Rob James Seymour + Testing new-ish gear.

May 03, 2016 in Photo Shoot, Gear, Philosophy

Back in March I managed to finally complete my stills bag by adding a second Canon 5D Mark II and a Canon EF 70-200 F2.8L IS (Version 1 ) which means I am good gear wise for a while. The only exception would be a more powerful location light which in reality will only happen if work that requires that power becomes a regular thing, that subject matter is a whole other blog post.

One thing I always do with any new gear after sitting and looking at it for a few minuets... is test it.

The lenses and camera bodies go through Auto Focus calibration using Focal software and the gear gets a clean/general test to make sure everything works as it should, the firmware also gets update if required. FYI it was required for the newly acquired 5D2 because it was still on the original firmware.

It's at this point I notice any differences between the cameras, for example the LCD on the backup 5D2 is brighter than my main body at the same brightness setting, this stuff gets filled away in my brain.

I also spend some time making sure the camera bodies are set-up the same from the custom shooting modes (C1,C1,C3) to the custom functions, this is so I can just grab the backup as a second body or a ... (I hope this never happens) backup after failure and the cameras feel and act the same. Same body,same sensor, same everything... ok apart from the LCD brightness but I can live with that.

Once all this is done it's time to use it on a job so I can run the new gear in the field and review the files later in post. That said below are some images from the shoot with Rob.

We started in the studio whilst waiting for the weather to clear and then headed out to see what photographs I could find nearby the studio.

Thankfully I can report the backup camera (Now called 5D2 B) and the 70-200 work great, the only thing I noticed with the lens is that it does not handle a white seamless set as well as the Canon 24-105 F4L but it is plenty sharp enough and I like the way it renders skin and colour which is partly down to that sensor in the 5D2. I love that sensor.

After shooting a lot of studio work lately I enjoyed getting out on location even if it was close by to the studio. Rob was great to work with, the gear all worked... it was a good day.

I understand that a lot of this might seem somewhat anal but, I have a job to do on set and I also need to make sure my gear is good to go. As a working photographer I need to know it inside out, we all should know our gear. We owe this to our clients, the craft and ourselves.

Thank you for reading.
Rick

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This Image #2 - Bethany & Back Lighting

May 06, 2013 in This Image

This is image #2 in this blog series I am writing. I explained the reason for this series in the first one but I want to add that this is my way of hopefully adding to good content online, some meat to the bones of internet photography that seems filled with a whole lot of quick fix bullet point lists and crap.

The image was made in a studio based in Liverpool, it was a different studio place than I was use to, and it’s an old house/shop. The studios name is Studio House, the couple that run it have some interesting ideas but allot of work needs doing.. That said you can still make images in that space. Not sure if it’s still running, can’t find a site for it.

For 80% of the shoot I shot natural light so the speedlites stayed in the bag.. Mostly.

Ok Gear Talk …

Canon 5D2

Canon EF 85 F1.8 USM @F4

1/800th sec

ISO 6400

Location: Studio House – In front of a window.

IS 6400 are you mad? Not really. Take look at the image, its high key and everything is push over to the right of the histogram. Believe me noise is not a problem when shooting this, sure you get some colour noise but luminance noise is pretty much none existent.

The light source was a window, that’s it no flash just window light. Now you can do this with a white or grey wall and use flash to blow it white but flash has a different feel than natural light and chances are with speedlites your flash might just have too good a duration to get any sense of motion.

I had Bethany stand in front of the window; the day was semi over cast so not a whole ton of light in camera speak.

I knew I wanted F4 – 5.6 with the 85 on a full frame camera to give me enough Depth of Field to work with, I also wanted 500th or faster on my shutter speed and that meant ISO 6400… ok so be it. Frankly I don’t care about noise generally and here’s why… if the photograph is so boring that all you see is the noise then it’s not a good photograph to begin with it be ISO 100 or Gabillion its going to be a snooze fest.

