Photo by: Roc Herm

Photo by: Olivier

Photo by: Michael Creagh

Photo by: Graphistolage David

Photo by: Florencia Mazza

Photo by: Cámara Oscura

Photo by: Ashburn Eng

Photo by: Susan Anderson

Photo  by: Orgut Cayli

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Our approach to photography has changed a lot in the past couple of years. Our main goal now is to become full-fledged cinematographers. One thing that you learn by making films is that the story is the key. Your whole universe resides within the text. You could be shooting a film with a HI8 camera and still make something amazing if you have a good story. A good photographic process will also come from your relations to your subject and your life experiences. You need to learn to trust your instincts; this is where the creativity comes from.

The process of creating a photographic atmosphere should be determined by an idea and a story. What am I trying to say here? Digital technology and the general instantaneity of still photography tend to take away from that. Don’t get me wrong this can lead to amazing results. But, the process of thinking something through and visualization can be an awesome experience. We actually recently bought a 4×5 camera for this exact purpose. We were tired of shooting away.

Now that we have an idea, what do we do next? We steal! Not literally! A good project will always start with some good research and references, especially when you are working with a partner (like us). This way you can communicate your idea clearly. Of course, genius ideas can always come to you (especially at 2am when you don’t want to get out of bed to take a note). But, good research into what you are doing might open some new doors or even make you realize that you should be rethinking your project. Most of the time what you’ll find as reference material will only solidify your idea and vision. The relationship you have to your subject will be heavily dependent on how much you know. It’s like reading a script 15 times and knowing each character like they were your friends. At that point you dive into your project with great confidence and dexterity. Of course, what you need is a cue – copying is never a good thing. Any good artist out there knows that once you’re on the shoot there is no way you could copy someone. You are way too concentrated on the creative work at hand.

Usually, from that point on you have pretty good idea of what you want your project to look like. This is where it gets critical. You have to stick with your look while leaving some place for new ideas and improvements. Your guts are 90% of your work and upon arriving on your shoot you’ll start to see new things. At that point it’s important to keep focused on what you’re doing (not forgetting your main idea) while letting the shoots’ energy and chemistry seep in. This is usually where the magic happens. A good dose of wild and unbridled creativity is always good.

It gets even more critical in post-production. This is the part where you really need to get your ideas straight. Post can become intensive when you find yourself spending too much time tweaking the reds and tuning down the greens in the shadows. “Oh hell! Why not dodge the whole sky!” Post should exist only to accentuate your work. Unfortunately, like we all know, we use this process more often to fix errors. Which brings us back to our planning and creative research process. Start well, end well, and don’t go too far in post! You just end up hurting your images and your wallet. It’s ok to say “I’m done!”.

The cinematic process we now use to prepare most of our shoots has helped us visualize our ideas, which is the key to creating any good photographic atmosphere. The whole idea of making a film is having the right universe around the story. Plan it, see it, bring all your visual tools to the shoot and give it a killer look in post. It might not be true for everyone but it’s definitely helped us.

About the Artists:
Chuck & Twist is a collective of long time friends that are passionate about cinematography and photography. We are also multidisciplinary artists that will strive to envision your story, message or idea with color and panache.

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Image by Mikkel Bache

Image by Ibai Acevedo

Image by Victor Eredel

Image by Shoot Me Photographers and Production

Image by James Craig

Image by Rengim Mutevellioglu

Image by Michel Rajkovic

Image by Rengim Mutevellioglu

Image by Carsten Jamrow

Image by Ibai Acevedo

Image by Magdalena Kmiecik

Image by Ibai Acevedo

Image by Anotnio Saba

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Industrial Photography is one of my biggest passions. I worked in the field since the early 90’s, shooting for more than a hundred companies in Italy. The lessons learned from another industrial photographer, Italian-American Edward Rozzo, played an essential role in my formation. My sources of inspiration are to be found mostly on last century artists and painters; Andy Warhol’s use of colors, some Kandinsky composition rules, and Italian futurism.

Another decisive step in my career was my trip to China in 2000, during which I closely studied the work of certain Chinese photographers and then tried to understand the techniques they used in their work. I was surprised to discover they used the edge of the circle of definition in the image as a part of the picture itself. From then on, I also frequently left that area visible. All this brought myself to show my first personal exhibition in 2003, “Visionarya Industrya” where I showcased my best pictures of this first ten years of Industrial Photography shootings, soon followed by “The Beauty of Physics” in 2005, and “Antonio Saba’s Vision of Lithuanian Food Factories” for the Lithuanian government.

This exhibits gained an international resonance and brought my work to the attention of CERN (European Center of Nuclear research).

In October 2005 CERN (European Center of Nuclear research) gave me the assignment to shoot the final steps of the assembling of one of the biggest nuclear experiments ever tried, the ALICE Experiment, in which the very first moments of the universe’s existence are reconstructed through the collision of ions in a 27 km. tunnel in which for an instant, and in infinite space, the temperature is a hundred thousand times higher than at the heart of the sun. In fact The ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) Experiment aims to recreate the situation as it was one millionth of a second after the Big Bang.

