Q/A Specialization In Photography

March 28th, 2008 Dave Scott

Paul in Grand Prairie, TX writes:

Dave

I stopped by your website and it looks like you shoot a lot of different types of subject matter. Isn’t it better to specialize in one or two types of photography?

Paul

I don’t believe so. When I started out, I did a lot of work for newspapers. I was very green, very young, extremely motivated, and was young enough to have the energy to take on almost every assignment offered to me. I needed to shoot a wide variety of subject matter. Rather than helping me find the one or two subjects that I would spend the rest of my life shooting, it actually showed me the similarities in shooting different subject matter. I now look at all subject matter the same way, always keeping in mind the use of main light, fill light, highlights, shadow, camera angle, focal length of lens, background, etc. These are all the things you should be considering when you shoot. Sometimes you’ll have control over everything like when you shoot in a studio setting. Other times you’ll have very little control like when shooting sports in available light. Just remember to stop, assess your shooting situation, and control what you have the ability to control. As you gain more experience you will be able make these assessments before hand and determine if you want to take on a particular assignment or not.

Just remember, your choice of subject matter is wide open. My opinion is that photography is much more than subject matter. I like working with subject matter that is familiar to me and easy to shoot as well as assignments that pose technical challenges and a lot of planning. That’s one of the best things about our profession, we all have plenty of choices.

The image above was produced a few weeks ago for a corporate brochure. I’ll be providing full details about this shoot in a future article. In the mean time, please visit the website of Erick Anderson, the graphic designer on that project. I am sure you will find his work as impressive as I do. www.emoeba.com.

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Q/A Finding The Money To Start Your Business

March 15th, 2008 Dave Scott

Reader, Anthony, in Houston TX writes:

Dave

It seems to be a catch 22. I am on a shoestring budget and trying to get my photography business off the ground but I am not generating enough money to actually purchase the equipment that I need to do any studio type work. I’d like to buy studio lighting that I can take on location to do portraits and such.

When starting a new business it is important to fund said venture. In photography, I notice that many people believe that they can simply buy a camera and lens and go into business. Photography is no different than any other type of business. You need a certain amount of capitol and equipment in order to get started. And No, regardless of what you’ve read elsewhere, shooting portraits on location with available light with your one camera body and two lenses is not what I consider a photography business.

The way I got my business started in the early 80s was to drop out of college and go to work in a machine shop for 2 years in order to bank enough money to open a studio.

Let’s get back to Anthony’s question.

I emailed back and forth a few times with Anthony to find out a bit more about his situation. What I found out was interesting. Every weekday, Anthony buys two coffees and eats lunch at a restaurant. I did a quick check of what that would cost me in my area. Two coffees would cost me $3.78 and an average lunch would run me around $6.00 (I don’t eat large lunches). Essentially, if I did the same thing Anthony did, it would cost me $9.78 per day.

Now, let’s calculate what I actually do.

COFFEE:
I buy Starbucks Breakfast blend by the pound for $10.50. That pound yields me 36 cups of coffee. My cost per cup of coffee, including cream and sugar, comes to $0.43. My total cost for two cups of coffee per day is $0.86.

LUNCH:
I make my own lunch. I have a sandwich (some type of meat and cheese), chips or crackers, and a piece of fruit every day for lunch. My total cost for lunch is $1.43.

If I spent as Anthony does on coffee and lunch it would cost me $9.78 per day. I actually spend $2.29 per day for the same items. That saves me $7.49 per day. That’s a whopping $149.80 a month! Every two months Anthony could purchase about $300 worth of equipment.

Let’s take a look at what you can get with $300:

• Photogenic StudioMax III 320 Watt/Second ($259.50)
• 33″ Impact Umbrella - White Translucent ($9.95)
• Impact Compact Air Cushioned Light Stand (34.95)

That comes to a total of $304.40. There is your photographic lighting equipment for a one light set-up. Make your purchase and get started learning how to use your new equipment. That means take it out of the boxes and try experimenting. Make mistakes and improve. For a look at business portraits that were shot on location and with one strobe visit one of my business portrait sample pages HERE. All images were shot with one strobe except the top, left image. Can you make money with a one light set-up? Absolutely, yes. The 11 images on that page were part of a 30 person business portrait job.

There are plenty of ways to tighten our belts to make our dreams happen.

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Q&A Equipment for High School Sports

March 10th, 2008 Dave Scott

This question is from Bethany from Calabassas CA. Bethany writes:

Dave

I am an amateur photographer and a mom of two high school athletes. I’ve asked on a couple forums about equipment that I would need and it sounds like I am going to need to spend a lot of money to be able to photograph indoor sports. Also, I shoot Nikon right now but most people on the forums say I’ll need to shoot Canon because that is what all of the pros use.

Any advice?

Thank you!

Bethany

The wonderful Canon vs Nikon debate.

I seriously dislike this debate. When I consider what I was using 26 years ago to shoot sports, I find it comical that anyone makes these statements. Two and a half decades ago I was shooting sports for magazines and newspapers and I was making better images than the folks who keep these debates alive are shooting today. Both brands are excellent. While you see quite a lot of Canon equipment at pro and top NCAA events there are also top sports shooters that are using Nikon. Take the time that many of these guys spend on the forums and dedicate it to shooting sports and you’ll learn to create excellent sports images with either brand.

Shooting indoor sports or outdoor night sports has its challenges. Essentially you need to maintain a fast enough shutter speed to stop action in low light. This needs to be achieved with either fast lenses, high ISO, or a combination of both. If you are going to stay with your Nikon brand, my recommendation is a D300 camera body and a 70 - 200mm f2.8 lens. If I was starting out today that would be my starting combo.

You may get a lot of people advising you to get the camera with high FPS (frames per second). It’s not necessary. The top magazine shooters use strobes in the rafters for basketball games. The strobes take one or two seconds to recycle. They time their shots as I have done in the images with this post. The D50’s max rate is about 1 frame per second. Practice and you nail your shots too!

The basketball image on this page was shot with a Nikon D50 (approximately $500) and a Nikkor 85mm f1.4 lens (approximately $1025). Exposure was 1/350th second at f1.7 and ISO 1600 (the D50’s max ISO).

The football image was created with a Nikon D50 (approximately $500) and a 20 year old Nikkor 300mm f2.8 lens (20 years ago $5300, now $4500). Exposure was 1/250th second at f2.8 and ISO 1600.

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