Red River Pro
CHRIS BORGMAN

The Photographer
Chris Borgman specializes in bold, colorful images for creative advertising and editorial clients including Miller Lite, Coke, Virgin Records, EMI Latin, HarperCollins and Philip Stein Watches. His work has been recognized and profiled in leading photography magazines in the USA, Mexico, UK, China and Ukraine. Recently, he has been featured in London's Digital SLR Magazine and in Digital Photo Pro Magazine where one of his images was chosen for the cover.

The Client
A cooperative promotional shoot for the photographer and a NYC talent agency called UGLY NY.

© Chris Borgman

The Assignment
The talent agency was approached with a proposal to shoot some character-type portraits for portfolio and promotional material. Ten very unique personalities were photographed doing what they do best, poking fun of themselves. The subject of this image was a bodybuilder with former military training who was made to appear to hunt bunnies with a paintball marker.

The Execution
"Having a background in beauty and fashion, I wanted to photograph 'character' types that would not normally be considered 'beautiful' subjects. But instead of using typical 'character' lighting, I used 'beauty' lighting- one main light above the camera (a small softbox), a ring flash for a fill light, one hair light above and slightly behind the subject (an umbrella) and two back lights; a bare bulb on the subject and another on the background. I used a Canon 5D with a Tamron 28-75mm, f/ 2.8 lens."

Post Production
"The original image was photographed on a green background, then turned more olive-ish, to reinforce the military theme. Later I got bored with it and knocked it out and replaced the background with an HDR (High Dynamic Range) image I took at an abandoned airport hanger in Brooklyn. It was more interesting but not there yet. So I thought it might be funny if this mean-looking, tattooed-up guy was hunting little fuzzy bunnies with a paintball gun. But the bunnies don't really take him too seriously! The bunnies, of course, are stock images."

The Output
"The final images from this series were printed at 14 x 22 inches on UltraPro Gloss with an Epson Stylus Photo R1900 printer. The colors were really pushed in post and I needed the print to look as vivid as the image on screen. UltraPro Gloss always gives my images the punch I need. Other papers don't seem to hold color values like this paper. Tip: For best results, make sure your monitor is calibrated or your output will never match what you see on it.

Contact
Chris Borgman's web site is at: www.chrisborgman.com. He may be contacted at: cb@chrisborgman.com