Jason Tag Photography

Jillian - Nov. 17 2008

On Monday, I had the privilege of shooting with a very talented and beautiful model named Jillian who was visiting Oahu.  When we initially talked about the shoot and locations she had mentioned shooting at a waterfall.  I was hesitant because I have spent a great deal of time hiking in the woods of Oahu trying to find a suitable waterfall and each time I try to find one, it never works out.  So we agreed on a stream location that she knew about.  So we set off on our adventure and it was an adventure.  we got turned around a few times and had to double back in order to find this super secret and extremely beautiful stream.

Jillian - Nov. 17 2008

Once we found it I knew it was going to be an amazing shoot.  we started off with some very basic shots on the stream bank.  playing in and around the trees and rocks.  It was raining and luckily JIllian brought an umbrella.  So I borrowed it to keep the camera dry while we shot which was an interesting way to shoot. I only wish I had a picture of myself holding the umbrella as we shot so I could see how silly I looked.

At one point during the shoot we found ourselves in the stream.  Jillian was posing on various rocks and I found myself knee deep in water just hoping that I could keep the camera from getting wet.  It was a real challenge because through out the shoot I felt that my mobility was stifled.  Normally I’m all over the place getting different angles of poses.  but because of the water I felt that I had to stay still.  Jillian did a lot to help me remember that I needed to get to different perspectives of each pose.

Jillian - Nov. 17 2008

All in all we both had a great time creating art under what can only be decribed as challenging conditions.

Peaceful Morning

Over the weekend I got the chance to shoot with Sylvia on Oahu. I was so stoked to be able to shoot with her on my island for a change. The ideas that talked about for this shoot was to shoot in and around water. so we headed to a location I’ve shot at several times. Instead of staying near the trails we hiked up the stream and into areas where not alot of people would normally go. We were rewarded for being adventurous with an amazing pool of water and a few small waterfalls. It was a gorgeous setting and a place that not too many people have seen before. Which makes it such a special place for me.

Flowing Water

One of the things I wanted to capture was water flowing around Sylvia. I wanted to try to slow down the water so that it appeared as a blurry mist flowing around her body. So we spent a great deal of time on it. One of the problems I found was that it wasn’t easy to get the camera to go dark enough to allow me to get a long enough exposure time. Even with the aperture set at ƒ22 I was still getting overexposure at .5 second exposure times. I knew that in order to really blur the water I’d need at least 1 second exposure times maybe longer.

When it wasn’t working at one part of the stream we headed further upstream and we did find another great place to shoot this idea. All in all it was a great morning creating art!