Celeb photography at night - techniques

[John Clare]

Hi,

I've recently been asked by one of my agencies to do celebrity "arrivals" at various events.

This basically involves hanging around outside the venue in the freezing cold, hoping certain celebs will show up.

While I'm resonably adept at doing events like red-carpet stuff, I find this other kind of work very difficult due to the failings of my Canon's autofocus.

I have a 5D and 30D, two 550EX Speedlites, and a Turbo 2x2. AF-assist is set on both cameras. I'm using 24-70 2.8L (mainly)

I'm finding that I just cannot focus quick enough and am missing no end of shots due to the AF struggling and hunting in the dark.

I'm beginning to think I should be pre-focussing and using f/11 or so, and relying purely on the flash for the exposure.

Is this a common technique for this kind of work?

Cheers, and Happy Holidays to everyone!

John

[Mark_Milstein]

John,

Hi. I wonder if you'd get a good answer from any of the celeb agencies in L.A.?

Their shooters have to work in all sorts of conditions. You might want to try either X17 or Buzzfoto.

Mark Milstein

[Marc]

hello john

i know a guy in la who does this stuff, pretty good
google him jonathan friollo, can't remember his website.

i would say at night the flash is your lightsource and you need to expose for that.
f7 is probably good as it will give some focus latitude

good luck

[Ray Cahen]

What's magic about f.7 as opposed to 6.3 or 8? Is that the sweet spot on that particular lens? I used to zone focus and use f. 11 in the dark, and never missed a shot.

[Bill_Jurasz]

I know that at night motocross (a demanding AF environment for sure) when I moved to a 1D Mark II the difference in low-light AF from the 20D was amazing. I just don't think a 20D/30D/5D is up to the AF task you require.