A Typical Shoot - Post Production: Bringing in the custodial, painting, and landscaping crews.

I'm sure that non photographers have somewhat of a misconception about how a photographer (in 2012) works: get an assignment, grab a camera, drive to location, shoot, give photos to client.  While that's true for the most part, a lot more goes into the final product than most people (including the client) probably realize.  This post will hopefully shed a little light on the process that I go through.

Yesterday I got a call from a (an awesome) client who needed a project shot on the fly for an 8am meeting the following day.  The phone call came in at around 10am.  Enough time to shuffle my schedule, do some quick homework on the project, and call the contact at the site.  Get specific equipment ready and plan it out ASAP.

Assignment was to shoot the three aquarium facilities at the Wildlife World Zoo out in Litchfield Park, AZ.  After speaking with my site contact and gathering as much info (which direction does the facility face?) as possible on the shoot (sometimes I look up the project on Google Maps), I planned my shoot.

I try to shoot at sunset or at sunrise.  In this case, it was too late for sunrise, so sunset would have to do.  So at 5PM I headed out.  I'm in central Phoenix and the location is near the White Tank Mountains, quite a trek at rush hour.  So I jumped in in the car, plugged in the new Offspring album, and got movin'.  Arrived at location at 6:00pm - unloaded gear.  (Contact was already gone for the day, luckily the guy at the gift shop was cool).

Now I actually started taking photos.  This is where the challenges began as far as lighting, people walking into the shot (it's a zoo), moving ant infested trash cans, trash on the ground, etc., and keep in mind that it's 112 degrees outside.  And I love every minute of it.

The facade of this building was completely dark due to direction of the sun; I wanted the sunset in the back so I lit the building with three remote speedlights.  I could have used big strobes but since I was shooting three buildings, I didn't have time to set all of that up.

After I shot all three aquarium exterior buildings, it was time to shoot the interiors.  Again, more challenges (see above).

 

When I finished shooting the interiors it was time to pack up my gear and head home - at this point it was 8:50pm and a lighting storm was brewing all around.  I considered shooting lighting but A. I knew my client was waiting and B. had I been struck by lighting it would have messed up their meeting the next day.

Once I got home (drive through for dinner) it was time to go to work.  I knew there would be some typical post production (white balance correction, color correction, etc.) but also some not so typical stuff as well.  I try to get it right in the camera, but a lot of the time that isn't possible.

Here are a few examples of this:

original, untouched

 Here's a great example of where my landscaping skills come into play:

landscaped, wall painted, white balance, and color corrected

Sometimes you have to be a custodian.  You don't want soda stains on the floor in the final project:

original, untouched

soda stain removed, contrast in aquarium tank

And other times I'll curse myself afterwards for missing something at the shoot:

original with ugly trash can

color corrected with trash can removed

At this point it's 11pm and I've completed the post production (sometimes I just have to walk away because I can be obsessive and spend HOURS).

Now it's time to upload to the servers - which I do twice so that the client can have different file sizes depending on how they intend to use the photos.

So at the end of the day, this particular shoot took 6 hours, add an hour for prep, so about 7 hours.  I enjoy every minute of it and I can't wait for the next call!

The Wildlife World Zoo is located at:
Wildlife World Zoo & Aquarium

623-935-WILD (9453) | 16501 W. Northern Ave., Litchfield Park, AZ 85340