Lights, lights and more lights

As you may have guessed I am a little bit obsessed with photography.  My interest was always macro, the world of tiny stuff, bits of things, not the whole, but then in got hooked on the 100 Strangers Project and I wanted to shoot people, people and more people.   While I was shooting strangers I was also shooting friends and I wanted to shoot more and more people .... with artificial light.

I have scads of equipment, lots, heaps and I even know how to use some of it!!!   My lenses are an even split between primes and zooms.  If I am shooting people I like primes, but for other stuff I usually have a zoom on.  As for lighting I have 4 flash heads, 2 soft boxes, 4 brollies and pocket wizards to trigger all this stuff, but after shooting a model earlier in the week I seriously want to move further up the food chain to strobes.  I know the gear I have can easily replicate the work I did with the strobes, but the one sole advantage the strobes have over my gear is a modelling light.  The modelling light provides me a better idea of what the final image will look like.  It shows where the shadows will fall and how two lights blend or don't blend as the case may be.

This sole advantage is the reason why I am seriously considering offloading all my lighting gear and donating a kidney to pay for some lights that give me shadows!!!  I know it is not really logical or valid or reasonable.... but it is not all about logic.  It's about wants, not needs!

Below are some images I have taken... the first three are in my lounge room with my current soft boxes,  flash heads and pocket wizards.  The second group are shot with strobes similar to those I want to go into huge debt for.  The difference.... I no longer know if I can tell!!

What is glaringly different is the backgrounds.  Lounge room verses studio.   That's my next big purchase I think!

Goodbye 2013, Hello 2014!

2013 is just about to click over into 2014 and just like that moment when your cars odometer clicks over a special number, it will seem all vital that you experience it and all important and yet strangely totally unimportant in mere moments after the event.

2014 will be an improvement on 2013, as 2013 was on 2012.

As for 2013 I had hoped to leave the whole cancer thing in 2012, but come February I was back in hospital for the Radioactive Iodine Ablation and lost another 8 weeks off work while I was radioactive.  Thinking the worst of it was all behind me I tried to get back into the swing of work and life... but it was not to be. I struggled and struggled until September when Dr Jeff decided it was time to test for all manner of cancers and oddities.  The first tests came back showing there was definitely something a rye (pun intended).  Ultimately I got a clearance on all the "regular" cancers, but Coeliac was preliminarily diagnosed.  So where I had hoped 2014 would be free of hospitals I am, apparently,  incorrect on that.  I go back in in mid February!  But that's the end of it. I am totally over the whole feeling crook senario. AND NO MORE HOSPITAL!  They are full of sick people you know!!!

2013 was filled with wonderful people.  If I began the list this post would go forever.  Let me just say I hope THEY know they are special and made 2013 great for me.  There are some I will never see again. Death and distance keep me apart from some special friends but that doesn't mean they are not thought of.  Distance seems much smaller with the internet being so accessible, but it's not the same as being there.  It IS a whole lot less final than death though.

2014 will see me finish my 100 Strangers photographic project and then work out what to do with it.   I'm stuck on number 64 because I never seem to be well enough to travel far from home.  That will change after February. I also want to spend more time on portraits in general and know a few likely suspects that will get the whole four light set up foisted upon them!  If you are one of those people, fear not... it is mostly painless!  Mostly!!!  I'd shoot more bands at the 16's if some goodies comes up.  It's a great venue for me to practice those skills.  A bit more macro is needed too.  I have a new series in mind too, but I will need the indulgence of a few friends to pull that one off!

2014 will also see me back in the veggie patch.  I'm still planting somewhat randomly. Not really following  a good crop rotation program or even good companion planting.  My record keeping sucks and I need to stagger my planting fortnightly.  So at the moment I get a glut of one veggie and the others are as rare as hens teeth.  I tried growing pumpkins for the first time this year and harvested my first on December 27.  They are messy and run all over the yard, but that just means less mowing! I think I need more flowering plants to encourage more bees, so rejuvenation of one of the beds that runs along the dividing fence is a must.  I have the plants.  It's the energy I am lacking.  Chickens are still a no go zone for me.  I do need to construct some frames for climbers in the yard.  That will have to wait to 2014 now!

So it's back to work on the 3rd for me and the daily grind is drawing closer to an end with retirement in the not too distant future.  But until that day comes I'll still be using photography as my primary escape method.

In celebration of 2013 here are a selection of my fave pics for the year.
Hope you enjoy them too!

