Modelling website upgrades

Got a bit of a busy summer planned as far as model photography's concerned. My recent shoot with Rage was the first of several which were, directly or indirectly, spurred by me upgrading my Purestorm online portfolios to a paid account, which made me more visible on the site.

I currently have the dress rehearsals and publicity material for Romeo & Juliet tonight, two confirmed waterfall shoots in May, a bit of portfolio enhancement for a pal of Rage who's new to modelling, and about half a dozen other shoots which I've still to finalize.

Feeling perky about my togging, and with a wee bit of spare cash burning a hole in my pocket thanks to recent circumstances, I decided to go hog wild: I upgraded my ModelMayhem portfolio to a paid account as well, splashed out on an ad-free version of my Wix website, and bought myself a dedicated domain name to point to it.

So gaze in wonder, puny mortals, at the majesty of...
www.gdelargy-photography.co.uk

Red Rage

After emerging from my photographic hibernation recently, I was contacted by Rage (aka Lou), a model who'd spotted my (newly upgraded) PureStorm portfolio. I'd already seen her own stuff and liked it, so once we got chatting, things started moving quickly. I ended up volunteering for a fashion shoot she was planning, since she's the "face" of an aspiring corsetiere and needed some promotional shots of their latest creation.

Now, I'm normally a bit rubbish with fashion, but this one turned out swell. Good location, nice outfits, and even the weather was reasonable. And as for Lou, she's supposedly not very experienced, but she was striking poses like a pro as soon as I got my lens cap off. Photogenic, a total natural in front of the camera, and didn't need any direction all day. And thank gawd, the pictures turned out quite well too, at least I think so.

PS I never did ask her why she was called "Rage". Perfectly charming lassie the whole time she was with me, but maybe she has a dark side...?

5D mkII vs 400D

So, this weekend... out and about with the 5D2 trying to justify its purchase. Cue lots of swapping lenses, taking turns with each body on the tripod, etc etc, making comparative test shots.

To my relief, there does seem to be a noticeable improvement in quality (between my brand new, £1600, full-frame-sensored 5D2 and the crop-bodied 400D which has over 13k actuations to its name in three years of use--not exactly a stunning upset). However, of course there's more to it than just the IQ.

The first thing to notice is of course the weight. At 810g the 5D2 is about 60% heavier than the baby Rebel. It's physically bigger as well, and though my small hands were quite suited to handling the 400D, I definitely like the chunkiness of this mid-range body. Next difference is probably the most significant so far: I just lurrve the 5D2's viewfinder. Big, bright, and clear, it blows the socks off the crop-body's.

Ergonomically, it's difficult to split them. The 400D's on-off switch is in a more intuitive location for me, and of course I'm more used to its layout, but I think it'd be impossible to squeeze in all the 5D2's controls and functions while following its baby brother's design. Since I've not yet come across anything that made me go "well, that's a stupid place to put it", I'll call that one a draw.

Does the 400D beat the 5D2 at anything? Well yes, sort of. I had a collection of 4GB CF cards onto which 370 raw files from the wee camera could be squeezed. Now, with the 5D2 and its mammoth 21MP sensor, it's not so good. I'm using the RAW + JPG(L) mode, which means about 107 images, or 215 on my new 8GB CF cards. I now carry 36GB of flash storage around with me spread across six cards, but I think I could fill the lot of 'em on a single charge of the 5D2's battery. And don't forget the humungous 16-bit TIFFs I'll create in post-processing: 120MB each before I even start editing?! Feck me, suddenly my PC's 1.5TB HDD doesn't seem quite so voluminous any more...