Carrie Bergan & Sarah Slater worked as a team of storytellers during our Storytellers Abroad Multimedia Missions Workshop to Trinidad.
Watch the story they captured about Felisha.
Storytellers Carrie Bergen and Sara Slater: Creative Servant
Category: Photography
Nikon Z6 & Sigma 24-105mm ƒ/4 or Nikon 28-300mm ƒ/3.5-5.6 perfect for travel
When I started my first newspaper job with the Hickory Daily Record in 1984, I loved the prime lenses that I carried.
My parents were generous and helped equip me with the first camera kit I used daily.
2 – Nikon FM2
24mm ƒ/2.8
35mm ƒ/1.4
85mm ƒ/1.8
180mm ƒ/2.8
300mm ƒ/4
80-200mm ƒ/4
However, airlines often limit the weight you can carry when traveling internationally. So, I have been working around this using a zoom lens, which means I can take fewer lenses but cover a more comprehensive focal length range.
I wrote recently about how the Nikon 28-300mm paired with the Nikon D5 works when traveling and covering sports. On my most recent trip to Trinidad, I knew we would have a chance to photograph the Scarlet Ibis at the Caroni Swamp. Due to the weight, I didn’t want to carry my Sigma 120-300mm ƒ/2.8 and 2x converter, so I brought the Nikon 28-300mm ƒ/3.5-5.6 on my new mirrorless Nikon Z6.
If I were going to Trinidad to photograph the birds for a job where the client needed great photos, I would have brought the Sigma 300-800mm F5.6 EX DG APO HSM.
The Sigma 24-105mm f/4 lens is usually perfect for my shooting needs. I love shooting wide at 24mm. I captured the students during class times with the Storytellers Abroad Multimedia Workshop.
At the same time, I like to zoom in to 105mm and take some photos. I like having a lens that lets me capture things near me, like in a room setting, and the Sigma 24-105mm is perfect for this.
I love photographing the food I eat when I travel. Here, I am showing the exceptional food that Lennox was making for us to enjoy.
Combine those lenses with the Nikon Z6; you have a small kit to cover most of your travels. The only thing I would add to the equipment is a super-wide-angle lens if I knew I would be inside and needed to capture something I could not back up and get.
Now, when I teach these workshops, I do not focus on shooting; instead, I am there to equip the students with the skills they need to capture a story.
I am shooting mainly to capture the experience of those going through the workshop. I love to blog about it and give insights into what I observe and learn each time.
If you want to see how well it shoots video, I shot some quick files with the Nikon Z6 and Sigma 24-105mm f/4 handheld using the camera’s microphone.
More photos were taken with the Nikon Z6 and Sigma 24-105mm f/4 Art Lens.
[NIKON Z 6, 24.0-105.0 mm f/4.0, ISO 1250, f/14, 1/250, Focal Length = 28]
[NIKON Z 6, 24.0-105.0 mm f/4.0, ISO 100, f/4, 1/1000, Focal Length = 24]
Cutting wasted time with video interviews
What was thing big Ah – Ha! moment with students during the Storytellers Abroad Multimedia Missions Workshop in Trinidad? How important it was to spend more time on the pre-interview.
We build the workshop time for the students to get to know their subject. This is the pre-interview. Even so, most everyone would start their “formal interview” with the camera rolling too soon.
They learned that if they didn’t know the story before they started, they didn’t know how to take control. They would let the subject talk and talk and talk. This meant they had 60+ minutes of an interview to edit, and every one of those interviews had to be redone.
When we teach how to interview, we teach what the key points you are looking for to help tell a compelling story are.
While this storyline/narrative has been known for a long time in storytelling, we still often struggle to get those key elements.
Subject
Conflict
Resource/Help
Action they took
Call to Action
Now the one thing we add to our stories that you don’t see in a movie theater is a call to action. Now that you have seen this story, we want the audience to know how to get involved.
If the storyteller has taken time to get the story before they roll the camera, those interviews are usually more of a 15 – 20 minute interview. The only reason it isn’t the short 3 – 5 minute finished project is they often have the subject do a few takes. They want to get the best emotional match to the content.
