Turn a new leaf...

For a very long time now I have wanted to update my website. I needed to throw a few new clients images into the galleries to keep them fresh. But I have really wanted to change the galleries from the somewhat lackadaisical FrontPage galleries to cool looking Flash galleries. In the world of photography it seems that if you don’t have some flash content in your website somewhere then you just don’t have a proper website.

I like to think of my motives to upgrade my site as not submitting to peer pressure, oh no, but rather just following my peers and learning from what seems to work for them. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

I had tried to do upload some flash galleries in the past with little success. I had originally created my website in FrontPage, as I am very deficient in the HTML department and this wonderful little program from Microsoft came to the rescue (was bound to happen sooner or later!) But I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to make galleries with flash content.

Then I discovered that Lightroom 2 had a really nice web flash gallery module. I managed to create a gallery just fine but still couldn’t get it where I wanted it to be – on my site!

Enter stage left a valued mate and blog reader who had the smarts to help me out – and the fix turned out to be pretty easy too. I can use FrontPage as my FTP client and just drop the flash galleries in the appropriate place on my local drive, change a hyperlink or 3, upload the whole thing and it does the rest. Fantastic. But enough of that.

I tried to do an “all nighter” to get all the new galleries uploaded and also create a new set of Gallery sub-pages for those who don’t have flash. I uploaded all the flash pages but I just couldn’t get there with the html pages. I’ll get to that tomorrow, I mean later on today. I need sleep.

But change is great – a new start if you will. Do you agree?

Day full of surprises... and an Orbis...

Wow – what a huge weekend. It really was. For those of you who follow me on Twitter you will already know that in the last 24 hours I have taken 4371 images of the fashion shows at the 2009 Every Woman Expo. And I’m now officially exhausted.

I am going to save the wrap-up from the great Nikon D700 v Fujifilm S5 Pro challenge for another night. I am too tired and there is a little more to the story that needs explaining. But the bottom line is I think both camera bodies shine on their own merits. The D700 on handling and speed, and the S5 Pro in the quality of the final image straight from the camera.

But anyway, other than the D700, the other cool thing I got to play with today was my Orbis Ring flash adaptor. I have had this thing for ages and have not really utilised it all that much, so I decided to change that. The image I have included with this post was shot with the D700 set to Manual mode, 1/200th sec at f/4.0, ISO 800. I used my beloved Nikon 50mm f/1.8 lens stopped down to f/4 and as you can see, although the models were charging down the runway at great pace this image is still pin sharp. This also dispels a fear raised by a valued reader that the D700 might be front focussing; hence the rather soft image presented in last nights post alongside the image from the S5 Pro. Thank you though to that valued reader, I really appreciate your input! PS, yes I know the image is a little risqué, but a fair portion of the fashion shows were this kind of attire so I think it is a valid example of my weekends photography.

Back to the Orbis just for a moment, I realise that a catwalk show is not the forte for a ring flash, especially one that is powered merely by a speedlight with a GN of just around 40 (my SB-900) as the Orbis does sap quite a bit of power from an otherwise powerful flash. But I am rather partial to the shadowless lighting it has placed on the models, even if it meant standing right at the end of the runway and blocking some peoples view of the show. But after all, it is all about getting the image right! Gorgeous. Gotta start using it more often…

And the winner is... um...

Well what an interesting afternoon! This will be another short post as I have soooo much work to do after today’s shoot and tomorrow’s all-dayer, but…

For my avid readers (or those of you who know how to scroll down to the last blog post!) you will know that today was the day when I got to try out the Nikon D700 for the first time in a live situation; in this instance it was during the catwalk shows at the Every Woman Expo which was held at the Perth Exhibition and Convention Centre.

I was very eager to find out how the D700 would stack-up compared to my old faithful Fujifilm S5 Pro. And I have to say I am more than surprised with the results. You see the S5 Pro has been around about 18 months longer than the D700, which as you know is a long time these days in the world of… well anything electronic really. In fact, the S5 Pro is now a discontinued camera – it’s even been removed forever from the Fujifilm website. Whereas the D700 is still an, albeit oldish but still current model in the Nikon line-up.

Now I don’t want the following couple of paragraphs to sound too biased. I have only been using the D700 for a day and a half whereas I have been using my Fuji’s for years. Maybe I just don’t know the intricacies of the D700 menu system or how to drive the camera properly to extract the absolute best out of it. But where I was expecting the D700 to leave the S5 eating pixels – it just didn’t seem to turn out that way.

