Technique

by Andrew Smith

In the temporary absence of a proper introduction I’ll tell you briefly

what this book is intended to be:

It is an honest discussion of how I work as a full-time photographer.

I can’t promise that it will help your own career, or that it will help you
take better photos, and I certainly can’t promise that it will help you to
make more money. All I can promise is that everything I tell you will be
truthful, unpretentious and sincere.

It might be wrong, but I believe it is right.

About me...
I’m a small-time photographer. I earn a modest amount of money doing
newspaper photos, portraits and some commercial work. My job is not
particularly glamorous and, for most people, would not be at all
exciting, but I love it. So that’s whose advice you’re reading.

For busy people...

If you want to save yourself the bother of reading the book then I’ll
summarise it for you:

Customers come first. Without them you’re nothing.

Integrity before money. Always.

Get paid.

Stick to those guidelines and you won’t go far wrong. That’s 90% of the
book covered right there. The rest of it is detail. More detail than you
could ever possibly want to know...

TECHNIQUE 1
 The hook of the
single strong element
Or: why ‘bland’ sells

This family portrait of two brothers and a sister is

frequently praised for its subtle black and white toning
(the result of a laborious and intricate processing job
over several days) and for the novel twist of having the
three subjects not looking at the camera, but instead
gazing into the mysterious unknown. These, however,
are minor details, mere artistic flourishes.

In fact the image works so well because of the

composition, which brought something new to the
repetitive world of classic portraiture.

If you can show people something that they haven’t

seen before then that immediately elevates your image
to another level and makes your work stand out from
the crowd in an over-populated market.

Concept
The booking for this session came with a rare luxury: An existing photo
of the three subjects. Immediately I could see that the anchor point for
my portrait should be the girl’s striking blonde hair, and this in turn
helped me to quickly decide on the black background, the dark clothing
and the lighting design. Figure 1.1 shows how the original concept was
executed successfully, producing a strong traditional portrait.

Towards the end of the session I suggested trying an alternative

composition. I had recently seen a dramatic portrait of the Queen and
the Duke of Edinburgh, created by Lord Lichfield, in which the two
subjects were positioned next to each other, lit from the front, and then
photographed from the side. I wanted to try my own version of this
composition but with ¾ posing for the subjects. After all, the photo had
been commissioned by their mother and she would be more interested
in seeing their faces rather than any clever lighting.

I remembered the Lichfield portrait as being black and white, and had
always intended my family portrait to be presented in that way. But as
I write this I have just gone back and looked at the Lichfield image
Figure 1.1: The original concept took
again, and seen that it was in fact colour. What a good illustration of advantage of the girl’s striking blonde
how much impact a strong composition can have on the viewer! hair as an anchor point for the image.

2 TECHNIQUE
 Lighting
Due to the composition of the image it required an
extraordinarily deep field of focus, and I was shooting
at a focal length of 110-mm so I had to use an aperture
of f/22. With an ISO speed of 100 this became one of
the most light-hungry images I had ever created.

The light was supplied by a 1000-watt strobe at full

power with a 100-cm softbox positioned just a couple
of feet in front of the subjects. When I took the first test
shot and the flash fired, all three members of my
carefully-arranged group took a step back!

As I was using a black background I also needed to put

some light around the back of the group for separation.
A set of barn doors was used on the rear strobe to
prevent light from flooding the camera lens.

Figure 1.2: Softbox in front of the subjects, bare flash

behind the subjects with barn doors.

Processing
Your initial goal in processing may be one of aesthetic ‘fixes’ such as
removing blemishes or tidying up some distracting stray hairs. But
ultimately you are aiming to give someone an immaculate photograph
of themself that they will accept as being true to how they really look.

Maybe it is essential for the portrait photographer to expertly wield the

clone tool, the healing brush, surface blur and layer masks for skin
softening, and all of those techniques and more were used extensively
on this image. But equally important is knowing when to leave the
image alone. Perfection is not natural.

Nobody imagines themself as perfect. But our mind’s eye self-portrait

doesn’t include the faults. Give someone a photo of themself with all of
Figure 1.3: The photo was shot in raw
their flaws fixed and they’ll accept it as true. But give them a photo with format using a hi-res digital camera.
perfectly smooth skin, for example, and they’ll know it’s fake. This allowed maximum scope for
conversion to black and white, tone
adjustments and selective sharpening
Commercial photographic portraiture has the opposite goal of with minimal loss of quality.
traditional painted portraits. A painter wants to reveal something of a
person’s soul. But a photographer is hired to produce an image that is
essentially a blank canvas. The viewer fills in the details later.

