Relaxing at the pool

beauty, erotic, location, Nude

Another series of images I did with Riona Neve last summer, the one and only model shoot I did this summer, in between two periods of lockdown there was not much time and I was very busy finishing off the studio room …

We had this beautiful modern house with swimming pool at our disposal for the afternoon, and started with some classy images with long black pants and a black blazer, paired with the inevitable sunglasses of course.

Sahri at the swimming pool

beauty, location, portrait

I did a call for locations in August last year, stating that I needed a beautiful location with swimming pool, in a private garden. I received 4 offers in a couple of hours 🙂

I have picked the one that seemed best suited for the occasion, and I got a doggy model as a bonus. The models did great together.

Model: Sahri Nimi, Jack, location disclosed 😉

thanks to the owners of the location, for providing willingly access

in the series hidden gems from 2019: Jack and Sahri at the swimming pool.

 

Remember, all images are available as a fine art print, send me an email if you need any more information, and … see you next week!

Ludwig

 

Workshop Portrait with available light – results

beauty, Behind the scenes Video, location, personal tips & tricks, Uncategorized, Workshop

As I do conduct the workshop myself, I do not have very much time to make images myself, it is my absolute desire to help the participant as much as possible.

Nevertheless, I managed to make some good shots in between tuition, and here they are, in the hidden gems 2019 category, images from the portrait workshop.

Remember, all images taken with available light only, on the day of the workshop.

On the bottom of the page I’ll re-link the youtube video I made from this interesting day, go check it out!

 

behind the scenes on Youtube

thanks for stopping by, see you next Sunday!

Ludwig

In bed with Julia

beauty, erotic, location, Nude

You’ve seen the first image with Julia a couple of weeks ago. The process of selecting and fine-tuning the images often is slow, but in this case, it took me even longer, since I had to finish all evaluations for my evening class students. All is done now, and vacation has officially started. A good moment to show you the first series from this collaboration.

• In bed with Julia •

What I often seek in models, is the ability to give me a natural, relaxed look. Julia is perfectly able to do so. And of course, she is stunningly beautiful!  I’ve enjoyed this afternoon in Brussels a lot, and I hope the images give you an idea of the atmosphere and get you in a similar mood.

thanks for passing by, I hope to see you soon again!

Ludwig

Julia

beauty, location, personal tips & tricks, portrait

I have never met her before, except on the internet. She’s all around the internet, google her and you’ll know what I mean: Julia Yaroshenko.

We worked together a couple of weeks ago, I rent an Airbnb in Brussels and we did an afternoon session. A first image as a little preview.

This weekend I’m giving the first two of my workshops, about working with available light in portrait/boudoir/art-nude photography. The above portrait was created in a small bedroom with only one window. Not everything is possible, but a lot can be done with a little creativity and bounced light. If you’re interested, there are still two spots available for next Saturday (01/06), tomorrows workshop is fully booked.

Ludwig

the bed’s too big without you – the series

beauty, location, Nude
Bed’s too big without you
Cold wind blows right through that open door
I can’t sleep with your memory
Dreaming dreams of what used to be
When she left I was cold inside
That look on my face was just pride
No regrets no love no tears
Living on my own was the least of my fears
Bed’s too big without you
The bed’s too big without you
The bed’s too big
Without you
Since that day when you’d gone
Just had to carry on
I get through day but late at night
Made love to my pillow but it didn’t feel right
Every day just the same
Old rules for the same old game
All I gained was heartache
All I made was one mistake
Now the bed’s too big without you
The bed’s too big without you
The bed’s too big
Without you
Bed’s too big without you
The bed’s too big without you
The bed’s too big
Without you
Without you
Bed’s too big without you
Cold wind blows right through that open door
author: Gordon Sumner for The Police

 

 

with the lovely Yana Mood, shot in an attic room in Leuven,

All images f1.8 at ISO 125, shutter speeds vary (1/25-1/200s)

Canon 5Ds with Sigma 50mm f/1.4 DG A

 

thank you for watching, don’t hesitate to leave a comment,

Ludwig

 

3x3m hotel room shoot

beauty, location, Nude, Uncategorized

I arrived at Leuven train station at about 11 O’clock, the people from the hotel had guaranteed me that I could do an early check in at about 13:00hrs. That was the time that I had fixed for the model and the make up lady. They pointed me a different building than the adres on the website, about 100 meters further. They gave me the entrance key.

