Fire under the table

November 30, 2009 | Filed Under photo | Leave a Comment 

I don’t usually shoot or post abstract work, but I was in a mood yesterday with my lensbaby. I’d accidentally taken a shot with the cam pointed under the table at a Starbucks, and decided to purposely shoot a few more. This was one result.

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Champion and the G Strings on Q

November 29, 2009 | Filed Under photo | Leave a Comment 

These guys are the most awesome dance-rock band on the planet. The albums, while good, do not do justice to their live show wherein DJ Champion (guy on the laptop) literally conducts the guitar orchestra for 90 minutes of music with no breaks. Shot info below the pic.

One of those instances where I brought lights to the CBC Q studio. From the first pic, there’s one to the singer’s right casting the main harsh light, and behind him is another SB600 bouncing off the white ceiling for fill on his back. Same setup for the other shots, if you can suss out the locations of the subjects. Shot it all at ISO 800, somewhere around F/5-ish. The four-guitar shot probably had me drop to ISO 400 and knock down my aperture to F/3.2 I believe.

The Strombo Show

November 17, 2009 | Filed Under photo | Leave a Comment 

Just prior to The Strombo Show’s launch on CBC Radio 2, George put the shoe on the other foot and was interviewed by Rich Terfry of Radio 2 Drive about his new gig. Used two lights, think one behind the camera to Strombo’s right and above him hitting him directly, and another to his left bouncing off the ceiling and also hitting him direct. One of them might’ve had a diffuser on them, can’t recall. Iso 160 (not 1600), f/3.5, and 1/160 to cut down on ambient light.

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Steeping Tea

November 16, 2009 | Filed Under photo | 2 Comments 

Earl Grey vanilla tea, that is. Long day at work, third bit of caffeine so far. Always NEED MOAR caffeine.

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Maple Leaf Garden’s media room

November 10, 2009 | Filed Under photo | Leave a Comment 

I’m working Battle of the Blades for the mothercorp, and my gig required me to spend a lot of time waiting. During that time, I decided to venture down some stairs in the media room and see what was there - looks like it was forgotten, pants and all. Here’s a slideshow of six shots, and you can fullscreen it with a button in the lower right corner. Shot at 1600 and 3200 ISOs and cranked for max graininess.

Steve Dawson’s bassist’s bass

November 4, 2009 | Filed Under photo | Leave a Comment 

Steve Dawson was in the studio for a performance recording the other day and I decided I didn’t want to light everything with harsh direct light for a change. I bounced two sb600s off a wall and a ceiling (click here for a setup shot) so they would act more like giant soft-boxes, and both were gelled for tungsten. Is it just me or is tungsten light never what the gels are? That’s what RAW is for, though… Shot at F/3.5, 1/60 shutter and at iso 1600 to let some of the ambient burn in a bit. If the light is good, iso 800-3200 on a D90 will look good, so don’t shy away from higher ISOs unless you’re shooting stock.

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A Capella at Nuit Blanche 2009

November 2, 2009 | Filed Under photo | Leave a Comment 

I was hired to shoot an exhibit at Haut House at UofT for Nuit Blanche. While most of the works on display required me to take very “dry” shots (I’d use lights but not to really show things different from the way anyone could see the work), Juliana Pivato here was doing a roaming A Capella performance piece. Took about 2 minutes to set up and ended up producing my favourite shot of the whole gig using two lights. It’s a dark shot that has more detail in it than an uncalibrated monitor will show, but nonetheless I still like it a lot when viewing it again and posting it from this non-workstation computer.
I had an SB600 on a stand going through a shoot-thru umbrella just barely out of frame pointed at Juliana (shoot-thrus are great for getting in realllly close without a metal pole hitting the subjects eye, like a reflective umbrella might do).
I also had an SB28 at the top of the stairs and to the side lighting up the area a wee bit. It works because of the hanging light which appears to be casting the light source, even though it was way too dim to actually cast any light on the walls for the shot. Here’s a closer test shot before I told Juliana that I was set up and she could continue her performance.

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I think the main reason I like this shot so much is that I think I figured out the best possible way to capture an A Capella performance piece without the benefit of accompanying audio or video.

Canada Reads 2010 team

November 2, 2009 | Filed Under photo | Leave a Comment 

Some of the key members of the CBC Canada Reads team, doing some shoots to prep for the next event (starts in December). Relatively simple shoot, a single white reflective umbrella with an SB600 inside it, hand held by a colleague. The background is a red pillar on the 10th floor of the Toronto CBC building, and its roundness is what’s giving that pleasant gradient. Easily repeatable for other team members. ISO 200, F/4.5, 1/125. Don’t recall the flash settings, probably somewhere around 1/2 power. Wish I’d used a reflector on the shadows, but I still like how these turned out. Click here for a lighting diagram.

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