Catriona Portrait (Testing Zuiko 100mm f2.8 on 5D mk 2)

Catriona shot in my small home studio using a Canon 5d mark 2 and a 100mm f2.8 Olympus Zuiko lens.

I have this olympus lens that I use on my old film camera the Olympus OM2n which gives some great quality and I have shot a lot of portraits with it on film in the past. I recently started to look into some portrait lenses for my digital set up (5D mark 2). I looked into the Canon ef 100mm f2.8 macro and the Canon ef 100mm f2. They are relatively inexpensive when it comes to good quality portrait primes and I would use either of them no problem and know that they would give great quality. Then I remembered I had this 100mm Zuiko lens so I bought a cheap adapter to get this on the 5D, I bought it from ebay for about £10. This is the first real test shots from it in a portraiture setting and from this image it looks like it works really well. This image is shot at 2.8 so the depth of field is pretty shallow and focused on her right eye (our left) and I really like how it rendered the image and I would be happy to use this in a professional setting. The only problem is though that it isn't that easy to hit focus spot on but I am going to buy an adapter with an autofocus conformation so that will resolve that problem. 

After this surprising experience I think I will look into trying out a zuiko 24mm f2.8 to see what the results from that are like as I would love an extremely compact wide angle that could fit in my pocket while out on a shoot rather than the very large 16-35 f2.8L which can get annoying having to carry around all day and I prefer primes anyway.  I may possibly sell my 16-35 f2.8 II L as I do really prefer primes for size and i've never really been a zoom guy but the 16-35mm image quality is great so I am caught in two minds. 

I'll keep updating the 100mm f2.8's images as I get through them, I want to really give it a good test before using it on a pro job. And possibly a zuiko 24mm f2.8 on a 5d mk 2 review soon. 

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Josh T. Pearson, Portrait Illustration.

Josh T. Pearson, Portrait Illustration.

I decided to add to my portrait Illustration series with this portrait of one of my favourite musicians 'Josh T. Pearson'.

It is from a photograph I took of him in London last year and I always wanted to do some kind of painting of it but was waiting until I felt I could do it a bit of justice.

Mixed Media on paper.

See the whole portrait illustration set so far here

I would love to do an exhibition of these sometime if I do enough good one's.

Check out Josh T. Pearson here http://www.joshtpearson.co.uk/

Places to follow me online:

My Webite

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Print Store

email: andrew@drewportfolio.com

Pretty Polly

Portrait illustration 4.

I went a little darker and atmospheric with this one.

See the rest of my Portrait Illustration set here

Ink, Watercolour, Oil and Acrylic on paper.

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andrew@drewportfolio.com

Portrait Illustration 2

Ink on paper.

I really like doing these portrait illustrations just now. Thanks goes to my friend Carlina who asked me to do a portrait illustration of her, I really enjoyed creating it and now think I'm going to do a portrait series.

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andrew@drewportfolio.com

'Monster Shark' Video (instrumental demo and video)

Monster Shark (demo instrumental and video) from Andrew Kelly on Vimeo.

I made this video to go with the 'Monster Shark' demo instrumental I did last week.

I made it quite quickly and it kind of matches the roughness and mood of the song.

All of this project including the music and video editing was made with free software. I liked the challenge of not using any expensive industry standard software, it really makes you work harder and I feel produces something more than you maybe would have with all the right tools.

This was a fun project from start to finish and filled my spare time well. I will be producing much more of these in the future so watch this space as I'm sure they will be getting bigger and better.

The Lines Begin To Blur

This is a mixed media piece. Painting on a photograph. I like to blur the lines between different media. Creativity is all about experimentation, whether successful or not, sometimes its really not up to you.

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andrew@drewportfolio.com

Original T-Shirt Design (Hand Painted)

I painted an illustration I did in the past on to a white T-Shirt. Think I will do a lot more of these, it was good fun and I liked the outcome. I think I maybe did this one a little too high (close to the neck), I will try some color too on the next one. Now I will have to look through the illustrations I have done in the past and see which one's might work well as T-Shirt designs.

If anyone fancies it you can look through my illustrations here and here and let me know which one's you think might work.




Wearing the thing, should have taken my bandage off, oops!


The Original Illustration:



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andrew@drewportfolio.com

DIY DSLR Shoulder Rig

Now have a new video blog post explaining more about this rig here

This is some of the process me and my dad went through while building me a shoulder rig. All in all the materials cost around £40 (thats including the tripod head). We intentionally decided not to use the standard 15mm rods to base the system on as I wanted to have everything home made and don't intend to buy any pro pieces to attach. I will also attempt a follow focus system soon.

It is based on a single aluminium sheet about 2 inches wide as it is nice and light. The handles are simply bike handles (I will buy a few different styles to suit different projects).

We then sprayed everything black.

I like that everything is adjustable to my needs. All I need to do is make some more screw holes if I need to attach any other pieces of equipment (follow focus, sound recorder).

I am very happy with it. It gets a very steady shot which is the sole purpose for making it, it is light, can be easily taken apart for storage and re-assembled, it cost at least £400 less than a store bought rig, easily adjusted to my needs and projects. Overall pretty damn good for around £40.


















Final Rig.
It was sprayed with a grey primer then finished with a satin black.

I added a small bag at the back with 5 pounds of weight to balance out the whole rig and take the strain of my arms. The whole rig with the Canon 5d mk 2 on it feels great and is a pleasure to use.

