Anthony Whitehead – musician portrait photoshoot

I am back from travels in Asia, I went with my girlfrind Fiona for a month and visited Singapore, Thailand and Laos. I took a lot of photos, and I am hoping to have some kind of exhibition later in the year. In the mean time I will put some up here once I have edited them!

Before going away I had a portrait session with Anthony Whitehead. Anthony is a man with a story to tell. Having survived cancer in his teens he has gone on to perform in a variety of settings for the Teenage Cancer Trust, including the Royal Albert Hall. His first album is coming out in the next few months.

He is originally from Oxfordshire, but is currently living in Brighton. I have known him since I was 5 years old so it was fun to do a portrait session with him. I picked a location in the Oxfordshire/Berkshire Downs to show his country side up-bringing. For this shot no flash was used to get silhouette from the sun.

One flash from the left was used with a tight beam to catch just a thin strip of grass.

This is the setup shot for the photo below, though slightly later in the evening when the sun had dropped lower. Canon 580ex mk II and 430ex flashes on full power triggered by skyport radio triggers. I used Canon 70-200mm F/2.8 for nearly all the shots as it gives lovley out of focus backgrounds and is very sharp. Out in the open countryside space there is plenty of room to stand back and shoot from a distance.

Two flashes were used for this shot, one for the main light and one to give a slight rim light to his left as described above. I am also just finishing off a website for Anthony, I will post about it when it is finished.