People frequently tell me that they want informal, almost candid images
of their loved ones. And they really believe that they do. But the posed
formal photos always sell the best. They have less life in them, so the
viewer can imagine the life for themselves, however they want.
Figure 1.4: Stray hairs needed to be
And therein lies the secret of this photograph: It has its single strong digitally removed. Here several bright
strands of the girl’s hair had to be
element – the composition – but at the same time it is quite bland. removed while being careful to preserve
her eyelashes, as well as the texture and
There is nothing not to like, so people are able to love it. shading of her brother’s skin.

TECHNIQUE 3
 Compliments don’t pay the bills
One of the most valuable pieces of advice given to me when I first started selling pictures was that people will
always tell you how beautiful your work is and how much they love it, but it doesn’t mean much unless they
actually put their hand in their pocket and bring out some money.

I have never considered myself to be an artist but I accept that people will always talk to me as if I am one, and
it is human nature to compliment artists on their work. As the recipient of these compliments you quickly get
a sense of whether people are just being polite or if they really like your photographs, and of course it is nice
when someone genuinely likes one of your pictures. But if you’re in this business to earn a living then
ultimately what you need is for them to buy it!

It may seem cold to play down the value of compliments. Perhaps someone really would like to buy the photo
but they can’t afford it? That’s always a possibility. But if people truly love a photograph then generally they
will find a way to afford it – so why aren’t they buying yours?

Figure 2.1: Channels

4 TECHNIQUE
Why people don’t buy pictures
The owner of a renowned gallery close to where I live is
known for his support of photography. When I first
started producing landscape photos I showed him
some of my large format glossy prints.

Most of my photos were dismissed in an instant but

some were greeted with a good measure of approval.
He advised me that photographs were best displayed as
giclée prints and suggested that I invest in having them
produced in that format and then come back to him.

The idea of showing my photos in a gallery was

appealing but not a priority, so it was months before I
produced giclées of my work. Then I headed back to the
gallery to show the owner my super-duper expensive
prints which I expected to be immediately hung on the
wall and sold for outrageous prices!

The gallery owner took one look at the giclées and

without any comment about the actual images said, in
the most stereotypically pretentious tone: “I’ve always
felt that photos are best presented as glossy prints.”

Since then I’ve heard an echo of that gallery owner’s

voice in every enthusiastic comment about any of my
photographs. Because I realised that people will come
This page from top to bottom:
out with any old nonsense to avoid telling you their
Figure 2.2: Archipelago
honest opinion: They like your work, they just don’t like Figure 2.3: Dawn of Winter at Cadboll Point
it enough to actually buy it. Figure 2.4: Rocks & Water Study in Blue

That’s why the non-buyers are always the most vocal

and complimentary. Buyers hardly say a word.

Silence is golden
All of the photos on these two pages have been widely
praised by other photographers. All have been framed
and prominently displayed in a busy café in a popular
holiday area. And all have received very positive
comments from many locals and tourists.

None of them have sold.

Meanwhile my landscape photos that do sell always go

very quietly. Consistently the people who buy them
can’t explain why they like them. They don’t need to.

The moral of all this is that you’ll receive two kinds of

compliment: Vocal and cash. The vocals are warm and
snuggly but unreliable. Base your commercial decisions
on the cold hard cash. It always tells the truth.

TECHNIQUE 5
 Six months and nine minutes:
A story of shooting Elton
At 7:03pm on Sunday 15 July 2007 the Tulloch Caledonium Stadium in
Inverness came alive with the applause and jubilant screams of 18,000 people.
Elton John made a low-key entrance to stage right and thus began the most
nerve-wracking nine minutes of my photographic career.

But this story began six months earlier...

It was mid-January and I had just done a depressingly poor job of

photographing the Highland 2007 Year of Culture launch night for the
BBC Scotland web site.

The spectacular evening of music, fireworks, street performers and

Figure 3.1: The aerial ballet troupe
Transe Express performed high above
Inverness during the launch of the
Highland 2007 Year of Culture.
giant inflatable monsters had attracted upwards of twenty other
accredited photographers from all of the local agencies and newspapers,
so I had decided to break away from the reserved media spots and look
for the pictures that nobody else would get.
As an amateur you want to get into the media areas. As a pro you often
want to get out of them. Public areas are sometimes better.

