Here’s a crash course on how to work with models as a photographer. Photographer Mark Wallace discusses tips for before, during, and after the shoot, and also how to find a model for your project.

(via ISO 1200)

Upon first glance, photographer Frank Kunert‘s photographs may look like they show pretty ordinary places. Look a little closer, however, and you’ll start to notice that each one has something wrong about it, and that none of the scenes would actually exist in the real world. They’re actually miniature scenes that are meticulously built by hand!
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Clothing retailer H&M has sparked quite a bit of controversy after admitting that most of the models featured on its website are computer generated. The company says that pasting real model heads onto CGI bodies provides a better way of displaying clothes made for humans than using real humans to model them. Spokeswoman Nicole Christine tells ABC News:

This technique can be found in use throughout the industry. This is not to be seen as conveying a specific ideal or body type, but merely a technique to show our garments.

It is regrettable if we have led anyone to believe that the virtual mannequins should be real bodies. This is incorrect and has never been our intention. We will continue to discuss internally how we can be clearer about this in the information towards our customers.

Although the identical poses and proportions are hard to overlook, the company does match the skin tones of the bodies to the faces quite well, making the ‘shopped nature of individual photos difficult to detect.

(via Jezebel via kottke.org)

Photographer Sharon Rainis recently collaborated with wedding dress designer Erez Ovadia for an underwater photo shoot in which models wearing wedding dresses were photographed 20-meters under the sea. In an interview with MegaPixel, Rainis shares some of the challenges involved in such a unique shoot:

What a model goes through during such a project is, well, A LOT! First, wearing nothing but a wedding dress, the model’s body temperature rapidly decreases, making it difficult for her to keep a natural look and to hold her breath during the shots. The model isn’t wearing a mask and therefore her communication with the divers around her is very limited. In fact, the only diver she can really communicate with is her air provider, who is the only one close enough for her to see. The model has to hold her breath for quite long periods, which becomes more difficult the more time she spends underwater and the lower her body temperature reaches. If that’s not enough, she’s also tied with weights to the bottom of the sea, which doesn’t add much to her sense of confidence.

Check out the behind-the-scenes video above for a better idea of what was involved. The resulting photographs can be seen over in the MegaPixel interview.

This video by FotoTV features “microstock king” Yuri Arcurs leading a workshop and imparting all sorts of useful tips that you’ll find useful even if you have no interest in doing microstock — things like working with models and capturing emotion. Get out your pen and paper and start taking notes!

(via f stoppers)

Mel Stringer (aka girliepains on Etsy) keeps dreaming up cooler and cooler camera papercraft decorations. Her latest creation is a Polaroid model that include fake Polaroids to stick in the slot.
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Here are a couple informative videos in which Yuri Arcurs — the best selling microstock photographer in the world — shares some advice on working with models, with everything ranging from choosing the right model to how to get the right smiles. Many of the tips (e.g. tricks for posing the head) can be helpful even if you don’t do commercial or stock photography.
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Flickr user Florian (AKA f/28) creates and photographs 1:87 scale miniature sets carefully created by hand. The photographs featured here are from a set titled “No Country for Small Men“, with the title and scenes inspired by the movie “No Country for Old Men”. Everything was shot with a Canon 400D.
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If you’re suffering from post-World Cup withdrawal, this might cheer you up: models frolicking on a soccer field. Actually, these women are doing much more than than that in fashion photographer Giuliano Bekor’s behind-the-scenes video of the Bebe 2010 World Cup campaign. Shooting and directing by example on the turf of the Los Angeles Memorial Stadium, Bekor pushes his models to the limit. These ladies are doing things I’d certainly never attempt in a dress and stiletto heels — running on grass, for one.

(via Fstoppers)

Lori Nix is a photographer that works with miniatures and models for surreal scenes and landscapes. Her work reminds us of the photographs by Matthew Albanese that we featured a while back. Her project “The City” depicts eerie abandoned buildings in an apocalyptic world:

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