I recently had the opportunity to do a photoshoot with actor Daniel Radcliffe for Bustle. As with most celebrity shoots, my time with Daniel was pretty limited, so preparing as much as possible before the shoot was essential.

When shooting celebrities, I do extensive research beforehand. Since Daniel has been acting since he was a child, there was no shortage of information on him. Since I always play music in the background when I shoot, I found out what his favorite music is and made a playlist catered to his musical taste.

When Daniel came in, the first thing he asked was if he could play his music. I told him that he could play his music, and as he was getting his computer out, he heard "Walk on the Wild Side" but Lou Reed come on. He said "I can't turn this song off, I love this." I explained to him that I made a whole playlist of songs he like and he was really appreciative and told me to play my playlist. At this point, I knew I had earned some trust from him before we even started shooting.

For the first setup, I shot against a painted backdrop from Gravity Backdrops. I love the texture and how much depth painted backdrops have. For this setup, I used 2 Siros 800 heads. the one acting as a rim light diagonally behind him to camera left had a large indirect umbrella with diffusion on it. The second light acting as key had a small indirect umbrella with diffusion on it.

After shooting about 50 frames with this setup, I decided to turn off the key light and just use the rim light with a bounce to create a more dramatic shot.

For the next setup, we wanted to shoot some clean images on a white background. I had the second set already built since I had such limited time with Daniel and wanted to make sure we had time for both setups. In order to keep things simple and contained, I used a Siros with a beauty dish for the second setup.

From first shot to last shot, I had exactly 10 minutes. I'm really happy with how this turned out given the limited amount of time. Daniel was extremely kind and surpassed all expectations I had. I even convinced him to shoot a couple polaroids at the end.

Link to article: https://www.bustle.com/p/daniel-radcliffe-is-happy-to-be-alive-right-now-15924021

Publication: Bustle

Photo Editor: Clare Thigpen

BTS Photos and Assistant: Colette Robinson