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Photography and Text by Isabel Zapata, Copyright 2016
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JACKET BY JACKET MANE
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In this series, I explore the relationship between fashion and college life. I loved the idea of playing with blurry lights and tying them into the blur of the college experience. With this in mind, I knew I had to think in terms of casual every-day fashion and pairing it with models my age.
I selected my models almost entirely in terms of their fashion sense. I tried to aim specifically for people who had striking faces and liked to wear casual grungy street fashion. I knew I wanted the shoot to center around the white washed ripped jeans look with leather jackets and flannel. However, my main focus for the shoot was jackets. I thought there was a lot of room to play with layers and liked the fact that it was convenient to keep the outfit changing process to a minimum because I had so many models in one cold location and had to shoot under a time constraint.
I asked all of my models to bring their own clothes to shoot after I showed them a few example pictures of what I was looking for. Since I was going for a casual every-day look, I didn’t ask for any specific makeup or accessories other than what they thought would represent their personal style within my theme and vision. For example, Cooper (one of my models) had a nose ring which I thought was perfect, and other models brought similar accessories that they were familiar and comfortable with.
The series was shot at night to be able to take long exposure shots of the lights in the background. I chose Cira Green as my location because I know that we would have tons of city lights to play with. In terms of lighting, I knew I had to use my on-camera Nikon 800 speedlight to get the blurry lights effect. I used a very slow shutter speed with a low ISO and my flash setting to be about 1/16.
I absolutely love the way the shoot turned out and will definitely be using these models for future shoots. They did so well with minimal direction, which made it convenient for me to focus on the composition of the shots. I would love to expand on this shoot and make another series!
About The Author: Isabel Zapata is sophomore enrolled in the College of the University of Pennsylvania, Class of 2019. To read additional articles by Isabel Zapata, go here: https://tonywardstudio.com/blog/isabel-zapata-dont-play-food/