Another studio shoot, this time with Cece. Makeup artist Kim Clay first put on some natural makeup, and I shot a simple beauty shot using a beauty dish as the mainlight and an octobox softbox for fill.

Studio Shoot - Cece (1)

For a second shot, Kim darkened the makeup and gave Cece a jacket. I shot with the same lighting setup.

Studio Shoot - Cece (2) original

I liked the shot but it didn’t feel quite right. However simply desaturating the image a fraction produced a much more interesting cinematic look.

Studio Shoot - Cece (2) slight desaturation

In the future I would like to take this further and “process” the same image in a variety of different ways. Anyone who has watched the various C.S.I. programs will be aware of the differences in color palette used to give the different shows their own look (Compare the saturated colors and oranges of C.S.I. Miami to the desaturated blues and grays of C.S.I. New York.).

As a travel photographer the only things I regularly do in Photoshop are dust removal and minor color or exposure corrections. The levels of color saturation were chosen back when buying the film. However, if you are not trying to document reality, but rather create an image, then you’re limited by nothing more than your imagination.