Category: Workshops

5 Weeks (1): The Washington D.C. Group Shot

The last five weeks have been a wild ride for me, from Washington D.C. to Kansas City, via San Francisco, Toronto, Colorado and Canyonlands Natl. Park.

Come with me on the trip during the next few posts!

Stop 1: the Washington D.C. Group Shot

This was a fun workshop, exploring photography and light and post production and workflow. (And thanks to SecureNinja for providing the computer room!)

Coming up with a fun idea for a group shot isn’t always easy, but having recently experimented with a new type of portraits, and having done a long portrait of German musician Joo Kraus, I thought it might be a nice thing to try this with a group shot.

» more from the 2012 tour

How good can you operate your camera upside-down?

We’re lucky that we have access to one of the best views during the Toronto Urban Photography workshop. The roof on the building that Sean Galbraith lives in reveals a stunning skyline…

…and a high ledge that my tripod is just a little bit too short for.

Well okay, it’s not too short, but in order to get a proper view of the city, I’d have to fully extend the middle column which for a 2-second exposure is a bit too shaky. So in order to be able to peek over the side and have a solid and stable foundation for longer exposures, I have last year decided to completely collapse the legs of the tripod (very stable!) and hang the camera upside down under it (low center of gravity, also very stable).

Tripiod upside down

As you see, the only potential problem with the setup is that right behind the edge of the railing comes an eleven floor drop, which is why I had the stap hanging this way. During the exposure and the setup, my arm was always through the loop. There was also no wind and no real chance of the tripod being bumped, and the rubber feet did a great job holding it in place. Still, just the slightest bit scary.

But in the end it was worth doing it like that:

Toronto Skyline

What are your unconventional tripod setups?

[sc:workshops]

An Incredibly Organic Process – Toronto 2012

In August 2012, ten people met in Toronto to celebrate one of the most magic ways of making photographs: with a 4×5 (and an 8×10) camera, using film. They spent three days to learn and explore every facet of the large format, from portraiture to landscape and architecture, from tilt and swing to rise and fall, from push to pull and from beginner to expert. This is the full version of the video.

If you liked this video, you might also enjoy “120”, a short film