This calculated gamble didn't pay off and I missed several of the main
events. A giant Loch Ness Monster paraded through the streets of
Inverness and I didn't even see it, never mind capture it on camera.

6 TECHNIQUE
That weekend I had some serious questions to ask myself, but they all
boiled down to one thing: Was I in the right business? I could make
feeble excuses about scheduling errors by the event organisers; I could
blame over-zealous security staff who wrongly blocked access to pre-
planned locations; but such hurdles come as standard in this job. The
truth was that I simply didn't get the photos and that was my fault. Fact.

Monday rolled around. No doubt still basking in the publicity of the

well-received launch night, the Highland 2007 organisers played their
trump card: They announced that Elton John would conclude his
Rocket Man tour in the Highlands, a major coup for the region. The
population of the entire north of Scotland is less than most small cities
so we aren't exactly a prime destination for world-class stadium artists!

Climbing the career ladder

Figure 3.2: Fireworks over Inverness
castle during the launch night of the
Career doubts were immediately put on hold and I set about getting Highland 2007 Year of Culture. Perhaps
credentials for the Elton concert, still half a year away. the perfect example of how not to
photograph a fireworks display over a
castle. Later thousands of fireworks
Somehow I hadn't entirely blotted my copybook with the BBC and I was sailed down the river and I didn’t get
given the go-ahead to photograph the concert for the Highlands & one useable shot.
Islands web site. I would do the photos on the same basis as I covered
the Year of Culture launch: If the photos were good then they'd be
published and paid for; if not then they wouldn't be.

(Some photographers would balk at this way of working but I think it's
a sensible and fair way to start climbing the ladder. It was my
suggestion. And if that sends a chill down your spine then you won't like
hearing that I never invoiced for the eleven Year of Culture pics that
were published. They didn't come up to my standard.)

The first challenge in getting a photography pass for the Elton concert
was finding out who to request it from.

The venue referred me to the promoter who in turn referred me to a

lady at a PR company who referred me to a man at the same company
who was constantly "in a meeting". Eventually I applied by e-mail.

Freelance accreditation: Just be honest

I'm finding that few silences are more deafening than the ones you get
from PR companies. Knowing that our livelihoods depend on their
cooperation, they seem perfectly content to leave e-mails unanswered,
phone calls unreturned and answering-machine messages ignored.
Figure 3.3: Thomas and Anna with
In fact, at the same time I was also applying to a different PR company dad Robert watched rehearsals for the
for permission to photograph the Rock Ness dance festival and not one Highland 2007 Year of Culture launch
night. This image, one of my early
single e-mail or phone call was ever answered. The festival came and attempts at using off-camera flash,
could have been so much better if I’d
went without any evidence that the PR company existed at all, and a lot
put the flash on a light stand to frame
of media coverage of the festival seemed to rely heavily on poor quality right, or asked someone to hold it.
camera-phone snapshots sent in by members of the audience.

TECHNIQUE 7
 It took a while, but eventually I managed to syphon a smidgen of information about the pass for the Elton John
concert: My application had been received but it would not be processed until two weeks before the concert. To
cushion the inevitable disappointment I took this to mean that it would be refused at the last minute.

And sure enough, the first week of July came and went. Elton was five days away and, again, nobody was
talking to me. More e-mails into the void. More calls not returned. More empty assurances from people who
were clearly in no position to make them.

Then an e-mail arrived from a different PR company: My pass would be confirmed as soon as possible. A
follow-up e-mail asked who I would be doing the pictures for.

Some photographers love to big themselves up to be more than they are. I never do, and I would advise others
that honesty is the best policy. So I explained that this concert was a huge opportunity for me to cover a major
event and I had asked the BBC if I could do the photos for them. I also stated that I would behave
professionally, I wouldn't cause any problems for security, I had the appropriate public liability insurance, and
I knew that the photos could only be used for news/editorial purposes, no commercial sales.

The reply came: "Fine." That was it, just one word.

Then a phone call explaining that my pass would be waiting for me at the box office.

Above all else: Getting the shot you need

However there was still one problem to overcome: The pass was
extraordinarily restrictive. Photographers were not welcome in the
stadium before the concert. We weren't allowed to photograph the
support act. We had to meet at the box office shortly before Elton was
due on stage, at which point we'd be escorted into the stadium by
security who would then wait with us for one song. Then we'd be
escorted out of the building. There would be no press facilities on-site,
not even luxuries such as a chair or a power socket. And if it was
raining? Well, laptops are waterproof, aren't they...