All the students were talking about how next time, they will spend more time getting the story during the pre-interview so that the editing process will be much simpler.
Student’s Butterfly Lighting Examples
I love teaching at the School of Photography, run by my good friend Dennis Fahringer. I think it is the best school of photography I have come across. Here is a link to learn more about the school.
This is my favorite light for headshots. We didn’t have my Tri-Flector that I love to use, so we used a softbox lower under the person’s chin.
This was the lighting set up—the main light was 45º above the camera, and the fill light was below 45º. The key here is to keep the camera lights and subject in the same positions. You can have them face a little left or right but keep their head straight forward to get that butterfly formed under the nose due to the main light.
You can get many excellent photos by staying with a lighting setup and just having the person move a little right and left by mixing your expressions and body language.
For this assignment, I didn’t have the photographer light the background. I did suggest the hair light up and directly behind the subject. Putting the stand behind the background lets you hide it.
If a person was bald, I suggested not to use the hair light. If they had light hair, maybe no more than one stop brighter than the main light. If you have dark hair, you can often go as much as two stops more luminous than the main light.
Now, if you look closely at the eyes, you can see the main and fill light.
This is even closer for you to see the eyes.
This is a tip for deciphering photos. Look in the eyes; you can usually see where the lights are placed and the shape of the modifiers.
Here is my setup. I use it most of the time for headshots of actors and models.
This is the second modification where I light the background.
This last setup is where I have enough space. I turn on the lights behind the background for white and turn them off for a grey background.
KISS Rule
Keep It Simple Stupid – is what I have been taught through the years. Don’t overthink things.
I hope this inspires you to use lights with your photos.
Student’s 3:1 Lighting Ratio Headshots
I love teaching at the School of Photography, run by my good friend Dennis Fahringer. I think it is the best school of photography I have come across. Here is a link to learn more about the school.
I love to teach lighting. One of the setups I love to teach is one I learned first from my Uncle Knolan Benfield.
He is the one that taught me what a 3:1 Light Ratio setup looks like and why I should know how to shoot it.
These are some of the shots that the students produced last week during my time teaching at the School of Photography in Kona, Hawaii.
The problem with too contrasty lighting is that when it is reproduced in something like a newspaper, the shadows go black. The 3:1 ratio produces a good shadow on newspaper print yet still has some modeling on the face.
Here is a blog post that goes step by step on how to shoot it.
I wanted you to see how students who had never done lighting before my time with them could not just master it but get great expressions as well of their subjects.
They learned that having an excellent solid lighting setup can free you to work on expressions and pose.
They also were challenged to write a little story on their subjects. John Davidson wrote this about his subject.
Stan was a farmer who raised potatoes, alfalfa, and wheat and grew marijuana. Unfortunately, he also smoked marijuana and used many harder drugs. His life was a mess, and he almost killed himself. He went to a Drug & Treatment Center and got clean. He retired after working 27 years at Idaho National Laboratory as a nuclear reactor Operator/Instructor.
The idea is that sharing a photo with a story with the picture makes it so much more exciting, and people come back to look for more.
What do you think of these students’ photos they made of people?
Environmental Portrait enhanced with off camera flash
I was teaching the School of Photography 1 students at the University of Nations campus in Kona, Hawaii, how to improve photos by adding a flash to the available light.
I walked outside and immediately found this guy we had seen the day before.
We met him during our devotion time, where he did a monologue on a scripture.
They had the assignment to do an environmental photo of a person and improve it using a flash.
I found him playing basketball. I knew I already had something about him taking a class on learning the scripture by heart and performing it as a monologue. I could see he liked playing basketball, so I asked him to photograph him.
He had to go shortly, so in less than 5 minutes, I took the first two photos. One without flash followed it up with the off-camera flash of the Godox 860IIN, which was on a light stand and triggered by the Godox transmitter.
Go and try this yourself. Just find a place where the subject can use some help with light. Then add your flash off the camera. Start with it at 45º to the left or right of the camera. Then put it 45º above the person’s eyes as a starting point.
While the students would have to find their model and location later, I had each shoot the same setup with their flash and camera.
After a while, I noticed they were not coming up with anything exciting for compositions. I shot this to challenge them to look for something different.
