"Taking pictures of gorgeous Sunny Leone? Count me in! A visit to New York City? Count me in! Shooting Sunny Leone in NYC? Instant awesomeness, you can so count me in!
I gotta say for me it's about commitment, that's why I knew that I had to cross the Atlantic Ocean as soon as I read about the Photoworkshop that was supposed to take place in the Big Apple. After a first couple of e-Mails with the mastermind behind the idea, Gabrio Linari, I found out that he's quite a great person and was more than willing to provide me with tips on how to make that trip happen without spending a million dollars so it was just a matter of days until I booked the flight and a room to take part in what will be known as one of the coolest things to hit the photography community in 2009.
Will I be able to take at least halfway decent pictures on that workshop? Will it be crowded? Is my knowledge enough? What gear should I bring? Will I be able to handle studio strobes? … The endless line of self destructive questions came finally to an end when I set my foot into the cellar of the „420 Bar“ in the Upper West Side in Manhattan on Oct.4th 2009.
Meeting Gabrio and his team turned into a warm welcome that made me feel relaxed and confident as soon as we shook hands (even though a half naked, bright smiling Sunny Leone was already getting her make up - a view that can make the strongest fade...).
We were a nice, mixed group with people who had almost no experinece to more advanced photographers who all connected well and shared their knowledge and ideas.
After a first short explanation of what we're going to do and about what kinda settings we should experiment with the tech-talk was over, Sunny Leone posed for our 3 groups with 3 photographers each, first in a sexy purple negligee and later sporting nothing but her well tanned skin.
After the first setting we decided to head upstairs to use available light and try to experiment with some fill flash. Since it was bright day and everyone could peep in from the street the next shoots were not completely naked, but hey, we're talking about Sunny Leone, she could've worn a plastic bag and it would have been one of the sexiest things ever!
So, up the lights and a short but needed break before the second set of shoots. Here we decided to go for 3 different settings, where each photographer was supposed to get round about 30 shots. I got lucky and started off the first variation with Sunny wearing a black bra and panties, a jeans vest and some killer black high heeled boots. Picture that in front of a pitch black brickwall and you have my favorite setup of the day.
Afer everyone was satisfied Sunny changed her outfit again to a pink bra and panty and black high heeled shoes. Unbelievable sexy? Yep!
She was supposed to pose in front of the bar first and then get up there to turn the heat up a few notches more. The first part went really well and shortly after we shot even more pictures!
Unfortunately the sudden heatwave got hold of most of the group and our shooting-order was gone as too many people tried to get as many shots as possible, resulting in lots of dark frames for me since almost always somebody else was triggering the strobes. In addition to that Sunny didn't quite know who was supposed to shoot and therefore not at which camera to look. That was a bit of a bummer that made me rather sit down and watch than try to get shots. Although I totally understand that it is hard to hold back when a girl like that get naughty, I wish we would have gotten back to our turns.
Now it was about time to go downstairs again to pump up the naughtyness even more in an ALL nude shooting without strobes. and for this set Sunny was dressed in a pearl-necklace „bra“, black panties and black high heels. This turned out to be the most demanding setup of the day since I had to fiddle with the camera settings a lot before I got the pictures as I wanted them to be.
I had to crank up the ISO (I started with 1600 but got down to 800 again because of too much noise), open the f-stop and go down to around 1/30th of a second in order to get decent lit pictures. Luckily I have a quite steady hand so I ended up only with very few shots that were slightly blurred due to motion or because they were out of focus. I ended up shooting at f2.8, which gave me a real small depth of field and made it hard to get focus where I wanted it (usually the model's eyes).
After that day of shooting I can say, that we were more than ready for the tasty dinner that was provided by Gabbrio. This was the perfect end for the day and gave us the possibility to talk some more about all the things that just happened and relax a bit.
Photography is as fun as it is hard work. It needs a lot of concentration and stamina and is way more than just releasing the shutter, but I guess we all knew that before, right?
Although I already knew most of the theoretic things we talked about, I had a really great day working with Gabrio, his assistants, and of course, Sunny Leone. They were all real great persons and very nice and as professional as it gets. Sunny took time for everyone and made sure, that everybody got shots with her looking sexy as hell.
Would I do I do it again? Sure as hell! I flew in from Germany to take part and it definitely was not one of the cheapest things I have done so far but I would do it again as soon as I see a way to afford it somehow. It was a great experience, I got lot's of great impressions I will remember for a long time and got some very good photos of one of the sexiest girls out there!
A big thank you to Gabrio, Sunny and everyone that was working hard to make that day happen!"
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