Neil Danton

Thought I’d post something different today, and shock horror, there are no people in today’s images. Instead, laydees n gennulmen, I bring you CAKES!:

Black Forest and Madarin gateaux to be precise.

Not just big cakes though, you could also have something more bite-size. Chocolate or fruit?:

Maybe a slice of Apple & Cinnamon?:

Or a piece of Madeira perhaps?:

All these cakes are handmade and the fresh cream ones are unbelievable. Have a slice of one of these Swiss Rolls?:

All these images were produced for a bakery who make them all in-house, by hand, for wholesale and retail customers. One of the nice advantages of shooting commercial photography in Cork is that sometimes you get to shoot something you can eat!

Fresh Cream Slice anyone?:

My tastes would be more towards savoury things in all honestly and so I’m not a huge fan of sweet things, at least regarding food

I saved my favourite until last though, as I could definitely go for one of these at any time!

Fresh Cream Eclairs, wonderful!

TTFN

..Ladies. Or Gentlemen I suppose. *Not wishing to appear judgemental*

Here’s something that’s a bit different, and I only use it to point out a couple of things (well three actually having thought about it).

This was an editorial shoot for a beauty/female supplement and the focus was on the make-up:

Point 1: Use a custom white-balance. Don’t want the different skin tones as the make-up is applied to affect the white-balance and the camera try to compensate.

Point 2: Use a 2-light set-up. In this case I used one of the classics for ladies, the over-under. Your subject will love you for it. If the focus was on the hair, I would have added a 3rd as a hair-light to err, highlight the hair.

Point 3: I’ve only thrown this composite together very quickly, so the images don’t line-up 100% but that’s the 3rd point to note. Use a fixed focal length lens instead of a zoom. You are more likely to stand in the same place then and get the same aspect ratio of the subject. You need to either use a tripod to maintain the camera position (I don’t like using a tripod) or put some kind of mark on the floor to maintain the same position for each shot.

I find it easiest to take a hammer with me, and use a couple of 6 inch nails to secure my feet to the floor. Maintaining the same position is pretty easy after that.

TTFN

Had an editorial shoot recently where I was asked to photograph a music student, at a piano. Nothing remarkable in the shoot, except it took me 3 lights to get the effect I wanted, and I’m not sure what I wanted was what the publication wanted, because the article didn’t run in the end! Oh well, my vision for portraits doesn’t always coincide with the poorly-lit cheesy-grin portraits that seem to be used in abundance.

We had access to the CIT Cork School of Music, where they have a large quantity of Steinway pianos (so many in fact, they have a Steinway engineer permanently on site to ensure they are tuned to perfection). A Steinway is a work of art in itself and I wanted to capture some of the beauty of it in the portrait.

Here is my first test shot with a one-light set-up. I was quite surprised at the result, mainly as I had forgotten that the previous day I was shooting in Monochrome mode!

In all honesty, if it was my publication I would probably have used that image. However, it’s not my publication, so…

Here’s the same thing when I switched back to colour:

It’s alright, but because of the position of the one-light and the obstruction of the piano lid, the light is too much from one side. I added a second fill light from the left (didn’t keep a copy of that test, DUH) and that was better, but the inside workings of the piano weren’t visible, so added a third with a snoot, just to light up the inside.

Here’s one of the resultant images, which I like because of the subject’s reflection on the piano lid:

and here’s a second that shows more of the lit piano interior, but less reflection:

Can’t make up my mind which I prefer. What’s your preference?

Either way, I got to listen to some fabulous piano solos while I was working

TTFN

Fortunately, we both managed to avoid a soaking, although I came pretty close to it.

A second look at the back-story to creating a fairly simple editorial image. Nothing remarkable in the image as such, pretty standard fare for an editorial feature in a sunday newspaper. Fairly shallow depth of field to focus on the “widget” (yep did the reverse image as well, with the subject in focus and the “widget” out of focus).

It’s the setting-up that I’m detailing…

The subject is an engineer and the “widget” is part of a system that assists visually impaired people with swimming. Anyway, the sunday newspaper in question really wanted a image taken in a swimming pool environment and a local leisure centre were happy to oblige us – but we could only have access before they opened for the day (no cameras or phones allowed in swimming pool areas nowadays).

OK fine then. “What time are you open to the public?”

“7am”

“and what time do the staff open-up?”

“06:30/06:40″

Now that in itself wouldn’t be a problem, nice early start, get shoot done, off for breakfast.

One small fly in the ointment – having experienced shooting swimming competitions, I know that generally it takes AT LEAST an hour, sometimes longer, for all the metal, glass and electronics in a camera to adjust to the very high humidity in an indoor pool area.

So three conditions then. Opening time (fixed), kicking us out time (fixed), camera equipment fogging up (hmmm, maybe a variable there).