“Watch Me” or “Meet _______ “
Although an article published in the Journal of Computers in Human Behavior didn’t prove the exact correlation between narcissism and social media, it certainly picked up on how social media enhances and possibly contributes to narcissism.
“Watch Me” is what we say to our parents when we are small children. While later, as teenagers or adults, we are not trying to get mom and dad’s attention, many of us are trying to get the rest of the world to pay attention.
If you post something on Facebook, you often feel better that people are paying attention to the number of likes and the type of likes you get.
Even better than likes is positive feedback by comments.
There is another way you can use social media, and one of the best examples I can give is Humans of NY.
Brandon Stanton is the founder of HONY. Initially, he was going to photograph 10,000 New Yorkers. It was mainly about his love of photography and wanting to share his photos of people.
Somewhere along the way, he started interviewing people. At first, he was sharing little interesting quotes with the photos.
Today Stanton is interviewing most of the subjects and “peeling the onion,” as we like to say when you interview someone and get their story.
In an article on Open Eye Creative, they reported:
“He partnered with Tumblr to raise more than $300K for Hurricane Sandy victims. He helped raise more than $1 million for a Brooklyn school after one of the students appeared on his blog. He reportedly raised more than $5 million for philanthropic projects in 2015.”
Today HONY has around 20 million followers through its website, Instagram and Twitter.
“It’s a dialogue, not a monologue, and some people don’t understand that. Social media is more like a telephone than a television.”
Amy Jo Martin, author of Renegades Write The Rules
Make Social Media About Others
I think professional photographers would grow their following by sharing stories of the people they photograph. Be sure your post focuses on them and not you. Do all you can to remove yourself from the center.
Brandon Stanton’s three suggestions for better stories also is a great place to start. Sooner or later, you will find your style for telling stories of the people you meet.
Stanton’s Questions
- Get to the heart of it
- Ask one question at a time
- Seek out the unexpected
Here is a good article that goes deeper to learn more about those questions.
Why does he have such a following?
This video is an excellent example of how he connects with the audience.
First Others & Then You!!!!
Here is another exciting thing that research is showing us. People want to know more when you share great content with others. They want you to take them backstage. This is where you can share a little about your experience in meeting this person.
Here is the strange thing, if you were only to share your experience, the number of followers would be drastically smaller. However, if you always lead with others and then share something behind the story and photo, then your numbers will do the opposite. They will soar.
Now just sharing about others, well, that works, but the combination works best.
https://www.uofnkona.edu/uofn_courses/school-of-photography/
[NIKON Z 6, 85.0 mm f/1.8, ISO 50, ƒ/4.5, 1/125, Focal Length = 85]
This would be a great Instagram post. Today it would also be great to follow up with another photo and the scenes peek into the picture.
When I post these to my Instagram account, the second photo might get more comments. I hope you notice that I am always trying to help others get better with their photography. I am not saying look at how great I am, just like my photos.
I encourage you to make Social Media a way to create community and inspire others. When you do this, you will be even more fulfilled than if you made it all about you.
“When I hear people debate the ROI of social media? It makes me remember why so many businesses fail. Most businesses are not playing the marathon. They’re playing the sprint. They’re not worried about lifetime value and retention. They’re worried about short-term goals.”
Gary Vaynerchuk, CEO of VaynerMedia
Nikon D5 & 28-300mm perfect travel for sports
When traveling and doing mainly general photography, I don’t pack a Nikon 200-500mm or a 600mm ƒ/4. I have found that the Nikon 28.0-300.0 mm f/3.5-5.6 is the perfect lens for about 99% of the situations I encounter.
When I went to The Big Island of Hawaii, I saw online that there was a rodeo going on when I was there in Hilo. I just decided to travel with my Nikon D5 because of its unsurpassed ability to follow focus and freeze action.
The lens did a great job. Could I have done better with a 200-500mm–YES. However, I would then have to pack that large piece of glass.
I cropped a little in on these photos knowing that the principal place I will use them is on my website. A 20-megapixel image can easily be cropped for this end-use.
Now here are the settings I use for sports with my Nikon D5.
