The Lourcey Photography Blog

Blog
Larry Lourcey
last updated on
 
February 24, 2014

Off The Record: Cris Joel

February 24, 2014

Off The Record For this cover, I took on the album cover of one of my all-time favorite albums:  Billy Joel’s Greatest Hits Vol 1 and 2.  When photographer Cris Duncan suggested the cover, I knew it was one that I wanted to work on! How It Happened Cris is located in Lubbock, Texas – which would hav...

Off The Record:  Cris Joel

Larry Lourcey

Hi and welcome to my blog!I do my best
to keep things updated and give you a look at things happening behind the scenes here at Lourcey Photography. Although I've been a professional photographer for over 20 years, I'm also semi-famous for my pizza and bread making. So follow along and enjoy the adventure. And don't be afraid to leave a comment and say hello!

Off The Record

For this cover, I took on the album cover of one of my all-time favorite albums: Billy Joel’s Greatest Hits Vol 1 and 2. When photographer Cris Duncan suggested the cover, I knew it was one that I wanted to work on!

How It Happened

Cris is located in Lubbock, Texas – which would have normally made things kind of difficult. However, we both spent this past weekend in Richmond, Virginia – speaking and judging at the VPPA Annual Convention (which was a BLAST by the way!). Although the days were pretty busy, we managed to find some time to squeeze in a quick photo shoot for the cover.

The Cover

Billy Joel's Greatest Hits album cover

Billy Joel’s Greatest Hits album cover

The original cover featured Billy leaning on a piano. Since Cris plays guitar, we decided that substituting the guitar for the piano made sense. We found a blank wall in hotel and setup a single monolight to try and emulate the look of the original image. Unfortunately, we setup right outside an elevator and had a constant parade of hotel guest passing through. However, Cris was a trooper and we managed to capture a great image.

Cris Joel Album Cover

I thought it was a very nice shot – similar to the original, but with a little bit of a twist. As it turns out, Cris’ middle name is Joel – so the name swap on the cover was an easy decision. I decided to change the title from Greatest Hits to Greatest Pics – for the obvious reference to “pictures” – of course, it later dawned on me that it could also refer to guitar picks. Funny how things work out sometimes.

In all, I was very happy with the final shot. I think it makes a great addition to the Off The Record series. I’ve got several more in the works, so stay tuned!

Outtake from the session

Outtake from the session

 

Read more

Off The Record:  Donnadele

Off The Record: Donnadele

Getting Modern Welcome back for another addition to the Off The Record Project.  We’ve been doing a bunch of older album covers lately.  This is probably due to the fact that the 80s produced so many iconic cover images.  For this one, however, we decided to get a little more modern, with an homage ...

Read more
My Favorite Photoshop Filters

My Favorite Photoshop Filters

I get a lot of emails asking which Photoshop filter plugins I use on my images.  By far, my favorites are the Topaz filters.  I like the fact that they offer easy-t0-use presets, but also allow you to go in and fine tune the look as much as you want. I don’t really endorse too many photography items...

Read more
The Painting

The Painting

Daniel brought a painting created my his mother. He told me about how he grew up watching her paint and she created this awesome painting of his wedding day.

Read more

Let's tell your story with a portrait!

Imagine capturing a moment in time and being able to return to it forever.  A truly timeless portrait goes beyond how someone looks- it tells a story.

Discover the Portrait Experience