CCforP Lecture Series: David Sullivan

Yesterday I had the pleasure of attending the 2nd monday lecture series at the Charleston Center for Photography to listen to photographer asistant and photographer David Sullivan, aka Sully. 

He's a talented photography that has also had the opportunity to work as a first assistant to many top names in the fashion/photography industry.  Sharing his insight on being an assistant to other photogs is useful to anyone that has or wants to assist other photogs while gaining experience in the industry.  Not only is he well versed in the art of being a photo assistant, his witty presentation style rather enjoyable as well, sometimes even comical.

Since I got there way to early, I did what any photographer would be.  I shot.  Being in a little bit of a rut lately I decided to play around with some different subjects that are way outside of my normal.

Here they are......

I struggled to find anything interesting to shoot so I whipped out by SB-800 and cybersyncs to make it interesting.  For this, I simply set my flash to about 1/32 power and placed it on a pipe just below and to the left of the window.  Not sure why, but I really like it.  Kind of eery.

I've always been a big fan of simple minimalist photography.  This was an ariael telephone wire right outside of the CCforP.  Since there was still a little bit of daylight left but I didn't want any of the ambient, I set my SB-800 to 1/4 power and held it in my hand just below the lens pointing straight at the subject.  Using my shutter at it's max sync speed allows me to keep the ambient out giving the look as if it's completely dark outside, while a larger aperture (f4) allowed me to capture the right amount of flash since it was a relative long distance.  Just simple long throw hard light.

For those that are learning to mix ambient with flash lighting like me, here's the biggest tip I can give you.  Aperture controls flash while Shutter controls the ambient light. 

In a studio environment where flash is 100% of your available light, the shutter speed doesn't even matter.  Set it to whatever you want as long is it's at or below your max sync speed.

He says what I can't explain...

I know this is way over played every where else but I can't stop watching it.  Zack Arias says some of the things I've been trying really hard to put into words.

umm, what am I?

I was talking with another photographer whom I consider a friend about business and photography.  During our conversation, I began to wonder what kind of photographer I am.  I've put so much thought into what kind of photographer I'm not nor want to be, yet never thought about what kind I want to be.

What am I?

Am I an Artist?  No, I don't think so.  I've never worn a turtle with a beret and go to a coffee shop to drink tea.  To be honest, I don't even know what art is!  I don't think I have a creative bone in my body.

I'm a very technical person.  Sometimes it's a currse, sometimes a blessing.  I'm always trying to master something that someone else has already done, but have yet to do anything of my own.

I can look at an image and tell exactly how it was done, heck I can even recreate it.  How do I create my own?

Why do I even continue to shoot?  What's making me lose sleep constantly thinking about taking images?

I look at my images from past to present, I can see the image and it's huge.  They are technically better 10 fold yet just as boring as before.  What does everyone else see in them that I don't?  I don't get it.  I just keep trying to tell me self that as long as they like them that's all that matters.

That's it!  As long as the people I'm shooting for likes the images they get are happy than I'm happy.  I sat and thought about this for about.  The one common motivator in everything I've ever done has been to make others happy.  That's what makes me happy, while feeding my need to be the best at whatever it is I do.

I actually don't really care about the images I've created (well I do, as I don't like crap) but for me it's about the process to get there.  Someone might like my images, great for them.  For me, it's about the making of the images.  Planning the shoot, setting up my equipment, working with my subjects for the look I and they want, creating the customers vision.

Alot of times, the process of creating the image is as much of an art as the image itself.

Does this make sense to anyone?

I guess that's all for my senseless dribble this evening.

Beautiful models and fun workshop makes for an awesome day!

Yesterday I had the privilege of attending the workshop Studio 101 at the Charleston Center for Photography led by the talent Amelia Phillips Hale.  It was a great way to spend a rainy day with fellow photogs in what I believe to be the largest studio in the state.

During the class we had the opportunity to learn and practice with studio equipment that one wouldn't normally have access too, along with a beautiful model as our subject.

If you are interested in photography and want to improve your craft I highly recommend trying out some of their classes or workshops.

Here are just a few of the shots from the workshop.  The model is Jennifer Tokarev who is a truly talented model and a pleasure to photograph.

I must admit that I am really struggling with post processing.  Other than cropping, these are pretty much straight out of the camera.

While some of the other students were shooting with the strobes I had a chance to use the High ISO capabilities of the D700 to shoot the following shots.  The only lighting available for these shots were from the modeling lamp of a white lightning B800 (IIRC) and nothing else.  The noise reduction is strictly from the built in capability of Lightroom 2.  Every day this camera impresses me more and more.

ISO 6400 anyone?  :)

ISO 3200, very little noise reduction applied!

Shooting Tethered and Studio 101

Nothing much today, just wanted to mention some things.

This weekend I get the joy of attending the workshop Studio 101 at the Charleston Center for Photography led by Amelia Phillips Hale.  For anyone that has never been to CCforP or would like to learn more about photography, I highly recommend them.  The Center is ran by a fabulous group of passionate professional photographers.

I really look forward to this one!

Are you a mac user that shoots Nikon?  Don't want to spend $300 dollars for Camera Control Pro?  Why do we have to pay so much for something that should come with the camera? (Canon provides their tethering software free of charge).

Check out http://www.sofortbildapp.com/.  Sofortbild is a really simple yet powerful application that allows you to shoot tethered.  It's interface is really clean, and lightweight.  The best part is, it's cheap!  Sofortbild is donationware, if you like it you simply donate some money to the creator.  It's really worth it!

I've been playing with it myself lately, and was up and shooting in less than 5 minutes.  It allows me to shoot without having to constantly dump memory cards or rely on a tiny LCD to preview my images.  Instead, nothing is written to my CF Cards and they are automagically imported into Lightroom with my presets automatically applied!.

Please check it out!

Redemption from my last post?

After the last post,  I wanted to post something a little better to redeem myself from that failure.

My wife just had her hair done and was so happy she asked me to take a few shots for her real quick.

These were shot simply with an SB-800 with umbrella camera right front and reflector camera left rear.


ISO 200, 1/250th, f4, 1/16th power on flash

ISO 200, 1/250th, f3.5, 1/16th power on flash

high winds and lighting gear....or failed location strobing.

Failed lighting attempts from yesterday.

nothing like 25mph winds with umbrellas and lighting gear and 30deg windchill....


After watching the 1st disc of Zac Arias's OneLight workshop DVD and finally having the equipment I need to go portable I was so stoked to go try out some of what I learned.


Sadly, what he didn't talk about in his DVD was crazy high winds with umbrellas, numbingly cold temps, and uninterested subjects.


I could go on and on making excuses on why these pics sucked, but ultimately I shot them.  Though they are horrible they teach us a lot, we learn more by studying our failures than reveling in our successes.


So here they are for all too see, my biggest blunders so far this year.