Fitness Lifestyle Photography #1

I’ve started a new project photographing body builders, cross trainers, and general fitness fanatics.  This project will be split between on location photo shoots and in studio form/body images.  My first model and I were able to correlate our schedules and begin shooting right away.  I chose to invoke an urban training look for this particular set of photographs… with the idea that an urban setting with it’s myriad of obstacles and structures could make for the full body workout that usually would be reserved for a proper gym.

With an unusually mild January morning here in Pittsburgh we set out for our shoot.  With lifestyle photography I like to keep things simple and loose.  I chose a simple kit to take along which included 2 monolight strobes each with it’s own independent power pack, a silver reflective umbrella, and a small Chimera softbox.  I also brought a microphone boom pole which I’ve found is very handy for attaching a strobe to and handing to an assistant.  We shot untethered to the MamiyaLeaf Credo 80 camera system using it’s beautiful retina style LCD screen to quickly preview our lighting, framing, and focus.  I also utilized the Mamiya/Schneider-Kreuznach LS 80mm 2.8 lens.  This lens is a leaf shutter type which allows for flash sync speeds up to 1/1600th of a second… this combined with our specialized monolight strobes with their ultra short flash duration speed enabled the freezing of action.

Below are a few images from this shoot.  Be sure to check in over the next few weeks as this series and project continues.