u n b i d d e n

Last night we had dinner with friends and ended the night by shooting off the fireworks for the kids dads. Vienne had way more fun catching lighting bugs. She seemed to not even care about the fireworks.

When we got home we had another surprise. We found a baby bird on the armrest of one of our deck chairs. She so wanted to take it inside and care for it somehow. After much negotiations we decided that it was best to leave the bird outside. It was gone this morning. We hope for the best.

Vienne however probably thought the creatures were better than fireworks.

For a shot about using food as beauty products. I was almost able to pull off an equipment cliche trifecta. I used a Lensbaby that I borrowed from Nick and a DYI ring flash made by Parker.

Some times it’s the test shot I like the most. When I get the lights close to how I want them and want to check what’s going on I tell the subjects, “this is a test shot.” They let down their guard. They get lost in thought. I make a snap. They come back to the present and I say, “Ok, we’re ready for the real pictures.” But now I think that the test shot is the real picture. Even when it’s from a sort two minute portrait session. One problem. No one sees the real pictures. Most go unseen. Well almost, most.

We watched the 1986 file “The Mission” a couple of days ago with some friends. A pretty powerful film for sure. Towards the end of the movie there was a part where two of the characters, Gabriel and Rodrigo, choose different paths. One chose love and non-violence and the other selected resistance and violence. When they began to struggle with these choices there was a quote that really stopped me in my tracks.

Gabriel: If might is right, then love has no place in the world. It may be so, it may be so. But I don’t have the strength to live in a world like that, Rodrigo.

I don’t have the strength to live in a world like that. What a powerful statement. And a true one at that. Living in a world of gossip, pride, anger and conflict takes way to much energy. It’s so easy to get sucked in to that mindset. I guess for me I’d rather use my strength not to live in a world of “might” but to struggle to live in a world of love.

I handled a portrait assignment the other day. This lady is a Sports Information Director at a local college here. She won an award we are doing a story about here at the paper.

During the interview I walked around looking for locations in the athletic facilities. I finally decided on the hall of fame. I quickly decided on using just two lights. A main light with the soft-box and a bare strobe hitting the wall behind my subject.

I carry two colored gels in my lighting bag. A red one and a blue one (some day I’ll put more in there). I thought using some color would jazz things up some. And since she had on a blue shirt I thought red might be a nice contrast. Then I remembered that the schools colors are blue and silver. So I went with the blue.

I shot some test images before my subject arrived and I quickly learned that my main strobe was not firing my background light. I was relying on photo-eye slaves since I didn’t have along any Pocket Wizards.

My quick workaround was to put down a third strobe on the floor with a photo-eye slave on it and set the power to 1/16th. This set up a relay of lights that would trigger my background light placed down the hallway.

I get a lot of satisfaction out of improvising solutions on the fly.