This kiboshed most of my long-formulated plans for the day. I would

have liked to put together a gallery documenting the whole event: Stage
preparations, sound-check, audience arriving, support act, Elton, crowd
shots, Elton, the band, a bit more Elton, more crowd shots, etc. But it
was made abundantly clear to me that the photography policy was set in
stone and it applied to everyone, no exceptions.

Figure 3.4: For this concert media
access was so limited and restrictive
that it could be seen as little more than
a token gesture. Even while taking this
photograph from outside the stadium a
security guard told me to put my
camera away, until I convinced him that
my pass covered this area.
When the big day arrived I did the best I could with my limited options.
I was given my pass early, allowing me to at least shoot telephoto from
outside the stadium. I got some fun pics for the local papers. And I
chatted with the other photographers about how this was the most
media-unfriendly event I'd ever heard of.
Then it was time for us to be puppy-walked down to the stage. I think
we had three security people with us, all of whom had different ideas of
when and where we could go. One of them gave the nod for us to get on
with it and I didn't need telling twice: I installed myself in the perfect
position to get a good view of where Elton would be seated at the piano.

8 TECHNIQUE
I had decided by this point that I wouldn't do crowd shots. I'd have liked to, but I wasn't going to risk losing my
vantage point. The only shots that really mattered were the ones of Elton: Get one good pic of Elton and I had
done the job right; get a Pulitzer-winning crowd shot but miss Elton and I would have failed.

I did briefly stray a few feet away and quickly took a succession of photos in a circle, a weak attempt at making
a 360-degree panorama of the stadium. Then I scurried back into position.

By now I was more nervous than when I first photographed a wedding. Realising how unexpectedly nervous I
was made me more nervous. It took me two minutes to meter the piano: I was convinced that the perfect
histogram was somehow wrong.

When your instincts fail you...

I’d say I'm fairly good at photographing people on stage.

I've done it often, in a variety of environments and conditions: Badly lit

schools, brightly lit theatres, even a cruise ship with constantly
changing theatrical lighting.

I can switch to any of my camera's 45 focus points in a fraction of a

second. My timing is good. I can chimp without moving my eye from the
viewfinder and I can correct the exposure instantaneously.

But my first dozen photos of Elton were two stops over-exposed and
out-of-focus. Figure 3.5: Not what you want to see
when you check your first images:
Terribly over-exposed, probably even
When I chimped and saw the flashing highlights I was suddenly gripped beyond the point that it could be saved.
with a fear that I didn't know what to do. It took me a second or two to
bump the shutter speed and when I went back to shooting I had no idea
if I'd bumped it too far or not far enough, but another quick chimp
looked okay.

Elton had only just started playing the piano and he turned to the
audience and punched the air. It was an iconic image and I missed it,
didn't zoom out quickly enough.

So far, everything that could go wrong had gone wrong.

Elton was singing his heart out. I zoomed in, focused on his face and hit
the motor drive. I had a good shot.
Figure 3.6: So it was a relief to have
this one in the bag moments later.

TECHNIQUE 9
 The rest of the shoot is mostly a blur, although thankfully the pictures
weren't. For some reason I moved from my vantage point and got some
nice frames from a more side-on angle, and then I moved back to where
I had started. One guy moved to let me back in. Moments later I ducked
down to let him get a shot over my head. I was impressed that all of the
photographers, about ten of us in an area maybe six feet square, were
mindful of what each other was doing and we worked well as a group.

I've never been an Elton John fan. Haven't even heard much of his
music. But at one point he turned to one of the photographers next to
me and gave him a stern look, which gradually melted to a smile and
then a cool-looking, playful snarl. I immediately liked Elton John. The
guy has style and charisma exploding out of him.

The first song ended and Elton leapt up to stand on his piano stool with
one foot on the piano. I switched to my centre focus point, zoomed out
and motored it. Then a security guard gave me a light punch in the ribs
and it was time to leave. I think the security guys made a point of
walking us out as slowly as possible, which was good of them.
Figure 3.7: Snarl or a smile? I don’t
know but it made a good photo.

