09 – Photography Tips | Shelley Paulson Photography Blog

09 – Photography Tips

March26th

5 Comments

How I Travel with Camera Gear

Posted in: 09 - Photography Tips

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As I write this, I’m flying high above the plains, on my way home from a working trip to Kansas City. This is my second trip in three weeks. I love to travel and fly frequently for both photography and photography instruction, so I thought it might be helpful to others for me to share some of the things I’ve learned about low-stress traveling with my camera gear.

My primary purpose for this trip was to photograph the Senior Dance Recital for the daughter of dear friends of ours. In addition, I set up several mentoring sessions, one with a hands-on element, and also wanted to photograph my friend’s twin babies while staying at her home. I needed gear for a low light theatre photography (which was mainly my 70-200 2.8 L IS II and 35mm 1.4) and a few portrait sessions, which was mainly my 50mm 1.2, 85mm 1.2 and 135 f2. I also wanted to teach off camera flash at the hands-on mentoring session, so I needed to bring one flash and my Stratto II trigger set to fire the flash.

Planning My Trip

I would have made a great travel agent. I love searching for flights and getting a great deal on travel! I have found that it’s true that the best travel prices are on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. A TSA agent told me today that the airports are the least busy on Tuesdays as well. About 45 days before a trip, I start to watch the prices on flights. They can fluctuate quite a bit, and I like to watch them for a week or two to see if it looks like they are going to drop more. I decided only three weeks ago to fly to Kansas City for this trip instead of drive, and that was a good call. There were snow storms I would have had to contend with, possible on both legs of the trip! When I started watching prices they were around $210 for a round trip ticket. That’s a great deal! But I waited for Tuesday to roll around and they dropped to $193. Even better!

I also had to rent a car for this trip, so I did a bunch of research because I was finding that any well-reviewed car rental company at the KCI airport was going to run me close to $200 for an economy size car. I read that Travelocity had the best car rental rates, so I went there a scored a car for $137. That’s a pretty great savings! I almost couldn’t have driven down here for $330 (I drive a Jeep with a v8 Hemi. That equals poor fuel economy.)

Packing My Camera Bag

I carry all my camera gear in the Think Tank Airport International Rolling Camera Bag. I love this bag because it’s roomy, rolls great, locks both to things and locks the contents of the bag, but most of all, I love that it will fit under the seat in pretty much any commercial airplane. I prefer to put it in the overhead bin, but there are times when I’m on a very small regional jet and it won’t fit in the overhead. I’ve been in situations where they wanted to gate check my bag and I absolutely will NOT check my camera gear. I don’t want it out of my sight for theft reasons and I don’t want it thrown around by baggage handlers.

Above you see a photo of how I packed the bag for this trip. I have two camera bodies in there, one with a lens and one without. I have my 70-200 tucked under my flash, and some flash accessories in that smaller compartment in the middle. I didn’t need to fill the bag for this trip, so I do have one empty compartment, that I sometimes threw my wallet into.

I also brought my Shootsac, a monopod, and a small soft box for my flash. I packed those in my big suitcase, as I wasn’t worried about damaging them.

Packing My Carry-On Bag

My carry-on contains my laptop, accessories, wallet, book, snacks (always bring snacks! I pack nuts and Mojo bars) and a super handy water bottle with a built in filter (they sell them at Target). I hate paying $4 for water at the airport, so I just keep the bottle empty until I’m past security, then just fill it from any tap.

I always leave a pair of ear buds, a flash drive, pens, a note pad, and other small things like Truvia for my coffee an extra memory card reader in this bag so I don’t have to pack it every time I travel. I throw a small purse in my suitcase so I don’t have to lug this bag when going out to dinner or shopping.

When I travel for weddings, I bring a backpack for my carry-on instead of my laptop bag, so I can fill it with my lighting gear and put more lenses in my camera bag. My backpack has space for a laptop, so it’s works well.

