Advice needed - Ski Resort photo shoot

[steelerdirtfreak]

I need a little bit of advice. I was just asked to do a photo shoot of a ski resort - indoor and outdoor photos to be used for promotional materials (print and web).

What sort of lenses would you recommend? And I tend to get less than satisfying results when shooting outdoor snow scenes. Any advice there, settings-wise or otherwise?

I really appreciate any help and advice any of y'all can offer. This is why this is my number one learning place and the first place I send friends who are looking to learn something new.

[Medley]

Snow scenes require some exposure compensation, particularly if you're not using full manual mode. Digital cameras in particular tend to darken the scene, trying to compensate for the brightness. This usually results in snow that looks greyish.

How much compesation depends on the scene and camera, but a +1ev is a good starting point. Take some test shots, and check the histogram. It's important to make sure you're not clipping the highlights.

Shoot in Raw, if possible, as this will allow you to change the exposure and white balance later, if neccessary. You'll probably have to readjust the settings for the indoor shots, so don't forget to check the settings again indoors.

Abover all, have fun!

- Joe U.

[freygr]

For indoor you will need wide lenses and lighting. Out doors you do need to use a UV filter or maybe a polarizing filter. If you can a blue sky with some white clouds

[Dylan8i]

If you can a blue sky with some white clouds

yeah good luck with that in PA any time of the year


what resort are you going to?
i'm heading to 7 springs on monday to use a free lift ticket i got.

[steelerdirtfreak]

yeah good luck with that in PA any time of the year


what resort are you going to?
i'm heading to 7 springs on monday to use a free lift ticket i got.

I don't think the sun is allowed to shine in western PA during the winter, is it?

Actually, I'm heading over to near Cleveland to Alpine Valley. The father of one of the sprint car drivers I regularly work with during the racing season owns Alpine Valley and wants to start sending some work my way. That works for me!

[freygr]

I don't think the sun is allowed to shine in western PA during the winter, is it?

Actually, I'm heading over to near Cleveland to Alpine Valley. The father of one of the sprint car drivers I regularly work with during the racing season owns Alpine Valley and wants to start sending some work my way. That works for me!

It has been the 18% gray sky here also. But it has been know for the sun to come out sometimes. In fact the cold is coming and we maybe will have the sun for a few days, if we don't get snow!

[EOSThree]

Outdoors in snow you'll encounter some difficult conditions. Try to shoot on a bluebird day preferably with some clouds for interest in the sky. Get down low to get a skier. the slope, and the sky in the shot. Because your camera's meter is going to meter for a light gray some EC is going to be necessary. Like already suggested, around +1 will be a good start. Try to find interesting angles that show the steepness of the slope. Try to pre focus on an area where you anticipate the skier being, put the camera in high speed shooting mode and predictive focus mode. When the skier reaches your pre focused position fire off a string of shots.

Indoors some kind of artificial light will probably be necessary. Find places you can bounce the flash to reduce harsh shadows, light walls and ceilings are best to use for bouncing flash. Look for interesting rooms with a lot of sunlight lighting the interior and use the flash to supplement that natural light. Try to balance the natural light and flash light so the flash use is not obvious.

As for lenses, I don't know what you have, but I would try to cover UWA for indoors to short telephoto for skiing shots. 12mm give or take to 200mm or so.

[livin4lax09]

i would recommend a wide angle lens. Pretty wide. it makes everything look much bigger, which is always what ski resorts like!

[another view]

I was going to suggest a wider lens too; 24mm just isn't very wide on a 1.5x camera. I have a D200 but just got it and don't have a feel for how it really handles snow scenes. Nikon's Matrix Metering is pretty good but past experience with a few other cameras would say that it will still require compensation. The camera isn't expecting to see that much white, so it will underexpose.

Some experimentation is really the only way to get the best results for you since everyone's technique is a little different. I might try starting with a +2/3 though, but be careful of blown highlights. Having a little bit here and there is par for the course with snow on a sunny day, but you don't want too much of this. Using fill flash outside might really help too.

[steelerdirtfreak]

Thanks for all of the advice so far!

It sounds like it would be in my best interest to rent a lens for this shoot? So, what might be the best lens to rent? And from where? I currently know of RentGlass.com and LensProToGo

[another view]

I haven't rented any lenses so I can't help there, but look for something like the Nikon 12-24 or Sigma 10-20. The only thing is that these lenses are so wide that you might want to play around with one for a day or two (at least!) before using it on the shoot. DOF is huge with these short focal lengths, even at a moderate aperture like f5.6. Close down to f8 or f11 at the widest setting, and you can just about touch your subject to the front element of the lens (not recommended, of course) and it'll still be close to the DOF.

Like any wide lens, the best results will come from having depth to the shot (to show off the perspective distortion, IOW stuff that's close looks really big and stuff that's far looks really small) and be careful to keep the camera level (up and down) unless you want the perspective distortion that you get from doing that. The wider the lens, the more distortion to worry about (or have fun with!).