Congratulations. I don't think I would have the confidence to try such
a large event and largely alone.
Chuck Norcutt
On 4/25/2012 10:52 AM, Ken Norton wrote:
> As you all know, every year I shoot this one big honkin event. This
> year I returned a bit to my roots and travelled quite light. One of
> the big factors this year is the almost total elimination of the use
> of flash. This is a big change from what I was doing.
>
> The elimination of flash did present a few problems, but for the most
> part it worked out fine and was made possible through the use of the
> 100/2. This gave me a two-stop advantage over what I was doing before.
>
> I used the DMC-L1 exclusively with the 14-50 zoom and the E-1 had the
> 100/2 glued to it. This turned out to be a very decent combination and
> gave me excellent coverage. As always, I long for something really
> wide, but I make up for the limitations in other areas.
>
> For the group shots and portraits, I had the stage lights turned on,
> with the color washes on the background scrims. A nice look. The flash
> was on-camera, which was the venerable T45 stuffing its light into my
> favorite reflector so I got over-the-lens lighting. Carefully
> balancing the exposures, ISOs and flash power, I got a nice look.
> During the reception, I did what I never do, but it turned out great.
> I just used the built-in flash on the DMC-L1.
>
> So, other than the lighting, the other big change for me was using the
> DMC-L1 as my primary camera. In the end, I actually took more pictures
> with the E-1, but that had to do with the nature of a "graduation
> style event" where you are photographing people receiving their honors
> on-stage and you have to shoot from a vantage point other than the
> stage. My shooting location was perfect distance for the 100/2. I was
> handholding the E-1/grip/100 at 1/100. Just to make sure I got the
> shot, those were always a set of three or more pictures.
>
> I'm screwed up a few of the shots, but overall, they all look good.
> Everything possible is being done in LR4. I shot Raw for the entire
> shoot. About 1700 pictures in all. Of this, there were individual
> portraits for around 100 couples. The portrait session, which included
> three large group shots and the 100 portraits took about 45 minutes.
>
> Yes, 45 minutes. Once you get a system down you can really fly. When
> people are cooperating, you can shoot them in about 30 second
> intervals. My wife helps me out with this making sure that suit
> jackets, jewelry and ties are straight. I rattle off a series of three
> shots. Since I shoot with both eyes open, I can tell if a person
> blinks and I'll chimp if I'm not sure of the shot. But chimping takes
> time, so getting the system down to the point where you can trust it
> is important.
>
> The hardest part is getting the group shots arranged. People come in
> all shapes and sizes. Getting 30 people quickly arranged for the shot
> is like herding cats, but what is helpful is that in two of the three
> groups you are dealing with people who have been part of one of the
> lower groups in previous years. That also means they've heard your
> jokes before, so it's fun coming up with new variations of the same
> old joke about chimping.
>
> I was going to use the 35-80 for the portraits, but discovered that I
> had left it at home as part of my weight saving efforts. Oh well, the
> Leica does a decent job too. Actually, more than decent.
>
> Still, getting around 100 portraits and three group shots done in 45
> minutes is probably close to a world record. We always have a time
> pressure as the band needs to set up and practice, but we cleared the
> time limit by 15 minutes!!! Simplifying my lighting setup made a big
> difference and the super fast recycle time of the T45 meant that I was
> waiting for the camera to write files--not the flashes to recycle.
>
> After all these years, the biggest challenge is coming up with fresh
> images. The majority of the images are your bog-standard grip-n-grins,
> keynote speaker, band, audience and graduation/awards type of
> photography, but the goal also is to supply the organization with
> photographs that can be used throughout the year for various
> publications. Some of that is, again, pretty typical stuff, but I like
> to throw in some new creative shots once in a while.
>
> On the subject of "new media". It would have been extremely valuable
> to have the ability to upload to their on-line content stream that
> updates the website, twitter and facebook all from the camera. The
> media manager for the organization was doing this from her cell-phone,
> but I would have liked to have the ability to upload a shot directly
> from my camera in the midst of the shoot. I do believe we are reaching
> a critical point in this and may decide my next camera purchase solely
> on the availability of this feature. Video is a nice toy, but
> in-camera media selection and upload is a game-changer.
>
> After the event finished, we were, as always, the last ones to leave.
> But unlike previous years where it took me an hour to get everything
> packed up and loaded in the Jeep, it took about two minutes to get
> everything in the ONE bag. We used the rest of the time to just yack
> with our friends.
>
> AG
--
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