Magic on Michigan Ave.

When Cathy Dod contacted me asking me if I would be interested in shooting her daughter, Lauren, she stated that the 14-year-old “is quite photogenic.”  I receive a lot of messages like this, so when I clicked her link I expected to see somebody with little to no experience, but had some shots perhaps that had been captured by friends and relatives.  To my surprise, what I saw as a well-established model, who had a clear direction of where she was going with her portfolio.  Her confidence and camera presence were apparent, and I knew that we would add to each other’s portfolios.  Coincidentally, I was traveling to Chicago the following week for a business trip, and I had planned on spending Sunday evening exploring the downtown area along Michigan Ave.  It was opportune that Cathy had contacted me, because now I was able to meet some great people and had an awesome time capturing images in the historic Hilton Chicago and surrounding area.

As a fashion photographer, shoots like this are fun to challenge myself with.  I was not able to bring much equipment with me on the flight.  I was barely able to fit my reflector into the suitcase.  Due to Chicago traffic, I showed up a little later than I had anticipated, which cut out any opportunities to scout locations.  This shoot was going to be free style….. totally improvisational.  We see, we create, we have fun and we move on.

We started with a quick warm-up session in the hotel room, then ventured out into the hallways on the 10th floor.  There was no shortage of interesting light and compositions that I could use within the hotel.  When we made it down the the lobby, I was blown away by the palatial Beaux-arts architecture.  We went from room to room, capturing what we could, until we stumbled into one of the most impressive rooms that I’ve ever been in… the grand ballroom.  I did not know the history of the room and the hotel until after the shoot, but I knew at the time that we were very privileged to have this setting to use.  As impressive as our surroundings were, my approach to how I incorporate and use those surroundings for a shoot remained the same.  A location establishes place, but is never the “focus” of my shoots.  I use light, lines, colors, etc to draw attention to the model in the most creative way that I can.  I look for unique vantage points and compositions.  Once we were done with the ballroom, we made our way outside and worked our way around Grant Park.  The weather was perfect; there was a slight overcast, which gave us great diffused light to work with. Again, I could have put Lauren in front of the city skyline to take some images that showed that I was in downtown Chicago, but I wanted to keep the focus on her.  We used the grassy areas and the fountain, and worked with different poses and expressions.

When the light was finally dying down, I was content at that point with what I had captured.  We made our way back to the hotel and upon crossing the street, I saw something that had caught my eye before, but was much more attention-grabbing now…. the marquee light on the side of the hotel.  We walked underneath the light.  I worked with Lauren on a couple of shots and was getting great images, but I felt like there was something more powerful that I was not capturing.  It was then that I noticed Lauren’s reflection showing up on the smooth surface of the granite wall.  Reflections are a very powerful compositional element for me, and I was sure there was a powerful shot here. I just needed to find the right angle to incorporate the lights overhead and the reflection in the wall.  I lowered myself down so that I could shoot up towards Lauren, and asked her to look over me towards the road.  The image we captured there at that moment was my favorite from the whole day.

I was truly blessed to work with some beautiful and talented people that day.  Lauren was amazing to work with.  She was very comfortable in front of the camera, and knew her lines and poses well.  But the expressions are always what distinguish models for me, and she had the confidence to really create the looks I knew she was capable of. Andrea Pascalau is a talented photographer in the Chicago area that was great to work with and a huge help with many aspects of the shoot.  Roxana Alexandru did an awesome job with makeup, and is somebody that I will be shooting as a model at some point in the future.

I would highly encourage anybody to check out their work and portfolios below.

Model – Lauren Dod – http://laurendod.weebly.com/

Wardrobe and assistant – Andrea Pascalau – https://www.facebook.com/corseiphotography

Makeup – Roxana Alexandru –  https://www.facebook.com/RoxannaAlexandruMakeupAndHairDesign

Special thanks to Cathy Dod for reaching out to me, and also for the Blackhawks shirt!