Preparing for Proper Lighting - Event Photography
I love capturing photos of my kiddos. When our first one was born, I used to come home, sit on the floor with my camera and used to capture candid moments. They mostly turned out to be my kiddo trying to reach for the camera, but the attempt to grab it and the ensuing smile has given me tons of memories I go back to. The challenge consistently has been what to do when the kid's birthday arrives. At first, I used to just photograph the kiddos and Manali on the day of the birthday. I was ok being left out of the frame, which will be unique when the kiddos look back and don't find me in the frame.
Over time we realized we needed good family photos and started looking for help. With a modest budget, we struggled to find a decent photographer to cover our event. We didn't need 5 photographs. It was not a session, but we needed a ton of candids with the guests and some group photos to look back on.
The next challenge was aligning the stars to make the scheduling work. This was almost the deal breaker with most of the budget photographers we found. We pushed ourselves to plan better and early. One of the photographers had to cancel 2 days before, and luckily we found a backup. This led me to help our friends to cover their kid's birthdays. I have covered a couple of birthdays, which has given me a great experience. Photographing your own family is different than going out there to do it professionally. Expectations are different, and there are very few retake opportunities.
I will be covering a birthday event in a few weeks. Before any project, I tried to do a bit of a reconnaissance of the location. The lighting scene is critical to me, and planning ahead for illumination challenges. The Sony is a workhorse and has an excellent low-light camera which gives me great confidence, but the Sony can't conjure magic from the god light.
The first thing I check when I visit a venue is to understand the direction of the south in comparison to the location of the setup. Being in the northern hemisphere, the south-facing windows will give the most illumination depending on the time of the event. Next, I try to be at the location around the same time as the event. In this case, the event is supposed to start from 1130 to 1500. The Sun is expected to be overhead.
Now, unto what has been bugging me since I visited the venue. The window wall against which the birthday decor is planning to be set up is on the Southside, which means I will get a ton of background illumination. If you have ever taken photos, you know that a light source behind a subject will result in silhouette, which is a fancy term for saying the subject's feature will be darker.
In the photos I got from our friends, I thought there should be enough light given the windows around the venue, but my personal experience when I visited was otherwise. The indoors were quiet, shadowy and dingy. The venue is excellent to host parties but not kind to photographers.
This led me to pull out the trusty flashes I have been experiencing ever since. I even thought about using softboxes, but the problem with softboxes is that they need to be closer to the subject and are not ideal for groups of people which is more common for event photography. My first instinct was to bounce light off the ceiling, but interestingly there is a beam right above where the birthday decor is to be set up, which I suspect will cast hard shadows on top of the frame. I have enough say to move the decor out of the shadow zone, but I can't leave anything to chance, so I started strategizing all the scenarios and options to mitigate the lighting concerns.
I have so far come to the following options. I want to go to the venue ahead of time(at least an hour ago) to try out what works best. I prefer to avoid carrying flashes around as they are bulky and limit my ability to use burst, which is more helpful while photographing kids as they move so fast, and it is tough to freeze or get the right photos. One other issue I have that flash leaves a unique light pattern in the eyes. One reason why I need to have options is to diffuse the light. The current options for the lighting situation are as follows:
1. Use a flash on the camera and bounce off the ceiling. This will require setting up the decor at the proper distance from the wall to prevent the beam from casting shadows
2. Use two flash stands with a remote trigger. I have ordered some diffusers, and manually setting up the flash will help reduce the harsh shadows.
3. Once I am done with group photos, I have ordered flash bounces that simulate a 45-degree ceiling and go right above the flashes. This makes my setup ridiculously bulky, but I think I can hook it up and carry it anywhere. I intend to turn ON and OFF the flash depending on the light scene. I have yet to experiment with this, but as soon as they are delivered, I will get my model (my wife) and try it out against the window.
4. I got some continuous light with light boxes which is my last option, and I may only try it if all others fail, but my bet is on option 3 with the simulated 45-degree ceiling
I will do some test shots and share it as part of a follow-up post. I am excited to cover this event. Wish me luck!