"Quick, bring me the half stop diffuser!!!"

For Austin Sports Medicine.

Shooting in hazy sunlight. The lighting is too contrasty. What to do? While we've been taught to rush to the camera bag and grab a flash with which to add fill-in flash there are some circumstances in which floating a one stop or half stop scrim over the top of the subject is easier and more visually convincing. 

I used a Westcott one half stop silk diffuser directly over the talent's head and as close to her as possible to get this effect. It works for two main reasons. First the foliage in the background always renders darker than it will look to the eye which means that a half stop or one stop increase in contrast won't burn it out or make it look fried. And second, the light colored dirt of the playing field provided additional shadow fill from below. 

With the diffuser on the top, the sand acting as a reflector below, and the background being (lucky me) dark enough the stars lined up to ensure a good exposure. 

An additional help was the wide dynamic range of the camera, an older Kodak DCS 760. 

Hanging a diffuser over a model can be a much quicker, easier and more believable fix to contrasty light than pulling out a flash. But, of course, every situation is different. 

"All The Way" The LBJ play at Zach Theatre in Austin, Texas. Photographs by Kirk Tuck.

©2015 Kirk Tuck for Zach Theatre.

Zach Theatre in Austin, Texas continues to raise the bar in their productions on their Topfer Stage. Last night I went to the dress rehearsal of "All the Way" to make public relations and marketing photographs of the show. Belinda came along to see the show and keep me company. I wrote about what I packed yesterday and now I'm going to write about what I used.

I took twenty or thirty wide shots of the stage because it was really cool and well done but it was largely static and when I felt like I had good coverage I put the Nikon D610 down on the top of my bag and didn't pick it up again until the very end of the show. When you are shooting for press use and documentation your goal is typically to get tight shots of your lead actors and then lots of tight "relationship" shots and small group shots. We've learned over the years that the tighter, more graphic shots always have a better chance of being picked up in social media and traditional, non-paid, print media. 

Understanding the ever growing appeal of video on TV and the web the theater also documents the dress rehearsals with the help of a very talented videographer. His name is Eric Graham and he's usually sporting two cameras. One is set for a wide shot of the stage while the second one is equipped with a long zoom and Eric uses it to follow the action of the shows. 

If I am correct then last night he was shooting the wides on a Canon C100 with a Canon 24-105mm lens and doing the action oriented shots with a Sony FS-700 and a long range zoom. He's got the sound figured out too. He's running a cable from the sound mixing board in the theater directly into his FS700. No coughs and rustling of the audience in his audio....

Back to photography. I did the bulk of the 1,000+ images of the show with a Nikon D810 and an older (but very sharp) Nikon 80-200mm f2.8 zoom lens. It's the old "push-pull" design and it has fun stuff on it like distance limiters that you can set so the AF doesn't hunt. I set mine to 30 feet to infinity and never had an issue of the camera/lens combo failing to lock on. I find the lens to be in the "sharpness ballpark" with the newer lenses but I still have my eyes on a 70-200mm f4 because it's lighter and has vibration reduction inside.  That being said there was very little not to like about the lens I was using. 

I had the camera set to shoot medium, fine jpegs and every once in a while I'd use the 1.2X crop mode just to get a little tighter. It worked well and it comes in handy for those times when you don't have the bandwidth to crop after the fact. Some stuff goes straight to the client to be distributed ASAP. 

I used Nikon's auto white balance and was not disappointed. The D810 has an uncanny ability to nail the right WB for flesh tones and I never felt the need to override it or go to a preset. That's a big change from previous generations of cameras!

I assigned a rear button for focus. It was nice to "lock" focus by taking my finger off the button but still being able to re-compose and lock exposure. Separation of stuff. Nice. 

Looking through over a thousand shots there were less than a handful that didn't achieve sharp focus. Most of my "after the fact" corrections were aimed at opening up dark areas with Lightroom's shadow slider and occasionally brightening frames --- the D810 allows a bit of exposure correction with underexposed images and the noise (at 1600 ISO) stays polite. I'd always rather be a bit dark that lose detail in the highlights. It's a real consideration when shooting Jpegs. 

