On location portrait photoshoot

I received an email from the pharmaceutical company Nobel Biocare asking if I would be free to take some portraits of a dentist for an article that they will soon be publishing.

When I  responded positively that I was available, I was sent details of the shoot and the requirements of the image that was needed. Basically it was a vertical format, preferably three quarters or head and shoulder with a slightly out of focus background. Another proviso was that the dentist shouldn't be wearing his work clothes. 

All very straight forward except it was to be taken in his surgery during business hours. There would be patients in the vicinity. I decided to travel light and although all my gear remained in my car, I used only my 5d MKII with my new 24 - 105 zoom, a Speedlite 430 EX2 and an interesting diffuser that I picked up on a Swiss auction site for a few Francs. I love this device as it gives a lovely almost shadow free light.

The new diffuser in place

I arrived half an hour early at the practice and looked around whilst Dr Sleiter tended to business. As the background had to be slightly soft, I looked for a location that had something on the walls that wouldn't detract too much. I saw two rooms that I thought would be suitable for the image. In one room, the ambient light was measured at 1/80sec at f5.6 and the other recorded 1/200 sec at f5. These apertures were chosen to render the background as slightly out of focus.

When Dr Sleiter was free, he changed out of his dentist clothes and selected a shirt which (in my opinion) wouldn't clash with the surroundings or background.

We started in the first  room and I selected 1/80sec at f5.6 manually on the camera. The walls weren't white and this was seen in the image as the flash reflected from them. The resulting image is warm, which I quite like.

 

 1/80sec @ f5.6 with flash

My only concern was the background. I wasn't sure if it would distract too much on the magazine page where it was appearing.

After a couple of more pictures we moved to one of the surgeries where it was a lot brighter. I started (with the settings established earlier) with a head and shoulders of Dr Sleiter standing then I had an idea. What about making the foreground out of focus?  

1/200 @ f5 with flash

 To be safe, I first asked him to sit on one of the dental chairs and I took a head and shoulders pic of him.

 1/200 @ f5 with flash

Then I swung the dental equipment in front of him to give some sort of "meaning" to the image. This is my favourite of the bunch as it immediately says to me "dentist in his environment".

All in all an enjoyable assignment that went very smoothly with the minimum of equipment and setting up.

It will be interesting to see which image they use in the magazine.

Thanks for reading.

Still images in a video

I just came across this promotional video featuring some thirty of my images. 



This is part of a multi language promotional video series from Regent Lighting. I really like the effects they've used. Here's the video. For more of my professional work, you can look here.

It's certainly given me a few ideas for using some of the many images i have in my archives that are just taking up space.

Thanks for reading.

DMD Pano app for iOS and Android

I'm having fun at the moment shooting and uploading panoramic images taken with the Dermandar App.

The App allows you to take either a wide panorama or a 360 degree image which can then be either viewed on the phone or uploaded to their website.

 I uploaded this one that I took in Engelberg.

Here's a link to some of the panoramas I've made so far.
 
It's a fun tool and very simple to use. There's a free version and a paid for one. At the moment, I'm testing the free version.

Thanks for reading.

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, LG, OM, PC, FRS was a British Conservative Party politician who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and the Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990.

Book of condolence at Grantham library

I remember photographing Mrs Thatcher receiving the freedom of the city of London back in May 1989. At the time I was freelancing for some eleven different publications. My remit on this day was to cover it for the City of London Recorder newspaper

 

The press pass that I was issued with allowed me a position right at the back of the ceremonial hall on a balcony about ten meters high with three other 'togs.

Press pass

No flash and no tripods was the order of the day so that meant high film speed. The event was also being covered by television so there was just enough light to get away with using 1600 ISO.

My next problem was the timing. I had to get the images to the newsdesk as soon as possible. In those days I would usually drop off my unexposed films to the various newspaper's darkrooms and have them process and print them up for me. The city of london Recorder was a small publication and didn't have any darkroom facilities. I solved the problem by booking myself some darkroom time at the Photographers Gallery about half a mile from the event itself. Back then, you could hire a communal darkroom for a couple of hours for quite a cheap price and it was quite near to where the event was taking place.

To further save time, I decided to use Ilford XP2 chromogenic film. This was becoming my main black and white film for newspaper use when time was of the essence. Although it was monochrome, it could be developed in C41 chemistry of the type usually used for colour negatives. It also had an extremely wide exposure latitude. In essence, this meant that i could do a job in bright sunlight with my camera meter set at 100 ISO, go to my next job indoors and use 400 ISO and then finish off shooting a floodlit football match at 1600 ISO . . . ALL ON THE SAME ROLL!

So on the day, I turned up early (as I tried always to do) and was shown to the small balcony that I'd be sharing with my three colleagues representing her majesty's press. I could see why tripods weren't allowed. There was barely room to stand. As I was first to arrive, I blagged the position by the railing.

Soon after, my three companions arrived and began complaining about the space allotted to us. I didn't mind because I was in front :o)

Then the ceremony began and we noticed another problem. Mrs Thatcher was wearing a wide brimmed hat. From our vantage point at the back of the building and from ten meters high, we could only see her chin! 

This meant that we had to constantly look through the viewfinder and be ready to fire off a burst when she glanced up. I was using my canon T90 coupled with a 300 mm f4 telephoto lens which was ideal. As a form of insurance I took photos of the other dignitaries in the audience in case I wasn't able to get an image of the lady herself.

In the event, I shot a full 36 roll and only got her face on three exposures but this was enough for me. When the ceremony ended, I took off to the nearest photolab and had my negatives processed. From there I ran to the Photographers Gallery and ran off five or six, ten by eight enlargements which I delivered to the editor two hours after the event and well before deadline.

Both images. Canon T90 EF 300mm f4

1/125sec @ f4 1600 ISO

 This was used large in the 'paper

So that was my small experience photographing "The Iron Lady". As I heard someone on the television this morning, "Like her or loathe her, she won't be forgotten. "

Thanks for reading.