Stradawhovious
Been spending a lot of time on here!
- Joined
- Nov 8, 2010
- Messages
- 3,241
- Reaction score
- 911
- Location
- Minneapolis, MN
- Can others edit my Photos
- Photos OK to edit
Well, OK, I'm not a professional, but I did get a taste of what its like for some of them.
Here's how it started. A good friend of mine helps out with a photographer at sporting events and the like. I expressed my interested in being a fly on the wall at one of these events, since I though it would be a good learning experience. My friend talked to his photographer buddy, and I was invited to shoot along with him at a Pee-Wee hockey round robin today and tommorow.
I started at 7am (central) and just got home now. (9pm central) It was work. No..... really... I mean work. I was expecting to be busy, but not physically exhausted and mentally drained at the end of the day. Allow me to tell you about it. (feel free to stop reading right here... you won't hurt my feelings, it will probably be long... and you seasoned pros will probably roll your eyes.)
Here's how the gig works. We get to the rink a bit beofre the first game to set up. There is a main computer, and a bank of viewing computers set up on a local server. We take pictures of the game (10 games total), and 5 minutes before the game we're shooting ends we haul ass out to the computers ad feed our memory cards to the guy at the main computer. These pictures are loaded into an album labeled with the appropriate team names and face off time, then sent to the bank of viewing consoles. After the game is finished, the parents of the kids on the teams are welcome to view all of the pictures of the game that ended minutes ago. If they see a particular picture of their child they like, they can purchase a 4x6, 5x7, 8x10, or 19x30 on the spot since the photographer also has an array of high quality printers hooked up to the main console. What usually ends up happening is that the team pools their money and buys a copy of the DVD containing all of the pictures from that game for a set price. It generally ends up being about $15 per child give or take depending on how many kids are on the team.
Here's what I learned..... (and this is only for this type of setup and not for most others. I'm sure it will make many pros cringe.....)
1. the image quality that your camera is set at makes a huge difference in this game. In this case, anything higher quality than "Medium Normal JPEG" on my D7000 and the pictures would take too long to peruse, and the parents would get bored and walk.
2. There is NO PP with this. The images go straight from the camera to the consumer. Tiem is of the essense, and this is a impulse buy type gig. If they have to wait........ They generally wont buy, or won't buy as much.
2A. PP on the fly, in the camera is a must. This means Cropping, straightening etc in the camera on the fly.
3. A Nikon 80-200 ED 2.8 lens is HEAVY. Well, not at first, but after about 10 hours of holding it to your face it certainly takes its toll.
4. Coaches don't see you. And if they do, they believe they can walk right through you. This, however, is not the case.
5. Even though these are kids, things happen fast. If you aren't watching through the view finder, you missed a shot. If you see the action happen through the view finder, you missed the shot. If you are busy CHIMPing or futzing with images in the camera, you missed the shot. etc. etc. etc.
6. CHIMPing is kind of a must. Like I said, no PP, and straight to the consumer. We don't want any crap in there, now do we? Bad images makes for badbusiness.
7. I got the hang of it fast. Really fast. By the end of the night I was keeping about 90% of my shots (as opposed to the 50% in the earlier games) and I was PPing on the fly like a pro. A couple of my shots ended up getting printed and sold, and all of them went into the folder to be sold to the teams. ( I was pretty thrilled about that )
Overall impression. I loved it. Every muscle in my body hurts. I'm tired, hungry and frozen to my core. I must have taken 2-3,000 shots today, and I learned a lot. An awful lot....... I learned about my camera, I learned about ambient lighting, I learned about white balance, and I shot the whole thing in Manual. (another first for me.) And before anyone asks, No, I didn't get paid. I didn't expect to get paid. My payment is being allowed to actuate my shutter 3,000 times and get the experience that comes with it. Not to mention get to use one hell of a nice lens all day.
I truly and sincerely can't wait for tomorrow. :mrgreen:
That is all. I'm going to bed....... right after a drink and a shower.
Here's how it started. A good friend of mine helps out with a photographer at sporting events and the like. I expressed my interested in being a fly on the wall at one of these events, since I though it would be a good learning experience. My friend talked to his photographer buddy, and I was invited to shoot along with him at a Pee-Wee hockey round robin today and tommorow.
I started at 7am (central) and just got home now. (9pm central) It was work. No..... really... I mean work. I was expecting to be busy, but not physically exhausted and mentally drained at the end of the day. Allow me to tell you about it. (feel free to stop reading right here... you won't hurt my feelings, it will probably be long... and you seasoned pros will probably roll your eyes.)
Here's how the gig works. We get to the rink a bit beofre the first game to set up. There is a main computer, and a bank of viewing computers set up on a local server. We take pictures of the game (10 games total), and 5 minutes before the game we're shooting ends we haul ass out to the computers ad feed our memory cards to the guy at the main computer. These pictures are loaded into an album labeled with the appropriate team names and face off time, then sent to the bank of viewing consoles. After the game is finished, the parents of the kids on the teams are welcome to view all of the pictures of the game that ended minutes ago. If they see a particular picture of their child they like, they can purchase a 4x6, 5x7, 8x10, or 19x30 on the spot since the photographer also has an array of high quality printers hooked up to the main console. What usually ends up happening is that the team pools their money and buys a copy of the DVD containing all of the pictures from that game for a set price. It generally ends up being about $15 per child give or take depending on how many kids are on the team.
Here's what I learned..... (and this is only for this type of setup and not for most others. I'm sure it will make many pros cringe.....)
1. the image quality that your camera is set at makes a huge difference in this game. In this case, anything higher quality than "Medium Normal JPEG" on my D7000 and the pictures would take too long to peruse, and the parents would get bored and walk.
2. There is NO PP with this. The images go straight from the camera to the consumer. Tiem is of the essense, and this is a impulse buy type gig. If they have to wait........ They generally wont buy, or won't buy as much.
2A. PP on the fly, in the camera is a must. This means Cropping, straightening etc in the camera on the fly.
3. A Nikon 80-200 ED 2.8 lens is HEAVY. Well, not at first, but after about 10 hours of holding it to your face it certainly takes its toll.
4. Coaches don't see you. And if they do, they believe they can walk right through you. This, however, is not the case.
5. Even though these are kids, things happen fast. If you aren't watching through the view finder, you missed a shot. If you see the action happen through the view finder, you missed the shot. If you are busy CHIMPing or futzing with images in the camera, you missed the shot. etc. etc. etc.
6. CHIMPing is kind of a must. Like I said, no PP, and straight to the consumer. We don't want any crap in there, now do we? Bad images makes for badbusiness.
7. I got the hang of it fast. Really fast. By the end of the night I was keeping about 90% of my shots (as opposed to the 50% in the earlier games) and I was PPing on the fly like a pro. A couple of my shots ended up getting printed and sold, and all of them went into the folder to be sold to the teams. ( I was pretty thrilled about that )
Overall impression. I loved it. Every muscle in my body hurts. I'm tired, hungry and frozen to my core. I must have taken 2-3,000 shots today, and I learned a lot. An awful lot....... I learned about my camera, I learned about ambient lighting, I learned about white balance, and I shot the whole thing in Manual. (another first for me.) And before anyone asks, No, I didn't get paid. I didn't expect to get paid. My payment is being allowed to actuate my shutter 3,000 times and get the experience that comes with it. Not to mention get to use one hell of a nice lens all day.
I truly and sincerely can't wait for tomorrow. :mrgreen:
That is all. I'm going to bed....... right after a drink and a shower.
, you will learn how to use your camera while shooting without having to look at the button or even take it away from your eye