Time to transmit
While 18,000 people danced away the perfect summer evening I went back to the hotel, only to find that the
wireless network wasn't working. I headed across town to another hotel and by the time Sir Elton was about
halfway through his set I had seven photos processed and sent off to the BBC, and to an editor at Getty who I
had asked to take a look at them with future commissions in mind.

The results of all that effort?

One photo was used to illustrate a story on the BBC web site. Getty liked the images but said they weren't
different enough from existing shots. One local paper used a cute shot I did of two local gals. Pictures in some
other papers were evidently by photographers who were given special treatment or who broke the rules, which
is the sort of behaviour that makes it difficult for the rest of us to get passes in future.

Overall a successful day. Great fun, good experience, I made a small profit and I did a competent job under
tight restrictions. I e-mailed the PR people who helped me and thanked them for giving me the break. No
replies, of course, but I hope they read the e-mails at least.

Months later a legal firm wanted to license one of my images so I sought

clearance from the PR company. I was told that such licensing was
against policy but, as someone had forgotten to get my signature on a
contract, I could do whatever I wanted with my photos. I assured them
that I would honour the contract even though I had never seen it or
signed it, and I declined to license the image.

That, I feel, is one way to stand out from the crowd: In a cut-throat
business, put your knife away. Being trustworthy is more important to
me than selling an image. And long term it will be more profitable. Figure 3.8: Fun photos of local people
are always a good bet with newspapers.

10 TECHNIQUE
Metering and focusing for concert,
theatre and other stage performances
With the wide variety of stage lighting conditions you may think it
would be impossible to offer any useful guide to metering and focusing
for photographs of people on stage. But there are some fundamental
techniques that will serve you well for all kinds of live performance.

Stage lighting is almost guaranteed to confuse your camera’s automatic

metering as it won’t know how to cope with the brightly lit performers
against a dark background, possibly with strong back-lighting. You will
likely end up with performers over-exposed as your camera’s exposure
algorithm tries to compensate for the many dark areas in the frame.

So for stage photography it is essential to use manual exposure, and a

spot meter is invaluable. This will allow you to meter the performer’s
face and adjust the exposure accordingly. Some cameras have spot
Figure 3.9: Automatic metering
meters built in or you can buy light meters with spot capabilities. would struggle with this scene due to
the black background and bright lights.
You also need to have some basic knowledge of the zone system. But by using manual exposure settings
based on a spot meter reading of Elton’s
skin tones, the exposure is correct.
Now, the mere mention of the zone system can be scary for some people
but it is not nearly as complicated as you may believe. Two minutes
from now you’ll understand it...

All you need to know is which zone your

spot meter is calibrated to (zone 5 is the
standard) and which zones different skin
tones belong in. For example, the average Figure 3.10: The zone system divides
all visible tones into 11 zones numbered
white skin tones belong in zone 6. from 0 (pure black) to 10 (pure white).
Each zone covers one f-stop. Your
When you take a zone 5 spot reading of white skin the resulting image camera will be able to record
approximately 5 zones in each exposure
would be under-exposed by 1-stop, so you need to adjust the reading to and spot metering is the easiest way to
over-expose by 1-stop, putting the skin tones in zone 6. That’s it! tell the camera which 5 you want.

If you understand that last paragraph then you now know how to spot
meter white people under any lighting conditions.

Dark skin goes in zone 4 or zone 3 for very dark skin. So for black people
you take your spot meter reading and then under-expose accordingly.

There, now you know how to spot meter everyone. Easy.

Focus can be an artistic choice but generally you’ll want to get the
performer’s face in focus, and specifically their eyes.

Many modern cameras have 7, 9 or 11 user-selectable focus points, and

some have as many as 45 points. So compose your frame, select the
focus point closest to the subject’s eyes, and let the camera focus.

This is much more accurate than focusing with the centre point and
then re-composing the shot. When photographing performers you will
usually be working with a telephoto lens so re-composing by even a few
degrees can be enough to shift the plane of sharp focus away from their
eyes and from the rest of their face. Plus, of course, in the time it takes
for you to re-compose your shot, the performer may have moved!
Figure 3.11: If the camera was allowed
to decide where to focus then it would
choose a high-contrast area such as the
cross of the music stand or part of the
harp. By selecting a focus point it was
possible to focus on the musician’s eyes.

TECHNIQUE 11
 The masterpiece myth
You are captivated by an image. It speaks to you. So you seek out other works
by the artist and you find that they are good, but something is missing. The
image you fell in love with is the pinnacle of the artist’s genius.

