Variety is the spice of life

When covering an event, I try to think of it as telling a story. So there are seven things I try to always have in my coverage. This week, I discovered that my friend Mark Sandlin, Director of Photography for Southern Living, uses this same list. The list is what all photojournalists have drilled into them.

Mark Sandlin, Director of Photography at Southern Living
  1. Opener: Sets the scene for the story
  2. Decisive moment: The one moment that can by itself tell the story
  3. Details: Besides being like visual candy to the report, help often with transitions–especially in multimedia packages
  4. Sequences: give a little variety to a situation
  5. High overall shot: Gives a good perspective on how the elements all fit together.
  6. Closer: Besides the classic shot of the cowboy riding off into the sunset, there are other visual ways to help bring the story to a close
  7. Portraits: These photos are great for introducing the characters of the story

Below are photos from an annual meeting where the investors come in, and the company gives them an overview of what they have done and where they are going.

One thing I am working hard to do is to make each photo have an impact on engaging the audience. I use light, angles, composition, and, most important, expressions of people to engage the viewer. I wanted my photos to help this company communicate they are vibrant and viable in today’s market.

This photo shows how the attendees could interact with the leadership team. I wanted to show them engaging in conversation, so I shot a few to capture not just a good expression finally, but use the environment to draw you in. If you notice, even the lady in the mural seems to be paying attention to the conversation in the foreground.
Details, for me, are a way to have fun. So I am looking for unique angles, colors, and light to help create impact and entertain the audience.
A high angle is usually successful today because it is unique to our everyday l es. Seldom are we tall enough to see this angle, so it looks different than you just walking ar nd. Even the lady in this mural looks from above to see what is below.
The man to the far right is the CEO, and while he will be on stage later in more formal roles, I like to show him as more relaxed and approachable. Again, I am using the lines from the window to help draw you into the picture. I want you to see the conversation first in the foreground, and then you should drift to the background. Again, visual composition keeps you engaged.
While you can see everyone on the panel, and I always shoot the obvious, it isn’t as compelling to me as in other angles below. But I always need to be sure everyone on the panel is well-seen in one photo in case they require this.
As a panelist responds to the question, you will often find that the rest of the panel may or may not be engaged.
In this photo, the CEO is the focal point, and while the other panelist is not looking directly at him, you can see from their expressions and slight turning of their heads to catch what he is saying as showing they are engaged.
PowerPoint presentations can be challenging to capture the slide and the speaker in one photo. Thank goodness they had a spotlight on the speaker and had it balanced. If you organize an event like this–always have a spotlight on the speaker to make them not disappear into the dark.
While this isn’t a close-up portrait, I think it is a lovely portrait of him working in this situation.
As I mentioned, they were streaming on the web, and I have a photo that can help say that for them.
Another high overall shot to help tell another part of the story.

The decisive moment photo should be the one that is used alone and not part of the package could tell the story. Which of the ones above did you see that would work for you?

Did you notice the sequence of the panel? Now the hard part is often a closer. Sometimes you don’t have an ending. No closer is because you want to communicate. There was so much to see. You want to leave the audience visually craving for more rather than wrapping it up to say well, that is everything.

I suggest sitting down before you arrive to shoot a story, thinking through everything you know about the assignment, and making a list. Then, write down on a notepad that you will carry with you the outline of the seven shots. Under each one, list a couple of options for each.

As you shoot your story, check off the photos that you get. Then, use your notepad to get the names of people for the captions.

Once you have everything checked off on your list, don’t stop shooting. I continue to shoot more photos, but now I may be looking more and taking fewer shots. I cherry-pick the moments I think will be better than I already have.

I want to thank my friend Mark Sandlin for reminding me of what I do with every assignment so I can share this with you.

By the way, Mark said he wished he had said one more thing to those attending the class. He wanted to say, “if you haven’t made any mistakes, you are trying hard enough.”

What can I photograph?

Addie Card, 12 years. Spinner in North Pormal [i.e., Pownal] Cotton Mill. Vt.

 If I could tell the story in words, I wouldn’t need to lug around a camera. 

– Lewis Wickes Hine 

Lewis Hine is a photographer I have studied and admired, and I think of him when I struggle for something to photograph. Like Hine, I started my studies in the social sciences. Then, I studied social work and quickly realized my calling was to be a photojournalist.  

Lewis Hine studied sociology at the University of Chicago, Columbia University, and New York University. He became a teacher in New York City at the Ethical Culture School, where he encouraged his students to use photography as an educational medium. The classes traveled to Ellis Island in New York Harbor, photographing the thousands of immigrants who arrived each day. Between 1904 and 1909, Hine took over 200 photographs and eventually realized that his vocation was photojournalism. 

