Joe McNally: Go Where the Light Already Is

The Kentucky Headhunters are an amazing, down home, rockin’ band. They’re also a helluva nice bunch of guys. Super talented. Grammy winners. A country rock institution. And, when you walk into their headquarters, visually, you get smacked right between the eyes. You look around and your first thought in this chock-a-block room, seen above, is “I gotta shoot in here!”

And your second thought is, “How the hell am I gonna do that?”

It’s beautifully busy, this room. And it’s got reflective, glossy 8×10’s all over the place, polished guitars, and even some vinyl tacked to wall of memories. You want to shoot it, but you also realize that if you put up some spiffy umbrella or big ass soft box you’re gonna step on the essential character of the place, not to mention create reflections everywhere.

So, I sat there and stared at it. You let the place speak to you. There was a window to the camera right side and a door to the camera left side. The light from these two sources was nice, just not plentiful. What if I put SB 910 units right where the light is anyway?

Which is, tried and true, what I did. I put up a diffuser on the window and banged a Speedlight through it. And I put up one SB unit in the doorway, bouncing off the floor, ’cause that’s what the existing light was doing. Made a click and hoped it would work out.

The light just has to not interfere at this point, or draw attention to itself. I simply wanted it to look like the light that was already there. The one guitar on the left had a hit from the door anyway, so I just let it be. The heart and soul of the picture are the two characters (and I do mean characters!) in the photo…Richard Young (seated) and Doug Phelps (standing). Had a great time with these guys, and Black Stone Cherry, working just outside Nashville, this past summer. More on the adventures of both bands in blogs tk. 

The window diffusion is a Lastolite skylite panel, and the floor bounce is a tri-grip with a warm reflector cover. Nikon D810, fitted with a Nikkor 24-70.

More tk…..

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Joe McNally: Trump and Biden-Two Magazines, Two Approaches….

This is not a political blog, saints be praised. I talk about Group A, Channel 1, and stuff like that, not the results of the latest polls. But the life of a photographer is punctuated with encounters, large and small. And you make pictures of these encounters! That’s the job.

Trump for Newsweek, Biden for People. Different magazines, different approaches. Trump was a week long encounter, Biden just a day or so. Trump was in color, with lights and an assistant. Biden was by myself, no flash, working with window light. I’m a generalist, doing what the job requires, so I was comfortable with both approaches. The current, roiled political waters caused me to do a bit of an archive rummage, which was, well, interesting.

I think perhaps the stories, and the way I had to approach them, might have mirrored the men. Trump was in color, all glitz, powerhouse ego, and I did my requisite lighting and staging. Biden I met at the train station in Wilmington, and we shared a Metroliner to his Senate office. Shot B&W, available light, all day. Tiny bit of color by the windows in his office. The Trump days were often set up and wait. With Biden, it was shoot and move, shoot and move, all day, camera bag over my shoulder.

Trump gadded about in what he claimed at the time was the only non-military Puma helicopter in service in the world. Biden had, well, the Metroliner. And some big windows, thankfully.

They have widely disparate political beliefs, but both, on those days, shared a penchant for red ties.

Trump was “The Donald” to Ivana, at that time. I never met Mrs. Biden.

Shot the cover below in about three minutes, with one 3×4 softbox, in his conference room. Biden went to meetings on the hill. I sat on the floor and covered his expressions.

Trump is the big news of this year’s race so far, which everyone who turns on a TV knows. Biden is deciding about participation in what would be a long, hard political season. Two different people, two very different coverages, done in very different ways. The job of a photographer. You adapt. You keep your views and opinions to yourself and you cover the job. On those days, you simply oberve the world you are assigned to, and you make pictures. And those pictures stick with you, amazingly. These jobs were shot in the 80’s! And, here, now, I have cause to look at them again, in 2015.

What a wonderful, intriguing and forever relevant thing we do, us photog types. Make pictures of our life and times, and the people who populate them.

