Ian L. Sitren
pro member
This post is from Nill Toulme's popular thread on Sportsshooting workflow. Here we want to deal with social events such as weddings, parties, fundraisers and such. Ian's post is a good kickoff for this discussion. Asher
For a number of years I shot on assignment, the larger amateur and professional bodybuilding competitions around the country, typically 25 or so per year. Along with my client, I pioneered the concept of shooting and then having the photos uploaded for the viewing audience within a few hours of the end of the show. For the first few years all of the other magazines never beat me even when they deployed teams of people to get it done, brought in full desktop machines and even a T-1 line. For me it was myself and a guy pulling overnight duty back in Idaho to do the actual galleries and getting them online.
My first secret was actually simple, I did my absolute best to nail my exposures and to get my photo right every time I pushed the shutter button. And although I might be shooting 500 or more frames during a show, the other photographers around me were shooting 2000+. And all those extra frames were a huge time burn in processing and uploading.
The next part of my secret was PhotoMechanic, simple the fastest tool for editing photos by a long shot. I would shoot in RAW, cull out the few rejects in PhotoMechanic and then use the 'extract jpg' feature, run them again to size for online use and convert to sRGB. And then upload a zipped file to the servers in Boise. The other guys were trying to use Bridge, PhotoShop and other misc programs and while they were slaving all night with it, I would be kicking back, maybe having a drink in the hotel bar.
My third secret was logistics. I would always make it a point to stay in hotels with the fastest internet service. Typically for me this was Marriott with their 'iBahn' service, very consistent and fast across the country. Other hotels would struggle along with limited DSL upload speeds while my stuff was flying out. And then for big events where 8000 people would be leaving trying to get a shuttle bus or cab back to their hotel, I would have a limo waiting for me.
That is the way I did it. In the last two years it has changed somewhat but that was also something I started when I uploaded the first photos from a show while it was still going on by using wireless WiFi to the T-1 line for our video broadcast.
For a number of years I shot on assignment, the larger amateur and professional bodybuilding competitions around the country, typically 25 or so per year. Along with my client, I pioneered the concept of shooting and then having the photos uploaded for the viewing audience within a few hours of the end of the show. For the first few years all of the other magazines never beat me even when they deployed teams of people to get it done, brought in full desktop machines and even a T-1 line. For me it was myself and a guy pulling overnight duty back in Idaho to do the actual galleries and getting them online.
My first secret was actually simple, I did my absolute best to nail my exposures and to get my photo right every time I pushed the shutter button. And although I might be shooting 500 or more frames during a show, the other photographers around me were shooting 2000+. And all those extra frames were a huge time burn in processing and uploading.
The next part of my secret was PhotoMechanic, simple the fastest tool for editing photos by a long shot. I would shoot in RAW, cull out the few rejects in PhotoMechanic and then use the 'extract jpg' feature, run them again to size for online use and convert to sRGB. And then upload a zipped file to the servers in Boise. The other guys were trying to use Bridge, PhotoShop and other misc programs and while they were slaving all night with it, I would be kicking back, maybe having a drink in the hotel bar.
My third secret was logistics. I would always make it a point to stay in hotels with the fastest internet service. Typically for me this was Marriott with their 'iBahn' service, very consistent and fast across the country. Other hotels would struggle along with limited DSL upload speeds while my stuff was flying out. And then for big events where 8000 people would be leaving trying to get a shuttle bus or cab back to their hotel, I would have a limo waiting for me.
That is the way I did it. In the last two years it has changed somewhat but that was also something I started when I uploaded the first photos from a show while it was still going on by using wireless WiFi to the T-1 line for our video broadcast.
Last edited by a moderator: