Russell Brown, WineMaster

Had the distinct pleasure of meeting Russell Brown during the DLWS Napa adventure. For those of you not familiar with Russell, he’s the Senior Creative Director at Adobe Systems and is heavily involved in the graphic design and development arena. He is also a total blast to photograph. Russell came prepared to get into “character.” He asked a couple of us to shoot him in the vineyard we were visiting… So I broke out a flash and a Lumiquest LTP softbox (a McNally favorite) and went to TTL town.

Russell is just plan awesome to have in front of the lens. He lends drama where there is none, and very quickly transforms himself from “mad” scientist to elder winemaster with ease. For this portrait I wanted to bring out the drama in the clouds building behind him, as well as include enough of the vineyard “environment” to show where he was and paint a “story” around the image.

I call this the “Wine Spectator” cover shot. :) Enjoy.