Anatomy of a Photo: Koji Shiraishi for Metropolis

This month I photographed horror movie director Koji Shiraishi for Metropolis magazine. The challenge was to show his profession clearly, while not doing something cheesy or ridiculous. Each detail of the picture was important.

1)     The lighting. For this picture, I back-lit Koji from both sides, then bounced light back into his face, holding a Photoflex LiteDisc next to the camera, with the gold side towards his face. This provided just enough light - too much would have ruined the back-lighting effect.

2)     The knife. We needed something sinister-looking, and this knife - all steel, no wooden or plastic handle - fit the bill nicely.

3)     The blood. My initial attempts at making blood were somewhat disappointing, so Koji mixed up a concoction of syrup, corn starch, red food coloring, coffee grounds, and soya sauce.

4)     The tie. We initially looked at bow-ties, but settled on a conservative blue tie, to contrast with the scarier elements of the photo.