Have you ever had one of THOSE days?
Day 2 of the Peter – Vasko “3 Day Creative” was one of those days for sure…but the end result was noteworthy.
Vasko and I started out prepared to shoot “food and drink” outside in the nice, dreamy, dappled light under the big maple tree outside the house.
Scrim…check. Food preparation by Christine in progress… check. Prop glasses clean…check. Styling set… check. High wind BIG STORM blasting through….What the??? CHECK!
It was literally on us in 2 minutes from when we spotted it rolling in from the north at high speed. It lasted 30 minutes, knocked out the power, and made quite a mess. Christine also had to stop the food prep she was working on when the stove quit.
Hmmm…..Now there’s debris all over the lawn and there’s no sun. The wind is goofy-silly, and the ambient changes every few seconds.
Ok…plan B.
We move inside to photograph a set of breakfast plates on the nice, bright (usually) balcony. No problem. We’ll use daylight balanced hot lights.
We do ok, but now the light is getting darker by the minute. The balcony area looks rather more like the “Bat Cave”, than a nice bright, airy, breakfast nook.
We got some great shots, but it’s now time to change strategies again.
Ok…dinner break..we decide we’ll try something else.
We were able to shoot some more shots of our volunteer Marcel. he suggested trying an industrial-commercial thing,
doing some arc welding in a dark setting. The results were quite nice considering no real planning was involved.
Sometimes this shooting-on-the-fly method results in some pleasant surprises.
We move on to working on some captures of some high-speed water splash photography.
Setup is all in place. Turn on the power on the “safely distant” Vagabond II Power Pack….uh oh!
Smoke starts pouring out of the inverter. Lots of smoke! Um….NOT good. How about we unplug that puppy!
The smell of burnt circuit board isn’t a pleasant one. I sense a warranty call on Monday morning.
Ok…stay positive…Let’s move on…
Run new power cord. Go get props. While Vasko is carrying out bucket full of water balloons, handle on bucket breaks off.
Really? Ok…let’s keep moving. Ready balloons and start shooting. Local skunk decides it’s time to clear the pipes in the vicinity.
Really…Really? Ugh! Well….Let’s keep moving…We shake it off and resume shooting and tweaking settings.
Yep. Mr. Skunk deploys AGAIN, 15 minutes after the first round of de-foliant.
Now we’re laughing, and getting punch drunk. I’m dropping water balloons almost as often as I’m clamping them up…geez!
The splashes aren’t working out quite like we anticipated, due to how we’ve set up. We work the challenge back and forth, but we’re tired, we’re giggling,
we stink of skunk residue, and we’re STILL not getting the results we want. Sigh…
Let’s finish up.
Here’s my main point of re-telling this misadventurous and malodorous day.
After we clean up, and while talking about the challenges encountered during the day, we then do some MORE research.
The answer actually presented itself at approximately 2:30 in the morning. The answer also yielded some tremendous inspiration for the next morning’s shoot!
Here’s the important point to all of this.
We could have just given up and put our feet up at any point in the process. I’m sure glad we didn’t.
We could have easily gotten discouraged by weather, broken items, fried lighting equipment, fatigue, skunk, that $@#% skunk…AGAIN,
and whatever else we might have come up with as an excuse, but we didn’t stop moving!
The solution to the main challenge manifested itself when we were both exhausted and had nothing left.
Sometimes that’s how life is. The best things happen after everything looks to be long past finished.
As a result of this marathon, we found some answers we were looking for. Technical things.
Fine points that came through a pile of trial and error and struggle. I think the results are worth it.
Here’s a shot from the next day…
Bottom line: When things get frustrating. Don’t stop moving! You may be closer to a breakthrough than you think!
Special thanks to Vasko for enduring Day 2 of three! It’s an awesome thing to work with someone who refuses to allow negative stuff to derail the creative process. Glad we persisted pal!
More to come from Day 3….Stay Tuned!
Cheers,
P.
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