Photographic Impressions

OLD – part 2

Bernard — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 22:26:20 +0000

Still some pictures from 2011.

I met Laurie during a bachelor party @ Dare-2B-Different and asked her if she would be interested to work on the Old project. To my surprise it didn’t take her long to decide to cooperate. We planned the shoot a few weeks later, worked from 8 till around 11 o’clock in the evening. She had never modeled before (in this way at least) and gave the best of herself for every picture. Real fun to do, and something that makes pictures special (natural people prepared to experiment and create).

For the OLD series I use a pair of halogens with an 2 by 1 meter Lasolite diffusor. I try to get all pictures right out of the camera (because I’m not such a PS guy) and apply one of my NIK Silvereffects presets to get the old picture effect.

2012 Is a fact!

Bernard — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 19:41:35 +0000

Again a new year to look forward to.
Dance and movement will take a big part in what I want to realize this year. So, if your interested to model.. just let me know

2011 can be summarized by the book ‘Body Of Art’ I compiled. It should have been ready just after the expo we did on February 6th. And is was more or less. Only, I had some specific pictures in mind that I needed to add. Thanks to the cooperation with Jessica (she worked for Cirque du Soleil and now for Cavalia and who know what great project will come up next for her) I could realize the images I had in mind. Add to this the images of another project and the book grew from 20 pages to +60.

Body Of Art by Bernard Panier | Make Your Own Book

During 2011 I also started the series ‘Old’. Using fixed halogen light, a Tilt & Shift lens (the create the specific depth of field and unsharpness) and long shutter speed I’m searching to emulate the feeling of the glass plate photography. First impressions can be found on the site .

It must have been September when I did the session for the ‘Old’ series with the great Victoria Rose. It was one of those shoots I will remembers because of the fun we had in creating the images. It was also one of those shoots I will remember because so many things went wrong. I tried some light setups that didn’t give the result I was looking for, the tethered connection failed at the most inconvenient moment, we ran out of time so quickly, etc. In the end I got out of it what I wanted.

Hereunder the result of my studio shoot with Victoria Rose:

This series shows a typical flow of my work in studio. I start with the main project (‘Old’ in this case), experiment with some ideas and end the last 30 minutes with a portrait session I do with every model. Here I always use the same conditions of light, clothing and lens (60mm @ f4). Have a look at the site to see more.

New Site is finally live!

Bernard — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 20:27:27 +0000

Every time I was asked to show my work I had to tell the site didn’t reflect the latest work. This is finally resolved. A new site, updated blog, links to Flickr and Facebook. I hope you have as much pleasure watching the different albums as I had sleeting the pictures and building the site.

Serge Romanov @ Luxillag

Bernard — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 20:41:52 +0000

A huge thunderstorm flooded the studio last Tuesday. 180 square meters of water and mud. Nothing to do with Serge Romanov, but the reason this spost came later than planned.

So, Luxillag organised a workshop on the usage of continious light of Dedolight last Tuesday. The day was organised like every other workshop I followed. First some theory. A bit of marketing and then live examples. We kicked off with some insights to the low voltage small Dedolight systems. These use lamps (12 and 24V) as one finds in cars. The system also has a lens and focussing system. During the demo the light system (not the transformer part) was put under water. Interesting if you use it in extreme conditions. A demo was given to shoot a product. They started with one light, added accent lights, a flood light and so on. Seven in total. The whole thing is to have nicely directed, focussed or unfocussed light, relatively long exposures or high ISO to create a very controlled picture.

After a very nice lunch and meeting up with fellow photographers it was Serge Romanov’s turn to give us an insight in his world of (feminine) beauty. He kicked of with his vision on composition, contrast, brightness, light, colour, creativity and inspiration (I remember the renaissance and citizen Kane playing an important role). Also the usage of the golden rule in composition was a fantastic eye opener.

[Show as slideshow]

Serge brought with him the beautiful Anna (they only spoke Russian by the way and the translator did his work marvellously) as model. They worked together numerous time, which is something you notice when he build up his picture. Here also he started with one light (3 to be honest) to light the background, one for the face, one 600W for the golden paper reflector to shape the dress (to make the effect softer he added a second normal reflector). One light for the accent on the wall and ono other for the doorway. Lots of light. He made his picture at f3.5, 125sec at ISO 1250 using an Ukrainian T&S lens.

