This photo didn't end up at all like I had planned, sometimes thats just the way things pan out. Nevertheless, I am still happy with the way this shot came out.
My original idea was to snoot my flash so it only lit up his eyes and have the rest of his face and body blacked out. It was an idea I got from a photo I shot a few years back where I did that by accident and remembered how cool it looked. I didn't have a real snoot so I just rolled a magazine up and put it over the end of my Sunpak pz 5000af flash. No matter how right I rolled it, I just couldn't get it to light up only his eyes, it just wasn't working out the way I imagined. After a while I just said fuck it and went a different way with the photo.
Alex Esguerra - Staten Island, NY
Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L @80mm (iso400, f/4, 1/30s)
I ended up leaving the magazine on , but loosened it a lot so it lit up his whole face and hands when he went to pull his hood up. I had a Sunpak 555 behind him on high power for a harsh rim light and used the ambient red and purple lights from the staircase behind him to fill the rest of the frame for a dark/moody look.