Becoming a jobbing photographer as I said previously is both challenging and daunting. Where do you start? There seems no end to the advice coming through my socials, but you must start somewhere, so I started to practice with dogs or a dog, Bee.
I hadn’t done portraiture, particularly studio work for a number of years. Stanley was my last sitter, I think. It was a trade with Adam for a pair of Patagonia wetsuit boots. Decent boots until the bottoms wore out. I should try and get them fixed, given Patagonia’s brilliant ‘If it’s broke, fix it’ policy.
Stanley
So, I dug out my lights and thought about the set up. Photographing Stanley the light, diffused through a soft box was positioned to the side but given the symmetrical nature of dog’s heads, and a Dobermann is a good example of this, I wanted to focus the light centrally. When working in your living room this, at least for me, creates the challenge of space in all directions. You can only go so high before you hit ceiling and back before you hit the wall. It was tight, especially working under a centrally placed key light but with a bit of patience we got through a roll of film.
Bee
Feeling inspired I attempted another set up to compare. Again, resorting to the same side light as Stanley. I’m not sure the results were as effective, at least to my eye.
Bee
Reflecting afterwards I thought this isn’t for me. It’s too difficult. The main problem is dogs move and when you are photographing with manual focus it’s hard. This is compounded by shooting on a tripod with an aperture of F16. It means the light coming through to the view finder is limited so in a darkened room, against a dark background, with a dark dog, everything is dark.
I learnt from the experience though and after a couple of weeks and a chat with a photographer friend, I grasped the nettle and had another go. This time with Chester. Essentially, I faced the same problem. Dogs move. They lie down, they face the other way, they stand off centre. They don’t know they’re being photographed, they get confused with all the directional coaxing, not to mention what might seem like endless titbits, so I need to work differently.
Having processed the negs, I glanced through them to check the overall results. The centralised setup through a soft box was the same but they didn’t look particularly flattering. The exposure didn’t seem right. The negs were dark. I think, on reflection, I should’ve checked the light meter reading when Chester was in situ. Scans would give me a better understanding.
Chester
Photographing on film is expensive today. A roll of 120 film costs around £15.00. That’s twelve shots. Sheet film is even more expensive, and photography can be difficult. Learning to photograph with a 5x4 view camera has been a particularly steep learning curve. There are so many stages where you can make mistakes, from loading the film through to processing. And as mentioned film isn’t cheap and processing is time consuming, so commercially, working on film presents limitations but the overall challenge has been my ability to work fast, to be fluid and move with the dogs. Working on a tripod with a medium format film camera makes this difficult. So, if I am to proceed with success as a jobbing photographer, I think I need to consider the D word and so that’s what I did. I have taken my first real foray into the world of professional digital photography and invested in a not so new system. The results of which I will share another time but before that I did manage another photo shoot on film. This time with the boys.
I was as surprised as anyone they agreed to it. They usually don’t. I framed it as practicing with a new lighting setup which was true, but I also wanted to use that as a means to photographing them and it worked. They sat for me. I’m still surprised they were so willing. Maybe the promise of gaming had something to do with it.
Sticking with the central lighting setup I changed the diffused soft box for an umbrella, a white one and a silver one. I’m intrigued to see the scans but photographing the children was a surprise. I enjoyed it. I had done a bit of online learning, and it helped. It's a just shame my eldest wouldn't allow me to post some of the pictures.
I'm looking forward to getting stuck into learning and experiencing the challenge of photographing digitally. I'm hoping it will bring a freedom to my studio work but with field work, I look forward to getting back to film.
Nuka