The Bestest Darn Softbox --- EVER

y of you know of my association with SOPHA Studio in Manchester NH. It is a fantastic place to practice the craft of controlled photography, and learn the craft from those who are willing to teach. 

Now since SOPHA has a drive in cyc wall, they have that lit with

 the biggest softbox I think I

 have ever actually seen. It is big enough to light a car front to back, and has something like 7 lights in side of it. Beautiful.

Well, I have found one bigger! And softer! And a joy to work with! Anyone want to guess ??

It is a FOG BANK!

Yes indeed. Fog. Which is a cloud at ground level. 

I know you all think I have lost it, but read on:

I have been shooting lots of sports assignments over the past few days, and the weather here in New Englan has been nothing short of murky. But this, I feel, is an advantage. The sun goes down around 4:30 which requires the lights at the fields to be the primary source of illumination for the soccer or football games. Now invariably there are areas of the field that are unevenly illuminated. It is the nature of the beast.

So here is where the fog comes into play. The fog scatters the light around, and that softens it. But it also fills in some of the shadows, as all thouse photons bounce around. COOL EFFECT!

Here is a shot from Reading High School in Reading Mass during half time of last night's Football game. I realize there are no players on the field, but I am posting this to show the conditions.

Even the kids playing pickup football are fairly well lit.

And that is what takes your photos from snapshots to well crafted photos, see the light and where it does and doesn't go and use it to your advantage.

Digital Images Over the Years

Labor Day - In my world, it is the last chance to prepare for the big show. If you know me, you know what I mean - Fall, aka Autumn, aka the Most wonderful time of the year! Why do I call it that - one word, well OK three words - HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS.

So I did what I do every year about this time - I made sure that my computer and workflow are up to speed for the season ahead. Like winterizing your car, I call it fallerizing my computer. First I make sure all the summer files are backed up on DVD and transferred to the archive hard drive. I then make sure that the Hard Drives in my system can handle the gigabytes (GB) that are about to be thrown their way. Yes I shoot sports and yes I shoot heavy and yes I shoot lots of games. Usually 2 a day, and up to 5 on a weekend. So, yes, I churn out the GB.

So today, realizing I was running out of drive space, I was swopping over files to the new 500GB drive, and I thought I would make a chart as to what I have shot for the newspapers, since 1999 when I acquired my first digital camera. (A Nikon Cool Pix 990!)

A side note here: my workflow involves a very basic filing system: Ingest the card to a "todays date" folder on a small drive, then separate each assignment into individual folders, then under each assignment a folder labelled by destination of photos (I work for several newspapers with different deadlines and mechanical requirements.) If the photo is going to be posted on my website, then the folder is copied to the web drive for posting.

OK, so here it is for your humour, is my chart of newspaper shooting for the past 8 years or so:

• 1999 15.7 mb 4 files 1 folder
• 2000 548.0 mb 633 files 50 folders
• 2001 11.1 GB 10098 files 239 folders
• 2002 20.7 GB 18519 files 410 folders
• 2003 44.2 GB 39823 files 1489 folders
• 2004 55.6 GB 49957 files 1738 folders
• 2005 100.0 GB 56430 files 1290 folders
• 2006 177.0 GB 80647 files 1747 folders
• 2007 86.5 GB 42907 files 809 folders

Wow, maybe Rick Friedman's assistant Marlene was right - we digital photographers DO have diarrhea of the shutter finger! LOL LOL LOL

As always, I'd love to hear your comments!