dynamic Range enter the vocabulary of photography enthusiasts all over the world. The images yields details traditionally hidden in shadows as well as shadows hidden in highlights and "blown-out" areas.  The digital age has allowed us to manipulate a photograph in a few minutes which historically took hours and even days to create in a darkroom full of chemicals and cardboard cut-outs. The first time I saw an HDR art piece on canvas took my breath away. I had never seen a photograph quite like it before. Then, these art pieces started to morph into what looked like a colorful LSD hallucination. I think they still sold. But, now, it's a trend. Todays cameras have built in HDR software or you can do a plug-in for Photoshop or any other editing software. Cool !  I guess.
But, it's now more like the "special effects" built into Picasa, Photoshop, and every other editor consumers have fun with. So, now a crappy picture looks AWESOME ! YippeeeE!
Well, I'm still impressed with the first HDR images I saw. It didn't look psychedelic at all, but natural.
Our eyes will naturally adjust for light and shadows, all the time. Yet these fresh new HDR photographs were images that resembled what my eyes naturally see.  I feel, there is an art to HDR interpretation of an image. I believe that when I see a subject, my intention is to create an image as I saw it. So, if I'm in an urban area, my eyes adjust for the shadows between the buildings and adjust again when I look up and above the buildings. I see detail in the clouds and sky too.
  I use Lightroom quite a bit for processing my images. I realized that it isn't always necessary to shoot 3 photos of a subject then merge them to get a HDR image. Below are two examples of single shot image with highlights and shadows adjusted within Lightroom.

The image below has a little vignette added to it.

Environmental Portraits with Daniel Patterson

I recently did a photo session with Daniel Patterson. We started in the studio. He didn't have anything else planned nor did I. So I suggested we move our session to a different location, an abandoned cotton gin in Walburg, Texas. I appreciate when I client allow  me to create and direct a project, which this turned into. There are so many different textures, colors, and patterns in this old gin, not to mention, the light inside is quite magical.  Here are a few samples ...

Let us create

Today I found a website of a creative photography artist, Miss Aniela, from Britain. Her work is phenomenal and of course, I was inspired. Although I created a couple of pieces recently, I have yet to be commissioned to do another. So, while being inspired by Miss Aniela, I did a self-portrait from a collection of photos I did during a photo walk in Georgetown. This is a composite using ONLY what I shot at Wolf Ranch, which, in short, are 3 photos.

                              Can you guess what are the components of my image ? 

1. The clouds were photographed separately.

2. The lilly pads were actually only part of a photograph of the pond. I then, separated the lilies into 3 parts and dodged and burn light values and shadows.

3. I was actually standing on this rock which was part of a larger bed of rock. Light values were adjusted around my head, shirt and pants to match the sky's light direction.

As, with any project, it can be further improved, but, it's just an exercise of basic Photoshop skills.

If I decide to put it on canvas, I'd work on the shirt a bit more, as well as the lilies...

Thanks for visiting.

Touch Up - S.O.P.

     I was taught by my mentors that a good portrait have the eyes as the doorway to their soul. If anything has to be focused it must be the eyes. Spot meter and focus on the eyes.  The photo on the left is pretty much right off the memory card.  It looks like a nice photo. I just wouldn't call it a portrait, just yet.  I know where the light is falling and its quality. Adobe Lightroom is my processing tool of choice, like a million other photographers, and for very good reasons.  I rarely use Photoshop for a portrait, since Lightroom has an easy to use spot remover for blemishes, and a easy to use "clarity" tool to soften skin texture a bit. 

       I start brightening the eyes including the top of the cheeks and up to the eyebrows, first.  Then, I'll add another layer of brightness across the entire face.  Lightroom also has a very nice vignette tool, which I apply to darken the perimeter. Sometimes, the teeth need a little whitening. I use the brush and desaturate about 80%. Teeth that are too white look weird to me... Then finally, I look at the neck's light value, which often ends up looking brighter than the face because it rarely gets tanned. I adjust tonality of the neck by lowering the exposure value in Lightroom. Re-crop to an 8x10 and it is now suitable for framing !

Jim and Denise Wedding

   Once upon a time, in a land in the center of the Universe, overlooking a lake, known as, Lake Travis, a wonderful nuptial occurred. It was summer and the sun was setting quickly as if to race to kiss the hills that embraced the lake. The bride was in her room preparing, and her groom, anxious, was in position to receive and escort her to the ceremony. It was time. Her son brings her down the staircase and passes her hand to her groom with approval and love. Her best friend officiates the ceremony. Friends and family applauded as they made their promises and watched doves fly off over the lake then disappear beyond the horizons.

Let the celebrations begin !

Simplicity and Effective Lighting

I appreciate simplicity. I especially appreciate the effectiveness of properly executed practices using simplicity. Practical. Photographing for my local magazine, The Georgetown View, is a perfect opportunity to exercise simplicity in most environmental portraitures. I use only two flash speedlights for effective lighting on my subject. While I do have a Sekonic light meter, I rarely use it since I have become used to using reflective metering from my camera and "chimping" the image. Spot metering is preferred.

Both of my flashes output the same power, one
is fired through a white umbrella for soft light on
my subjects, while the other is set without any
modifier for a harder rim light fired from behind my subjects. The speedlights are on lightweight
stands most of the time. While I used to bounce
on ceilings, I find that color and details get lost
more than I'd like in a portrait.


In the next image, the flash in the rear is placed
high above her head (7 ft)  and the flash is aimed inside
the reflective silver umbrella which produces a soft glow on her hair.


Rudy Ximenez Photography
Serving Georgetown and Austin, Texas

512-589-3956

Composites and digital manipulation

Above, is a piece of art that was used as an inspiration to create a digital composite art piece for my client.

