Hard/Spot News: Southern Utah Performing Arts Festival

 I decided to shoot Southern Utah's Performing Arts Festival for my hard news assignment. While shooting this assignment, I couldn't help but notice how similar this type of photography was to shooting a wedding reception. I strapped on my telephoto lens, and tried to sit back in the crowd and document what I saw without being noticed, much like I would at a wedding reception. But I guess if you think about it, shooting an event like a wedding reception can sort of be considered photo-journalistic.  

As someone who used to perform in SUPAF, I kind of had the competitive advantage while shooting, because I knew what to look for, and I knew what would make interesting shots. I also had a background understanding of what the event was, so I didn't have to ask, or figure it out on my own. 

I think that the main difficulty of shooting this even was that it was the fact that the visual scenes that occur are so repetitive.  Something else is that I was definitely a little bit self conscious about how loud my shutter was... and I couldn't figure out how to make it less noisy. Woops!

All in all, I'd say that I got a somewhat successful take, given that it was so dark, and that my telephoto lens isn't super great.

Portraiture Part II

So, portraiture part II was fun. I experimented with alternative Rembrandt and glamour lighting situations, and it was really interesting. If I had to say that I specialized in one aspect of photography, single portraiture would be it. Normally though, when I go into a portrait session, I don't think about the lighting situation beforehand. I get there, and I move my subject, or my lights until I find something pleasing to my eye. It was really beneficial for me to go into these portraits with an idea of what lighting scheme I wanted.



I used a south facing window for these portraits of my dad. I went into these with the thought that, because the southern light would be more harsh, I might be able to get a harsher triangle. I'm actually not sure that I accomplished that, because I would consider this more of a split lighting scheme, but it was still really fun to play with.

I took this portrait on Friday, around 3:00p.m. on top of Angels Landing. This one really doesn't have anything to do with the lighting schemes that we went over in class, but I thought that it was a good example of how to expose using the sun as a back light. 

I went into this portrait session thinking that I would use the diffused sunlight to create something similar to glamour lighting. I shot these over the weekend at sunset, and there were a few clouds in the sky breaking up the lighting. I'm really happy with how these turned out, and I think that out of all of my experimental shots, these turned out the best.

The next few shots consist of a mixture of different lighting techniques. My sister came on a shoot with me, and as we waited for my client to show up, we shot a few. The first few were shot in the shade, and are more evenly lit, and I used harsher, more direct light for the last few to create Rembrandt, and attempted to create glamour lighting. 

 Rembrandt

 Rembrandt

 Attempted glamour - turns out that high sun doesn't really work for glamour lighting... haha

Portraiture

Rembrandt Lighting

  I love Rembrandt Lighting. This lighting style is so classic, obviously, and I think that it gives such a professional feel to the subject. I think that is one of the biggest benefits and characteristics that are achieved from using this lighting style.

Glamour Lighting 

Glamour lighting is great, especially for women. Although people don't realize it, "good selfie lighting" is often quite similar to glamour lighting. Even lighting is created on the face to erase wrinkles, blemishes, and defined features.

Low Key Exposure

High Key Exposure 

Terrence High and Low Key Exposure

 

 Brooke High and Low key Exposure

 Natural Glamour Lighting

Natural Rembrandt Lighting 

Editing Andrew's Take 

I chose to edit Andrew's take. I really liked his photos, because the coloring was spot on, especially for studio lighting, which can be really difficult to white balance, and post process. I brightened all of them up a little bit, added some contrast, and a little bit of warmth and sharpness. This is basically all that I do to my raw images, so I tried it with his.

 

Photo by Andrew Pinckney

Photo by Andrew Pinckney

Photo by Andrew Pinckney

Photo by Andrew Pinckney

Photo by Andrew Pinckney

Photo by Andrew Pinckney

Favorite Portraits of Me

I actually really enjoyed this exercise. It definitely took me out of my comfort zone, as I am generally only comfortable in front of my own camera. It was a really good experience, and gave me some insight into what my subjects, and my clients might feel like. This is something that, believe it or not, I feel like we don't do as often as we should in the art department. We usually contract, or find a model and shoot them, rather than ourselves. It makes sense, but I'm still really grateful for this exercise. These are two of my favorites, from what has been uploaded thus far.

Photo by Andrew Pinckney

Photo by Annette Frazier