A studio to call home

As you have probably gathered I have a love of photography and even through the whole cancer thing I still tried to practice it as much as I could.  Sure for a while, especially when in isolation, all I could shoot was me, or flowers, it still was great to have a camera in my hands, even when it was impossible to wear one around my neck!  The desire to shoot with artificial lighting or rather with me controlling the artificial lighting has been smouldering in the background for a while.  It started with buying a hotshoe flash, then 3 more.  Then I looked at ways to trigger them to fire off camera.  I tried cables, till I got tangled up in one, then cheapy ebay triggers, till they failed more than they worked and finally I was fortunate enough to get my hands on some top of the range Pocket Wizards and then the fun really began! The failure rate dropped to next to nothing, the ease of controlling the ratios between lights became childs play and the results began to show.  So the next step on that ladder was to find a space in which to work!

I have a couple of backdrop stands. 2 metre and 3 metre in width and some fabric and paper backdrops.  All of which I can set up in the loungeroom here. I can even do a four light set up, triggered wirelessly and get an ok result..... but it is impermanent.  It's like a pop up shop.  Pops up and down in a matter of minutes, but still I want more. I want a permanent working space.

About 18 months ago a couple of us of similar mind looked at renting a space. We looked at a multitude of alternatives.  Reduced prices spaces in Newcastle,  storage spaces in Wickham,  shop spaces in Morisset and finally warehouse spaces in Westlakes.  For each alternative there was an issue.  For most it was the cost.  For some it was the location and for one it was size, or lack of it! So that idea died a sad and lonely death.  Saturday saw my renewed interest in a freestanding permanent studio space.  I attended an open day for a new studio for rent in Tuggerah and I liked what I saw!

The simple concrete warehouse had been transformed inside from grey slabs to 3 shooting areas, one with cyclorama.  There was a small, but useable, change room area and an array of chairs and props.  There was a green screen available too and some lighting gear for hire.  The prices were reasonable and the owners are catering specifically for people like me, the hobbyist that wants to control light.

Inadvertently there was a shoot going on at the time which was a great demonstration for the onlookers.  Strangely there were very few women photographers there.  There were lots of blokes and two female models.  Nice young girls who simply wanted a few good pics of themselves.  With about 20 photographers in the joint the likelihood of them getting decent shots was pretty high!

So until the lotto ball falls on me or I get my grubby little paws on my superannuation looks like I will be renting great spaces like this to get the shots I want.

I can and do still do table top stuff at home.......so here's some for you to enjoy.

Spice Girl

Well all the plans for the weekend have been scrapped.  These plans have been in the making for months.  We had to wait for niece to go to Europe for it all to happen.  And she has finally gone!  The plans were to get into Nephew no.2's bedroom and do a total reno.  But rain has stopped play.   The paint won't dry in time and he's still tucked up in bed after some horribly early starts this week.  So plans are delayed and we will attempt it next weekend IF the weather improves.

So what is a girl to do with when she is all geared up for painting and decorating???? Well take some photos I suppose.   My dining table can become a table top studio with the addition of a few flash heads, light stands, backing paper, modifiers and some rather expensive radio triggers called pocket wizards.  I learnt a long time ago and the hard way that me and cables don't work well together after dragging a brand new $4000 camera across a rough cement ledge, over the edge of the ledge and towards the ground because I had cables wrapped around my ankles.   It was only the super fast reaction of a naked woman who caught the camera by its neck strap mere millimetres before it connected with the rocky ground that saved the day.   Well that isn't exactly true, she wasn't totally naked, she was wearing a pair of angles wings at the time...... but that's a whole other story!  The event cause me to race out and buy some cheap shoddy ebay triggers to fire my flash heads, but they were never really reliable. They didn't have good range. OK for use inside, but outside it was a hit and miss affair.    So last year when a good mate was offloading some top of the range pocket wizards I stepped up and bought his goods.   And I have never looked back!  They are so easy to use, easy to store, reliable and work on three different channels and in three different groups and I can control each group individually from the camera.  I love it.

Of course it is super easy now...... but when I first got them it was a different story. Teachers will tell you we all learn differently.   I loved TAFE for its immediacy and face to face teaching and HATED uni because it lacked both.  I learn by watching, asking and doing, not by reading and therefore 3 years of uni  by correspondence was doomed to fail from the start.   So when the Pocket Wizards entered my life I was so lucky to have Josh to show me the intricacies of the world of wireless strobes.  Josh is a genius and I have mentioned before how he believes I am a dinosaur, technologically speaking!  T-Rex!

The dining table has become the table top studio many a time and this weekend the spices came out to play.  It started with chillies a few weeks ago, then star anise and cinnamon quills.  Yesterday the saffron.  Today was vanilla beans and cardamon pods.  My kitchen cupboards are filled with such photographically interesting ingredients.  So that's how I spent the day.  Not painting or pulling beds apart and building new ones. Not washing new bed linen for use and old bed linen for donation. The rain hasn't stopped all day, but I think I did ok all the same!!!