Photo finish with Cade Martin

I thought that I’d share some of the before and after shots from the photo shoot that I was just on.

Cade Martin was the photographer. I’ve used him on other shoots and he still remains to be my all-time favorite for photography magic. Cade really commits to a shoot, finding the most extravagant and expert talent to achieve the shot that you’re hoping for.

The objective

For our shoot, Erin Otwell, one of our art directors at Science News, needed the same model dressed in both as modern day man eating junk food and as a paleolithic man gnawing on a bone. It’s not the easiest shoot to make happen in only a week’s time. Luckily, Cade’s well connected with a knack for knowing the right talent. Armed with our model, stylist, make-up artist and a handful of assistants, we were fully equipped to make it happen.

For our paleo man, facial and body hair was actually individually glued alpaca hair. The make-up artist did a great job bronzing the model and making him look appropriately weathered.

For the modern man we just wanted an everyman feeding his face and weighted down with tons of junk food. We tried to make his clothing as neutral as possible to make the vibrant colors of the junk food stand out.

Besides Cade’s technical abilities, what really sets him apart from other photographers is how he can get the very best out of the subject he’s shooting. He’s wonderful at building the trust needed between subject and photographer to get the perfect expression.

New tricks

As I noted in a previous post, I was turned on to using Google’s Nik Collection by watching Cade’s long-time assistant, Kirsten working her making armed with the Nik Collection and Photoshop.

In a week, I have another shoot coming up with Cade for an upcoming issue of Science News and I’m looking forward to watching the magic unfold.