Rangefinder Magazine
June 2005

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Photographing David Beckham by Fernando Escovar
On Location in Madrid

One of my favorite assignments thus far in my career was photographing superstar soccer legend David Beckham in Madrid, for PLAYER magazine’s first anniversary issue. PLAYER is a popular luxury lifestyle magazine, (www.playermagonline.com/). I scored that cool assignment by letting the magazine know I used to live in Madrid and Spanish is my native language.

PLAYER had reserved a suite at La Reina, a hotel which I scouted the day before. It was so small that I got nervous about the shoot, so I convinced my client we needed someplace larger and more luxurious. Across the street was the Westin Palace, and it truly is a palace.

When I explained to the PR girl that we had Beckham, she didn’t believe me. I wanted the Presidential Suite, and she said, “Fine—if it’s really Beckham, I want a photo with him, and if it’s not, you owe us $3000 for the use of the suite.”

After establishing the location, we went to the suite to pick out areas and backgrounds we wanted in the shots. Beckham is both a kid and a gentleman at the same time. He is a very humble and quiet guy. I have photographed many of Hollywood’s elite, and I found David to be one of the coolest and smoothest gents I have ever met. David came prepared, as all celebs should. He brought four racks of clothes and 20 pairs of shoes along with jewelry and glasses.

I used a Canon 1Ds in RAW file mode at ISO 100. I also shot some Kodak E100G film on a Mamiya RZ II. When I got home, I processed the film at Pro One Los Angeles. (I avoided the X-ray machine at the airport by putting the film in my pocket.)

Using Profoto’s Ringflash at a low power setting, I managed to move all over the place with this lightweight system. David had never seen this type of lighting system before and asked me a lot of questions about how it worked. This was helpful in keeping a flow to the shoot because now he became increasingly involved in the mechanics of the session. I only had a half-hour with him, but since I let him see shots (digitally), as we went, he would override his publicist and let me grab more shots.

The images shown here were primarily taken with Profoto’s Ringflash. For the image shown on the opposite page, I was lying down on the floor against a curtain with a Photoflex circular reflector at his feet. In Photoshop I added mini sparkles to his earrings and cufflinks for a “bling” effect. Also David’s face was smoothed, and some slight imperfections in his collar were removed. The exposure for the image at left was 1⁄100 at f/16, using the Profoto Ringflash.

Profoto is my new favorite strobe setup because I can plug the generator into any wall socket anywhere in the world, and the unit adjusts to whatever voltage it needs. It also comes with its own built-in PocketWizard ( digital wireless triggering system).

As the shoot continued, I asked Beckham to just be in his tank top and show off his tattoos, so I took the sync cord off the camera and used available light from the window, posing him in thought. I raised the ISO to 640 and kept the shutter speed at 1⁄60. I just held the camera in a Zen mode and captured some nice grainy shots of the formidable Mr. Beckham.

Fernando Escovar is a Los Angeles-based photographer (www.fotographer.com/). Recent shoots include Tom Green, Shaquille O’Neal, Patricia Heaton and Jon Bon Jovi. Fernando is releasing a Cool Photo Tips DVD series with “Car Photography,” “Shooting Swimwear” and “Aerial Action.” The first DVD will be released in June and will be available at all camera retailers and Amazon.com