Some of the most important things that go into making a shoot successful happen long before you pick up your camera. I was doing one of them tonight, scouting.
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| What's inside? |
I'm shooting a series of portraits, and I'm lining up some cool locations. Tonight I went to an old school boxing gym. Yeah, yeah, I know boxing gyms are a cliche. At least, they are in photography. I don't care, this place is just so dead sexy I have to do a shoot here. Am I wrong?
It could be worse, I could be shooting my half eaten breakfast at Helen's diner and calling it art, or better yet, a deserted gas station at night.
At least this place has a soul, and definitely some history. Not too many chardonnay sipping types coming in here to do boxercise or pilates. This is the real deal. As soon as I walked in the door, it hit me, the smell that is. It smelled just like the study lounge in my university dorm. I lived on an all guys floor, and we won the intra-mural championships when I lived there. The only thing our study lounge got used for was drying out hockey gear. Have you ever smelled 18 sets of hockey gear belonging to a bunch of guys who have no chance of ever being professional hockey players, but a very distinct chance of being on Canada's Olympic beer drinking squad? But I digress. Back to the scouting.
If you know any good locations, drop me a line, I'd love to hear about them. Tonight was good. I'm excited about the shoot, and I'll keep you posted.
5 comments:
I think we might be at a point in photography where it's impossible to avoid cliches altogether.
Now hold the phone there buddy.....
Helen's half eaten breakfast an art clique? I think not.
And the gym looks great too. As an aside, do you just approach these places and ask if you can shoot there?
I need more practice shooting guys, so I drove around the Terminal Street area and found some industrial backdrops. There are the good ol' train tracks back there too and as much as yes, some locations are cliche, the challenge is to photograph them in a way that isn't.
cliche smiche...
take a stunning photo and no one will notice the clicheness...they'll just be gawking in awe.
I second that question...you just go and ask to shoot there?
If you don't ask, you'll never know. Very often people are flattered that you are taking an interest in them, and what they do. As photographers, our currency is the kindness of strangers.
Cheers, CJM
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