Hine went on to work for the Russell Sage Foundation, which improved social and living conditions in the United States. After just a couple of years with the foundation, he went to work for the National Child Labor Committee. He did this for ten years, and his work helped to change the labor laws for children. 

During WWII, he worked for the American Red Cross, covering the work in Europe. In 1930 he photographed the workers building the Empire State building. To get the photos of workers through the years, he would take similar risks to the workers were taking. He was in a unique basket 1,000 feet out over 5th Avenue to get that unique angle while working on the Empire State Building project. 

Raising the Mast, Empire State Building, 1932

Lewis Hine’s work is so powerful because he knew what he was photographing and why he was doing it. He was doing something useful with his photography. Hine said, “If I could tell the story in words, I wouldn’t need to lug around a camera.”

The fun in photography is when you take on a challenge and bring all your creativity to it to help communicate an idea or concept to your audience. But, unfortunately, when you use a lot of typical clichés, it quickly becomes tiresome.

Not knowing what to photograph is an excellent time to ask yourself what you stand for as a person. First, you need to understand your relationship to the things around you and their meaning. Observation is how you form thoughts and convictions about the world. It is not from formal education—it is from a sense of caring about people and the world in which you live. 

Child laborers in glassworks. Indiana, 1908

When you have this gut check, it will give you the inspiration to take on a subject and communicate how you feel about it, not just a documentation of its existence but its significance to you. You want people to respond, and this is what motivates you.

I am struggling to find subjects that often lack personal convictions. 

The secret is to think about the audience. Knowing the audience gives me a goal in mind. I must love or hate the subject to get my emotions going and create a mood and feeling that I want to communicate beyond the obvious. 

The young girl pauses for a moment’s glimpse of the outer world. She said she was 11 years old. She has been working for over a year. Rhodes Mfg. Co. Lincolnton, North Carolina.

You tend to scapegoat your responsibilities when you find yourself in a mental block. This is where you often look for a formula or copy someone else’s concept. I see this most often in sports photography. You see the photographers all standing together. One of my friends Scott Cunningham who photographs the NBA for Getty Images, is rarely sitting next to other photographers. He is in the stands and always looking for something different. 

Another scapegoat photographers use is that they don’t have a piece of equipment, or their equipment limits them. Remember, we still haven’t exhausted all that is possible with the simple point-and-shoot. Be careful that you are not buying new equipment as a way to inspire you. Instead, take the time to think and feel about your world.

“What shall I photograph?” will not be an issue. Instead, the problem becomes, “How can I say it clearly and with enough emotion that my audience is moved to action because of my photos?”

Photographing in Charleston, SC

These are some photos I made this past weekend at Corp Day at The Citadel.  Which ones do you like and why?

1st Battalion marches out to the parade field.
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Summerall Guards 2012 make a slight breathing noise together to keep in cadence and so everyone is together.
3
Summerall Guards 2012 closeup of the breathing technique for timing.
4
Summerall Guards 2011 last time together before handing over their rifles to the class of 2012.
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Summerall Guards 2011 last time performing.
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Summerall Guards 2011 take the field with all the alternates in position.
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I took the photo showing the alternates for Class of 2011.  These guys seldom are photographed as compared to those marching.
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Timing is everything to show the precision.  If their legs are all down not as impressive.
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Summerall Guards and BVA run together the night before the rifle exchange to the new guard.
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Bravo Company during parade review.
12
Nelson Lalli checks the alignment of Bravo Company.

I am reminded every time I photograph the cadets how important it is for each person to have a nice photo.  After I post these to my facebook account I spend hours accepting the requests for tagging and friends.  I try and make “portfolio” quality images, but find often just simple clean image of a cadet is really appreciated.

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Nelson Lalli  and Tj Fischer 

15
Christopher White

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Matt Spysinski, Nelson Lalli, & James Riley Harrell

Lens Choice: Just the subject or a story

Filling the frame with a subject can look quite different depending on the focal length of the lens.

These three examples the f/stop stayed the same. I moved the camera forward or backwards to keep the stuffed ducks the same size in the frame.
c
The 28mm wide-angle lens lets you see the environment around the subject more as you see in this photo of the What the Ducks.


b
The 105mm short telephoto focal length lens makes the background less distracting.

a
The 300mm telephoto focal length lens makes the background even less distracting.
Which one do your prefer and why? 

What you need to do is understand how a lens choice can really help your subject.

You just need to say here is the subject then look at using the telephoto lens.  This will help you make the subject pop out away from the background. All the focus will be on the subject.

If you need the subject to be part of a sentence where you use adjectives and adverbs to help give a context for the subject, then move in close with a wide-angle lens. Now you see what is around the subject as well as the subject.

There are varying degrees to this change. Just as the writer uses simple sentences and sometimes longer sentences to tell the story, the lens helps you make it a simple sentence or complex.

Three Stages of Composition

Stage One: “Literal” Snapshot – making photographs to describe what you see. 