More tk….

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Joe McNally: Go To Light Shapers

I’ve been luckily associated with the folks at the Lastolite Company for a while now. I have learned a lot from Gary Astill, their chief designer and mad genius in residence. He can take a napkin, a piece of wire and some black gaffer tape and make the light from small flash guns sing and dance. Over time, we have collaborated on a number of light shapers that have been well received.

I get asked a lot, “What always goes with you?” “What is your go-to travel kit, apart from lenses and cameras?” Or, the line of questioning is a tad more blunt. “How many goddam Speedlights do you really travel with, dude?”

Variations on a theme, to be sure. So, here goes. Speedlights, generally, three to five. Battery packs. Gels. Tape. Maha battery chargers, and Powerex batteries. (The Maha quick chargers can go zero to sixty in like 10-12 minutes. You get a fresh group of eight batteries pronto with these things.)

Then, what do your run the lights through? It’d be pretty idiotic of me to have designed light shapers I don’t use. So, below is a listing of light shapers I use consistently to relentlessly.

Ezybox 24″ Hot Shoe Softbox, White Interior

Handy, collapsible, nice, soft but punchy quality of light. Drop a velcro egg crate over it and it is very controllable, without a lot of spill. Translates well from location to studio.

4 in 1 Umbrella

Light and easy to transport, as all umbrellas are, it gives several variations in terms of approaching the subject. (Shoot through, reflected with white, reflected with silver and shoot through with square mask.) My favorite iteration is to use as a shoot through and put a Tri-flash with three Speedlights into it. Big, soft, easy light. With a little low fill, it transforms into a bit of glamour light.

Just shot the above on our wonderful Scotland workshop, organized by my dear friend and tidal wave of organizational prowess, Liza Politi. She and Ari (who shot the below on a smart phone) form Fancy Girl Street Boy Productions, and together we have done Prague & Vienna, and most recently, Scotland. Stay tuned. More to come.

The below was shot in China. The stuff travels well.

Used alone, at an angle, though, it can become a character light, with a deeper set of shadows. The light here is more to the side, and farther away from the subject.

Speaking of low fill…if you want to really formalize and directionalize it….the Uplite.

I use it on occasion when the set is static, and there’s some control being applied, in the sense we are not moving fast and shifting positions and locations. It’s a great low fill source that you can configure as a direct light, and as a bounce that is diffused.

Just enough of a low tweak to get under the cowboy hat, for instance. My subject here is the wondrous Nancy DeSantis.

Ezybox Speedlite Box. White interior. Small, light and fast. Move it close, and it’s a nice light. Never gonna be a 74″ Octa, but then a 74″ Octa doesn’t fit into your shoulder bag the way this does. A move-around light, perched on the end of a paint pole or hand held, it gives you a nice bit of control in an impromptu situation. Below are examples shot on the fly in front of an audience, working TTL, and moving fast.

The colors in the backgrounds of these are just raw Speedlights with gels.

You can use the speedlite box as a main if you want to carve out a singular area of light and leave areas of darkness to play with other lights. There are several lights in the pic below, Profoto big flash even, but the main is that little speedlite box-a-doodle.

Skylite Rapid with Masks. I call it the 3×3, but that is a misnomer. It is actually about a 40″ square of light. Collapsible frame. Nice light and you can control it well with the masks. Again, a source I often use with a Tri-flash and multiple Speedlights.

Whole surface below….

With masks…

Mixed into a number of the above pix is the background, hopefully subtle, use of fill light, which is often coming from a Tri-Grip diffuser/bounce surface. They come in kits and can diffuse or reflect off a variety of surfaces. And, they can be used as a main light, such as below.

Most of the pictures published here were done very quickly, sometimes with just hand held poles and lights. Others required more work, but the basic mantra of the shapers I use is small, light and fast.

Gear questions, as always, shout out the big guy….jsnyder@adorama.com

More tk….

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