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Ken Cook:
A Golden Time
By CharMaine Beleele
It's early morning in Salinas, CA, and as Ken Cook strides down the street, he is a stranger
to no one. In fact, the townspeople who greet him have known him all their lives. The oldest
surviving business in the downtown area, Cook's Photography has been on the same street
for four generations. And over the years, Ken has certainly developed lasting relationships.
A prime example is a waitress at his favorite coffee shop, the Cherry Bean; Ken photographed
her mother and her grandmother, and this spring, he will photograph the three generations
together. His storefront is across the street from the Cherry Bean and his show window
displays his work. He is known for classical, painterly images that almost appear
three-dimensional. His senior and bridal portraits are reminiscent of Rembrandt beauties.
Cook's Photography combines Ken's 60-year career as a photographer with his son Jason's
fresh perspective, which establishes the studio as one of the few father-son photographic teams.
The studio was first founded in 1879 by Ken's grandfather, W.D. Cook. Eventually Ken's father,
Orville, took over the business and fostered it through good and bad times. Growing up, Ken
was encouraged to inherit the family business, but wasn't won over by photography until many
years later. Upon his return from the Korean War, Ken had planned on finishing his college
degree, but his father became very ill. While helping his mother in the studio, he took a
photograph of a young girl. She was thrilled with her portraits and declared them the best
she had ever seen. That was the decisive moment for Ken. He shares, "That was the end of
college for me. After that momentous session with the young girl, I rushed to join the
photography club, then competitions. I got my first print merit in 1959 and my master's
in 1962."
In keeping with family tradition, Ken's son, Jason, joined the generational studio in 1994.
Jason comments, "When you are out to learn the photography business for yourself, you need
to become the best you can be, just for your own interests. If you learn from a master,
then you have the responsibility to uphold a legacy of knowledge. I want to carry on what
my dad taught me and what he learned from the 1950s and 60s, as well as what my grandfather
knew as far back as the 1800s."
The decades Ken has put into Cook's Photography have helped him develop as an artist
and have shaped his skills, particularly with lighting. In the 1950s, Ken was busy shaping
the business, while the photographic world was emulating Yousuf Karsh and a Hollywood-style
look using hot lights in the studio. In the 1960s, color portraits were popular, with
photographers Paul Linwood Gittings and Vincent Thomas (Ken's mentor) leading the way.
During that time, Ken developed his eye for color, hue and flesh tones. Even today, he
processes all of his own work up to 30 x 40-inch portraits. Says Ken, "We develop, proof
and scan our own film. We print our work on an Epson 4000 and an Epson 7600. And we have
a world class photo artist, Shirley Hixson, to do the retouch."
At 30, Ken earned his master's and developed his specialty for children's portraiture.
He began to introduce his methods at various photography conventions, which led him to
teach portraiture for five years at Winona School of Photography. In that time period,
Ken realized his forte was not only color, but also lighting. Vincent Thomas was mentoring
Ken as he studied the art of wraparound, three-dimensional, feathered light. Vincent told
Ken, "It is my conviction that portrait photographers should strive to relate their work to
that of the great masters."
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In 1974 Ken invented Westcott's "Master's Brush," an amazing lighting modifier that is a
hybrid of a softbox and a parabolic light, with its very own large, adjustable barn door.
Recently, Ken has been reinvigorated by a resurgence of interest in classical portraiture
from both his clients and his colleagues. Because of this, a new generation of photographers
is discovering his "Master's Brush."
During the 2005 WPPI Convention, Ken noticed a new trend toward elegant portraiture. He and
his co-presenter, Jim Meltzer, were demonstrating lighting techniques with Photogenic lights
and Westcott light modifiers (like the Master's Brush) on stage in one of Bally's ballrooms.
An eager crowd of young photographers buzzed in and out of the room. One asked, "What's he
doing? How can he be painting with light without a computer?" Another excited photographer
said, "This lighting will save me hours of retouching!" Even back in the 1962 issue of
Studio Light magazine Ken freely admitted to "copying masters like Thomas Gainsborough
and trying to produce an available light effect, but available light with polish." And
like the young photographer at WPPI said, Ken produces such light in the camera, not in
Photoshop. This is why Ken Cook's DVD on lighting, How to Survive in an Imperfect World,
is now in 33 different countries.
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Ken explained to me briefly how he replaces flat lighting with dimensional lighting. "We
have seven patterns of light and shadow to put on the human face and make the subject look
the best she or he can be," he says. "I can show how the lighting patterns work the light
and shadow to chisel the face. With the appropriate lighting, I can make an overweight,
unattractive old man look strong, dignified and elegant in his own right." A demonstration
of this technique is on his DVD mentioned above.
As the 1980s and 90s brought the world more candid works of art and the advent of
photojournalism, Cook's Photography did not ignore the trends, but quietly maintained
classic portraiture as its most lucrative product. Ken grins and says, "I do not believe
photojournalism is enough for a wedding. Did the great painters say, 'Just do anything and
I'll paint it?' "
If you are just beginning to add a painterly quality of light and shadow to your work,
here are Ken Cook's five cool keys to finesse your lighting:
Cook's Cool Key 1: "Either do a profile or keep the nose within the confine of the
face," says Ken. The confine is that pretty contour line on the side of the face that sinks
in slightly at the eye and smoothly down the cheek to the jaw and chin.
Cook's Cool Key 2: "Someone once told me and I have made it my personal rule: 'Only
one ear per image!' Confine it close to the head by keeping it back in shadow," he says.
Cook's Cool Key 3: Ken shares, "The nose is an important key to the face. It will tell
you what light pattern you are working with. Remember to use just half of a nose in
light." (This may sound strange but it works beautifully!)
Cook's Cool Key 4: "Shoot into the hair part. This will minimize the distortion of
part of the head being higher than the other," says Ken. It will also make your subject's
hair look its best without draping it into their face. Remember, rules can be broken too.
Cook's Cool Key 5: "Practice, practice, practice," Ken states. "Rehearse keys 1-4 until
they are second nature."
Ken is not alone in his opinion that clients as well as portraitists are beginning to
rediscover, or perhaps discover for the first time, a gentle, classical approach to their
portraits. On the welcome page of the Gittings' website (www.gittings.com) we find this
same sentiment echoed: "We need formal, quiet portraits when we are composed and at our
very best." The late Monte Zucker was quoted as saying, "The world is ready for a return
to good portraiture. It's obvious by the signs of the times…the demand, the sales!"
Consumer technology has given us another factor to consider; with today's cameras, what
can the studio offer that clients cannot do for themselves? For Ken, the answer is, and
always has been, lighting. You can view more of Ken and Jason Cook's work at
www.cooksphotography.com
or reach them via email at
cooks@cooksphotography.com.
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CharMaine R. Beleele owns a full-time photography studio,
(www.angelkissedphotography.com),
and teaches speech-communication at the University of Arkansas in Fort Smith. She writes for
Rangefinder and WPPI Photography Monthly and can be contacted at her email:
photoangels@sbcglobal.net.
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