In these four years (October 2005-June 2008) I went to Geneva almost once a month to shoot my project. The ALICE scenario is a cavern, some hundred meters under the ground level, where the main character is a huge red magnet in which, time after time, the scientists fit the several machines (detectors).

I decided to shoot the whole thing in film; Velvia 100, with my 4″x5″ view camera and my Hasselblad. I still love film and use it when time and budget allow it. I then scan it myself with an Imacon virtual drum scan.

I always picture the final image in my head before starting framing with my camera, and achieve 90 percent of the final effect with the actual shot. I use post production and Photoshop only to tune up the final colors and a little cleaning. With my view camera I use some extreme tilt and shift techniques, this way I can have narrow focus, diagonal blades, and extreme deformation of the real proportions in order to add drama and mystery to the subjects in the pictures. Sometimes I tilt as much as the edge of the circle of definition shows up- I love the texture where the image was born. Most of the time I use many flashes to enlighten and/or fill in the shot. My lights always have colored gels to give the pictures nice color contrasts.

The lenses I used for most of this series were the Schneider Super Angulon XL 90/5.6, and the Schneider 180/5.6 Apo Symmar. These two lenses covered most of my needs. The view camera I use is a Toyo VX125. I used the Hasselblad when I needed a more handy camera, especially when I had people posing in the shot and did not need tilting effects.

Usually each shot at CERN took 2-3 hours since the lights were hidden in the machines and radio controlled. My process consisted of the following: first, I observed the scenario without looking in the camera and determined the layout, then frame, lights, tilting, tune up with Polaroids and finally shoot on film.

My final goal is to have beautiful and dramatic pictures, and not necessarily reproducing the reality when shooting industrial or science. I think that, when thinking of these kinds of environments, we all have in mind colored, iconic pictures. In the reality these environments are mostly white and grey and not so fascinating.

In the blue picture of the TPC, the machine was in a white room, and the machine’s original color was metallic grey. I used a blue gelatin flash bounce towards the room’s wall and an amber one in the tunnel inside the machine, giving a different flavor to the final shot.

In the shot of the red magnet I tried to give life to the machine imagining it as a huge crab, the deformation was intended to show the doors like the crab’s claws. The optical fibers shot (ZDC) was inspired by the movie “Matrix” and by the movement of the Jellyfish-like machines in that movie. The TRD shot shows (in my crazy mind) the back of a giant insect and the worker is about to climb on it. The TOF shot shows this electronic snakes curiously watching us.

About the Author

Antonio Saba

Antonio, based in Milan and Cagliari, is a  photographer specializing in adverising. His clients include Seabourn Yachts, agency Zimmerman Miami, The country of Costa Rica, Agency BBDO Garnier, Playteam Milan, Tiscali and many others. He shoots for magazines like In Viaggio, Gente Viaggi, Natural Style, Bon Appetit, Town and Country, the Kee Magazine, The Peninsula Magazine and few others. His most recent books are “one millionth of a second after the big bang” and “Sardegna, Paste della Tradizione”.

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It could be a scene from Alien or a Sci-Fi classic made by Stanley Kubrick, but “Power Station” was actually shot at one the worlds most energy sufficient power plants – Avedøre Power Station. Located south of Copenhagen in Denmark, Avedøre Power Station consists of two power station units – Avedøre Power Station’s unit 1 from 1990 by Claus Bjarrum Architects and unit 2 from 2001 by Jørgen Hauxner, Krarup & Mortensen Architects.

I wanted to capture the mood and size of this enormous building, and standing in the core of this behemoth made me feel like I was trapped on the set of a Sci-Fi movie or a cathedral from the future – and very much alone. My inspiration for this series came from various directions: Retro Sci-Fi movies, Ridley Scott, Stanley Kubrick, Alien, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Blade Runner, and the list goes on. “Sci-Fi” was the word I had in mind and the mood I wanted to capture.  During the “pre-shoot” period I listened to a lot of Sci-Fi movie soundtracks to get in the mood – also a lot of ambient and lounge music. I often use music as a source of inspiration.

No artificial light sources were used in the shoot. All the light you see in the images is the natural light inside Avedøre Power Station- which in some places is freaking scary.  Luckily I was never alone in there due to security reasons. I shot the entire series with my Canon EOS 50D, mounted with my Canon EF-S 17-85 IS USM lens. I shot nearly 1000 frames inside the Power Station resulting in 13 images that made it into the series. In most of the shots the ISO speed was set to between 500-1500 due to the poor light conditions and  a shutter speed at around 1/30. I then edited the images in Adobe Photoshop, mainly adjusting contrast and color, giving them a greenish “alien” look.  I started out by bleaching/desaturating the colors and adding a little green/blue tone. I then applied more contrast to make the images more dramatic.

About the Author

www.holtermand.dk

Kim Høltermand is an autodidact architecture photographer from Denmark. Kim has been featured in international magazines such as GRAFIK, Dwell, ESPER and Candy Magazine along with mentioning in numerous blogs around the world and was awarded Best of the Year by Netdiver Magazine in 2008.

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