Sure the D700 is a joy to use. It really is. As I said yesterday, I love the way it handles, and I love the way it feels balanced no matter if I have my 24mm f/2.8 prime which weighs about 100g attached to the body or my 70-200 f/2.8 telephoto which weighs about 1.5kg– it just feels right. I love the hearty thud the shutter makes, and the speed to which it makes it. The auto-focus works really well for the most part. The metering is on par with the Fuji (probably because they are exactly the same!) Everything about the camera oozes quality. It inspires me to get off my butt and get out there and take more photos.

But the proof is in the pudding – or pictures as the case may be. As you saw at the top of this post are a couple of example images taken with each camera body. Both are zoomed in to 100%. Both have similar camera settings to try and make the end result as even as possible. Yes they are totally different images with different subjects. But they were taken in the same venue, on the same catwalk, and the ambient lighting in the venue did not change for the entirety of the show. They were both taken at about 70mm focal length. Have a look and see what you think. Click on the images to get a larger preview.

The levels of noise are very close; but with the D700 there is less of it than with the S5 Pro, and what noise there is looks more like film grain. This is to be expected though from a camera with a full-frame sensor and big fat juicy photosites whereas the S5 Pro has to make do with it's APS-C sized sensor. But the image from the D700 is a lot softer and also a bit, well – yellow. As expected the Fuji has great skin-tones whereas the D700 doesn’t get the colour quite right. But there again “skin tone” is a relative term on a fashion show as all of the models are spray tanned to resemble walking tandoori popsicles!

That aside though, I have to say that I am keen to give the D700 another thorough workout tomorrow, which is the “all day” shoot. And I am looking forward to it. As for the big question asked yesterday though, am I finishing this blog post and heading straight to eBay to list my 4 Fuji bodies to make way for a stable full of D700’s? No. But, I have re-affirmed to myself that one D700 will certainly find it’s way into my camera bag, and I will have to evict one of my Fuji bodies to do it… but I don’t think I will have too much trouble doing that.

The D700 is an awesome camera body hands down. I can’t wait to get one. But I still love my Fuji S5’s more than ever too. The end.

My new toy... mmmmm

Ok, well today is going to be a short and sweet post. I have been really busy the last couple of days. I am heading into a totally insane weekend too. You see, I am going to be the sole photographer covering the fashion shows at Perth’s Every Woman Expo 2009, which is being held at the Perth Exhibition and Convention Centre.

I have shot this event and many like it before. When I first started shooting fashion runway parades I was using my old faithful Fujifilm S2 Pro. It worked well but I had to bring along my own lighting in the form of two Bowens Gemini 500w/s heads that were set-off by a wireless trigger on my hot shoe. I needed to bring the lights so I could be sure of providing enough light within the venue to enable me to shoot at 100ISO – therefore keeping the files nice and squeaky clean with very little noise.

Of course the problem with using big ol’ studio strobes to light a venue means you have to manually set them so they meter to a spot about 2/3rd’s down the runway. Which works most of the time, but I used to spend the majority of the show with my thumb on the aperture adjustment dial chasing the models up and down the runway either side of the metered spot I had set before the show.

Along came the Fuji S3 Pro - a truly remarkable camera for it's day, so I bought one based on my love-hate relationship with the S2. The high ISO performance was oh so much better than the S2 but I still had to bring the strobes along. This was starting to get annoying. But I put up with it because of the colour these little Fuji's were producing. There is no other way to describe it than beautiful.

Then I got myself a (back then) brand new Fujifilm S5 Pro. I loved it so much I bought another one. These two sweet little bodies are to this day my work-horses and they do not disappoint. They work so much better in lower light than the S2 and S3. But they still don’t work as well in low light as some…

So today with great anticipation I bought home a Nikon D700 to play with for the weekend. At the last fashion show I shot, Jailhouse Frock 2009 which was held at the old Fremantle Prison the ambient light at the venue was very low. So low in fact that I had to put my SB-900 on top of the S5, even though I already had the ISO set to about 1000. The images turned out great and I really really, yes really love the colour rendition that all of my Fuji’s since the S2 put’s into skin tones. They are simply gorgeous. Whack on a flash though, especially an “on-axis” hot shoe flash and things were starting to burn out here and there, and a little too frequently for my liking. I tried turning the flash off all-together and turning the ISO all the way up to 3200. This mostly solved the problem for me. The high ISO wasn’t creating all that much noise but the image sharpness does start to suffer a little due to the in-camera noise reduction algorithm. But, as well as the Fuji handles high ISO’s like water off a ducks back, I couldn’t help but keep glancing over to another photographer just to my left. She was snapping away all night, bam – bam – bam – no flash – and from what I could see occasionally popping up on the LCD screen were some simply fantastic images. At the end of the show, upon closer inspection she was shooting with a Nikon D700. And that was it. I had to have one.

