Letter to a young photographer

Rex,
I’m always happy to help.  Right off I have to say I like the glass
you’re using. 18-200 gives a tremendous amount of flexibility in
composition.  You didn’t mention how fast it was so my first piece of
advice is to always try to buy lenses that are 2.8 or better.  This
will help you get shots in dimly lit churches without having to boost
your ISO to the point of adding noise to your pictures.

You said that you are using a SB600 flash and that you had some
trouble shooting in fluorescent light.  This problem has a very cheap
fix.  You can use colored gels to make the light from your flash match
the ambient light or (in this case) to correct for the ambient light.
If you’re using flash outdoors you can make your flash match the color of
the sunlight, giving you that natural look that is so popular today.
It will also help turn a cloudy day into something a tad less
depressing.  A pack of gels should run you about $25 and is something
you should always have on you.

You can also use a bounce board to put sunlight where you want it so
you don’t have to use flash at all.  This method works great when you’re
dealing with portraits because you’re not distracting your client with
blinding light every three seconds.  Office depot sell a pack of white
foam core poster boards for $20.  I use these poster boards as a
simple bounce board.  I also tape several together to make a giant
free standing “V” and either bounce sunlight or flash off of it.  You
can also put your flash head on a stand and park it in the middle of
the “V” and put the light exactly where you want it.  Put a “V” on
either side of a model, park a flash inside of each one and set the
flash to F8.  This gives a very nice high fashion look.

Anyway, I could go on all day.

Go to www.Strobist.com, this is a great site that will teach you all
you ever wanted to know about flash.  They also have a “boot camp”
section with assignments for you to send in and they will critique
them for you.

Also check out Youtube for free instructional videos. Never spend $ on
books or videos without looking on youtube first. Just search for
Photography lighting setups, Photography How to….you get the idea.

Feel free to hit me up with any questions you might have.  I’ll give
you an answer if I have one and make something up if I don’t. 

–
Have a good one,

Daniel Troutman
503.871.5505
www.troutmanphoto.com

Vowing to Spend Less on Weddings

Vowing to spend less on weddings from The Washington Times

By Gabriella Boston  

Saying “I do” is costing less these days as Americans are slashing their wedding budgets. Just two years ago, the average American wedding cost around $28,000. Early figures from this year show the average at about $19,000 for 2009. Analysts in the wedding industry say they think those numbers will fall further as American spouses-to-be continue to shave everything from professional photography to professionally designed and printed invitations from their overall wedding budgets. Other belt-tightening wedding trends include smaller weddings and an ever-growing do-it-yourself market, says Shane McMurray, chief executive and founder of the Wedding Report Inc., a Tucson, Ariz.-based research company that tracks and forecasts number of weddings, spending and consumer trends for the wedding industry. “Part of it is the recession,” Mr. McMurray says, “but I would also say that the wedding industry is changing bad economy or not.”

Sharon Naylor, author of “1001 Ways to Save Money Have a Dazzling Wedding,” agrees and says we’re moving into a more “modest wedding cycle” compared to the opulence that started in the 1980s and meant couples were spending the equivalent of a down payment on a house on their wedding.

“At the same time, everybody is concerned about not losing the magic of the day,” Ms.-requested- Naylor says. “But they also know they don’t need a 20-tiered wedding cake .”

In fact, says Cho Phillips of the Roseville, Calif.-based Wedding Planning Institute, which offers accredited courses in wedding planning, the tiered wedding cake increasingly is being replaced by its cheaper cousins: cupcakes and cheesecake.

Other cost-cutting measures: more and more couples are engaging in DIY as it relates to everything from wedding invitations (in fact, about 48 percent of brides do their own invitations – including various online versions – according to the Wedding Report) to using an iPod as musical entertainment instead of a DJ or live music.

But, says Ms. Naylor, don’t go too far in the cost-cutting frenzy or yours might be the wedding people remember as the one with the boring music, bad food and expensive booze. (Ms. Naylor strongly advises against having a cash bar: “Guests are already spending so much just to be there.”)

No one wants that for their special day. Instead, Ms. Naylor says, look at ways to save money where it doesn’t show.

“What impresses people are creative, unique weddings,” Ms. Naylor says.

For example, pick flowers that are local and seasonal or just unusual. How about begonias instead of roses for a June wedding?

How about doing a cocktail reception at a marina overlooking yachts instead of a pricey sit-down dinner at a hotel ballroom without a view?

As for the booze, pick two or three wines and two or three signature cocktails for the guests’ choice and then limit the open bar to a certain – smaller – number of hours and make sure you don’t pay a corking fee.

Another great cost-cutter, Ms. Naylor says, is to pick a time and date that is not in the peak popularity zone, meaning anytime between October and May.

“Timing is everything. You could save up to 40 percent on the reception by picking a Saturday afternoon in April instead of doing a Saturday night in September,” Ms. Naylor says.

Another big trend is in-kind help from family and friends. For example, someone with great handwriting offers to do the invitations and a superorganized person deals with the vendors.

“Tap into people’s talents and skills,” Ms. Naylor says. “It can be their wedding gift to you.”

All this means one thing for vendors, Mr. McMurray says. “They have to rethink their strategy.”

For example, he predicts that DJs and photographers the hardest-hit wedding vendors will take on more of a consulting role as opposed to doing all the work themselves.

Some segments of the wedding industry are doing well, however, including spa treatments, live music and honeymoon travel.

In the end, there is no formula for right or wrong when it comes to weddings, Ms. Naylor says.

“Build your own priority list,” she says. “It’s a game of math where you get to splurge where you need to.”

School Pictures – What goes wrong and why

The apathy in this country never ceases to amaze me.  And I realize that it might be hard for someone who doesn’t know me to make the jump from a bad school photo to all the troubles of the world, but hang with me for a moment. 

My daughter had her picture taken by the school photographer this year.  We didn’t used to do this because Daniel is a photographer and the pictures are much better etc etc.  However, as the kids have aged, not getting your picture taken has become a social faux pas.  So we’ve sucommed to our childrens’ peer pressure and indulged them.

What a complete waste of money.  The only upshot of Danae’s picture this year is that we didn’t buy many of them.  This is Danae’s photo for fourth grade:

What adult doesn’t help her push her headband up? Or help her comb her bangs down where they belong?   What about  families who can’t afford pictures and this is all they get all year long?  I was incensed and enraged. 

 And for me it immediately come back to people not caring, and not taking the time.  When we were little, or perhaps, I should say, when I was little, we stood in line, we had a little comb they handed out, our teachers looked us over before we were allowed to sit down, collars were straightened, buttons buttoned.  Unfortunately in this day of “do you want fries with that” teachers have 30 students, and no time for the niceties.

 So no, next year, instead of paying for pictures, I’m going to stand tall – hand over wallet photos that they can share amongst their friends and remain firm.  Because until we stop paying for bad pictures, why would they stop taking them?