of course when one makes a decision to go one way another direction pulls in the another. so it is with this series i’ll call a somewhat learning experience. i was hired by this productions company to do lighting for a video of theirs in texas. they loved my lighting in my portfolio. all we needed to do was meet, agree to a price and shake hands.
but, yes here it comes, could you do an outdoor shoot of our dancers to show to our people. well most if not all of my portfolio is studio stuff. can i light outside, well sort of i’ve done enough movies but here i was alone. i packed up a couple of speed lights, a 580 ex & 580 exll plenty of batteries and off we went. the crew consisted of me the tog, producer acting lighting assistant holding a speed light and another person who was always on the phone.
we shot in fort tryon park without a shot list or photo script. there is a story/script not in the conventional movie scene setting ‘they walked down the street’ that i knew, but i was briefly told the story, not in picture terms but the gist of the story.
we had a boy, we have a girl, they meet are attracted to each other, dance a bit then who knows?
the boy
the girl
the location
and then we dance well sort of, my concern was to be able to tell a story with just pictures. but it’s hard without a story board.
the look from her
from him
the touch
the mount
talking to someone afterward about what a photographer does their reaction was ‘how cool’. hummmmm oh you don’t mean when i knelt down on one knee and put a piece of glass in it? my language wasn’t too cool then. every one sees the glamor and not the work. i don’t get the chase jarvis shoots.
tables are turned
oh that candy wrapper over there is really a used pastel condom, how naive i am, this is a deserted part of the park.
the bend
so what i had with me were a cannon 580ex and a cannon 580exll. the ex being mine so i knew how to zoom it in but my lighting assistance weren’t really paying attention to,lighting. the 580exll changed how tos so i was a bit lost. sometimes there were recycle problems, my error. or batteries etc. but i got what i got and here is most of it.
any way i left the park exhausted i always give my all no matter what. i headed home to do the edit because the producer was leaving the next day at noon. oh i don’t mind picking the images and burning a disk. oh it wasn’t what you wanted? no problem here, they loved the stuff.
my body still hurts two days later but at least i know i did the right thing and gave the production my all.
today i started packing for the russian trip. my think tank bag is giving me a big problem from their bad design, their partitions being a 1/4″ too long causing the bag to buckle outwards putting a bad strain on the zipper.
think tank bag
side
close up of zipper
vise grips to straighten zipper
as you can see i don’t have a lot in there 2 cannon mark ll and a spare camera without a lens.
loaded
and i needed to bend the partitions and change one to smaller one, not the idea and this doesn’t work completely.
you can see the problem on their web site. i’ve got to fix their design to. they will hear about this before i go, so will adoroma where i bought the bag.
hopefully the silicon spray on the zipper and changing one the the partitions helped but i know i won’t buy another think tank bag i can’t inspect before committing to buying it. pictures just don’t do it for me. maybe hot glue and gaffers tape can help, noting worst than having a secure camera bag fall apart.
but it’s late and i need sleep
good night
jene
“Child with A Toy Hand Grenade” © Diane Arbus 
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