This is the masterpiece myth.

12 TECHNIQUE
Separating intent and result
For the purpose of considering one artist and one masterpiece there
could be no clearer choices than Leonardo da Vinci and the Mona Lisa.

But what can photographers learn from one painting by one artist?

While we may be able to garner a few gems about composition or

lighting or colour, the Mona Lisa also reveals something more telling of
human nature, something crucial to our understanding of our own work
and to the nature of the milestones that we aspire to reach.

What the Mona Lisa can teach us is that there is no such thing as a
masterpiece. At least not in the traditional sense of the word.

When we think of a piece of work as an artist’s masterpiece we have a

naturally romanticised view of the work being intentional from start to
finish: The artist had a vision and then made that vision real.

Yet it is debated whether or not the Mona Lisa is even complete.

Figure 4.1: The unprocessed original
As a frustrated perfectionist da Vinci was known for leaving his work version of the main photo.
unfinished. In the case of the Mona Lisa it is noted that the subject’s
eyebrows and eyelashes are missing, and perhaps her fingernails too. Figures 4.2 & 4.3: (Below) Other
photos from the same shoot.
And the Mona Lisa known to the modern world is somewhat removed
from the original version of the 16th century painting. Restorations and
repairs have left layers of paint upon layers of paint, discoloured by
coats of varnish, with the orphic strokes of da Vinci’s own brush and
perhaps even the touches of his fingertips obfuscated for centuries.

If a painting is left unfinished by the artist, and the version that we

know today has been minutely changed by the interim involvement of
restorers and repairers, then how can we sincerely declare that painting
as the artist’s masterpiece?

Perhaps doing so might even be considered an insult.

You’re as good as your best accident?

The black and white photograph on the left is generally regarded as my
best work, and if I were to become famous one day then it might even
be proclaimed as my masterpiece. But it isn’t.

Originally planned as the cliché dichotomy of a beautiful girl against a

starkly under-exposed background, and always intended as a colour
image, the bright sunlight on the day proved too strong to over-power
with flash. The resulting image (figure 4.1) was, in a word, boring.

It was converted to black and white, and some subtle processing was
applied to enhance the surreal lighting. Only then did the photo take on
its enchanting quality and became something special.

So as much as I like the final image, I can tell you that it is not good by
design, but by accident. And accidents are not to be aspired to...

TECHNIQUE 13

Figure 4.6: Main photo: Bare strobe
with silver reflector to frame left. Sun to
frame right. Both on full power!
Figure 4.7: Harry Potter launch night:
Bare strobe to frame left, strobe with
CTO (orange) gel to frame right.
Figure 4.8: Chefs: Bare strobe to
frame right, strobe with CTO (orange)
gel to frame left behind group.
14 TECHNIQUE
Your masterpiece? Your decision
If you could have a conversation with Leonardo da Vinci about only one
of his paintings, which would it be: The one that the world regards as
his masterpiece, or the one that he considered to be his best work?
And the natural extension of that question: Do you aspire to take photos
that other people will tell you are good, or would you prefer to take
photos that accomplish your own pre-determined goals?
For me, it’s all about the goal, and the goal is composition. Before I even
held a camera I had a passion for certain styles of newspaper photo and
I would practice the compositions by forming a rectangle with my hands
and framing anything and everything. When I got my camera I began
refining my compositional skills by taking thousands of random photos
on a half-mile stretch of beach, nearly every day for months. I would
look for uninteresting scenes and try to find a good composition.
The compositions that I aspire to master are ones in which you arrange
small groups of people in such a way as to create a foreground and a
middle-ground. This is standard fare in thousands of local newspapers
around the world, and many photographers appear to create these
photos effortlessly, but I find them very difficult. To date I would say
that figures 4.4 and 4.5 are my two best compositions:
Figure 4.4: Chefs at Taste of Tain Figure 4.5: Harry Potter launch night
So suppose I do become famous and someone holds up that black and
white photo of the girl in front of the wooden fence, and proclaims it as
my masterpiece. Of course that would be a hug for the ego, in the sense
that it’s always nice to hear kind words said about your work, but it
would also mean absolutely nothing. Figures 4.2 and 4.3 from the
same shoot turned out how I envisioned them an hour before I tripped
the shutter so praise for those would mean something. But praise for an
image that is accidentally good? That’s not a compliment!
I’ll take a small success over an accidental ‘masterpiece’ any day.
To grow as photographers we must keep in mind that luck cannot be
repeated, and luck is often a factor in why people like a particular
photograph so much. If you rate your images according to other
people’s opinions of them then the first photo you ever take could be the
best photo you ever take. How’s that for a depressing thought?
So accept the compliments graciously, but be guided by your own
opinion of your work based on how close it is to your intentions.
 How many hours are there in
one minute of your time?
This is an issue that photographers love to whinge about but doing so
achieves nothing so we won’t spend any time on that here.

