Old Dutch Masters Shoot

Last Saturday I worked with a group from Ohio Valley Camera Club setting up and shooting still life in the vein of the "Old Dutch Masters".  There were approximately 40 attendees for this shoot, including the instructors and coordinators.  Bob Wilcox, John and Cathy Steudel, and Jerry Spohr were the venue hosts and did a wonderful job.

The afternoon started off with a power point presentation by Nancy Germer and then the group was broken out into four different groups.  There were two studio set ups with all the amenities and lighting and fixtures you could want and there were two home made set ups, using whatever was available to set up and light the subjects, the point being that you can do this sort of thing without investing a lot of money and using available household items.

Everyone was tasked with bringing in some sort of object to occupy the still life sets and it was all arranged on some central tables where everyone from each of the four shooting venues would draw objects for their set ups.

I was in charge of one of the home made (minimalist) set ups and there were six shooters working there setting up the compositions and the lighting, with a bit of help from me.  I was seriously impressed with the talent present and the fact that we were working with bare bones equipment made it all the more astounding when looking at some of the results.

I didn't get too much chance to visit the other locations and shoot them, thus, these photos are from some of the set ups we put together at our location.  Hope you like.

This scene was set up by my friend Connie Sanders, with just a bit of help from the group.

This was a group composition, but was started by one person, who's name I don't recall, but a brilliant idea, none the less.

This stuff was too much to overlook.  I would have thought there would be a waiting line for these items.  Great stuff.

I brought the window and the pitcher.  I was having second thoughts about hauling such a large object, but everyone loved it so glad I did.  Also glad I didn't clean the glass of all the sawdust and cobwebs.  The tight crop is to hide the plastic and aluminum parts of the window and try to make it look a bit more "antique".

All in all a great shoot and there were a lot more and different set ups and compositions.  It was quite a treat and also inspiring how many people had such a great time and how many excellent photos came out of the shoot.  You can view a whole lot more of them on Ohio Valley Camera Club's website here.  I think there are about 125 all together including some black light images from a box by Jerry Spohr.