In the last month I’ve attended two weddings and at both weddings Justin Bieber’s latest single “What Do You Mean?” kept playing to the point of getting stuck in my head. Curious about the JB’s new single I pulled out my phone and looked up the single’s details. Its artwork looked rather simple, so when I got home I decided to recreate Justin’s shot.
Execution
From the original image I noticed that there is a distinctly hard shadow right behind Justin so I grabbed one of my strobes and set it up bare-bulbed and aimed at the ceiling. I then positioned myself in front of an empty white wall and stood rather close to the wall. This way my shadow would fall right up against the wall and create that hard-line.
Post Processing
Most of the styling was recreated later in post processing. I imported the selected image of me trying very hard to look cool and uncaring into Lightroom. Within this software is where I push and pull the tones and contrast of the image. Afterwards I exported the shot as a .PSD and reopened it into Photoshop. Within there I used a combination of the Black&White and Curves Adjustment Layers to match the original shot.
You can watch the entire editing process in the video below. Note that it’s sped up between 500-2000%.
The Results
Equipment:
Camera:
Lens:
Accessories:
MeFoto Carbon Fiber Travel Tripod
PocketWizards Transceivers
Foto&Tech IR Wireless Remote Control for Sony Alpha
Lighting:
Einstein 640
Post Processing:
Wacom Intuos Small Tablet
Adobe Creative Cloud Photography Plan
If you liked this post check out that one time I turned myself into Taylor Swift’s “1989” photo
