Learning From Success

You can learn much from your failures, but you can learn equally from your successes. Case in point: this shot.

I was approached by a friend, who needed some pictures taken for a job she was applying for. She sent me the list of requirements for the pictures, and boy were they long.

And detailed.

And involved.

And on occasion, contradictory.

I wasn't sure I was good enough to take the pics, but I said I would try. So I read and re-read their requirements, pulled out some of my photography books on lighting and poses, read some more, and set up my gear.

I had a black cloth backdrop to absorb some of the light, she (and my snake, Pokey) in front. A hair light shining down from above, one strobe at a 45 degree angle on the left side about 4 feet away, and another one at 90 degrees from her at the same distance.

I used my 50mm lens at F/14 (now, a sidetrack here: F/14 isn't a "real" f/stop in the classic sense, but it worked in this case) set the ISO to 200 and shutter to 1/250.

One of the requirements of the shots that are submitted is they cannot be photoshopped in any way, straight from the camera only. So what you see is what I took.

I took about 30 shots, and she submitted the ten best. All ten were accepted and she got the job. I was super happy for me, but also for myself, for it showed I could pull off demanding shots in an area I'm not well versed in.

A Day Late and Many Dollars Short

Ok, so I've been busy with Holidays and all that happy nonsense, and haven't posted in a bit. Well here you go, still doing the concert work, and I think this is going to be my favourite type of photography for the foreseeable future. The energy given off by a good metal band is hard to match.

Lighting was still dicey at the venue, so lots of conversion to Black and White. And the crowd was highly energetic and packed in like sardines, so that was a new situation I had to contend with. That's ok, you learn something new every day!

The Key-

I was pretty pleased with the prior fish shots I took down on Emerald Isle, but I knew I could do better. So off I went to research how to take better pics in an aquarium setting. Most of the articles I ran across (even from sites devoted exclusively to photographing fish) were all the same, shove the lens right to the glass, fire away and hope for the best.

That didn't strike me as all that useful, and a good way to scratch the lens, so I kept looking. One fellow (thanks VC!) told me a different way, which I took up for this trip, and as you can see, the results are great! More to follow.