Why Jpegs? Mostly because of the need to turn the files around quickly. Shooting 36 megapixel raw files means hours of conversion after I've made a few adjustments. The 36 megapixel size is just too big. I could try the small raw but I think 9 megs is a bit too small a file if the client wants to do a bigger print size. It sure would be nice if you could shoot Nikon raw in all the sizes that are available while shooting Jpeg. Kodak at that on their full frame DSLR cameras back in 2004. 

There is also the question of storage. As it is we're taking up 22 gigabytes of storage space with our final output files.  So far, in the last 30 days we've filled an entire 4 Gb drive and it's twin brother, the back up drive (but we've done a lot of video and that makes a huge impact on storage resources....) and I'm becoming concerned about my ability to keep up with storage demands over time. But that's fodder for another blog.

The images took post processing in stride and nothing fell apart. I am delighted with the vast majority of the take and, as always, there are some I would love a "do over" on. But the first volley of selects is already on its way to a bunch of community papers, the popular alternate newspaper, the theater's web resource and into social media. 

How's the production? It's funny, sad, fabulous and amazing. Like a history lesson wrapped in drama and compelling stagecraft. Well worth your time and money.  If you are in Austin any time this month be sure to catch it. Thanks!

©2015 Kirk Tuck for Zach Theatre.

©2015 Kirk Tuck for Zach Theatre.

©2015 Kirk Tuck for Zach Theatre.

©2015 Kirk Tuck for Zach Theatre.

©2015 Kirk Tuck for Zach Theatre.

©2015 Kirk Tuck for Zach Theatre.

©2015 Kirk Tuck for Zach Theatre.

©2015 Kirk Tuck for Zach Theatre.

Packing up to shoot the dress rehearsal of "All the Way." The play about LBJ's time as President. What to pack?

Tonight is the big night for me on this show. It's when I pack up the cameras, figure out the best seat in the house and spend a couple of hours trying to get the absolute best images I can wrangle of a big, wonderful, complex show. A lot has changed since I first stated shooting marketing images at the dress rehearsals for Zach Theatre nearly 24 years ago. Back then I shot everything in black and white because that's what the daily and the alternate newspapers were willing to run. In those days I shot every show with a couple of Leica M series cameras. One with a 90mm f2.0 Summicron lens and the other with a 35mm f2.0 Summicron lens. I kept a 21mm f3.4 in the bag --- just in case we really needed a wide shot of the stage. 

While there were faster films around at the time my favorite was always Kodak's Tri-X. I shot it as if it was ISO 800 and pushed the development in D-76, diluted one to one. After the show I would head straight over to the darkroom to process the eight to ten rolls of film I'd shot, keeping track of two or three development tanks at a time. Once the film was through the wash I'd dip it into a Photoflo solution to prevent water spots, hang the film up with clothespins and then head home and get some sleep.

The next morning I'd go back into the darkroom and, if we had time, I'd make contact sheets to share with the young, new marketing director. Sometimes we would be on a tight deadline and he and I would have discussed the shots we thought might work best the night before and he'd leave the edit up to me. Either way we'd figure out five or six different "hero" shots and I'd make five eight by ten inch, black and white shots of each on RC paper (resin coated, it processed and dried quicker). 

As soon as the prints dried I would rush them over to the theater so they could distribute them to the various media outlets. Then I'd wait to see if the papers would give me a photo credit. Yes for most of the little one. No for the bigger ones....

But today is now. And I'm packing up to go and shoot a dress rehearsal that starts in a couple of hours. Here's what I'm packing and it seems like nothing to me. A Nikon D810 which will be paired with the Nikon 80-200 f2.8 and a Nikon D610 which will be matched up with a 24-85mm f3.5 to 4.5 G zoom. I've also packed the old 105mm f2.5 (just in case) and the 50mm G f1.8 (again, just in case). Each camera has a 64 Gb card in it and I've got extra batteries in the front pocket of my battered and tattered Domke "little bigger bag." I'm carrying along a small Benro monopod with a small bracket on the top in case I want to stabilize my unstabilized long zoom. Can't use flash so I'm not packing it and don't really want to mix formats. Full circle. All the way back to two shooting cameras and two shooting lenses. I think I can handle that.