Working with continuous light has a relaxing working atmosphere. You see the impact of the light in another way than with using strobes. Also the absence of flash is in my point of view more conformable. I asked Anna how she experiences it, and she said that the continuos light is less anoying than flash but more fatiguing because of the intensity of the light and the heat.

After the shoot Serge showed us how he finishes his pictorial work. Also here an interesting insight. Not the way I would finish my work but some intersting ways of manipulation. Like making duplicating your picture, make a smaller image size, use liquify, save as a mesh and then apply the mesh to the larger picture. This saves lots of time and frustration.

At the end of the day I was not sure I really learned something new. I like workshops to be advanced. Delivering lots of insights at the limit of my own understanding, changeling me to dig deeper into the matter. So, interesting – yes. Well organised – yes. Worth the 150 Euro – not really.

Elinor Carucci @ FoMu

Bernard — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 22:58:21 +0000

I had the pleasure to meet Elinor Carucci today at the pre opening of her expo at the FoMu in Antwerp.

A nice eye opener. It was a long time that I experienced such an honest, touching photography.
Initially here photography is not what will attract me. It was when listening to here story, what goes through here mind when taking these pictures, the relationships she has with the people around here and here loved ones that the Elinor’s photographs identify with the world I live in. The way she interacts, show herself in all intimacy and make us part of here world is confronting.

What was even more confronting is how Elinor brings here art photography to the commercial work she does.

The person Elinor Carucci: open, honest, vulnerable, sensual, gracious and beautiful.

God created women and hats

Bernard — Sun, 13 Feb 2011 21:48:00 +0000

Inspirational weekend after our first ‘Body Of Art’ expo at Dare 2B Different. We had a great bunch of visitors and were able to sell some of the pictures. What was even more rewarding were the comment and interpretations of the work presented. Thanks to all who came and helped at the expo.

This weekend we went to Leonhards Gallery for the new series of Marc Lagrange ‘And then God created women’. Again really nice and inspirational pictures full of emotion. One picture telling a whole story.

On Sunday we finally decided to go and visit Stephen Jones expo at the MOMU. Finally because it was the last day. We arrived at 17:00 and closed the doors at 18:00. One hour of pure enjoyment seeing different shapes, colours, fabrics, constructions, humour, … .

The Dark Project

Bernard — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 20:23:41 +0000

At Dare-2B-Different I am the one that can play around a lot. Assisting Nancy doing portrait shoots, preparing Boudoir shoots and bachelor parties is great fun. Doing projects like ‘a Body of Art’, ‘She’ and personal projets is where I can even put more of my photographic Impressions.

‘Dark’ is such a project. The starting point was one light with a grid in a dark environment and see how one can use the flexibility of the body to create shapes and beauty.

On Februari 4th and 5th we will organise our first expo at Fotolocus and Dark will be part of it.

Until then, I’m still looking for some flexible models. If you’re interested … just send me a mail.

Enjoy some impressions of Dark below.

Body of Art @ Dare 2B Different

Jessica Peeters act @ www.pascalbaetens.com launch

admin — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 06:51:14 +0000

A few months ago I had the opportunity to have Jessica Peeters in the studio. Jessica is besides a very nice and gentle person a great dance performer working for Praga khann, Marc Bogaerts, …. More on this shoot in a following post.

Last weekend Pascal Baetens launched his new website in his psychiatric residence in Lovenjoel. There Jessica brought and act she made for Marc Hermans (one of Belgians best triathletes and disabled the waste down). Here act wants you to reflect on the fact that disabled people are still people of flesh and blood. Needles to say I enjoyed this toughing performance.

Its been a while

admin — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 21:33:52 +0000

Yes, its been a while since I posted some impressions on my blog. The only reason being the dicipline you need to keep everything up to date so that all material is available for the posts. In the coming weeks I will catch up because I had the pleasure to experience lots of interesting stuff.

Next post on the dance act I enjoyed last weekend.

Serge Baeken – Shuffle show

Bernard — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 14:02:33 +0000

Last Thursday we zere invited at the opening of Serge Baeken‘s expo at the Art Space Leguit.

The Leguit is very close to the red district here in Antwerp and immediately gave a certain antmosphere to the work of Serge Baeken. These large and small, color and B&W, drawings and paintings are sometimes very sexually tinted. There are more than 100 images to view, presented in different ways. During the Expo Serge made some drawing, the whole accompanied by gitarist Philip Osier (this guy I want to see and hear again).

A great evening, nice people, fantastic music.

Closing event on March 5th.

Live drawing

Philip Osier @ Art Space Leguit Antwerp