Typical Snapshot

Typical Snapshot

A snapshot is popularly defined as a photograph that is “shot” spontaneously and quickly, often without artistic or journalistic intent. Snapshots are commonly considered technically “imperfect” or amateurish, out of focus, poorly framed, or composed.

Snapshot – this time with an off-camera flash at 45 degrees

We all start with the literal snapshot and often revisit this Photography stage. These literal snapshots are primarily taken for the photographer. These photos are “memory joggers.” They help you remember the moment.

Inside snapshot without flash.
Inside snapshot with flash at 45 degrees.

Believe it or not, many “professional” photographers never move beyond this point. Since the bride and groom were there with the photographer, the literal snapshots are also like “memory joggers” for them.

Another place I see this is my church. After a team returns from their mission trip, they show their photos. The group laughs because they get the “inside joke.” While not always a joke, it is another memory jogger and not an image that communicates to the audience.

When a photographer realizes that other photographers are getting better-looking photos than they do, they often move to stage two.

Stage Two: “Artistic” Snapshot – making aesthetically pleasing pictures that enhance what you saw

Inside the photo, with a flash of 45 degrees, the photographer simplifies the background, giving more attention to the subject.

In this stage, the photographer is aware of visual composition, exposure, and how to control their depth of field and freeze a subject or blur the background.

This is where a photographer thinks about being sure the subject is well-composed.Not everyone can see the difference in their photos to get to stage two but believe me, most everyone can see the difference between a “literal snapshot” and an “artistic snapshot.”

I have written in previous newsletters about composition, lighting, and framing and therefore encourage you to review those articles.

Stage Three: “Expressive” Images – images made for public rather than private meanings. Like all art, expressive photography offers universal, often symbolic, statements.

Ansel Adams said it best, “There are always two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer.” Once you realize this and want the audience to feel about the subject as you do, you want to move beyond just the “rules of composition.”

The subject is in her room. She is leading the light off to the side out of the camera view to highlight the issue and draw you to her.

 Expressive Photography interprets, rather than describes, what we see to others.

 There are three aspects to Expressive Photography; see the diagram. All three must be present for the photo to be more than an “artistic snapshot.”

snap7
A subject close to the camera and her room around her. Light off to the right, lighting her to draw more emphasis on her.

Abstraction removes literal, descriptive clutter, hones an image’s essence, and encourages unlimited thinking. This might be the difference between listening to music with no words in the tune.

Your mind is free to explore your thoughts. However, if the music has words in the music, then it is less abstract, even if the words are not sung. For example, hearing Amazing Grace played even without the words will put a more literal thought and therefore is not unlimited as the abstract music.

If the photo moves too far into abstraction, then the other parts of the triangle weaken and become just an “artistic snapshot.”

Tension presents elements that seem at odds with their context and creates contrasts and juxtapositions that stimulate emotions and the imagination. This is where the photographer helps create a mood within the photo. They may use composition, lighting, and exposure, or in combination, to help move the image beyond just documenting the moment to an interpretation of the moment. Underexpose a little, and you create darkness or gloom. Expose, and you may generate lightness and lighten the mood.

After photographing my daughter in different locations, I started to write this newsletter. My wife said, “Stanley, you’ve got to see Chelle.” So, of course, I had to add another photo after seeing her in a tree playing her guitar. Some of the best images are when you catch the subject doing what they like best.

Human values convey the emotions, beliefs, traditions, and knowledge we understand and share. Genuine smiles communicate across all language barriers, just as frowns and anger will. We often say this is one of the most critical factors of the portrait. So what are the three most important things about a picture?—1) Expression, 2) Expression, and 3) Expression.

 To make expressive photos, you must first ask yourself what you want to express through your image(s). For example, how do you feel about your subject? I like to boil this down to “Why?” Why should anyone in your audience care about what you want them to see? Journalists are trained to ask: Who, What, Where, When, How, and Why. However, in my opinion, the story’s hook often rests on the Why. If you failed to ask yourself why you are making this photograph—rest assured that your audience will not know either. I would love for you to have a chance to comment on which photos you think above are your favorite photos and why? Do any of them work as “Expressive” images?

Group Photos

Every once in a while, you have enough good things come together to turn a stock photo like a headshot or group photo, in this case, into something pretty good.

Buddy McDowell & Sherry Decker with Design Directives

I was pleased with the result. The two key leaders of the design firm are out front leading their team at this Victorian home in Marietta, Georgia.

I enjoy spreading out-group photos where you can see everyone. You may have to use a larger image to see everyone, but it is a much more interesting photo.

Sherry Decker, Design Directives

The strength of the photo is that each person is an individual portrait, all put together for the group photo. This makes me want to look at the picture longer and see each person.

Buddy McDowell, Design Directives