Promotional image for Oulun Sydänkeskus, a health-care center for the treatment of cardiovascular disease based in Oulu. Lighting is two speedlights aimed at the ceiling behind camera.
This summer, I got called to make promotional images for a local health-care center for the treatment of cardiovascular disease. Oulun Sydänkeskus needed images to be used on their website and the aim was to create photographs which depicted their day-to-day operation. They also needed some headshots for the personnel.
Their offices are located in downtown Oulu and I did a quick, one-hour scout there before the actual day of the shoot. I pinned down the locations I wanted to photograph in with Sydänkeskus' employees Katri and Soile, who provided me with invaluable assistance throughout the shoot.
So! The space was low and had a weird recessed ceiling in some areas. The ceiling had these rectangular recesses, but was painted white, which meant I could do a lot of work with speedlights aimed at it. Had no idea how the light would bounce around in what was essentially a ceiling of dozens of softboxes, but it worked out fine! Speedlights were great to work with because there was no hassle with power cords and we needed to move quickly from one room to the next. I did bring in the usual assortment of modifiers, too, and made good use of softboxes of my own.
One speedlight bounced off of the ceiling for the customer and two speedlights bounced off white doors on camera left to light the hallway and the health-care professional.
Same lighting as the one above, minus the hallway lights. They needed a bunch of detail shots for their website, such as this.
Images like these are to be used on the website for different sections. Lighting is speedlight in a softbox, camera left. I brought in some white paper for product shots and just laid it on the floor like here.
Another room, another set-up! Lighting is also bounced speedlight. This was shot on a tripod: shutter speed set so the monitor would read and the flash did the rest. Something medical happening here!
We had a full day of shooting with Oulun Sydänkeskus. We started in the morning and worked for a few hours before breaking for lunch. We got all the images shot at the center in good time and then we convened to the studio. We considered photographing the personnel at the center but decided it would be more comfortable in the studio as it was not a problem for the client to meet me there. 15 people in little under two hours including teardown. I provided them with color and B&W versions of their portraits:
Here are some examples from the portrait shoot. Medium softbox boomed over the camera and a large octabox behind the camera for fill.
We had a big shot list for the on-location stuff and of course a decent number of people to photograph in the studio. Thankfully, Katri and Soile from Oulun Sydänkeskus run a tight ship and we were able to get everything on time! Special thanks to Pipsa for helping with the teardown.