After Action Report on My Portrait Sessions at the Seminary. One camera, one lens and some lights. And some black and white photos from Rome.

 

Via Condotti. 

I meant to say, "no." But I didn't. I have no other excuse than that I was bored on the day I got an emailed request from my contact at the Seminary of the Southwest. And, that I have always enjoyed the laid back, easy going nature of this particular client. So I said, "Yes. Sure." So much for sticking to my guns about retirement.

The project was straightforward; I would make portraits in a small video studio in the library. The people we were photographing would be faculty and staff members of a small theological college that exists in the shadow of one of the country's largest Universities. The contrasts between the two facilities are obvious. UT is huge and well funded. SSW is much, much smaller and feels not poor but never extravagant. We'd be photographing 12-15 people during a long morning and into the short side of the afternoon. Later, after people got to choose their favorite pose/expression I'd circle back, retouch their selection and then choose a background in which to place them. 

The backgrounds exist in a catalog that I created a year ago for the same client. They consist of out of focus scenes around the SSW campus; buildings, walkways, stands of trees, and little manicured plazas. It was also my job to match the feel of the exterior background shots with the color and feel of the interior studio shots. As much as possible. 

My contact and I scheduled a morning arrival by nine for load-in and lighting set up and then a start time for the first portrait at 9:30. I was up early on the shoot day and arrived around 8:30. I pulled the gear from the trunk of the car and loaded it onto my trusty cart. Called the art director who would be hanging out with me for the day and arranged to meet her at the library loading dock. 

The small studio we worked in had a cyc wall that was painted white. The place had programmable lighting fixtures suspended from ceiling tracks and my first task was to call up the lighting app on the control desk computer and turn off their lights. Once I figured that out I set up my basic lighting design for the day. I used three 16 by 24 inch Nanlite LED panels and one small Nanlite LED panel. One of the bigger three was a main light to the left of the camera and always set with the bottom of the fixture above the subject's chin level. I wanted shadows to fall under the chin to give people a fighting chance at hiding any double chin action. The fill light was the same kind of LED panel used on the opposite side of the camera and also elevated high enough to keep reflections out of even the least anti-reflection coated eyeglasses. Both of these panels were used with fabric grids to help eradicate spill light.

I  used a third panel from the back of the set on the opposite side of the main light to emulate sunlight outdoors sweeping across the subjects from behind. This panel features color control so I warmed it up to emulate late afternoon sun. Finally, a small Nanlite panel was used directly on the background cyc to raise its value and make the background a very light, soft gray. That seems to work well when separating an image from the background in order to drop it into a new background. So, four panels all set and ready to go. 

Why am I using these panel lights? Mostly because it's so darn easy. You put a light on a light stand and turn it on. The front of the panel is a permanent, neutral white diffusion panel. No need to rig a soft box or an umbrella. And you can use them close in to good effect. They are so fast to set up and use it's almost embarrassing. Same with the small light on the background. Set it up on a stand, turn it on, and aim it in the right direction. Done. 

I vacillated a bit on lenses but I was certain that I wanted to use the Leica SL2-S as my camera. The files are big enough but not too big. The camera's low noise at higher ISOs meant I could use ISO 800 or ISO 1600 without any worry at all about grain/noise and ... the colors out of the camera's raw files are super easy to manipulate and fine tune. The SL's 47 MP raw files would have been too big for this use case. 

I thought of using a zoom lens like the Leica 24-90mm but I ended up using the TTArtisan 75mm f2.0 for every one of the portraits. It's a beautiful lens for portraits. Sharp and detailed but in a "rounded" non-clinical way. So, f5.6 and be there. 

All of that is secondary to what should be the only challenge for an experienced photographer. That challenge is the ability to develop a quick and very positive rapport with the subject. Both sides of the camera have to be engaged. I have to be curious and a good listener. The sitter has to be engaged and relaxed about the process. 

I spent about 15 minutes with each person and we started each conversation with me asking: "Tell me what it is you do here. What's your role?" And while it's pretty much cliché my next question is usually along the lines of, "Tell me what are the challenges you find when doing your work?" I try to get a conversation going and letting the sitter talk about things they are keenly experienced with is the best way to start.

The art director was good at scheduling in flexible breaks so we could go on a hard target search for coffee first and then maybe cookies, and finally a well catered lunch. 

At one point in the morning we had a 45 minute gap between sessions and since I hate to sit around doing nothing we decided to go and do interior photos of various guest quarters the school maintains for visiting scholars, clergy, etc. I brought along a 28mm lens just in case and it was the perfect match for some interior architecture. We made a contest of moving fast and did three apartments and change before rushing back to our temporary studio. Just minutes ahead of our next appointment. 

The social engineer for the school had lunch catered for us by a favorite Austin restaurant and by 2:45 I had finished the photography, filled my stomach and loaded the car for the trip home. 

It was our first really, really hot day of the Summer. My car was like a mutant toaster oven when I got in. With the A/C blowing hard I drove over to my favorite car wash, halfway to home, pulled into a shade covered stall and gave my car a long, luxurious wash. It also helped to cool it down and make driving home more pleasant. Which was the important part of my plan. 

The architecture files have been post processed and sent. Client liked them very much. The people stuff has been edited down to 25 poses each and I've done a round of preliminary A.I. retouching to them all. The files were uploaded yesterday to Smugmug and I'm hopeful that we'll see final portrait selections by mid-week. Everything is going to plan. 

All the gear choices were just right. Maybe we were being watched over by a divine power but really, I think it's just my Boy Scout training mixed with a bit of anxious hyper-vigilance. More to come. But I do have to admit in getting no pleasure from unloading a bunch of heavy stuff from the trunk of the car in the middle of a heat torrent sort of day. No fun breaking a sweat on the way into the office. 

But here are some images from Rome. 

As you can see, the Spanish Steps were packed with tourists....