Yeah I could of brought the ISO down some to 4000 to get 1/500th but 6400 was good to my eyes.

Once I had exposure set I asked Bethany to move and dance a little, move her head left to right to get the hair flicking. I will sometimes demonstrate myself which is funny as hell… have you seen me try to dance :)

One great thing about not shooting flash is I could shoot as fast as my shutter finger would let me as I’m not waiting on recycle times, hell I could motor drive if I wanted.

When shooting back lit subjects your sky, windows, background are going to highlight heaven.. by by gone.. Nothing to see here. By the way that’s fine.

Their seems to be this rule that blown highlights are bad.. Yeah sure on skin but windows nope, remember the star of the shot is your subject.. That person you have in front of the lens, not the windows.

The bulk of the light is coming from behind, some will rattle around in the room depending on the environment your in but mostly it’s all from behind, this mean you need to open up exposure 3 or so stops as far as the background is concerned, this will give you your exposure on your subject other wise they are a silhouette or dark on your subject.

One thing you will notice is the edge of the shoulders and arms start to bleed in to the background, personally I don’t mind this in fact it can help thin a subject (not that Bethany needed this).

I chose this frame because I like the hair motion and the fact we can see her smiling and see part of her left eye through the hair, I also like the hand coming up to the mouth. Shot a few in the sequence and this frame felt right.

Ok who’s clicked that this can be done anywhere, don’t need a studio just a windows and enough available light to work with. Beyond that you can use flash.

Go try it, its great. As much as I like dramatic light I do still have a soft spot for back lighting.

Rick

Client Work (3 Family Shoots 1 Day part 2) – Harry & George Hughes

April 28, 2013 in Client Shoot, Child, Photography, Photo Shoot

Part 2 of this blog series is shoot number 2 of 3 than took place on that busy day.

This shoot was with Harry & George Hughes; they arrived with Grandma as mum and Dad were working.

I kept on the white seamless for this shoot. Reason is its cleaner.. Allot cleaner. If you shoot on grey or black paper backgrounds with no boards / plexi it does not look as neat as a white seamless set does.

A great shot of them both together. Brothers and at this point friends.

We then moved on to some images of just Harry.

As you will see through this set of photographs of Harry the expressions became more fun and silly. This was in a bid to get little brother George back in to the shoot.

Yeah Harry found a hat. Kids love these hats.. but sometimes I wish I would remember to hide them for longer. But it was the hat that got George back in to the shoot.. he loves that hat.

Little George checking out Harry’s Spiderman impression.

Harry was enjoying moving around at this point which can always make for some interesting images.

This was Harry talking about his super heroes with George listing in.

I managed to get Grandmar Judith in front of the camera for one shot. That toy truck belongs to one of my god sons did not think I was going to get it back off George.

The next set of images are of George not wanting Harry near his cushion… not even close.

Get off its mine!

Next I got Harry talking about his favourite super heroes again.. do this and he’s away and can talk for ages.. you may also make him get up find another hat and start kicking the you know what out of imaginary bad guys. Come on we have all done that before.

Just enough time at the end to have a face pulling.. face off.

Thank you Harry, George, Judith and Mum & Dad for another fun shoot. And again thank to Ian’s Studio for the studio space.

For the photographers: Keep it simple, simple light and simple set.. make it about the kids and about the family. Oh watch out for hats :)

Shot with a Canon 5D2 and either a 50mm or 85mm prime lens. I need to (infact just have) add a zoom lens to the kit for studio work, primes can be a bit limiting if you need to shift position quickly.

ISO 250
1/125th sec
F11 – giving some wiggle room with Depth of Field.

All images lit with 2 lights on the background and one 60” umbrella as the main light, reason is simplicity, it’s a huge modifier giving a soft light with good coverage for multiple people on a set. I used it in reflective configuration as you can get more light from it that way, shoot through takes more power.

Thank you for reading.
Rick

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