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Variety is............ Max Earey
Last month seemed a mixture of highs and lows! The war started and had a surprising and immediate effect on one shoot by way of cancellation; Vauxhall wouldn't allow an employee to fly with us to the Opel factory in Germany! And the Opel factory wouldn't let us shoot their concept car without a Vauxhall employee present! Very disappointing; the call came less than 12 hours prior to the flight, bags were packed, other jobs were turned down and the question of a cancellation fee had to be negotiated. This is not the first time a job has been postponed or cancelled however; more notice is usually provided thus giving an opportunity to re book the day. Cancellation fees can be a bit of a grey area but really need to be a factor in any successful business strategy. I always make new clients aware that I have a cancellation policy prior to accepting their first commission but point out that if enough notice is given so that I can use the day for another job I will waiver the fee. What to charge is difficult I don't want to appear greedy but on the other hand a lot of research can be done prior to the job for example, finding a location and obtaining permission to use it can be time very consuming, generally I charge some where between a half and a full days rate depending on circumstances, most clients appreciate this position provided they are aware of the policy you operate.
Indoor work has also been a factor this month! Not the pleasant warm studio variety either! I had to cover two shows and shoot some high performance motorcycles under florescent lighting in a paint shop the size of a squash court……some things are really sent to try you!! Shows generally don't present a major problem especially the larger shows as the lighting tends to adequately flood the cars and be daylight balanced. One of the shows was just as described and went smoothly enough apart from the constant stream of people straying into the shot. In these circumstances apart from tripod and flash an enormous helping of patience is required along with a willing helper to gently usher the said people out of the way. The other show however, had a mixture of lighting ranging from daylight balanced to florescent tubing and even some household lighting in the trade halls. These problems are never insurmountable if you are able to carry portable lighting but for the editorial snapper working against a deadline ……… the sweat starts to rise, so what can be done? Firstly you can shoot away! Camera, tripod, cable release
and long exposure leaving the available light to its own devices and using
the colour cast that comes out on the transparency as some of artistic
license? It can look good in small doses but! When your feature is due
over five pages with somewhere in the region of 30 - 40 small pictures
the said colour cast would be somewhat overpowering.
You could shoot the feature on print film, giving more latitude and an opportunity to correct the colour cast at the print stage, today's offering's are far superior to those of yesteryear but check with your client, whilst print can be reproduced well many art departments mine included are not so keen! So that really leaves a couple of alternatives filters or flash? All editorial photographers have reasonably powerful flashguns. In these situations bracketing a few shots by altering the shutter speed could pay dividends in the end result. I like to fill the frame with the specific car I'm photographing and set the flash somewhere between 1 - 2 stops below my chosen aperture in this way the frontal area of my subject will be cast free leaving only the background slightly darker and suffering any colour effects, framing can minimise the visibility of the background so it's worth experimenting a little with your positioning of the car until your confident and able to work quickly. Filters are the other aid in your bag and I use two slightly different ones to overcome florescent lighting either a Magenta FLD or a Magenta FLW if I'm after a slightly warmer result. Household lighting is generally a rarity at shows but a Blue 80B filter usually combats the yellow effect seen on unfiltered film. It is worth noting and finding out prior to the shoot the style of lighting you will have to work with if possible and ask whether it is daylight balanced many florescent tubes these days are in fact balanced for daylight. The motorcycles were a different proposition, the job came through at very short notice I thought there would be one only and in fact they wheeled out three plus a host of accessories, my fault for not checking but a good point learned and as I was there the job had to be done.
The client in this case wanted digital images so some
of the lighting worries were alleviated, artificial light gives off strange
colour casts because of the temperature and it is possible to buy colour
meters but be warned they are quite expensive. The light scale is measured
in K (Kelvins) and some of today's digital cameras offer a Kelvin white
balance that can altered in increments of 100 at a time Canon's 1Ds and
10D are two such cameras. This minute adjustment allows continual manipulation
of the image at the capture point until the resulting image is acceptable
for the purpose. Once the correct setting is found it really is almost
a case of shoot, shoot, shoot providing the light source is constant or
so I thought! What I found in this particular case was slight variations
on the silver, black and orange bikes that faced me so another point learned
check your LCD and if possible upload a few samples to a laptop just to
check. Thank god for digital and the opportunity to see the results on
location.
Finally the month finished on a high, cars are great fun but car after car day after day can become like many other things a little mundane. Occasionally though everything comes together a wild and unique piece of machinery, a lovely warm day with acre after acre of blue sky and not only a good but also very unusual location…..could it be and more to the point could it last? The Peugeot 206 WRC replica is not just any replica this particular example would set your wallet back some 50k not cheap eh? But conversely not as expensive as a 350k full spec WRC model sold at the end of each season to anyone who has that sought of money lying around. It does have a full Peugeot 206 WRC body but that's where it ends for underneath and in the engine bay the muscle and traction are provided by Ford Cosworth components resulting in some 400bhp of shatteringly quick power in a car weighing less than a standard 206 that you make take your granny to the shops in…. Well that's how it was described to me! Seeing the car, seeing the weather and then finding the location pushed this from a 7page feature to 11 plus cover and A2 poster! The Editor of the magazine was with me and found his excitement and desire to have a bigger wallet almost overwhelming so much so that every 5 minutes he kept saying 'have you got this' 'what about this angle' 'Not there, here' Editors don't you just love 'em? At the end of the day the shoot is one that will stick in the memory, it made up for the month of highs and lows and brings it home yet again of how lucky we are considering what is happening elsewhere.
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