These are shots of Martin Burke (superb and justifiably famous Austin actor) horsing around on a theater chair. They were originally shot as a fund raiser for the new (now three year old) Topfer Theatre on the Zach campus. I love working with Martin. Off camera he is quiet and thoughtful while on camera he's a maniac. Just one of the hundreds of great artists I've met through Zach Theatre. 

 If you are in Austin for the month of April you might want to saddle up and get to the theater to see "All the Way." It's going to be amazing. But you know you'll see images from the performance sometime tomorrow. We'll have them up in the afternoon.

Now that I'm packed for the evening I'm making two final changes to a video project that morphing into a three week long assignment. I think I've learned and used every control in Final Cut ProX.

Wrapping up means I now get to bill. One of my favorite parts of every job.

Hope you are having a swell week!

Sorry, no ads today. 

Homemade soft lights for almost every purpose.

If you are tired of spending money on photo gear but you need a good light consider what we did for a project. We bought four fluorescent "under the counter" lights at Home Depot, taped them all together and bungee-corded them to a light stand. Spent $24 bucks + sales tax. Worked perfectly for the project we had in mind. There's more than one way to skin a Scheimpflug Principle....

The dour assistant is extra.....

It's a great way to practice your custom white balancing skills.

OT: I'm curious to hear what all you smart VSL readers think about the Apple Watch. Will it offer something to photographers?

Image done for Austin Lyric Opera. No real connection to our Apple Watch question. 

But would note that the model is wearing a watch, being lit with tungsten light and photographed with a Nikon 105mm f2 DC lens on a Kodak DCS 760C.

I am interested in what the upcoming Apple Watch will eventually offer to photographers and videographers. Since the watch will be linked to the iPhone will it be possible to do some of the stuff we normally do directly with our phones on the watch? 

For instance, if I am running the Olympus Share camera app on the phone could I see the menu on the watch? If I can see the menu on the watch and control the camera from the watch could I trigger the camera's shutter with a deft touch of the watch face? Could I arrange it so the live view is shared on the watch screen? Can I also watch my heart rate increase if I accidentally drop an expensive lens onto the concrete?

I know that my son's demographic currently has little to no interest in wearing watches and I am genuinely curious (as long time Apple stockholder) to see whether Apple's marketing clout will change that. But I am also interested in what you think about this. 

The watch isn't cheap. The least expensive one is reported to cost about $350. Is this something you will buy? Is it something you would use?

I remember when the iPad was announced. It was soundly ridiculed by everyone on the planet and spoofed on the TV show, Saturday Night Live. By October of 2014 Apple had sold 225,000,000 of the units at an average price of over $600. ( or, $135 billion U.S. dollars of product in four years).

Will the watch enjoy similar popularity or will the need for it to be tied to second product, the phone, limit it's success. Which then introduces another question: if the Watch does become popular enough will Apple also release on that works with Android phones. Will we one day be able to buy an Apple watch to use with a Samsung phone?

What am I waiting for in an Apple Watch? The same thing I've been thinking of since I jotted down a note in 1982. That would be to have an incident light meter in my wrist watch; no matter what company it came from. But, of course, if it all comes to pass I'll need a stronger pair of reading glasses to use it to it's fullest extent... Naw, that's too much.

I'm interested to read your opinions. Hit the comments. 

Thinking about lighting today. Something about sunny days in Spring.

I have one simple lighting design that I use a lot on sunny days. Today is our first sunny day in a while so I thought I'd share an image I did of Emily a while back. We wanted to shoot an image of her toting her bike, along with some other triathlete imagery so we went to the lake and found some nice foliage in the background.

It was full sun and in most cases like this the full sun combined with electronic flash always seems to give me too much fill. I generally put up a 6x6 foot diffusion scrim like the one you see above. It's anchored to two light stands and the connections that hold the scrim to the stand are also wrapped with gaffer's tape to keep them from coming apart in the breeze. 

