Several of the characters did stand out, including Gem, a Siren who worked in the armory underneath the Arena, providing armor and the Identity Disc to Sam Flynn when he arrives.

We shot this pic of Gem on a bench on the campus of Kansas State University, located in a tunnel on ground level of one of the buildings. On this particular day it was several degrees cooler than we would have liked, and the wind blew especially hard through that tunnel as we were trying to shoot. It was strong enough that I had to shoot with no modifier on the speed lights, and Chelsey went above and beyond to deal with both the wind and the cold as we shot.

To get the general look of the inspiration frame from the movie I had to bounce the light off the floor and concrete bench she was laying on to get the soft up-light which was then modified in post.

With the large subtle gradient I was originally having a lot of trouble with banding and had a little success eliminating it by switching over to 16 bit RGB and adding a bit of noise to that layer in Photoshop by using the Camera Raw Filter. I have never used that approach before but it ended up being really simple and effective.

Even though it is a pretty simple shot I am pleased with the results we got, Chelsey did a great job with the costume, hair and makeup like always and I think the overall look ended up being pretty convincing.

Gem: Chelsey Curently Cosplay

The cosplayer in this shoot is Morgan, Starburst Cosplay, and this is our first shoot of what I hope are many together.

I included an original pic to show how much of the pic was added and how much was thanks to the efforts of Morgan. I started off combining elements from four different hair flips. The Phoenix in the background is illustrated in Photoshop using a tablet and a variety of fire brushes and effects.

Phoenix: Starburst Cosplay
Event Host: Russ Matthews 

Also part of the shoot, Hannah Kathleen as Wonder Woman. It is our second time shooting Wonder Woman together and of all her characters so far this is probably my favorite.

In my early days I was very inspired by a handful of artists, especially fantasy artists Frank Frazetta and Boris Vallejo. Frazetta pretty much created the genre and made it mainstream, especially his Death Dealer character, using lighting in a unique way that felt almost cinematic, and Boris manipulated color and motion to bring his fantasy worlds to life.

Since Jim is a huge Frazetta fan I decided to do what I could to incorporate those styles into this photo, taking the photo as far into the fantasy art look as I could while still maintaining the detail and craftsmanship that went into these costumes.

Ares: Jim Bartlett of Heavy Metal Heroes, Sword: Immortal Props
Wonder Woman: Hannah Kathleen
Wonder Woman’s Shield and Accessories: Clay Aksarben Hielscher or Aksarben Industries Costumes and Props
Queens Guard Sword: Heavy Metal Heroes 

The most challenging thing for me was the weapon’s fire and trying to make it at least similar to the way it looked in the film, and in addition to the shots themselves making sure they functioned as light sources for the rest of the image and had their influence on the elements around them.

Daniel Wise
Jeff Seever
Rachel Chai

Baby Groot – Calen Hoffman
Gamora’s Belt – Casey J McBroom
Body Paint and Blasters – Rod Zirkle

It has been almost two years since Morgan and I had a chance to shoot together, and since she is not doing a lot of modeling these days I was absolutely thrilled to have her come be a part of this. Genie from Life, Love & Pictures let me know she had gotten her hands on a parachute dress and wanted to know if I would like to shoot with it, which of course I did! As the day of the shoot approached it became pretty apparent the weather could be a problem, but we decided to risk it anyway and ended up with some really interesting skies thanks to the incoming rain and storms. The wind became a bit of an issue and limited what we wanted to do with lighting but it did things with the parachute that we never could have done by just tossing it in the air.

We decided to do something a bit different and create a few images that we could connect into a page resembling a comic book. It represents a small part of a much larger story, but it was a lot of fun building this tiny piece.

Domino is an interesting character that I was admittedly unfamiliar with until we decided to do this shoot. She is a genetically engineered mutant mercenary with exceptional combat skills, both hand-to-hand and with weapons. She was born with the ability to affect luck around her to her favor. It requires her to take action, for example she could not just stand still while people take shots at her and miraculously avoid being shot, but if she makes an effort to avoid being hit luck will be in her favor and she will survive. We wanted to show this side of her in the pics, first displaying her skills as a sniper and then just narrowly avoiding the return fire as she makes her escape.

If you click on the thumbnail it will open a much larger version.