The Airport

I try to arrive at the airport two hours before my flight. You can cut it a lot closer than that, but I don’t want to be stressed when I travel, so I get there early. If the lines are long, I can just breathe and people watch, instead of freak out that I’m going to miss my flight. Getting there early also gives me time to get coffee. An essential element to easy travel. ;)

I am old school and still like to carry a paper boarding pass. I’ve done the phone pass thing, and it’s just not a easy as paper. I’m constantly having to unlock my phone, reopen the Delta app (if I was on, say, Facebook for the hundredth time). Paper is just easy to pull out of my pocket.

When I go through security, I always put my shoes through first and my gear through last. If my camera bag gets inspected, I don’t want it whisked away while I stand there waiting for my shoes. I purposely wear comfy shoes that are easy to get on and off, shirts with no embellishments and pants that don’t require a belt. Travel is not a fashion show for me, and this gets me through security quickly and painlessly.

If my bag does get pulled for inspection (which happens very infrequently for me), I just smile and practice patience. Oh, and I don’t make small talk about bombs. Not that I’m speaking from experience or anything. ;)

I also smile and greet any TSA person or Ticketing/Gate Agent I make eye contact with. It takes almost no effort to be kind and I think it just makes the experience better.

Boarding the Plane

Minneapolis is a Delta hub, so I try to always fly Delta. I’m a SkyMiles member, which means I pay a fee to have a credit card through them and I get to board right after first class. The reason this is important is that if I board last on a full flight, I could end up with a situation where there’s no room for my bag overhead. I can put it under your seat, but then my carry-on will have to find room overhead. It’s possible I could get separated from one of my bags and I don’t want to take that chance, so I board as early as I can.

With my SkyMiles membership, I also get my first bag free. Because I fly with a camera bag on almost every trip, I have to check a bag, so this easily pays for the membership in the first two trips of the year.

I personally like the aisle seat, so I don’t have to climb over people to get to the bathroom. I also like to put my bag in the bin right over my seat, so I can get it down without worrying about hitting someone on the head.

Once I’m in the air I sit back, write blog posts, and enjoy the ride. I today, the flight isn’t full, so I moved over to the window seat and have enjoyed looking out the window a few times and marveling at the snow-covered earth below.
January16th

13 Comments

The Whole Truth

Posted in: 09 - Photography Tips, 10 - Personal

A have a confession to make…

(Don’t you love it when people write that? You just know there’s a juicy tidbit coming.)

I’m not a perfect photographer. My creative process isn’t always pretty. There’s a lot of work that happens before my images land here in the blog or on my Facebook page.

But I haven’t really shown you that part. I have kept it all “behind the curtain,” like the great Wizard of Oz, pulling knobs and turning dials, all the while leading you to think I poop pretty photos.

Was that gross?

Okay, all the while leading you to believe that my work is always as you see it here.

But it’s time for me to share the whole truth. I have a creative process. It’s messy. I make mistakes. I fix them. And I only show you my best work because somehow I thought that putting on this show of perfectly pretty photos would make everyone love me and hire me. Then I read something that caused me to have a change of heart.

I “randomly” came across a book that is having a profound effect on my heart and making me rethink a lot of things about my life and my art. It’s called “Untitled” by Blaine Hogan, the Creative Director at Willow Creek Community Church in Chicago (long known for mingling faith and the arts.)

I could write 6 blog posts about this book (and I might, this being number one), but the first thing I wanted to share about is my creative process. Because without sharing my process, all you see is my product, and to me, that lacks the kind of authenticity I believe deeply in.

But first, a little story…

I spent the week between Christmas and New Years mentoring a small group of photographers in Christian Event Photography. Each day they would create images and I would give them feedback and ways to improve. They progressively got better and better – blowing my expectations out of the water! One day I decided to critique my photos for them. When they saw my photos, I remember someone saying, “You make mistakes too!?!”

Like this was shocking?

Okay, now I was the one shocked! OF COURSE I MAKE MISTAKES (see the opening image in this post)! I immediate felt a weight of sadness for inadvertently giving other photographers the impression I don’t make mistakes.

So when I read this quote from “Untitled”, I realized that it was time to come clean:

“When your art is only in your product and not also in your process, things will always end this way (miserable). You must understand that your art is not just what you make, but also how you make it. Your art isn’t just the ‘what’ of the end-result, but is also ‘how’ you got there.” Hogan, Blaine – Untitled: Thoughts on the Creative Process (Kindle Locations 608-610).