While I had the brand new Nikon Z6, it doesn’t perform as well as the Nikon D5. The Nikon D5 computer does a much better job with focus and buffer. You can shoot 200 RAW images before the buffer fills up. That is a lot. At 12 fps, you can pretty much nail the shot.
If I had to start over today
I would recommend that most people invest in a mirrorless camera system. I would not recommend starting with the Nikon FM2 that I first started my professional career shooting.
The market is very different when you ask me in my career what I would recommend. With that said, there are core things that do not change.
Cut Expenses
Start with essential gear. You don’t need the top-end model camera. Today’s most basic camera will do just about all you need. The only thing I would think a little about is if you are doing photography and video, you would want to go with a camera with headphones and microphone jacks.
Food, Shelter & Transportation are needs, but if you are not careful, you can live beyond your means. Remember you are starting out, so keep all these to the bare minimum. Drive a cheap car, get a roommate and eat as much as possible at home.
Know what everything costs. You need to know precisely what you need to meet your bills. I like to budget by the month. I know exactly what I need to pay for my monthly expenses. This is your budget, but you must also know your business budget. To get these numbers, NPPA has an excellent Cost of Doing Business Calculator. Here is that link: https://nppa.org/calculator. There are little “i” in a circle on each item. Click on that to learn more about each item.
Gear
- Camera
- 2 lenses
- 5 in 1 reflector
- Hot Shoe flash, Light Stand and umbrella
- Memory Cards, batteries
- Computer and Lightroom
You don’t need a lot. I would probably recommend having a second camera. This is more for backup than anything else. The rule is always to have two cameras for any job that cannot be rescheduled.
You need an essential website. I recommend WordPress. I have it hosted with Godaddy. Create a domain name. Use this with your email address as well.
Get a business card. I would have your name, phone number, email, and website domain name on the card.
Find your niche. I would start with headshots and family photos. You need very little gear, and your network already exists.
Too many go-after niches that require a lot of gear. Sport is a great example. To compete in this area, you need expensive telephoto lenses. The downside is the going rates for sports are one of the lowest in the industry.
Don’t try and market yourself for everything, but if someone calls, then take the job. Just don’t overreach. Start small and realize you must spend most of your time cold calling.
KISS for portraits
When you are changing lighting setups or camera settings, you cannot pay attention to expressions. Giving a lot of variety with lighting setups may not be the best approach.
KISS – Keep It Simple Stupid
Getting great facial expressions takes much more skill than changing a lighting setup. You have to build trust with the person. You have to connect with them so that together you can capture the subject’s true essence.
I do minor lighting changes so I can spend more time getting lots of expressions.
One thing I do with my setup is to change the background from a grey to a white background.
I can pause for a moment and turn on or off the two lights behind my white muslin background. Off I get a lovely neutral grey. The light from the beauty dish is what lights the background and my subject.
When I have my background lights on, they are giving me one stop more light than I have set on the subject. This gives me a spotless white background.
I love to shoot 50 to 100 images before I change the background.
I encourage people to bring a couple of outfits. It is incredible to me how much wardrobe change impacts the final photo.
Changing from a low-key to a high-key photo can also help change the photo’s mood.
My tip is to pick one outfit and shoot a lot. Go for 100 photos without changing lighting: background, or clothing. Then change the background and repeat. After you have done that, then change outfits and shoot again.
Make the emphasis of the portrait/headshot session about getting an expression. Go past the extremes of sadness and joy. Then try and shoot all the nuances of faces.
Don’t forget to get verticals and horizontal photos.
Remember, the thing that makes a great headshot is EXPRESSION!!!
It is much easier to get a pleasant and genuine expression if you have pushed the limits of expressions first.
What you can learn from actors
I believe there is such a thing as overdirecting a person during a headshot/portrait session.
I love working with actors because they want to use their skills and rarely get to do that with photographers during a headshot.
Before I get an intimate and what I would call a transparent moment with a subject, they have to be relaxed and comfortable with me.
One technique I use is asking “actors” to give me as many facial expressions as they can in 30 seconds. Those just starting in acting often will struggle, but for those who love to perform and do a variety of characters, this is like a psychogenic ‘trip.’ They are Thrill-Seekers whose risk is being perceived as being weird or off.
