It’s Not Easy
It turns out it isn’t as easy to take a decent self portrait as you’d think. Due to a number of factors I scrapped plans for my photo session today, but as it turned out I could actually do it but had no models, so the only one left was me.
One of the reasons I take photos is so that I’m not in them, I don’t like having my photo taken and even though no one else was present it still took me some time to get even slightly comfortable being the subject of my photos.
Stay Still Man!
Getting yourself in the right position & pose each time you make a change is pretty much impossible, especially if you’ve manually focused the camera as I did to start with. Manual focus + long focal length + non-repeatable positioning = out of focus photos.
Even though I was shooting with my camera connected to my laptop it was still tricky trying to balance, pose & lighting. I don’t shoot using the live view mode, as I’ve never been happy with the results. You really can’t beat the real-time feedback you get from looking through the viewfinder and seeing the effect the modelling lights have.
I did consider taking a bigger screen with me, but it was even more kit to load and unload so in the end I decided not to - I really should have taken it and also put some contact lenses in!
Not a Wasted Experience
Even though I had no one else modelling for me, it wasn’t a wasted session. I still learnt a few lessons, which is what it’s all about right now, one of them being to have some spare modelling bulbs to hand!
More importantly then that though, I learnt that I really do need to get off my backside and join the gym, enough is enough. I’ve put on about 12Kg (nearly 2 stone) since we got married at the end of 2012, it’s time that it went.