The fact of the matter is that clients often don’t comprehend, and
sometimes don’t appreciate, the amount of effort that culminates in
those few moments when we stand in front of them and push a button.
Figure 5.1: (Above) Even though this
location was not used, an hour was
For a family portrait in this country house, two of the first words in the
spent preparing it, including stabilising brief were quick and simple. All those words mean in real terms is that
the lights due to a strong breeze. Two
other locations had also been scouted as
the client doesn’t want to stand around for very long. You take the
possible alternatives, with test shots booking with the knowledge that you’ll still do the usual ground-work,
being done of each.
and thus you charge the usual price. Don’t cut your margin.
Figure 5.2: (Below) The location that
was eventually used had also been On the day of the shoot I appraised four locations and lit two of them so
prepared before the family arrived. The
scene was lit with a 1000-watt strobe on the family had the choice of an inside or outside photo. Or they could
full power with a 100-cm softbox about have had both if they wanted. It only took a minute to do the photo but
10-feet to frame left. This set-up was
used as a lot of light would bounce it wouldn’t have happened without the previous couple of hours.
around the room so a strong directional
light source was required to create
highlights and shadows.

TECHNIQUE 15

Figure 6.1: Bare flash on a light stand
to frame left behind shooting position.
Flash with CTO (orange) gel on the
floor behind the children.
16 TECHNIQUE
Priorities: When the right shot
is the wrong shot
From concept to set-up to execution your priority is to do the shot to the
best of your ability. You want it to be perfect. But if you’re shooting for
a client then chances are they’ll have a different set of priorities.
This photo was requested by a schools activity coordinator who wanted
photos done at a series of crown green bowling lessons, hoping that the
local newspaper would use them to publicise the project.
Setting up the photo took around five minutes, during which time I was
told by both the coordinator and a teacher that it was taking too long.
But the schools coordinator got what she wanted: The photo ran on the
front page of that week’s paper. That was because it was a good photo,
and that was because I took the time to do it right.
I thought that result might nudge the client into realising that I knew
what I was doing. But no, at the next bowling lesson I was allowed even
less time and then the rest of the photos were cancelled.
Nowadays, for any photos that require lighting or set-ups I tell clients
to allow 15 minutes. If the photo they want isn’t worth 15 minutes of
their time then I know that our priorities are different and the client
would be happier working with someone else.
Shooting sports:
Don’t be a dinosaur
Editorial sports photography isn’t about sport. And it
doesn’t have much to do with photography either. It’s
about money and having fun. People who specialise in
shooting sports have a passion for it and they want to
keep doing it. This can lead to them being fiercely
resistant to anyone trying to move in to their territory.

Of course there’s nothing wrong with that: A few years

from now when you’re having fun being paid to
Figure 7.1: (Above) The paper’s choice
photograph your sport of choice, will you be happy to from the first professional football
have some newcomer start taking your precious game I was commissioned to cover.

commissions away from you?

But many long-established sports photographers have one major Figure 7.2: (Below) Some of the other
photos I submitted from the game.
weakness: They are dinosaurs. They do the same old boring shots week
in and week out. So you can get ahead by out-thinking them.

One of my first sports commissions was a mid-week night game

featuring the region’s professional football team. I’d paid my dues
working amateur games for a couple of years so you can imagine how
good it felt to be moving up to the next level. For me, the most exciting
thing about the commission was that I’d finally have some nice stadium
backgrounds for my photos, but I’ll admit to also enjoying the sense that
I’d proved myself and earned the right to move up to pro games. There’s
nothing quite like that feeling when you first walk out of the press room,
along the corridor and out to the sideline.

After ninety minutes in the rain and snow of a freezing Scottish winter
evening I sent off half a dozen solid action photos with good captions,
confident that I’d earned my next commission.

Alas, that was not to be...

All is fair in sports and business?

