» On Seeing, A Journal. The Eddie Adams Workshop

I had the exceptional privilege of participating as a lecturer at the 31st Eddie Adams Workshop held at “The Farm” in Jeffersonville, NY, from October 5th to the 8th this past Autumn.

As I have for all but a few of the last 18 years, I set up a temporary portrait studio in the afternoon of Saturday, October 6, during the Workshop. About 100 workshop participants — teachers, volunteers, students, et al — waited in line to have their portraits made.

Each year, I have used a different lighting and set-up technique and have written about them in a previous post.

For the lighting this year I set up two lights, one with a red filter to the right of the subject and one with a blue filter to the left of the subject.

I programed the two lights to flash one-half second apart, both in one single camera exposure.

I demonstrated the timing for each subject and asked each to quickly and spontaneously modify their pose or facial expression between each strobe.

The idea was to capture a half second double exposure, one red and one blue, of two spontaneous facial expressions. I encouraged each person to let go, have fun and allow the creative gods to bless and capture surprise and wonder.

Here are some of the happy results: