A trip to France for the World Photographic Cup

We took a trip to Paris this spring for the World Photographic Cup.  Out of six categories I had been nominated for the best in the world for three of them.  We flew in a few days early to do some exploring and had many great adventures.  Each could probably be a book in itself but I have finally taken the time to process a few images from my favorite adventure.

On the third day we decided to rent a car and drive four hours to the coast to see Mt St. Michel.  By the time we walked to a rental place, rented a car and made it out of Paris the day was mostly gone and we barely made it to the coast before sunset.

As you will see in the images below Mt St. Michel is something out of a fairy-tale.  It sits on a island of rock a mile off the coast.  When the tide is out it sits on a great expanse of sand, but when the tide comes in it is cut off from the world except for a small road that leads to it.  To me the streets and alleyways of this place were exactly how I envision Medieval France would have looked.

sunset at Mt St. Michel

We explored the city for a few hours in the light before night fell and had dinner and wine at one of the many cool little restaurants hidden in the alleys.

As night fell, I made my way down the coast along old sheep trails to watch the tide come in and capture some images of the medieval city at night

These images don't even do the city justice.  I sat on the higher pinnacle of land as the tide rose in the darkness filling the bay.  It was almost scary watching everything flood.  Even a few seconds between shots would reveal the water rising inches at a time.  By the time I left the coast and walked back it was late into the night and nearly everyone was asleep or gone and so I had a dark and deserted medieval city completely to myself to explore.

 During the day the shops and restaurants buzz with activity but at night my only company were the stray cats that wandered the streets in search of rats. 

The city is built on a large hill of rock and is a maze of twisting alleys and stairways to rival any of  Escher's drawings.

An alleyway I followed that was barely 18 inches across.  It was so small that my camera backpack wedged occasionally between the buildings.  If you look closely you will see it continuing on and on in the darkness.  As a child I loved reading science fiction novels with knights, dragons and castles.  I can not express the excitement and udder joy of exploring this place.  Even now my heart beats fast to think about it - it was almost as if I had been transported into one of my childhood books waiting for the hero or villain to come around the corner at any time.    

Around one corner in a particularly dark alley and down a staircase were the open doors of a church.

Sandwiched between buildings, a graveyard.  High above sits the abbey.

A parting shot lit by lamplight as I made my way out of the city.    By the time I made it back through the French countryside to Paris it was early morning

BTW.  At the World Photographic Cup I won Top Portrait in the World, Top Wedding Portrait in the World and second place in the World in the Illustrative category.  I will try to have a post soon with some of those images

A perfect 400 print case

So I had a lot of people really like my entries this year and in competition the District judges scored all four of my prints as a perfect 100 which has only happened twice in history. They also did really well in PPA's International Competition - below is the press release for those portraits!

Ben Shirk of Shirk Photography was named a Diamond Medalist during Professional Photographers of America's 2015 International Photographic Competition. Shirk’s work will be on display at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, Georgia, Jan. 10-12, 2016.

A panel of 43 eminent jurors from across the United States selected the top photographs from nearly 5,200 total submitted entries. The level of the award is determined by how many of those four images receive the highest possible honor: acceptance into the PPA Loan Collection, which is displayed at photographic exhibitions, conventions and other photography events. Shirk was named a Diamond Medalist, meaning that all four of his merited images entered the PPA Loan Collection.

Shirk also set records in district competition this year with all four of his Photographic Open prints receiving a perfect 100 score. Only two other people in history have had a perfect print case. In competition Shirk was awarded First Place in Portraits, First place in Wedding, and First Place in Illustrative, the Canon Par Excellence award, The Kodak Gallery Award, and the Best Print Award from Sunset-Lexjet. Shirk was also named 2015 North Central District Photographer of the Year and Iowa Photographer of the Year by the Iowa Professional Photographers Association.

I was challenged to create an all in camera image because so much of what I have done before has had a lot of post processing to them. Besides a slight bit of toning, this was all created in camera. Thanks to the beautiful model Rose Couch for modeling for me!!!

I photographed this model (Twig Noir) while hanging out with some friends in Wisconsin. She has some amazing costumes so I created an image in my head as I was photographing her and then created this entire scene later on the computer. It is play on Alice in Wonderland and the Queen of hearts. Much of the wrought iron fence is hand shaped to inlay lots of hearts. The castle in the background was pieced together from Images I took in Ireland

I photographed this in my studio about an hour before I shot Mirror Mirror. It was originally going to be an all in-camera shot also but I decided to add more hair later. I spent a few days gathering old books and melting candles all over them. You wouldn't believe how much work went into getting the candles just right. There are lots of little details (like in most of my images) I even included a half eaten brown apple core, unwatered dead plants, dead flowers, and if you notice the binding of the book near her elbow is titled "knots" - which in my head aided in her escape later from Rapunzel's tower.

a cool shot of one pile of books that was part of the scene I created 

a detail shot I took later to allow me to add more hair 

I don't know which image I spent the longest on - there is certainly a ton of time invested into each but this one has been haunting me for awhile. I was unsure of who I wanted the subject to be but I could see the scene. From the door, to the door's frame, the sign, the words, the light, each and every element that you see was photographed separately and placed into the scene, then shaded, highlighted, toned, corrected for perspective and in some cases drawn to match.

WPPI

The Wedding and Portrait Photographers International (WPPI)  holds their annual convention in Las Vegas every year.  They also host a very prestigious print competition where photographers from around the world enter their best work.  This year I placed in the top three in four different categories. Here are my winning portraits!

Titled "Turf War"

Titled "To Fetch a Pail of Water"  

Titled "Twisted Dreams"

Titled "The Last Menagerie"

Team Sports Posters

We have been cranking out a bunch of team sports posters again and having a lot of fun with them!  Teams come into our studio to be photographed on green screen then we extract them and create an awesome scene around them.  Eventually the posters get turned into layered photoshop templates that can be reused for other teams around the nation.  If you are a photographer you can see some of our designs and options for photographers at http://shirkphotography.com/for-photographers/distance/.

The girls had a bunch of fun having a mud fight at the studio to get ready for their photoshoot!  I had them do a cool action shot then created a bunch of mud splashes around them to give it a cool mud volleyball look.

This has some special meaning - It is meant as a tribute to Boston College's #19 who lost his life in the World Trade Center Bombings helping to rescue others.  He always wore a red bandanna.  ESPN did a cool story on him that you can view on youtube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWKPjSirbcU.  The poster was sent to Boston College and also  Welles Crowther's Mother  who loved it.

Created from a scene I captured in Ireland at Giant's Causeway - this is a real place!
 This is already a template on our website.

The coach came up with this theme but I had to do some creative thinking to come up with a background.  Sometimes that is the hardest job is just figuring out what to do with their theme.