Arizona Ranch Lifestyle of Former Marine for Night Rider Jewelry
Night Rider Jewelry is an Arizonian-based custom jewelry company that hired me to do a lifestyle shoot for their new Marine Core ring. The cool thing about this shoot was that the model, Mike was a real former marine who now maintains livestock and lives with his wife and two young children out in Gilbert, AZ. When I stepped out of the car, the sun was lower in the sky and the world felt quiet. I was greeted by two golden retrievers, two running kids, and an excited billy goat with a personality so big you thought he was human. Outside, the goat surprised me by leaping up on top of the table for eye-to-eye head scratches. When it wasn’t trying to get in my camera bag, I was taking photos of it, the horses, and the chickens. Mike’s son loved feeding the chickens and the chickens loved him. It’s most likely because he flipped the bag of food upside down dumping it all out around him. Those chickens weren’t going hungry that night.
The sun set quicker than I expected, so I pulled out my Digibee (Paul C Buff flash unit) and quickly set it up to capture the sunset and Mike picking up hay bales, posing with his horses more clearly.
Overall, this shoot was much harder than I anticipated. I don’t know if you know anything about horses or even trying to photograph them, but they move CONSTANTLY. Trying to keep a ring on a moving hand in focus with low light is hard, while also making sure Mike was positioned properly and the picture itself was composed interestingly enough. It was a really good challenge for me, as I am new to photographing jewelry, but I am happy with the results of how this shoot came out in just 45 minutes!
