OneLove Date Auction | Preview Shots

-Posted by Mark

It’s been a while since I’ve gotten out and about and photographed an event (other than you know, weddings, fashion shows, and working with the Intern Army) – so last night was kind of a change of pace for me. +Laura and I attended One Love Generation‘s Date Auction fundraiser.

“One Love Generation (OLG) is a 501c3 non-profit organization empowering youth to inspire positive social change through art, service and awareness. OLG believes that the arts create awareness and that awareness creates the opportunity for change. The program matches gifted teen artists with professional artist mentors to create studio art projects focusing on specific environmental, socio-economical or philanthropic issues facing our world. Artists and mentees establish relationships with communities throughout the world and work together in developing artistic projects as a way to generate awareness about the issue on a larger scale.”

So. I’m always telling the Interns that every photoshoot is a game of ‘stump-the-photographer’, and last night was no different. When you’re photographing in a place like Johnny’s Hideaway – forget thinking that you can just use ‘natural light’. You need to bring in some flash. Now you can go the normal route of on-camera (which we did half the time) – but if you’re up to the task of even better photos – you’ll find some way to set up some speedlights off camera.

But you start with on-camera to see what it looks like: (and if you’re the boss – you make +Laura stand in to test the light.)

This is with the speedlight on my camera – and aimed up at the ceiling tilted about 35 degrees forward. Usable but not super awesome glamorous! So we went with the two light setup. You can see the lightstands on +Laura’s left and right. There are actually TWO speedlights on each stand, taped together. I wanted +Laura to be able to use the light setup as well, but we didn’t have room to have FOUR lightstands up there – so hey – in case you’re new to us here at LeahAndMark & The Intern Army – we are not limited by our gear and we just come up with whatever works.

So we have the two lights crossing each other and aimed towards the middle of the ‘stage’ – meaning that we didn’t have a ‘fill’ light. Then I noticed that there was a disco ball – and decided/hoped that it would reflect back enough light. (And yes – I know that if we had brackets then we could have fill light without setting up another lightstand.)

After I’ve set up my lights and while I’m waiting for things to begin – I do still kind of get anxious. I mean – conditions change – people move – and I may or may not be able to make any changes to the light stands after things start. You just never know. So you set up your lights in a way that you’ll get the most coverage, with an interesting look, and with the highest probability of not sucking once things start. You just have to be better than your gear, the people moving and blocking your view – and all the while aware of the movement that’s going on. Things don’t only happen on stage – and you have to make sure you get the ‘audience’ reactions or else you’ll just end up with a gallery of pretty photos. Pretty boring photos.

Have a great weekend. We’ll post the link to the full gallery soon. Thank you.