The Light Touch

Not all photos are created equal.
Some take more time than others to process, and other times, the shoot comes together so that very little retouching is required of fashion photographer Karina Ceja. “It just all depends on what the client wants,” she says. If the client wants the photo to be “raw looking,” Ceja retouches to color correct. If the job is for a magazine, she then retouches accordingly.

The process, from beginning to end, is pretty straightforward. The client will give Ceja a model and an objective for the shoot. Once the Los Angeles-based photographer understands her assignment, she spends time researching a location and figuring out the logistics of the shoot. Then, with the model in tow, Ceja’s job is to bring his or her personality out. “I connect with the model,” she says. “I meet with the model, connect with the model and then just have fun.”

To shoot photos, Ceja prefers to use a Canon EOS 5D; her favorite lens is the Canon EF 24–105mm f/4 L IS USM. She’s made the choice to go digital over film because “you can’t go wrong with digital,” she explains. “Digital gives you fast results and you can see the images and load them into the computer and give them to the client in no time.”

What about after the shoot? “Of course, we say our goodbyes,” she jokes. “I then focus on perfecting the image in Photoshop. I retouch it.”

Ceja says she’s gotten to be so good at the retouching, depending on the image, the process can take less than 15 minutes. But if the work is more complicated, the time spent in Photoshop could be as much as an hour.

To process the photo, the photographer relies on three main features in Photoshop: curves, hue, saturation and 
selective color.
According to Ceja, the secret to spending less time on the computer is spending more time setting up the photo, freeing her up to focus on the image. She works on securing the location and lighting, and she takes care of hair, makeup and clothing upon the client’s request.

Former model Brian Brown worked with Ceja on headshots and body shots. Ceja took care of everything, he said, even making decisions about his makeup and clothing. What struck Brown, a graphic novelist, was how the amount of work in preparation for the shoot affected the final product. “I got to see the shots between frames, and they were amazing,” he says. “She’s the total package as far as lighting and composition.” When he got the photos back from Ceja, Brown said he didn’t notice much of a difference from what he had seen in the viewfinder the day of the shoot: “They didn’t need a lot of postproduction because she got it right at the beginning stage.”

Ceja also argues that if the lighting is off, it doesn’t matter what kind of camera, lens or photo retouching program you use for a shoot. Those details must be taken care of in the initial stages of a shoot. “Lighting is one of the most important factors in photography,” she says. “Light can bring the image to life; it can make the image standout, and it brings out features in the subject. Light can also change the mood in the image from dark and mysterious to happy and bright.”

For her photo shoots, Ceja prefers working with strobe lighting and window lighting. If the lighting is poor in a photo, it can create problems in the retouching phase. “With flat lighting, you lose detail, and it can kill the image, making it boring,” she says. “Harsh and spilled lighting can lose pixilation, and it will make it difficult to work on the problems. Lighting can make the image or break the image.”

Even though lighting can sometimes be a challenge, Ceja believes that making sure it’s just right is her favorite part of the job. “I love lighting,” she says. “That’s one of the things that makes me different. It’s kind of like George Hurrell. He had his thing with glamour. I like doing it with light.”

Ceja’s techniques are evident throughout her body of work. For one shoot, Ceja had the model stand in a driveway in front of a house. She focused on using the saturation and curves tools to play up the color and lighting in the photograph. Ceja said she loved the way the lighting comes in from behind, emphasizing the model’s curves.

But for other projects, Ceja finds herself not having to retouch much at all. Once, for a denim shoot, Ceja used a child and an adult’s lower body. The child stands clinging to the adult’s leg while looking directly into the camera. All Ceja had to do was increase the smile in Photoshop because “the image was already so nice to begin with,” she says.

It’s that kind of simplicity and beauty that first attracted Ceja to photography. Her first encounter with beauty came before she made it to junior high school. The photographer moved from Michoacán, Mexico, to the United States when she was nine years old.

“At the time, I wasn’t familiar with art or photography,” Ceja says. “That wasn’t until I came to California. But I was familiar with beauty.” She and her family lived in the mountains of Mexico before coming to America, their house built near a river and wildlife.

At the age of five, she remembers running around in a more natural setting, a place she credits for developing her artistic side.
Becoming a fashion photographer wasn’t something Ceja considered until she was 16 years old, when she got her first camera, a Yashica Electro 35. “Since then, I couldn’t stop taking pictures,” Ceja says. “I just love shooting and art.” Her interest in photography led her to San Bernardino Valley College, from which she transferred to the Brooks Institute of California. After graduating from college, she had the chance to go to New York or stay in Los Angeles. “I was more familiar with Los Angeles,” she says. “I also wanted to work with celebrities, and this is the place to be.” That decision, along with her education and experience has served her well. Her client roster includes Elite Model Management, Ford, Latino Casting USA, Ideal PR, Baron Entertainment, Patricia Sturla Agency and John Russo, to name a few.

For more information about Karina Ceja, visit her Web site, www.karinacejaphoto.com.

Rita Flórez is an editor at a business journal and women’s magazine in Columbia, MO. She has also written for several newspapers, GOOD and VenusZine.com.