So “pushing the envelope” or “pushing the limits” means testing the boundaries of what is safe or acceptable in a given situation by exceeding those boundaries.
Once I have gone with them on this journey of letting them perform risky expressions, they tend to let me in.
They can tap into their emotions and let me see them through their eyes and faces.
For me, the most complex photo to get with people is one where their personality is being projected.
Even the smile photos are more genuine and inviting than had I not gone through asking them to give me all their expressions.
I slowly adjust the heads so that the light works best and their expressions are captured most effectively. That might mean I lower and raise the camera angle to their eyes.
I work hard at getting rid of things like double chins.
I like to think of getting a great expression because you need to have the subject go past the acceptable moment to an extreme.
My role is to create a safe environment where it is OK to try any expression, with the goal being that by pushing the limits, we can be truly transparent. This is when great moments can happen.
How do you get to the next level?
- Educate Yourself. Have a goal in mind. …
- Move From Thinking to Doing. …
- Face Your Fear. …
- Embrace Your Challenge. …
- Avoid Procrastination. …
- Adapt a “No Failure” Attitude. …
- Create a positive environment.
Know your audience
Look carefully at these first two photographs. What is similar, and what is different?
They are in the same church on the same day. The difference is the church has two types of worship services.
The very first photo is from the 8:45 a.m. Contemporary Worship Service and the second is from the 11:05 a.m. Traditional Worship Service. They went to great lengths to make transforming of their large sanctuary from a traditional church to a contemporary space. They have fabric that covers all the walls to keep the Rock Style band music from bouncing around too much in the space to allowing the traditional Choir to reverberate during the traditional service.
The senior pastor speaks at both services.
There is little difference between the two other than just his dress code.
Just six years ago, the church added a contemporary service that met in their gym. It is now the best-attended service and needs more space. This is why they converted their most significant space to accommodate the group.
One of the largest churches in America, North Point Community Church, is nearby. Many churches lost members to this church because of the style of worship and sermons.
When Andy Stanley started the church in November of 1995, they intentionally created a new format and wanted to be different than all the churches in the area. Andy said, “Atlanta does not need another church. Atlanta needs a safe environment where the unchurched can come and hear the life-changing truth that Jesus Christ cares for them and dies for their sins.” So began North Point Community Church.
Andy understood the audience better than most at the time for Atlanta in 1995.
WHY CHURCHES ARE DYING AND DECLINING FASTER TODAY
Slow response to change as change accelerates all around us. Many churches are incredibly slow to change. For most of our American history, the pace of cultural and technological change was sufficiently paced for churches to lag only five to ten years. Now churches are lagging 20 and 30 years as the pace of change increases dramatically. To many attendees and members, the church thus seems increasingly irrelevant. To be clear, I am speaking about issues of style, methodology, and awareness, not changing doctrine or biblical truths. A recently interviewed church guest said it clearly: “I stuck with my parents’ church as long as I could. But I had enough when we had a big blow-up over projection screens in the worship center. I wanted to go to a church where matters of minutia were not issues to fight over.”
I believe that the church isn’t the only organization that has to do a better job of understanding its audience. Journalism has suffered dramatically because they have lost touch with its audience.
Like the growing churches, the content should not change; instead, the issues of style, methodology, and awareness need to change.
Today communicators need to do a better of getting to know their audience. While you must master the subject to communicate it, just as importantly, you must pay as much attention to the audience’s understanding.
One of the most significant problems people have with anything they create is that they think people will discover them. Well, the smart ones know you have to advertise and appeal to the needs of that audience to engage them.
I know that some of the most successful organizations are those that have created a fictitious family/customer. This family represents the median of the bell curve of that community.
I have listened to writers and editors arguing over why Sam and Sally [fictitious couple] would be interested in a story.
If you cannot tell me why a story you are working on is necessary for those in your audience to see, then the odds of anyone reading it are not good.
You have to tell people how this information can impact their lives. Surprisingly I have been shocked when people show me their work in journalism, and I ask why they did a story that they cannot tell me why the audience needs to know about it.
If you know your audience and your subject, you will not have to worry about a Plan “B.”