And I am half-way there to getting one too. But I needed one this weekend and I haven’t quite got the funds together so I have turned to the great institution that is equipment hire! I have been playing with the camera tonight and I am surprised how easy it is to get around, even after using nothing but Fuji’s for the last 5 years or so. I know what you are thinking, Fuji’s are just Nikons in… um, Fuji clothing. And you are 100% correct. However the menu system is totally different on a Fuji.

Anyway, there you go. I am in love with the D700 – well at least on the operational and handling side of things. The build is exemplary. That 920k dot LCD screen on the back is good enough to watch HDTV on – I kid you not. I have a couple of reservations about how it will render skin tones, but then I have been spoilt by the super colour rendition of my Fuji’s.

Time will tell. This time tomorrow night I will either be listing all of my Fuji bodies on eBay to make way for 2 new D700’s or I’ll keep to the intended impending purchase of at least one D700 for use when I really need to ramp the ISO’s up and I will be hanging on to my dearly beloved Fuji’s for some time to come…

Are you comfortable?

Wow - what a day. I have to confess that I actually have two full-time jobs. I am a public servant by day and a photographer by night and weekends.

My “day job” is really stressful at the moment. I am on a research team in a large Government department. We have deadlines to meet – tight ones. We have new processes to create and implement – processes that have not been tried in this state for our industry. The Board want answers to questions we are not sure about; and on it goes. You get the drift.

So, by the time I get home from that – usually the last thing on my mind is sitting in front of my home office workstation working on the latest bunch of edits in Lightroom or PS; or hosting a shoot for a client. Just gimme coffee, a nice plate of dinner and the TV remote – thank you very much. Peel me off the couch at bedtime. Conversation is optional. I wish…

Don’t get me wrong. I hang out to get home. I hang out so see my wife. I really hang out to spend some time with my infant son. But I also really hang out to do some photography related endeavour; which brings me (finally!) to the title of tonight’s blog post.

Anyone who is fortunate enough to have regular access to a studio, if they are honest, is guilty of falling into a comfort zone with their studio images. As I run a home-based photography studio here in Kelmscott, Perth – my studio is just down the hall in a purpose renovated granny-flat! It is a little cramped but works really well, I have a fully functioning and stocked studio. I have a separate “green room” for clients. I have a separate change room and separate bathroom. I even have a fully stocked bar fridge for crying out loud. Everything is cosy, comfy.

I caught myself out two evenings ago however when I was hosting a shoot for a young couple. I had a hum-dinger of a day and a hectic arvo. Come 6.30pm when my stylist arrived shortly followed by the clients I was weary. So I relied on old faithful.

See, from being in this home now for a few years and having the studio running for the last couple of them, I have learnt what works really well as far as studio lighting goes. I have a couple of favourite lighting scenarios that work really well – they create gorgeous images.

Please don’t read in to this post that I really don’t give a hoot when clients come for a shoot. I do my best to create gorgeous images for them. Everyone ends up spending a LOT more than just the studio time/sitting fee – so clearly they are happy with the images too! I am not trying to get them out the door so I can catch the end of Masterchef Australia. But I do seem to end up shooting the same two lighting scenarios for most clients that visit the studio.

Is that wrong? I know for a fact that the far-and-away busiest and most successful chain of photography studios in Perth stick to a similar two lighting scenarios for their studio shoots. And they are doing very well for themselves thank you very much. It works for them so why not for me. If you’re on a good thing – stick to it. Right? – or wrong?

I’m torn. I know I can create really nice images off the bat with these set-ups. Minimum of fuss required. Is it really pushing me as a photographer though? Not really. Am I thinking outside the proverbial? Not so much. Do the images look great? The clients seem to think so.

When the pressure is on and you need to get the goods – now – your comfort zone is a great solution. I guess ultimately I need to make more time to host more portfolio shoots; anything at all so I can try something, dare I say, “edgy”. Something different. Something that makes you go “I wanna know how he does that!”

