It was fun shoot arranged by Minx Model Management with outfits by Exclusive Lingerie and Punani Inc. The home was an award winning home located west of Melbourne. The models were all from Minx Model Management and awesome to work with. For some of the girls it was their first time in front of the camera and they enjoyed the experience. A big shout out to Lisa from Minx Model Management for organising the day and everyone else that assisted / participated. Can’t forget to finally thank Slasha for the use of his amazing home. Cheers man!
Welcome to our new web and blog site. Here’s where I like to discuss the experiences of being a working photographer; the gear, the happenings, the techniques, the issues we all face, all working photographers. I’ve found that reading other photographers’ blogs and the hundreds of hours of video tutorials and behind the scenes videos I watch that I’ve learnt so much myself. So here’s where I contribute to that conversation.
In mid 2013, we photographed a fashion parade held in a Melbourne night club (http://www.rahbar.com.au). We were engaged by the event organiser with the brief to capture the fashion parade and the behind the scenes activities. Night clubs are not fantastic locations to shoot a fashion parade, but you work with what you’ve got. They typically have low and dark ceilings, poor lighting and restricted access. Here’s how we approach these issues when shooting an event like this:
Low & Dark ceilings – Not the greatest for bouncing your flash off. Having a camera that has better low light capability is a must. That is when you turn up the ISO to 1600 and above, though the amount of noise (grain) in the image is less than more. Having a higher power flash is also useful but needs consideration as to the flash recycle time, battery needs and be mindful of burning your flash out. Dark ceilings can bring benefits in allowing some directional control of the light, and we always look at what walls are available for such use. There may be a white wall ready to bounce a flash off. We’ll sometimes use on-camera flash modifiers, such as small soft boxes, like the Gary Fong Lightsphere or Lumiquest products. Personally, I often enjoy the results from simply using the supplied plastic diffuser and shooting using the bell method – that is, when the flash is pointed vertically and sends the light towards the ceiling, with a little spilling forward.
Poor lighting – Night clubs have a mix of lighting and it’s never very useful for photographing or filming live events. Lights point in all directions and have a range of colours, a wide range of temperature – we are talking white balance, kelvin here. It’s often about finding angles and locations in the club that work for you as the photographer. Over the years, I’ve tried everything from auto white balance to fixing it in camera, often with varied results. I’ll always shoot RAW file so in post production I’ll always have a better chance of making corrections if needed. I know many shooters like aperture priority mode due to the constant changing lighting. I’ve tried this, and other methods, but always come back to shooting in manual. Aperture effects the exposure and your shutter the ambient light.
Restrictions – Environmental constraints, such as the layout of the club, or those imposed by the event organiser or venue operator. Having unrestricted access to all areas is clearly best, as then you only need to deal with the layout. With this particular fashion parade I was able to set up at the end of the runway. While not ideal, due to the layout, I also had to deal with guests and their point and shoot or DSLRs, as well as other photographers attending on the night. You can always tell the other professionals from the guests with good cameras and it’s not just because of their gear – it’s the way they behave and the respect for the space of other photographers while determining from where they want to shoot themselves. I remember a guest at one event complaining I was getting in their way. I had to tell them – politely, with respect – that I was paid to be there on behalf of the event organiser and was hired to fulfill a certain brief. It’s essential to try and work together with other photographers.
Photographing a fashion parade can be challenging, it requires a need to think ahead about the obstacles that need to be overcome. And fast glass goes a long way to help. Lenses that have constant F-stops through various focal lengths. Usually you’d be shooting F4 or lower for run way shots, higher for group shots after the event. And the other lesson learnt from shooting these kind of events? Travel light if you can – you may not always be able to keep a close eye on your equipment bag and there isn’t always a safe plash to stash it.
Most of all, it’s important to photograph in your own way. Learn from the other photographers around you, but don’t all-out imitate.
They look cool and can really help sell an image. Whether you achieve the end result in Photoshop, Photoshop Elements or on your smart phone – don’t over do/use it. Remember to be selective with your image choices and again – this needs repeating – do not over do it. If you’re shooting a model portfolio or wedding it’s nice to maybe have one spot colour image, but that’s about it and only if there is a image that is enhanced by the process.
There are tons of free tutorials on line that will explain how to achieve this look. There are many different methods that can lead you to the same result. Find what works for you by trying them all. After doing several you’ll start to see what works and what doesn’t. Some images you’ll have the item or object you want to stand out as the spot colour, which is typically the norm with this effect, but you may also wish to try inverting the mask and having the dominant item as shot in B&W with the rest of the image as a colour.
Event coverage is always a ton of fun. You get to participate without really participating. Been a drummer of 39 years myself, I’ve always enjoyed supporting Campbell and Steve with D2Drumline and the Australian Drumline Association of Australia. While drum kit is my thing, I’m always impressed by the skills that Drumline players have. The 2013 camp was held at the picturesque Gilwell Park Scout Camp, Gembrook Victoria. The camp had Master Educator Scott Johnson, Scojo from the Blue Devils USA as the primary instructor, with several other Australian and International players on hand as instructors as well.
The camp took place over 3 days from October 3rd to 6th 2013, and provided workshops including a Master Class on the final day by Scott. Several drumlines were formed, coming together to play on the final day, first as individual drumlins, then as one mass drumline. Instruction was provided for Bass Drum, Snare as well as Tenor Drums with the students living on site for the 3 days along side the instructors. With the camp being fully catered there wasn’t anything for the students to do expect play those drums and that they did from sunrise to sunset.
The camps have been running now for 3 years now and are extremely well attended with students travelling from all over Australia and New Zealand, which is a testament to having some of the world’s best instructors, a great sense of community and a very well structured syllabus, providing extraordinary value. The camp is planned again for 2014 at the same venue and the team will be looking to put on a bigger and better camp. Until 2014, keep practising those chops.
Scott Johnson demonstrating the Bass Drum.Never too young to startScott Johnson demonstrating the snare parts to instructor Steve LiewScott watches on as the mass Drumline performsFinal camp photo for 2013
This year Luke understands a little more about what Mother’s Day is, compared to last year. As he grows older I’m sure what the day signifies will only become more relevant. So no matter if you’re young or old or maybe your mum is no longer around, pause and reflect for even just a minute or two how special our Mothers are.
After 10 months of wanting to get this web site up and running we have started the slow process of commitment to building this site. We plan to show the various projects and events we have been working on. We have some posts already written and have a few more to write then we’ll start posting. We’d like to share some of the behind the scene information, final images and video of those projects real soon.
