Equipment Review: 1f

I am, as always, busy. This afternoon I am shooting a family portrait or two for my good friend, Rick Barker (I can't mention him too much), promoter of rising country talent and after that, of Janie, a glamor model. I am just finishing work on Engelbert Humperdinck photos as well as Jan and Dean. I am awash in talent.

But today I want to acquaint you with my favorite lens from slot #10: a Canon 300mm f/2.8L IS. This is the lens with which I take my signature concert images: crystal clear head/shoulders shots normally taken from fifteen to twenty feet away in front of the stage. Far enough to be unimposing and near enough to count the freckles and see every imperfection. But lest you get the impression that am collecting a vast catalog of unflattering images of aging stars, I want to assure you that I throw all the unflattering images away ... sometimes 98% of these closeups.

The wonderful thing about this lens is that it is the biggest hand holdable lens in Canon's line. How do I know it is hand holdable? Easy, Canon makes the tripod collar removable and I haven't had it on the lens for over a year. Next obvious question is, aren't all the tripod collars removable? Nope! The slightly bigger brother to this lens is the 400mm f/2.8L IS, that I also own, has a permanent tripod collar. That puppy is just too heavy for hand holding, particularly on a 1D body. This is not to say some people don't do it ... but it is usually on a monopod, although I use mine on a big Gitzo legset with leveling head and Wimberley head. I'm including images of the 300mm f/2.8L IS on this big tripod setup, but isn't how I use it.

The Canon 300mm f/2.8L IS as seen on B&H PhotoVideo isn't cheap ... here's the full description link with a price of $4100, slightly MORE than I paid for it over two years ago. This is one of those classic lenses, like the 70-200mm f/2.8L IS that are so popular that they keep their value over long periods of time.

Here's an image of KC, from KC and the Sunshine band.

When shooting concerts at the casino I almost always have this lens on one of the two 1DMIII bodies I use. I carry both bodies with me, setting one or the other on the floor as I shoot, usually filling the buffer and switching to the other body/lens combination at that point. The images are usually superb from both, but there is something just a little sharper, a little contrastier and brighter from the 300mm f/2.8L IS. The only downside is that you can accidentally get too close and get inside the minimum focal distance.

And an image of the saxophonist from B.B. King's band.


This is a great lens. I have loaned mine a couple of times and caused several to be purchased.

Be Safe!

Dwight

Amber Rhodes: Singer/Songwriter and Lovely Model

I mentioned on Thursday that I was busy and doing all sorts of things that were delaying my Equipment Review. Still promise that it will continue soon. But in the meantime I wanted to share my session with Amber Rhodes (www.AmberRhodes.com) in my studio. I don't know Amber's music, yet, but if she needs a break from the recording studio she can certainly work in the photography studio. Amber is a photographer's delight. Gushing with personality and a natural beauty with perfect skin, she simply took over her own session. She marched in with three outfits and a makeup kit, spent ten minutes getting ready in her first outfit while I did a lighting test with her guitarist, and then marched into the studio already laughing ... a quick wit and ready smile already in high gear.

One of the hallmarks of professional experienced models is that they require very little direction and have a huge range of facial expressions. Amber is every bit of that. She posed. She twirled. She bent, jumped, twisted, turned, plopped down. She gave the 'Girl Next Door' smile, the sultry look, the happy, the pouty, the come-hither. I got to shooting so fast that I popped a circuit breaker twice and got black images where the strobes hadn't recharged.

Amber is an American singer/songwriter out of Lexington, KY. She writes country, rock and pop. She is on the radar, so watch out for her.

Oh, some technical details: all images shot with Canon 1DsMIII and 70-200mm f/2.8L IS lens. Lighting is two Bowens QUADX 3000 generators and five heads. Post processing consisted of LightRoom conversion with some resizing, levels, and color temperature. No retouching ... none ... not a spot removed or skin smoothed. Amber is a natural beauty.

You can see about 60 images in her gallery at my website at http://dwightmccann.com/Glamor/AmberRhodes05222008.html. Let me know what you think.

And once again, I promise to get back to my equipment review project soon.

Be Safe!

Dwight

Lots of Shoots

Well, I got the 400 ballerinas shot: 2055 images. Now delivered to Mike Mesikep. Phew, lots of fun and lotsa work. And I have since shot a 4 year old for a birthday invitation. And last night I shot Amber Rhodes, rising country singer/songwriter in my studio. She was awesome and I will have some shots from the session at some point. Tonight I shoot Englebert Humperdinck at the casino. And Saturday I have a VIP event at the casino with Jan and Dean. Monday I have a model shoot back in my studio. So, I will be picking up on the equipment review sometime in the next few days hopefully but I have been very busy.

400 Ballerinas

I've been so good about posting that I didn't want anyone to think I'm slacking but I likely won't get the next installment of my equipment review for a few days as I am off photographing 400 little ballerinas (well, not ALL are little) through the weekend. The event is the annual Los Olivos Dance Gallery's Center Stage, being performed at Solvang's Theaterfest theater in the round in Santa Barbara County, California. This event is put on by Maggie and Mike Mesikep as the premier recital of dance of all kinds in our little Santa Ynez Valley. It is a community event with dozens of parent volunteers, support of Arts Outreach and many other organizations, and total exhaustion of Mike and Maggie and their staff. It is a joy to watch as well as photograph. [Disclaimer: My six year old daughter attends Los Olivos Dance Gallery and dances in the Center Stage production.]

