April, 2009

Saturday was an eventful evening, with my first “hired” band shoot for local hardcore metal band Alex Renie (whom I’ve recommended to that they need a catchier, easier-to-remember name… but hey, I’m the only person who thinks so).  They played in the basement of a little head shop right across the street from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.  I have to say for a little metal show, the atmosphere of a dirty basement with graffiti on the walls was excellent. Not knowing what I was going to have for lighting, I brought three studio cans, two with red gels, and one with orange.  I end up finding the sole light source for the entire basement to be a window for daylight, and a single incandencent bulb overhead.  I was actually a bit worried at first.  With this being an earlier (6:00pm) show, the daylight was strong through the window.  I didn’t like the idea of A. the bright atmosphere and B. the mixed white balance of daylight/incandecent.  But as you can see from the pictures, the cans added a bit of extra color which helped quite a bit for backgrounds, and I was definitely able to tame the mixed lighting.  Having the red/orange cans being a bit warmer really helped the effect I was going for anyway.

I had already planned on going to the Cairo Cafe that evening because it was going to be packed for several parties and celebrations… and since it was only 3 miles away from the band shoot, I decided to go in early.  There was no point in going home.  So I rolled in and relaxed with a hookah.  Tonight I had a different goal in mind with my pictures.  In the past, I’d always been showing off the low-light capabilities of my D700 by shooting between ISO 2500 and ISO 6400… and while neat, I never could achieve the high contrast smooth look that I sometimes desired.  So I decided that I would experiment with flash.  Now, I’ve strayed away from flash.  I’ve always hated it.  I understood the concept behind fill and bounce, but for some reason my pictures always looked like A. I used flash or B. I tried to use flash.  I’ve been looking at some phenominal work with flash lately and decided I need to learn to embrace it as another tool… especially with my upcoming foray into weddings.  Wow I just said “foray“.  Well after some trial-and-error with flash power and WHERE the actual bounce was, I believe I got the results I was looking for.  I’m incredibly pleased, and hate to say, I will probably always shoot flash there from now on.

I just recently purchased some advertising in a local wedding guide startup called the Indianapolis Wedding Blog.  If you know anyone planning on getting married in the Indianapolis area, DEFINITELY have them check it out. It’s very slick and well put together, and will be a one-stop-shop for everything they’ll need. It’s run by a guy who also goes to Life Church where I run sound on Sundays.  I will be exclusively presented along with no more than 9 other photographers in their upcoming print edition of 5,000 circulated copies that will be their summer issue.  There’s no turning back now!  Speaking of “no turning back”, I have officially booked my first wedding for the first week of October.  The lucky couple are Bayleigh & Jeff.  A big congratulations to them (for the marriage, of course)!  That wedding will be at the beautiful Avon Gardens, and it’ll be an evening wedding!  Should be able to get some more interesting photos than your traditional early-afternoon-in-a-church!  Of course we can’t forget that Kala & Kevin are tying the knot as well next summer, and I’ll be taking care of their engagement photos next weekend.

Man, it’s been a crazy week and I’m really backed up on editing pictures.  It’s been almost two weeks, and people are breathing down my neck for the last set of Cairo Cafe pictures.  In the meantime, I’ve been out and taken some shots of Dave & Evan at the Mason Inn in Pittsboro.  If you’ve ever wanted to see someone use a suitcase for a drum, perform a kazoo solo while playing Smells Like Teen Spirit on a $15 Casio keyboard, watch the amazing technical prowess of Dave On Keys, and/or enjoy the finest calzones on earth… you probably should come out the next time.  I’ll have more pictures up on Flickr in the next several days!

I’ve also picked up another small gig running the mixing board at my buddy T.J.‘s church on Sunday mornings.  I’m not a terribly religious person, but it’s a pretty welcoming place and the people there are great… besides, they rock out quite a bit, and right now their theme is based on the band U2.  I don’t even care for U2, but hey, that’s not the point.

Anyway, I’ve got to do those Cairo pictures, the rest of Dave & Evan’s pictures… and on May 3rd, I’ll be doing Kevin & Kala’s engagement pictures.  I’m pretty exited to be doing my first portrait set.  Also, Adobe… I meant what I said.  I need an archive function.  I’m having problems fitting all my “negatives” on my laptop!  I don’t even have room to import all my pictures to work on them!

I made business cards today. NOW I’m legit.

*whew* What a relief.

Well, here’s the maiden voyage of my blog. I went as long as I possibly could without starting one… but, man, it seems all the cool photographers are doing it. Actually I’m really excited to have a place to share details about shoots I’ve done and I’m about to do!

As most of you know, I got back from a photographic adventure in Europe a couple weeks ago… and it was a great time, and the weather was very cooperative. If you go to London, you HAVE to go on the London Eye. It’s not only striking to look at, but it’s some of the most moving (wow, pun) 30 minutes you can have, soaring high above London in a 360 degree panoramic room. We were fortunate enough to go at sunset, and it was just plain gorgeous. In Rome, I was most moved by the Colosseum. It’s… unbelievable. Years of movies and documentaries did not prepare me in the slightest for the scale of it all. Just seeing it for the first time, stepping out of the train station, sent shivers down my spine.

ANYWAY, The ability to purchase prints is now operational. You can click “buy prints” from the main menu, or head on over to www.seanmolin.com/prints where I’ll be adding new prints regularly! For those of you wondering, I should get the pics from the Cairo Cafe last weekend up within a few days. I’ve been busy getting this site fully operational, and I still need to clean out hard drive space from my Europe pictures! Btw, Adobe, if you’re reading this… Lightroom needs an “archive” feature.

-Sean