Hot Piece O' Glass

[Loose Canon]

We have a glass makers shop in my home burg!

Apparently, this young man is scary good at it. It is a Father/Son endeavor (they call themselves the Old Man and the Kid!) and Dad has been doing it for all of his Life.

They have been good enough to allow me in and have given me a lot of latitude.

Earlier this week I watched a specialty piece being created from start to finish. Today they allowed me in to see what I could get of them in action.

I blew off today’s Honey-Do’s to see this one through (at my own peril)! It was worth it!

The usual! Crap light, lots of motion (glass and hands have to be in constant motion), no flash, high ISO. The down and dirty of glass blowing, so no "glam" retouching! These are artisans at work in their own environment.

This is the first one produced from the shoot. They like it so far.

f/4.0
1/50th (Dangerous for me. That is grazing to below what I can hand hold)
ISO 2000

Shot on a full frame body with a 70-200mmL.

Would love to get some thoughts before I go into full post production of this shoot!

[Donald]

Would love to get some thoughts before I go into full post production of this shoot!

Excellent stuff. Keep it coming.

Remember, this is not fine art. This is social documentary stuff and it is wonderful. You might want to look at trying to dull down backgrounds to make sure there is nothing in them that distracts from the action going on in front of us.

[Karm Redland]

Terry, well executed. Looks great.

Karm

[Loose Canon]

Hi Donald!

Thank you for commenting, sir.

This BG was dulled in this particular shot by a rather large degree.

I’ll struggle as to how much is enough and how much is going to look unnatural to the artisans in this shop. As you mentioned it is documentary stuff and I have to find a nice compromise. I want to give them something that they can’t get from someone shooting them with a p&s and with no processing. So, as you mentioned, I might like to consider dulling it down some, but not exactly going to black. There is really no way to target the lighting except in post. Thank you, sir, for reminding me.

Thank you for taking the time to say, Karm.

[Harpo]

I blew off today’s Honey-Do’s to see this one through (at my own peril)! It was worth it!

You're a brave man, Terry!

Ooohhh, keep these pics coming! Photographing glass making is very interesting. Your picture is excellent. I agree, the lighting is a bit harsh. Im wondering if they are interested in shots they can use for their business/brochures and giving you leeway, if they will allow you to adjust lighting and maybe be able to use strobe/off camera flash set ups?

Is this on the 2.8 or 4 version of the 70-200L? I don't have an exif program on my Mac to find out.

What FF camera are you using? I know on the 5D3 you can bump the ISO to 6400 and still look as clean as your shot. If you can go higher than 2000 ISO, you'll get the faster shutter speed you are looking for. (You probably know that).

[Loose Canon]

Hi Mike!

Thank you for commenting.

I’m just getting started with these guys really. They have a website under construction with a few product shots on it and are looking to get the site up to snuff. I don’t know what photographic requirements they may have in the future, but I'd like to help them out there. I’d love to get a shot at bringing in some lighting and setting something up. I think they are looking to put up some shots of them working. They do demos and teach classes as well as produce the art. But at least it is fun to shoot and not really your everyday subject matter!

I have the 2.8 version of the 70-200L and it was attached to a 5DIII. I have shot the Five at 6400 successfully. Really wonderful what that thing can do! I’m still not so used to that capability so I am still kind of in the “keep the ISO low” mode!

They have graciously welcomed me into the shop anytime so I plan on trying to do several shoots and get the best handful from each. I had a limited time to shoot so I started at high ISO and made it up to 2500 before I had to stop. That allowed for 1/100th in the conditions, so I was getting there. I’ll certainly bump on up from there!

I’d like to get a little more DoF as well as faster shutter. Since I rarely get exactly what I want I’ll just have to see what kind of trade-offs I am going to have to live with.

As is typical of this kind of shoot, there is going to be stuff “sticking out of their heads” etc. The kind of stuff that always gets mentioned when one posts to this site! Where they work is cluttered and is a working glass shop. While they have granted me a lot of latitude, I still have to stay clear of their personal working space so my PoV's are limited. From a photographic standpoint, it is pretty bad! So I’ll just have to do the best I can to mitigate whatever.

These guys work fast. What I am learning from them is that the glass calls the timing. So they are constantly in motion and moving over the floor working the glass. They are nothing short of a Glass Symphony they way they work. Choreographed and everything! Once they start a piece they don’t lolligag around! I am quite impressed!

A good example of “the more you can find out about what you are shooting, the more chance at success you are going to have shooting it”.

Hey, thanks for the comments, Mike. Very useful.

Now I have Double Honey-Do’s to do for my trouble! No good deed goes unpunished!