I am given full and total access, although I have to stay out of the way of the bizillion dancers and stage personnel. But since I can see over the heads of most participants, who are four to eighteen with a few adults thrown in, that's not too hard. This year the tear jerker dance is "Fathers & Daughters" which includes about eight or ten Dads dancing with their own Jazz Dancers. I know a few of the Dads and it tugs strongly on my heartstrings to see them performing ... these are not your young new Dads, they are 40-60 and loving the opportunity.

I gotta download last night's images, so I'm off.

Be Safe!

Dwight

Equipment Review: 1e

Slot #9: I am one of the few photographers I know who carries a tripod in his case all the time: a Gitzo G0012 (discontinued) with a Manfrotto 484 ball head attached. I have at least two other tripods and various other tripod-like gadgets that I will review later on ... one of which is designed to clamp onto your car window ... very neat! And I have a very good monopod that I will also review even though I do think this item is overkill!

But today it's the little Gitzo that could! I did a quick review on the web and couldn't find one, but they ran about $180. Yes, yes, I know that's a lot of money for this tiny little gadget and that doesn't count the Manfrotto 484 ball head which is only $45 at B&H. But this setup is worth the price and trouble to carry it around all the time even when no one else seems to think so, sigh.

The first image is just the tripod and head. The second image is my 5D with 24-105mm f/4L IS lens. Also note that there is a split ring in the strap bracket. I'll talk about that later when I discuss remote shooting with cameras mounted overhead.

I have made two good uses of this puppy, both using my Canon 5D body. First, at concerts where I have access to the stage after sound check with all the instruments sitting there waiting for the show to start, I often pop a fisheye onto the 5D and put it on this little tripod. I then walk around the stage, setting this assembly near instruments and taking time exposures. I have gotten a number of very interesting images that I just couldn't have gotten without a tripod and probably couldn't have gotten with a fullsize one. The Gitzo has both extension legs (just one extension for about six inches) and the center post extends (for about six inches) although I have very rarely used either ... I did once to shoot a CD cover at a concert.

The other frequent use is at the Chumash Casino Resort "Supper Club" VIP events. These are invitation only buffet/sit down dinners with dinner music and entertainment hosted by Linda Nielsen. There are about a dozen tables for seating and each is elaborately decorated for each event by John Blair and his staff with hand made center pieces and lovely settings. While I have to rely on flash to capture these most of the time, I am occasionally able to use the little tripod for stunning ambient light images. I also shoot some of the handsome buffet lines as I did last night as shown in the third image ... no way to get that in ambient light without a tripod.

The last picture today is Ed Zajac with his percussion setup, including timpani, prior to my last Johnny Mathis concert. There would be no way to get this image in the very dim light available prior to the concert, let alone with enough depth of field to catch that harp in the left rear of the image, without a tripod.

I've also used it to capture bands in small clubs where I have a table with a clear view but that is infrequent ... although when I do manage it the images are unobtainable any other way. So take a tip from a Pro, get and use a tripod ... or two or three!

Be safe!

Dwight

Equipment Review: 1d

Busy, busy, busy, busy! Lots of boxing work and family things. But I am back although this will be fairly brief, to do slot #7, which contains one of my Canon 1D Mark III bodies with a Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L IS. I have two of both of these items. They are by far the most used combination of body/lens I own. This pair generally sits in their slot as a pair that I rarely take apart.

The Canon 1D Mark III [not to be confused with the 1Ds Mark III which has about twice as many pixels and costs almost twice as much] is a 10.1 MP photojournalism body. It can expose 10 frames per second, has very high speed AutoFocus (recently fixed by firmware update 1.2.3) and a huge number of features that I have barely tapped. I'm not going to go through the feature list as that is on the Canon website as well as many other places on the internet and there are myriad reviews of the body and lens. It is a photojournalism body because of its frame rate and adequate pixel dimensions. I will talk about how I use it for various things after I get through the general equipment review.

The 70-200mm f/2.8L IS [IS stands for Image Stabilization, a very useful feature for us old shaky people] is probably Canon's most often seen lens. When you see the newspaper 'togs lined up to shoot some celebrity, a large percentage will be shooting with the 1D Mark III and a large percent of those will have the 70-200mm f/2.8L IS. It is just one fine combination. It comes in a non-IS version but that isn't nearly as useful. It also comes in an f/4 version.

Well, that's it for this entry. I promise things will get more interesting along the way. :-)

Be Safe!

Dwight

A Couple of Days of Boxing

ShoBox: The New Generation is Showtime's professional boxing entry level boxing production. They showcase young new boxers who have shown great promise. The Chumash Casino Resort will host two of these fight cards this year and one is about to happen. The fights will be tomorrow night, but there is quite a bit of action that will happen today: the Samala Room will be converted into a boxing arena with a boxing ring erected and lighted; the fighters will arrive in Santa Ynez, California; the California Boxing Commission will arrive and check the credentials of all the participants; Gary Shaw Productions staff will arrive and make sure the boxers and their entourages get their work done; weigh-in; and who knows what else. So, I will be at the casino for the action this afternoon.

And, in case I don't get back to this blog by then, I'll be back at the casino tomorrow afternoon and evening for the entire fight card. I'll try to get some pictures up here as things progress but it is a very busy time so no promises.

Be Safe!

Dwight