Digital manipulation, digital composite, are a few terms applied to this type of photographic art work.
I used Photoshop Elements 10, it has all the tools I need. Everything was photographed with my own gear, including the moon. The sunflowers were photographed in my backyard, the butterfly somewhere in Galveston, the sunset was from San Diego. I photographed Diane in a forest. To allow for the sunset,  the trees had to be removed (in Photoshop, of course). I then applied a final layer of soft wispy reeds to break up the horizon a bit.

From Vision to Fruition.

Recently, I purchased the revered Nikon D800. I am testing it from a "why would you do that" perspective. First of all, this is my first full frame camera. My film camera lens will work flawlessly and exceed the limits of film. Sorry film folks. Since I also have a small collection of DX lenses, I wanted to see why "they won't work" on a full frame camera. The image above is taken with a Nikon 18-55 G f3.5-5.6 DX kit lens. It is remarkably sharp for such an inexpensive glass. When I posted this image on Facebook, it got quite a few likes. The lens is set to 18mm and this is the effect of a DX lens on a FX body. However, once it is zoomed to about 35mm the hard vignette disappears. So, that being said, I bet, an 18-200DX lens will be fine once its zoomed past 35mm or so...

  The other testing I'm doing with this 36mp beast is setting the quality mode to JPEG BASIC. In this mode the files are, in comparison to most DXs, a hefty 4-5mb file. Below, an 85 f1.8G lens is used. I find that the D800 noise is almost nil at ISO 1000 in this photo. The lens is rather sharp and the details are crisp and impressive.

 PORTRAITS is one of my favorite facets of photography. I have become accustomed to using strobe lighting from my SB600 and SB700 Speedlights for portraits and food photography. A couple of weeks ago, the ROT Rally folks needed to upload several merchandise images to their website, primarily t-shirts and caps. I scouted the location while we waited for the model to show up. I set up 2 strobes and took advantage of a large open-air entrance whilst being under roof cover. The natural light spilled in nicely and I just needed to light up the model with a through-the-umbrella strobe and then light up the backdrop which was a slightly rusted metal door. PERFECT!

Nikon D5100, 85mm f1.8

On a side note:

  the model decided to enhance her picture. I asked her send me back a copy of her completed efforts.
Now, I understand personal taste, etc. , but, unless the art direction dictates this style, I would prefer to stay truer to actual skin tones as much as possible.

Shooting for View on Georgetown Magazine

I met Bill Skinner and a staff photographer, Carol Hutchison, at a ribbon-cutting ceremony and complimented the work of Carol in a recently published issue. I kept in touch with Carol through e-mail, commenting on the magazines' progression. A few months later, I was available to do any freelance work and she suggested I send a few samples. Two days later I received my first assignment. So, my own personal challenge is to try a make each image as storytelling as possible.

One of the View's many happy advertisers, Mayday Pest Solutions

Digital Art Phantasy Portrait

I enjoy making images that can tell a story and convey an emotion. Visual stimuli. While most folks are happy with portraits for their home or photo album, I bring a value-add where my client and I create an art piece that is either inspired from another piece of art, or created entirely from my mind while using photographs from my prized collections. These are composites. All elements of the creation are composed using only images I personally photographed with my own gear.

So our model was photographed in her home by a large window. I layered her onto a photograph of a Galveston sunrise. I then replaced the sun with my photograph of the full moon. The city scape is Austin photographed from Barton Creek Mall parking lot. I split that photo down the middle and swapped the two halves. The clouds have quite a bit of "dodge and burn" actions but are the actual clouds of the photograph. And finally, the seagull that is flying, was actually there and not photoshop'ed in... This piece is near completion.


The image is called Flora Sol.  The flowers were photographed in my backyard, the butterflies were in Galveston, the sunset is from San Diego Beach, while the moon was photographed with my 300mm.
Diane was actually in the reeds.

Entertainment is a big part of our culture today. The electronic age has brought every level of media to our fingertips. The electronics in today's camera allows the maker to instantly see what is captured and wirelessly route to a server and magically appear on a printer or the web.

Ted Nugent opens his show

 Concerts are one of my favorite forms of entertainment, and for a second year I have been asked to photograph the concert acts for the 2012 Republic of Texas Biker Rally. The Saturday night headliner: Ted Nugent. Opening act was Super Suckers, which I enjoyed. Thursday was Kenny Wayne Shepherd and Gov't Mule. I really enjoyed each of these bands!

Super Suckers

Kenny Wayne Shephard

Family Photo Enhancement

Family portrait, it's purpose, capture the beauty and emotion and memory for each person. Long lasting, pure, treasured. But, every once in awhile, with even the best of intentions and preparation, something get overlooked for the session. In today's case, my background. So, I dig into my sunset collection and "enhanced" the image to what I had envisioned days before ...

The only other changes I made were to replace the faces of the child and father from one of the other photos from our session.

Gallery Wraps

I received my 4th gallery wrap canvas today. I'm liking that it is almost box-like, the rear of the wrap is an archival board while the canvas is adhered to the board as well. No sagging will happen. And even the 24x36 size is so lightweight. The larger sizes I've received are of my son and my wife and display nicely throughout my living room. Perfect for clients to check out.

The top image is heavily enhanced, while the bottom image is a composite of four different images with textured layer of colors.

Chapel Dulcinea

I have a wedding coming up in March at a place called Chapel Dulcenea. My wife, Ann, and I went to see where is was and explore the opportunities for creative photography. It is nested in the hill country of SW Travis County. The chapel is open-air with very limited seating, so, I think this is perfect for an intimate setting.