So a friend talked Becky-Lee and I into volunteering to shoot the Selkirk Waterfront Festival, a community family thing. We had fun but I learned that I realllllly need to buy a flash before I do something like this again! Bright sunshine and folks under canopies, often coloured, do not make for easy shots without.
If anyone would care to take a quick flip through a few of the shots and add any other suggestions it would be much appreciated :)
Besides the posted I did remember to get lots of general crowd shots, exibitor's and sponser's booths, that kind of thing they always want. I've sent off the shots but haven't heard back, so hopefully she's satisfied.
Oh, and please let me know if colours are weird. I'm still not sure if my monitor's near to properly calibrated. And yes, I know some of the shots have a red cast. I tried hard to get rid of it and got it greatly minimised, but the main sponsor, Tim Horton's, provided brilliant red canopies. Sigh... what's wrong with white??
Thanks so much, Erick. Now I'm doubly glad you showed up when you did ;)
Oh, and I did dodge that little guy. I also hate baseball caps! He was soooo dark under there that I was afraid to try bringing it up any more, but maybe I'll have another go. :)
My suggestions for improving your shots overall. Change your angle when shooting kids photos get down on their level, do get a flash to pop a bit of light under the tents and the hats. I'm not a fan of the back of the head, back of the person shots. Overall I'd say you did pretty good, some of them are and please don't get offended but snap shotty. vary things up, get creative I know you can be I've seen your work. Gets some shallow DOF, gets some deep DOF, get some wide angle close up, lay down on the ground to shoot that kid sitting on the ground eating some ice cream or whatever.
Thanks, Matt, and I'm not offended at all. One of the things I mentioned to Becky afterwards was that I need to get over my self-consciousness enough to be able to get on the ground or into the middle of things for the more interesting shot. Practice should help with that, right?
Another thing I learned was it's probably better to break myself in with events that I've actually been to before. I was so focussed on making sure I got a bit of everything, since the entertainment/play area was separate from the stalls/food area, and making sure my helper got the releases for the kids that I wasn't taking the time to get the best shot rather than just A shot.
I got an email from the organiser this afternoon asking if we'd be interested in being their photographers for other events, so I guess she was happy with them :)