I had to make a choice on equipment at 6am and stick to that choice. The gear was put into the passenger foot-well of the vehicle and I drove to the pool with the vehicle heater on full blast. Happened to be in a period of fairly warm & humid weather which rarely happens here. Brilliant, I’m wearing shorts & a t-shirt and the heater thinks it’s mid-winter.

Arrived at the pool, almost fell out of the vehicle which, even with the windows open, was like being in a greenhouse by then, left the heater on until the moment we gained access at 06:40, and then carried the gear inside wrapped in a fleece!

The pool area was fairly hot, but the actual pool is covered with a canvas overnight so the humidity wasn’t over-bearing. By the time the canvas had been reeled in we were set to go, 5 or 6 images and we were done, just as I could feel the humidity starting to rise from the water.

No fogging on camera or lens, and exited the leisure centre at 06:59

Above is my preferred image, but the paper used this one:

Think that’s the earliest I’ve done a shoot, done post-processing, transmitted to picture desk, had breakfast, and all by 8am!

TTFN

It was a lot trickier to line up all 4 eyes than you might imagine!

TTFN

…Don’t They?

Apologies if you’ve just used a search-engine and are looking for the 1969 Sydney Pollack directed film about a dance marathon, but this is nothing to do with it.

This is about me shooting horses, actually more about shooting a horse-trainer, and only shooting with a camera.

I was assigned last week by one of the “Sundays” to head out into the countryside early on a very cold morning to shoot a feature on former jockey, now trainer, Jim Culloty. Jim won many races as a jockey, including the Cheltenham Gold Cup three times in succession aboard Best Mate.

I met up with the journalist and we arrived together, so while the interview was taking place, I was off scouting locations and setting up lights.

By the time the interview was finished, I had my shot-list sorted out in my head, and lights set-up in two locations.

First up was a shot in the Yard, one-light with a mini softbox:

Then there was an archway that led from the Yard to the Gallops and I wanted something there. This was going to be quite difficult to balance the daylight coming into the arch from the Yard, with the darkness underneath the arch itself. I had set-up two lights on stands behind the conveniently located doors that hid them, both firing out towards the entrance at about 45deg. As best I could guess I had the power about right, at least that’s what the images of the back of my hand were telling me!

I had my subject lead a horse through the archway, and believe it or believe it not, I’d nailed the flash-power with the 1st image:

I made another couple in different locations, here’s one:

The one that was used was actually taken in one of the stables, no lights, just subject interacting with one of the horses. Out of about 6 frames I chose this one to transmit and it was used pretty-near full page width:

That was it. 15 minutes to set-up lights, 20 minutes shooting, 5 minutes to pack-up lights and 30 minutes & 20 miles down the road before I could feel my fingertips again.

TTFN

…appreciate the things you take for granted, when suddenly you have to do without one of them.

Few people even think about the “normal” things that are always “just there” like electricity, running-water, cable or satellite TV and nowadays of course internet access. I recently had to struggle along for a week without broadband, as the average life expectancy for a Netopia modem that Eircom supply seems to be about six months (I’m now on my third).

The latest “doing without” is running water, as a result of the pumping station that supplies half of Cork City being under several metres of water. Why it was located in a place that to my certain knowledge floods on average once a year I don’t know. OK, so it’s never flooded that much before, but in a country where it rains so much, it comes as a surprise to me that it comes as a surprise to others that sometimes … it rains a lot.

The waffling excuses valid explanations being uttered so far, such as “unprecedented” and “once in a lifetime occurrence” aren’t bringing much comfort to the 100,000 people that are struggling along at the moment. Of course there are lots of politicians, public authorities and utilities helping to put things right by scoring points off each other in the media as to whose fault it all is, but right now they’d be appreciated a lot more if they offered someone the use of their showers.

The fact that the government has now got involved and set-up a “task-force” fills me with lots of confidence of course, and so I now expect things should be resolved by 2025 (and I don’t mean almost half-past eight).

So anyway, last week I needed to get an image of a chef with an “alternative Christmas lunch” and the dish was salmon, which I thought was appropriate. Salmon – fish – water – get it? Oh c’mon, I know it’s a pretty tenuous link but I’m doing my best under difficult circumstances. I’ve had to reduce my coffee intake by 50% due to lack of water.

This was going to be a real quick image. Chefs are always busy, so I only had a few minutes with Paul, the head-chef at Actons Hotel in Kinsale. Easiest thing was to kill-off the ambient light and distracting background by under-exposing the scene by around 4EV, and lighting him solely with lighting I have control over.

I always keep one flash in my bag that is set to slave mode and manual power which works nicely with an ST-E2 transmitter. It’s a struggle sometimes if used outdoors, as the infra-red transmitter doesn’t always fire the flash, but indoors I’ve never had a problem. Used a mini-softbox on the flash, 3 test shots to get the exposure correct, half a dozen shots of different angles and poses and job done:

I then took a different dish with a different subject (thanks Tania), and then one of the two of them together and all done. 15 minutes, start to finish.

If only the engineers could get the water supply back on that quickly.

TTFN