This blog is visited by as many photographers as potential clients (if not more) and I don’t want a single one to think that I’ve arrived at some pinnacle of excellence where I don’t make mistakes anymore.

Of course, dear potential clients, I make mostly great photos! :) But there is a process involved in making the photos you see here, and it usually involves several not as great photos before getting to the great ones. :)

I am what they call a “heavy shooter.” I use the camera as a sketchbook. My first photo in a situation is rarely my best. I create a lot of photos because I am driven to create that one great, compelling photo.

One thing I had to keep encouraging my students at the event photography workshop was to create more images.

Every single student: Click click. Move on. Click click. Move on. Click click. It drove me a little nuts. ;)

Why? Because I will sometimes spend 5 minutes or more in one spot on one subject. Trying different compositions, exposures, waiting for that great expression, waiting…refining…waiting…refining. This is my creative process when I’m behind the camera, and out of that 5 or more minutes that yielded 30+ frames, you only see one photo, if that. This process is exhausting, but totally worth it for those moments when it all clicks. Honestly, I work hard for every photo.

So I share this to encourage my photographer friends. Every photographer makes mistakes and has a creative process that you are not usually privy to. In fact, if you don’t make mistakes, you’re probably doing it wrong. You have to fail to succeed, and if you are bound up in needing every frame to be perfect, you will never take the kind of risks necessary to become all you dream you can be or do all you have in your heart to do as an artist.

You have to work hard for it. There are no shortcuts. And there will be a lot of frustration.

One of my favorite quotes on creativity is this one by Ira Glass:

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste.

But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit.

Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story.

It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

So the whole truth is that I’m still fighting. I wish to always have a gap that motivates me to work harder to get even better at what I do. I wanted you to know that my creative process isn’t perfect; that I work hard and make mistakes and that is all part of making great images.
September28th

3 Comments

Chris and Jill’s Lake Wedding at Maddens in Brainerd Minnesota

Posted in: 02 - Weddings, 09 - Photography Tips

When it comes to outdoor weddings, I always say that sunshine and heat are better than rain. Well, it definitely didn’t rain on Chris and Jill’s wedding day. The sun was an honored guest for their lakeside wedding and reception on the beach at Madden’s on Gull Lake Resort in Brainerd.

This first image sums them up as a couple. They adore each other and are adored by their friends and family. It was so fun to be a part of their day and share in the love!

Photographer’s Notes: Photographing weddings means being ready for any type of lighting challenge, this includes full sun on a white dress and human skin. What I have found to be the best approach is to shoot RAW (which I always do) and underexpose the image. I always photograph weddings with the highlight alert on in for the back of the camera. As a general rule, I don’t let the dress “blink” or overexpose (though once in awhile, I’ll let it blink maybe 10-15%). Once you lose detail in the highlights of an image, there is only a little leeway to recover that detail. I know that especially in a situation like full sun where I am using very low ISO settings on my camera (usually ISO 100), I will have a lot of leeway in bringing back the shadow detail. The image may look dark on the back of the camera, but you have to trust that you are getting the most data to work with in your RAW file by underexposing.

On a side note to that, brides spend a lot of time, money and energy choosing just the right gown, and that includes the small details and texture in the fabric and detailing. I see many photographers overexposing the gown so much that all the lovely detail is pretty much gone. Keeping your highlight alert on and not letting the dress blink will fix this problem! Even if you like a more bright, washed out style of editing, not blowing out the dress highlights in camera will give you more dress detail once you get your exposure back to where you like it in post-production.

Okay, on to the wedding photos!

Their guestbook was a painting of the trunk of a tree. Guests left a fingerprint and a little note on the painting and now Chris and Jill have personalized art for their home!

Is there anything cuter than a ring bearer and flower girl going down the aisle hand in hand?

This little girl cracked me up as she immersed herself in these flowers!

FIRE!

Guests cooled off by the lake…some in the lake.

You can’t go to Madden’s and not get a photo in the big chair!

Yummy light!

I love dancing grandparents!