In one years time I don’t want to have the same two “old faithfuls” to rely on. Let the fun of trying new things begin!

A little thank you

Last weekend as a thank you for one of my long-standing MUA's (that’s Make-Up Artist...) I held a freebie shoot for Jodie @ Je Mode Styling and Make-up.

Jodie has been a great find. She called me out of the blue one day a couple of years ago and introduced herself as a local (to me) MUA who had just finished up with a prestigious Perth based hairstyling chain. After a week of texting back and forth to arrange a suitable time she visited our Perth based photography studio here in Kelmscott – and the rest is history. The greater majority of the models in my photo galleries at www.timography.net/portraits.htm are the work of Jodie.

So anyway, this particular image was taken using a technique that I have wanted to try for sometime now. I have a small home based studio that I work out of. I have a flock of Bowens 500w/s monoblock heads. If I keep the light source close to the model, which I like to do to keep it soft, I really can’t shoot anything less than f/8 @ ISO 100 – which isn’t usually a problem. But lately I have been really taken by the work of Zack Arias and David Bean who do a lot of portrait work at really big apertures.

So I set up my SB-900 on a light stand with a shoot through brolly “strobist style” and put a SB-800 behind her as a separation light. I turned my on camera flash into a master trigger flash that did not contribute to the exposure and the flash mode to i-TTL or Nikon Creative Lighting mode; and set my 50mm f/1.8 at around 3.2 to pull it towards it’s sweet spot and started snapping. I got brave and opened right up to f/1.8 - keeping the camera in Aperture Priority mode (which freaked me out a little bit, I am so used to shooting manual mode in the studio); and the above image was one of the shots that resulted. I hadn’t tried my speedlights in the studio before, let alone in i-TTL mode. I am looking forward to the PocketWizard Flex and Mini being released for Nikon compatibility so this was a little taster.

Overall I think the image worked, but I still wanna try a few more shoots using this technique to hone my skills further. I don’t subscribe to the “I’ll fix it in Photoshop later” methodology. I don’t like to tweak an image until it is over-cooked yet somehow under-done. I really really try to do everything in-camera.

I still have a way to go to perfect this. I want to be able to shoot at f/1.8 or f/2 and still make a really nice shot. This is easy enough to do in natural light and look awesome but a little trickier in the studio for some reason. But practice makes perfect. Ok, pens down – I’m done.

Whatcha think?

I have had an idea for a while to do a series of images along the theme of "Portraits of a Phone Box". So, last night after the rain and in the freezing cold I decided to go around my neighbourhood looking for a phone box or two. I found some too...

From a technical standpoint, these are pretty tricky little buggers to photograph well. The metering of the light in the scene needs to be spot on so the orange "T" cap on the booth isn't over exposed, yet I still want enough ambient light from the booth to spill over a portion of the frame.

I found it works best to set your camera to spot or partial metering mode. Set your camera to aperture priority mode and get a spot reading from the orange cap on the booth, remembering what the reading was. From memory this image was f/8.0 @ 16 seconds. I then set the camera to manual mode, selected f/8.0 @ 13 seconds (1/3 stop under), took another spot reading from the cap - then finally recomposed the frame and took the shot. Easy.

Anyway, I thought it was pretty cool and have taken a few more since and I hope to take one or two locations per week with this until I have enough nice images to create a gallery - I guess I am not trying to win any photographic awards with these but rather just have some fun and make myself a better photographer along the way... and isn't that what it's all about?

Lost in the blogosphere...

Wow... all of a sudden I am lost for words!! Here I am with the entire www at my doorstep and nothing to write.

Here is an interesting fact, I heard today from http://www.strobist.com/ that there are approximately 200,000,000 blogs on the internet. Do the maths - give or take (and remembering to carry the '1') that's roughly one blog for every 30 people on the planet!

So, what am I trying to achieve then in this blog saturated world? Well, it's baby steps for me. I want to share what I'm doing. What I am doing as a Perth based photographer. What I am doing as a creative artist. What I am doing as a dad, father and husband. Current work that I am doing, clients that I have seen... Basically anything and everything.

I guess I want to see this blog grow and evolve. No doubt what I think it will be like now will be nothing like it is in a year from now... well at least I hope that is the case. Time will tell.

Ok, enough of this rambling for now. Time to get to my first post.