I should ask the cleaning lady to clean my room first. … No it was not cleaned yet, yes, she would take care of it right after she finished a room on the upper floor. (3rd, I was on second) I had the time to get my gear out of the car and have a quick bite.

Fifteen minutes to one, and I’m back at the hotel. I get pointed to my room, it is available …

… at least if you can call this a room, it is more like place for a bed, and half a meter around to manoeuvre around it. How on earth am I going to do a photoshoot here. There’s no room for movement, there is no free wall, and there is no light. It is freezing cold outside so that is no option, even worse, it is a dark grey day.

How to shoot in a really tiny Hotel room, on a dark winter day?

Both the model and the make up lady are more or less on time, so we can start preparing. I get them installed by the window, when the chair is between the bed and the window, there’s no more room to pass besides it. … this promises no good …

No panic though, I’m thinking about the options, outdoors, at 3°C, rather not, … dark corridors in the hotel, no light at all, … public places other than this, … probably not for the sake of clothing changes …

move the beds … move the beds, … are they fitted to the walls, no, that’s great, let’s move the beds: We moved the beds to the ‘entrance hall’ of the room, so we acquired a 3x3meter ‘free space’ to work in, talking about luxury.

(3D rendering below, showing a before and after situation, done by me, I still own and run www.renderhouse.eu remember 🙂

On the far left is the entrance door and hallway, upper left corner, the black chunk taken out of the volume is the bathroom, then the ‘main room’ with two single beds and window at the right, three night reading lamps (one on each side of the bed, one over the small table.)

And look, there’s a heart in the lighting pattern, that was unintended, but definitely good sign. It was Valentine’s day the day before I wrote this post …

It helps having a patient model in such cases. I worked with Pauline several times now, and we’ve got a good mutual understanding. She will express her goals, I will try to relate them to mine and we proceed from there.

I tried using off-camera flashes, but those gave me very hard and overly bright light, with no interesting light patterns.

We ended up using only the reading lights, (one of them can be seen above, next to Pauline) to create some kind of theatrical look, sometimes I used a plastic bag to make the light source a little bigger and hence soften it a bit, but that was our only source of light for these images:


It was rather important to have the lights positioned accurately, as you can see the shadows are really hard, due to the small size of the lights. In the last images I had to tweak the blacks a little in post production, but they came out quite well. The light sources had a really narrow beam, and they gave very little spill within the room.

A couple of hours later, we moved back the beds, nobody noticed anything, me happy, my model happy …

 

Settings on the first series of images (1/10s f3.5 ISO 400 – Canon 5Ds, Sigma 50mm f1.4 A DG)

Settings on the upright pose with curtain background (1/80s f2.8 ISO 1600, 50mm f1.4 A DG)

Settings on the nudes (1/8 f4.5 ISO1250 – Canon 5Ds with Canon 100mm f2.8 macro IS L)

I was rather surprised how sharp the images came out at 1/10th with no stabilisation 🙂

best,

thank you for reading

 

 

Analog or digital?

Analog, people, Personal Pictures, photo gear, portrait

I have invited two people to my studio and did a small analog vs. digital test.

I have, for the first time ever, linked my studio flashes with my old Rolleiflex 6×6 camera, and shot a roll of images with it, next to my Canon 5Ds with 100mm Macro lens.

What about the outcome, is high res digital better than medium format analog?

I think quality wise that is a no-brainer, our new camera’s and lenses are waay, no waaaaaaaay better than the old stuff, they are sharper, AF is spot on every time,  they have less grain (or noise) (films shots done on Ilford FP4 Plus 125) and for sure less dust to retouch. Digital is more convenient, more flexible, more secure (with immediate feedback) … it seems to be more of everything.