The scrim is in a position to block almost all of the sunlight striking Emily. We've positioned it to provide a small amount of backlit on Emily's head. Probably just a bit too much....  But we were having too much fun and no one wanted to walk back a mile or so to the car and get a second, smaller, weaker diffusion scrim to finesse the highlight. 

I like to light this way because I can use a big, soft umbrella modifier for the main light and get the highlights to roll off into the shadow areas exactly how I want them to. The main light was a single Profoto Acute B head running off a battery powered Acute 600B generator. The extra power of the Profoto rig allowed me to place the main light exactly where I wanted it (not too close and not too far away) and get exactly the effect I wanted. 

It's just a fun photo and not a big deal but I thought it would be fun to show an actual set up for a change....

A very useful accessory for people using DSLRs and Mirror-Free cameras to produce video. This is a low cost favorite.

BeachTek DXA-2T. A tough little box.

The three different cameras types I have all allow for shooting decent video. The D810 has the best look to the images while the OMD EM5.2 is a great handheld, ENG camera. The image stabilization is nothing short of amazing. In an ambiguous third place is my inexpensive, Nikon D610 which has decent looking video (not as nice as the D810) but no real image stabilization. The one thing all three of these camera have is the ability to manually adjust sound levels. All three also have microphone inputs on the camera as well as headphone jacks for monitoring audio. 

The other thing all three camera types have is not so good. All of them use menu driven (not physical knob controlled) audio level controls. This makes adjusting sound levels during recording a more complicated undertaking. For the lazy filmmaker it may be just the thing to push us into using auto level controls instead of working a little harder to get the audio just right. 

I cheat. I use the little box you see under the camera (above) to do three different things for me when I make video that has to have good sound.

1. I run any external microphones through this box because it has a hard knob (with detents) for each channel (left and right) so this allows me to set a middle level on the camera, say minus 12 dB, and then have the ability to adjust the levels downward via the knobs on the box. The DXA-2T is passive and won't amplify signals but it's a clean way to manually prevent overload into the camera's audio circuits without resorting to ALC and heavy handed limiters. And it beats trying to open up menus on the screen while shooting... 

2. I can run unbalanced stereo mics in through a 3.5mm plug or I can plug in real, balanced mics to the XLR plugs on the box. The advantage here is that the box has internal transformers that match the input characteristics (resistance, etc.) of professional microphones to what the camera's little, pixie pre-amp circuits are expecting. The best match is to microphones like the Rode NTG-2 which has the option of running its own internal pre-amp via a double A battery instead of requiring phantom power (which this box does NOT provide).  The transformers seems to have the effect of reducing noise and matching output and input more efficiently which translates into a stronger, richer signal delivered to the camera.  Being able to adjust the knobs on the box during recording in order to reduce overall volume is a big plus. The only time you'll need to go into the menus are when you need to boost the signal.

3. Sometimes I want to use a Zoom H4n digital audio recorder to record the audio but I also want to run that audio into the camera at the same time. The only way to do that on an H4n is via the "line out" port into the camera's microphone input. But the line out is about 35 dB stronger than what the camera expects (or is designed for) from a microphone and the sound in camera is quickly and sometimes massively overloaded. Unlike the newer digital audio recorders there's no switch on the H4n to drop the signal to match the camera's inputs. But there is such a switch for each channel on the DXA-2T. That means I have the option to run back-up sound right into the camera where I can also monitor it with headphones. 

I could also use the "line in" setting on the box to accept balanced inputs from a mixer like the big one they use at Zach Theatre. Then I can pull clean sound into the camera sound track if I am recording a musical performance without worrying about overloaded signal circuits.

The DXA-2T is a totally passive device which means no batteries and less chance of device generated noise. It's a sturdy little beast and it fits just about anywhere. I carry it in my microphone case along with duplicate cables for everything. It's wonderful not to have to go menu diving to make quick, small adjustments.  I've forgotten what I paid for it which basically means that it's so practical and useful that it's paid for itself many times over. The only issues I have with this box are the times when I forget to pack it and end up leaving it at the studio.