Only thing left to do is buy some black tiers to attach the weight bag in place of the red one's (purely aesthetic reasons) and buy some different bike handle bars for different needs and projects.

Now I plan to make a few different styles of rig to compliment this one (some more run and gun styled one's). I will also attempt a follow focus for this one.

A big thanks to my dad for helping me with this!

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andrew@drewportfolio.com

Catriona

My girlfriend Cat. Taken about 2 years ago. I just found this on my hard drive and really liked it.

Memory tree by Mike Kobal.

Another great movie clip shot with the 5d mk 2. I really like the use of depth of field in this and also the colour correction. It has an eerie feel to it.

Great work by Mike Kobal.

Watch full screen.

memory tree: Canon 5D, 50mm 1.2 from Mike Kobal on Vimeo.

g. (An amazing short film by J. Xavier Velasco)

Found this on vimeo the other day and I was blown away. It engrossed me from the first second to the last. It was shot so well and just sucked you into the story. The creator J. Xavier Velasco states that it was shot all hand held with a canon 5D mk2 and a few lenses and virtually no budget. Shows what can be achieved when you have vision and creativity. This puts a lot of big budget movies to shame in my opinion. I loved the hand held aesthetic, I am not a fan of complete precision and the slight hand shake in this only adds to the feeling, atmosphere and narrative. I think that if this was shot using steady cams, glide cams and other expensive gear it would not have had the same impact (well on me anyway).

Watch this and see what great vision and creativity can achieve.

Watch it full screen for full impact.

g. from J. Xavier Velasco on Vimeo.

Pretty Cool Canon DSLR Video with Zeiss 35mm

I just found this video online as I was searching around for reviews on the Zeiss 35mm f2 lens that i'm thinking of investing in. I like how the lens captures the video here, very clear and sharp with no vignetting and such like. I'm sure it would be great for still too. The person has done a very good job on this short video.

Anyway have a look at this

My first 7d test from Leandro Ferrão on Vimeo.

Film Colour Correction

A really cool tutorial for colour correcting your videos to get looks similar to Hollywood films. Its a great tutorial to get you started, i personally don't care for the extreme blueish correcting in this tutorial but i'm sure other people will love it. He shows you everything from quick colour correcting to adding vignetting to put more emphasis on your characters.

This is a good tutorial on simple image colouring and theory which is very relevant to stills photography too.

Have a look at this if you are interested in movie making, infact the whole article on movie making with your dslr is pretty informative.

Enjoy.

Episode 22: Creating a Summer Blockbuster Film Look from Red Giant Software on Vimeo.

Find the start of the whole article here:

Whole DSLR Cinema Article

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andrew@drewportfolio.com

Locum Pharmacist Business Card

I just finished a business card design for a Locum Pharmacist.

This was quite a tricky project as there is not much research that can be found on pharmacy related business cards and any that I did find were extremely bad and very uninspiring. So I had to approach this with a fresh mind.

The client wanted something that was visually attractive but got her details across effectively.

We came to the conclusion that incorporating a few pills or medical symbols would not be the way to go as it is very dull and very cliche. We instead decided to go for an abstract background design that wouldn't over power the text and a elegant soft colour that would make it stand out from the other generic pharmacy locum cards, so that when that company needed a locum they would reach for her card first.

This card is the outcome. It has the bold white text that can easily be read which is primary, It is attractive and eye catching yet elegant without being over powering. Subtlety was the most important aspect when designing this card as it would have been really easy to go for a bright saturated purple and high contrast background design that would loose the texts readability.

Both the client and I are very happy with the final outcome which is all you can ask for.

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andrew@drewportfolio.com

DIY DSLR Shoulder Rig

I am going to try and make one of these for my 5D to shoot steady videos. To buy new these things are expensive, £500 - 1200, no way am I spending that just now.

This guy has done the best diy job I have seen yet. I hope to create something like this but more suited to my needs. I will keep you updated on my pregress. In the meantime check out this guys video.



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andrew@drewportfolio.com

Chase Jarvis Inspirational Talk

This is a great speech by Chase Jarvis on photography, video and creativity in general. I love how he says that he didn't do anything the way you are supposed to in his creative career. I feel the same way, I always like to question why something has to be a certain way simply because thats how its supposed to be.

Click on the link below and give it a watch, it certainly brightened up my day.



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andrew@drewportfolio.com

Caught In The Storm

I was out exploring Sandend beach in Scotland (I grew up next to this beach)taking some pictures when all of a sudden the sky turned black and heavy rain and thunder followed. Needless to say I got soaked but managed to take this shot before the camera had to be thrown into the bag and I had to find some shelter.

I love the mood that Scotland weather can create, the getting soaked part not so much but its part of the package I suppose. Can't wait to go back.

Tae Kwon-do Flyer

This is a flyer I recently created for a Tae Kwon-do instructor in London to promote his classes. I had some fun with the design as he was more open to whatever ideas I thought appropriate. He wanted something modern that would stand out from the crowd so this is what we ended up with at the end. I am really happy with the outcome and so is the customer which is what I aim for when doing a project.

This is the Front



And the Back



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andrew@drewportfolio.com

Clay Model Attempt 2

A small monster face I made out of clay recently. This was really good fun and I think I will buy some more and see what I can do with it.

This will be painted soon, my elbow is in agony and can hardly use a paintbrush but when its healed and I have painted this model I will upload it here.

www.drewportfolio.com
andrew@drewportfolio.com