sedona international film fest

WOW!

The Sedona International Film Festival is on. I am helping to cover the events as one of the Festival Photographers and this is quite an event.

Covering this event has been much easier now that I am sporting lighter gear. The Micro 4/3rds format is awesome. I know with my full DLSR kit I would come home from a day of coverage with sore arms, hands and shoulders with a bit of lower back pain thrown in… The Lumix DLSM’s GH3 and GX7 that were hanging from my shoulders yesterday left nary a dent.

still from 'girl on a train' w movie viewersSill frame form movie ‘The Girl On the Train’ by Larry Brand with audience at Mary D. Fisher Theatre.

Larry brand photo answering questions after movie showingLarry Brand and audience following a screening of ‘The Girl On The Train’ at Sedona International Film Festival.

aron camisano with audience photoAron Camisano fields questions from audience after his short film ‘Chocolates’ was screened
at the Sedona Performing Arts Center.

jeremy levin photoJeremy Levin answers questions following the showing of his new film ‘Girl on a Bicycle’ at the Sedona Film Festival.

award for jeremy levin from sedona film festivalPatrick Schweiss, President/Executive Director, presents Jeremy Levin the Excellence in Screenwriting Award on behalf of the Sedona International Film Fest after the screening of ‘Girl on a Bicycle’.

patrick schweiss  addresses SPAC thearte crowd photoPresident/Executive Director Patrick Schweiss addresses a packed house at the Sedona International Film Festival at the Sedona Performing Arts Center on opening day…

More coverage to come in following posts. I’ll be covering this event through Friday morning.

Yours in Photography,         Bob

photographic serendipity

Serendipity. That’s a lovely word. It’s musical in sound. And can add musical notes to your photography and it comes around more often if you keep your camera close at hand all the time.

Having dinner at Sound Bites Grill in Sedona last night and came across this snifter sitting on the bar with beautiful light all around so I fired off a few frames. Love the colors. Enjoy the soft background. This would make a great illustration for a newspaper or magazine article about bars, cocktails or many other subjects. I am always looking for things like this for my stock files but also just to study light, shape, form and how the camera sees so if I need to create something like this for a bar or restaurant advertising image in the future I’ll have it in my arsenal.

bob coates photography image of snifter on bar‘Snifter on bar’ was captured with a Lumix GX7 and the f2.8 35mm to 100mm at 89mm iso 800 at f2.8 at 1/10 sec. The camera was sitting on the bar for support to keep the slow shutter speed from blurring the image. My GX7 is with me most of the time… And with the Think Tank small pouch on my belt I’ve got plenty of lenses too.

camera presets lumix gx7

For some reason I found myself enamored with this railroad draw-bridge in Tampa, Florida. It’s just outside the museum I was hanging in and I liked the graphic lines and shapes that ran through the scene. I thought i’d run the camera through some of it’s pre-sets  to explore different ‘looks’. Never used to be a preset guy but I’m liking the fact I can have a pretty well processed image straight out of the camera. Here’s a few…

Railroad drawbridge photo setFour different preset images from the Panasonic Lumix GX7 camera pretty much straight out of the camera.
Totally different feel with all of them. Having fun seeing what the camera can do.

Please be aware of a couple things. You must have the camera set to save jpegs. Shooting in RAW only will allow you to see the processing on the camera but when you download the RAW images and open them on the computer you will see the processed file for about 2 seconds and it will disappear leaving you with the RAW information only.

Now a wonderful thing is available here. You can get the best of both worlds by shooting RAW + jpeg. Then you have a finished processed jpeg and still have access to the RAW file if you want to process the image in a different way. My friend Kevin Ames of Ames Photographic in Atlanta says, “Friends don’t let friends shoot jpeg!” He is a big advocate of shooting in RAW because if you shoot jpeg only you are allowing the camera processor to throw away a lot of information from the file. If you shoot in RAW it has the most information and will allow your file to be even better in the future as more and better software is designed for processing images. I agree. But, I like the idea of working with and tweaking some of the setting the camera has available for immediate use hence I now do both.

camtrol camera controller

SOLID

That’s the way I would describe this video platform for controlling your camera. Camtrol has spent some serious time designing their camera platforms and I take a peek the Prime 22 model here. The controls are strong. Easy to use. Very sturdy yet comfortable and at a price point 1/2 that of other camera mount control systems.

When paired with the Panasonic Lumix GH3 you have a very powerful video capture system. Check out the video for more on that… and if you have lots more time then money I give you a possible alternative to hold you over until you get to the professional gear.

Video review on the Camtrol Prime 22 and pairing with the Lumix GH3

dirty dozen photograph

“This is scary!” Said my wife when she saw this photo.I understand. I call this the Dirty Dozen.

This is an illustration for a class about being able to change different areas of an image by locking the camera down on a tripod and making multiple exposures. This can be helpful with large groups of people to get good expressions and body positions. It can be useful when doing outdoor portraits and clouds are scudding across the sky leaving their shadow impressions on the landscape. A good background capture can be made and then concentrate on getting the people looking good without worrying about the rest of the photo. Sometimes you want to get the light source closer to the subject for a better lighting pattern yet it would then be in the frame. You can shoot with the light in the frame and then remove it in post. Very cool stuff indeed.

I captured the images with the Lumix GH3 mounted on a tripod and connected my phone with the on-board WIFI. Control of the camera is with an APP from Panasonic. In addition to tripping the shutter you can control almost all the functions on the camera including shooting modes and see the image on the phone or I-pad.

dirty dozen photoCourthouse Butte in Sedona, Arizona with twelve Bobs

lumix G6

Taking a couple weeks off for vacation slows you down a bit when it comes to staying up with regular posts… I’ll add in the Holidays to take the blame but enough excuses! I’m back on the horse!

Santa dropped off a package using the local Fed Ex driver… OK it wasn’t Santa but it sure feels like a present. The Lumix G6K is in my hot little hands and I gotta tell ya things just get better and better as each camera comes out. This is a Pro-sumer camera that has all the features. Great video with a fully articulating screen. Touch screen focus. A great chip and processing engine. Almost all the features of the Pro camera Lumix GH3 plus a few more. Yep it’s got the in-camera panoramic feature that I really enjoy. (just ask my fellow Luminaries!) The only thing that keeps this out of the full on pro realm is the fact it’s not built on the magnesium frame. But wait that makes it even lighter if you want to have a camera with you all the time. With a 2.8 12-33mm lens (35-70mm 35mm equivalent) this camera weighs well under 2 pounds! It’s on Amazon for just under 500 bucks with a 14-42mm lens. Freakin’ amazing!

panasonic Lumix G6