Shortly after the paper hit the streets with one of my photos from the
match, I received an apologetic e-mail from the editor: She wouldn’t be
able to commission me for these matches in future.

The photographer who she had been using in the past had complained
about me being commissioned instead of him. And he had backed this
up with threats about involving the National Union of Journalists. The
upshot was that he somehow forced the editor to surrender her own free
choice and commit to using him for future matches.

An injustice, for sure. And that photographer’s actions were certainly

extreme. But you need to be ready for people who aren’t entirely ethical.
So how would you have handled the situation?

TECHNIQUE 17

Figure 7.3: Netcam shots don’t need
to be done with a wide angle lens. This
one was shot at around 100-mm.
Figure 7.4: Not many photographers
take football photos from inside the
goal but at amateur games you can get
away with almost anything. This image
was the result of trying various angles
while photographing a prolonged
penalty shoot-out. I got dozens of
unusable photos but everything came
together perfectly for this one.
Figure 7.5: Strange colouring, the
players are too dark and it isn’t obvious
who scored. But where I live I’m the
only photographer who does netcam
shots so they are still new and that goes
a long way in getting published.
18 TECHNIQUE
It’s not their business, it’s our business
When you decide to earn a living by taking photos you immediately
become an equal to everyone else in the business. Yes, they have more
experience and they might even be better photographers, but you have
an equal right to earn money. And with that equal right comes an equal
responsibility to uphold the integrity of the profession.
So knowing that a fellow photographer had undermined my right to
earn a living, I had two distinct issues to deal with: First was my
responsibility to ensure that rogue elements don’t harm the business.
Second was the fact that I had just hit a major roadblock in my career.
The first issue was a no-brainer: My anti-competitive peer had decided
to involve his union, so I decided to involve them myself. I made some
unofficial enquiries and then filed a complaint.
If you would have thought the problem was “best left alone” then
consider this: Maybe you’re of a strong-enough character to cope with
someone stabbing you in the back, but what if the next person they do
it to is more fragile? Some people invest their life’s savings in pursuing
the dream of working as a photographer, and they deserve to succeed
based on the quality of their work, not how thick-skinned they are.
In my opinion, those of us who can cope with the extra pressure of
weeding-out the back-stabbers should do exactly that.
Think big, think different
Then I went straight back to the amateur games at the local parks and
focused on being the best football photographer I could be.
That’s how you compete with the dinosaurs. Don’t try to beat them at
their own game. I wanted to show the editors at both local papers that
there was a whole new game, and I could play it better.
The photos on these two pages were chosen to debunk some myths
about sports photography that many newcomers have, due mainly to a
lot of bad advice bandied about on Internet photography forums.
All of these photos were published apart from figure 7.7 which
was the only one shot in a stadium. If you’re kidding yourself that
your photos would sell better if you had stadium backgrounds
then get that idea out of your head right now. You can find good
backgrounds anywhere by working the angles.
Fast telephoto lenses are nice but you can probably earn money
in sports photography with whatever equipment you already
have. Figure 7.8 used a fast telephoto lens but every other
photo was taken with a wide angle lens or a mid-range zoom. The
netcam shots didn’t use remotes, they were all hand-held.
Newspapers do value originality. Every time I’ve tried a new
technique, the resulting photo has been published. Every time.
 Figure 7.7: Stadium terraces are the
ideal backgrounds but it could be years
before you shoot stadium games.

Figure 7.6: The newspaper didn’t have a reporter covering this match so even the best
traditional action shot may have been left unused. But the unique angle of this photo
made enough of an impact that the paper ran it without a match report and even
dedicated space on the back page to writing about the photo itself, explaining how it was
accomplished. The technique was simple enough: I pre-focused a wide angle lens and
then held the camera as high as possible on a 6-foot monopod. I aimed as best I could
whenever the action came close, and triggered the camera with a set of Pocket Wizard
radio triggers. I worked this way for the whole game and although I got a few other shots
that weren’t too bad, this was the only one that I considered useable. It may seem Figure 7.8: (Above) If you can shoot
excessive to commit an entire game to trying a new technique, to get only one good image, from an elevated position then you can
but I would prefer to get one good original image and have it published instead of dozens use the pitch itself as a background.
of great traditional shots that don’t make it into the paper.
Figure 7.9: (Below) Alternatively a
low angle can produce a more majestic
image with a stronger sense of drama.

TECHNIQUE 19