Then why still use analog? To me it is more fun, more concentration, at the same time more relaxing, it lets you look forward to the results, it’s more challenging, … people react differently when shooting with a 60 year old camera, they are curious, they are amused, wondering what might be the result, … I also find the images to have some sort of ‘alive’ feeling, the out of focus area’s are more interesting, the framing is square by nature, which I love … although the last arguments might all be nostalgia.

Here are the images, the square ones are analog:

 

 

 

A treasure on the attic, …

beauty, erotic, location, Nude

as promised here by the full series from this part of the shoot with Eva Evian,

• A treasure on the attic •

all images shot on Canon 5Ds with Sigma 50 mm f1.4 DG Art or Canon 135mm f2.0 L
all at f2.2 ISO 800, shutter speeds vary.

come again soon,
Ludwig

alternative beauty – Alopecia

beauty, Nude, portrait

We met at my last exhibit in Ronse. She’s not trying to hide her baldness, and wears it with pride. We agreed on a cooperation, she loved the pictures.

Alopecia is a disease that results in partial or total hair loss, for Marlies it is total.

Make up: Heidi

Model: Marlies

Shot in my atelier in Ronse/Belgium. It has been a long time since I used my studio flashes. This was the first time in my re-organized studio space.

 

A photoshoot for your own, please contact me at ludwig -at- ludwigdesmet -dot- com

 

all images shot on Canon 5Ds, with Canon 100mm f2.8 L IS Macro

thank you for watching, please come again soon, there’s a lot to publish, with landscape images from Scotland, Corsica, some more beauty shoots etcetera, …

Ludwig

Best wishes for 2017 – Thank you for 2016

Personal Pictures

Hello there on this very first day of the year, I would like to wish everybody a very good start, good health and some dreams that get you moving.

A second ‘you’ to love, family and friends to care about, a safe home and a world that is ruled by peace.

2016 has been quite a busy year in photography for me, with three exhibits, a lot of photo shoots, and some portfolio presentations here and there. All this next to my daytime job and teaching evening classes, educating two boys and keeping the wife happy 😉 … quite busy indeed.

You have been an amazing audience in 2016, that is for sure. Since I switched this blog over to this domain (late january) it has registered over 45.000 (!)  visitors and over 325.000 clicks. I would like to thank you all for this. What is even more fulfilling is the fact that my works starts to find its way to people’s home interiors. This means a lot to me, and certainly not only the small revenue coming from these sales.

Some images I gladly remember from 2016 to keep you warm until the new images for 2017 arrive.

ludwigdesmet_kr ludwigdesmet_vt-3591 _ds_4544 ludwigdesmet_rs-3948 ludwigdesmet_kd ludwigdesmet_cvc-2305 LudwigDesmet_PandL-1781 LudwigDesmet_LMandPM--4 LudwigDesmet_AL_OK_web--12 LudwigDesmet_aug2016-6258 Ludwig_Desmet_AVO-0147 ludwigdesmet_PM_theatre_-3 ludwigdesmet_Pauline M_Renaix ludwigdesmet_Romina_PH-6258 ludwigdesmet_Romina_PH-6223 ludwigdesmet_JW_corridor3 ludwigdesmet_AVO_parc01 LudwigDesmet_KDG-2590 ludwigdesmet_ea ludwigdesmet_ea-7

LudwigDesmet_aug2016--2 LudwigDesmet_Jane_Baudries-0171 LudwigDesmet_CDC-0951 ludwigdesmet_PM_theatre 6402

 

I hope to see you all back this year, I held back some beautiful images from my latest shoots to start with in 2017. Also I bought some new gear that I will review here soon. Don’t hesitate to make comments, ask questions, … and keep enjoying beauty.

Happy New Year !!!

ludwig

Yashica 635 …

beauty, Personal Pictures, portrait

… and a very nice photographer.

 

Jane again, she got to grips with my old Yashica 635.

LudwigDesmet_Jane_Baudries-0171

Canon 5Ds with Sigma 50mm f1.4 DG A – 1/20s  f4.0  ISO 320

 

thank you for watching, …

just a small reminder that a small selection of my work is to be seen till the end of August in ‘Het Godshuis’, Leemweg 11, 9980 Sint-Laureins, Belgium.

ludwig

 

for fine art prints or shoot bookings: ludwig@ludwigdesmet.com