FV | Party Time

I met Paul Atherton just before Christmas. I really enjoyed his company.

He invited me to his after Christmas Party and it was great fun. A very nice mix of people showed up.

As always I had my Camera with me to document the event.

I learnt a few things which I will share.

Firstly, I packed my Camera Bag with my D700, Nikon 24-70mm F2.8, The stunning Sigma 35mm 1.4, My Speed Light with Mag Dome Modifier. This is my standard kit now for shooting any type of event.

The Event was held in The Spy Room at The Morpeth Arms on Millbank. A very charismatic Pub with a certain character.

The Spy Room was a nice size, not small, tables with chairs etc. I instinctively felt I would not need my Nikon 24-70mm. I switched Lens to my 35mm - it was perfect choice.

The 35mm is firmly wired now into my visual database, it was absolutely perfect. All of the images created came from this Lens. The final image, the group shot was from the 24-70mm at 24mm.

Using my Speed Light for an Event is a given now - I don’t even negotiate light levels.

My Speed Light is mounted on my Camera, I set how much depth of field will need, F8, Shutter Speed 1/250 and do a quick test shot to determine my ISO / 800.

The ambient light in the room was slightly subdued just to give me some legibility in the shadows. My Speed Light did the rest at 1/8 power - I made a few adjustments on the fly because the room had a high ceiling.

My last image for the night was the group shot.

This was shot at 24mm; with a high ceiling, standing about 4 metres away, my Flash lost power to light the group. This is where I made some quick adjustments to my settings.

I kept my depth of field.

Adjusted my shutter speed to 1/25 sec and adjusted my Flash Compensation to achieve a decent image.

The most important detail in all of these images was to shoot in RAW mode. This a no compromise detail on my workflow. So much detail and recovery is waiting for me during my editing.

Finally, I was delighted to meet Cinderella and Charles

They both sat for me during this impromptu Portrait Session. Another great lesson I came away with was how brilliant my 35mm Lens is for Portraits.

Most Portraits fall under the Headshot Banner. The 35mm Lens adds more context to the Classic Frame - it’s what I call a natural wide frame so this means my subject will feature within the context of the environment.

I am very happy with these images.

It’s all good practice.

Thanks for reading.