The Chinese New Year Parade in Paris is like the opening of the season for me, the opportunity to get familiar with my current gear after a break over winter.

This year a couple of things went wrong:

1. The Riot Squad herded everybody away from the participants just as I was getting warmed up so I actually did very few shots
2. I forgot to switch my flash back onto automatic after the previous day's shoot so all my flash shots were unusable. (I really needed this practice shooting)

I use fill-in flash on all my Paris parade shoots. You're in a canyon between buildings and all the light is coming from above. I like to use a limited amount of flash to ensure that I get a clean light on the subject's face.

Fortunately this year I was using the D800 which gives me open shadows which are still bursting with detail and contrast. I decided to do some of my pictures without flash, and they turned out not too bad.

All pictures D800 and 24-85VR or 70-300VR

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