An afternoon in the sun...

See, I am slowly trying to get back on track and post a new blog a little more regularly than I have been of late. Today I wanted to quickly share a couple of images from a shoot I did on the weekend for a young family.

The brief for the shoot was fairly straight forward. We would be shooting in the mid afternoon sun, about 3.30pm to be precise, and we would be on a privately owned fruit orchard. Cool! As it was private property I didn’t really get the opportunity to do any scouting ahead of time (as I often like to do) but none the matter; I’d have to put into practice all that “thinking on your toes” wedding stuff I have been raving about recently.

I did know two things that I wanted to do before I got to the shoot. Firstly, I wanted to use off camera lighting. Secondly, it was a gorgeous afternoon and the light falling through the valley that we were going to be shooting in was amazing so I knew that I wanted to use the daylight to backlight my subjects as much as practicable. I have been getting more and more frustrated with my Pixel i-TTL radio triggers to the point that I refuse to use them any longer, as the results I get from them vary so wildly that it makes them pretty much impractical to use. This meant that I would obviously have to use a different method to trigger my Nikon SB-900 which was firing through a 24” collapsible softbox. I could have utilized Nikon’s wonderful CLS to trigger the flash, but with the ambient light so strong it would have proven to be a little unreliable also unless I was within a few feet of the remote flash.

So, enter stage left a newly purchased but until now untried 10m flash extension cord. Yup that’s right, 10 meters. And I got say, right off the bat this thing saved my hide. It worked brilliantly. Yeah I know it’s not a fancy radio trigger “Radio Popper” but for now it suits me just fine. I know that Pocket Wizard are now in beta testing with their “Flex” and “Mini” TTL radio triggers for Nikon but there is still no firm release date for them. So 10m extension cord it is.

As for the camera settings for the images, it’s pretty simple. Manual mode. Matrix metering. ISO200. Use the camera meter to establish what correct exposure would be for the entire scene, no flash. Take a shot. Check your LCD to ensure that you are getting enough highlights around your subjects. If you aren’t, move your shutter speed back and forth until you do. Remember not to try using your exposure compensation dials here as we are in manual mode, and although the camera will let you make the adjustment to the dials it will have NO effect on your image. Only use exposure compensation when in Aperture Priority, Shutter Priority or Program mode.

For me, correct exposure ended up being 1/2000th second shutter speed @ f/2.8, ISO200. I then turned on the flash and left it in TTL mode and set the camera to high speed sync mode so I could still use the flash at this high shutter speed. Of course the trade off with high-speed sync is that you lose a little power. But this was ok as I had the flash positioned nice and close anyway, at only about 1 ½ meters away. That’s it. Take a shot. Wait a couple of seconds for the flash to recharge. Take another shot. Repeat this process. Job done!

We took a bunch of shots in some different locations around the orchard that afternoon, but these ones sitting in the grass were my favourites from the day.

Keep shooting what you love and I’ll talk to you soon.

The best thing that happened to me...

Well hello everyone. I wonder if any of you thought that I had dropped off the face of the earth or something? Not quite, but over the last couple of months it has been really hard to try and find the time to write a blog post. But enough excuses, it’s time to write something meaningful.

So, what’s been happening you ask? A whole bunch of stuff actually. Shooting, meeting clients, post production, more shoots, more meeting clients and on and on it goes. You get the picture. It’s starting to get back into wedding season so to be honest they have been taking up most of my time. But that’s a good thing right? Hell yeah!

You see, I used to loathe weddings. Not because I am some sort of sour puss who doesn’t like to see people be happy; but because I was quite frankly terrified of photographing the things. When I am in my studio I can set things up just the way I like them. I know how the lighting will respond and I also know how to set the lights to give gorgeous flattering shadows and highlights. Everything is very controlled. Safe. Once the lights are set my exposure will not change from shot to shot.

But I also love doing location modelling shoots. I love to use flash to overpower the ambient sunlight to create dramatic contrast and saturation. I am also learning more about using natural light to my advantage. It’s a challenge, but not a scary one. We only have one or two models at a time. I pick the locations. Even though we are out in the elements I am very much still in control if things start to go a little pear shaped. We can stop, change things around, try something a little different and it isn’t a really big deal.

Now as for weddings, not so much of this applies. Any of you out there that have done any wedding shoots will immediately understand what I am talking about. These are a different kettle of fish altogether. If things aren’t going well you have to... well, deal with it. No real second chances. Sure you may get a little time to try and change one thing if it really isn’t working but if you start to do this too much during the wedding the bride and groom are gonna start to get (understandably) a little cranky. Plus, it doesn’t really look great if you keep stopping and changing things around. In the worst case scenario I guess the bride and groom could completely lose confidence in your ability. And I am guessing once this happens it would be pretty much impossible to regain any kind of rapport with the couple that is of any meaning. Not good at all, would you agree?

So have I sold you on wedding photography yet? Gimme a couple of minutes and it will all start to come together. You see, what do you think will happen to your own ability and confidence if you are placed in this otherwise uncomfortable situation on a regular basis? How do you think it will affect your photography? Will you crumble into a sloppy heap in the corner, or will you start to (very quickly) learn what works and what doesn’t. I’m hoping that you are thinking option “b” is applicable here. And you know what, it is.

Now I am not for one moment suggesting that I am some kind of phenomenal photographer that is about to turn the world on its ear. Far from it. But when I sit back and think about things, about different scenarios I’ve been forced in to, different locations that have gone sour and times when my equipment isn’t producing magical images just like those in the advertisements that made me want the thing in the first place, I am truly pleasantly surprised. I realise that being thrust into these situations has made me a better photographer than I was before I started.

Now this is true of any situation that you find yourself in, photographically speaking. But what I am trying to say here is that I have noticed a visible, tangible improvement in my own abilities that has been fast-tracked since I started photographing weddings. I used to loathe them. Now I love them. I love the challenges, the people you meet and the locations that you get to go to on a regular basis.

I used to think that there were famous photographers living the high life and doing wonderful things, and then there were the rest of the poor slobs stuck photographing weddings. The guys who really couldn’t make it in the real world so they settled for second best. Oh how my mindset has changed. There is something about being put in a situation that does not offer second chances. You arrive on location, assess the situation, the lighting and the environment. And then you have to make it happen, in the best way you know how. Sure it does not go according to plan all the time. But the times when it does fall in a heap are less and less. We are human, we make mistakes. The trick is to actually learn from them and move on, knowing how to recognise them in the future and not make the same ones over and over again.

I’m getting off my soap box now. I have a bunch of images to post from this week’s Perth Fashion Festival, so stay tuned for those. Take care everyone and keep shooting what you love.