Fashion Photography: Nina Ollenburg's Damaged Goods Collection

I recently had the chance to shoot the lookbook photos for Nina Ollenburg’s Damaged Goods Collection. Over a two-day period, we performed a series of studio and outdoor shoots designed to show off the vibrancy and detail that Nina's outfits feature heavily.

Nina’s designs featured a custom-designed pattern of flowers drawn to look like tongues and very highly saturated colours. This made high-key lighting a must when shooting the outfits. A lot of work was done to ensure the lighting was as bright as possible, while still showing off the colours in the outfit as accurately as possible.

I really enjoyed the collaboration that happened during this shoot. Being my first fashion shoot I was a little uncomfortable at first with posing the models, however, with the models help to decide what poses to use and with the fashion designer herself being there, we were able to come up with some truly unique poses that really showed off the beauty of Nina’s collection.

This shoot was an awesome chance to put my knowledge of both studio lighting and outdoor lighting to use. We had an abundance of studio lights to work with while in the studio, allowing me to create a fun four-light setup. Using two softboxes either side of the models ensured they were lit appropriately and then using an Octobox setup high and facing down at an angle I was able to create a slightly blown out highlight on the face replicating something you might see when shooting outside in full daylight.

Shooting outdoors made me get creative with the natural light we were receiving. Using a gold reflector, I was able to get really warm skin tones when reflecting at the right angle. I paired this reflector with a diffused speed light to fill in any harsh shadows or under-lit areas. This was actually quite intimidating at first as I typically don’t shoot portraits outside, but I quickly picked up how to get the best shots!