Learning Curve

 I've got a commission! Paid, even. A friend has a youngest child who will be a senior this year. That's high school senior, not college senior,  nor senior citizen. I've been commissioned to do their senior photo. As somebody who had to do two professional sittings for my senior picture, I understand the need for perfection. As somebody who takes bunches of shots before deciding which to keep/cull, I will take no offense when the first batch of tries is rejected. At least I presume that will be the outcome. I sent 8 pictures their way, with my own personal opinion being that one is worth consideration. The rest are part of the learning curve... for all of us.

I haven't done this before. I've shot weddings, not for pay but often sending a small selection to the couple as gifts. Those had their own challenges. This job has extra ones, besides the usual weird smile/closed eyes stuff. The photos must be shot outside, with fall colors in the background. A studio would have a big drop sheet with fall leaves as a background choice. We get to wait on mother Nature, and she better get on the ball in the next three weeks! We'll be heading back south after that.

 

A solitary high branch of color                                        

 

So what did we learn? The kid of course has some goofy smiles and closed eyes to offer. But that is to be expected. One spot which had great leaves in full red color last Friday now offers only bare branches. It rained last night. Of course I knew it rained, and I called to make sure my subject's footwear would tolerate getting wet, maybe muddy. I just didn't expect that ALL the leaves had dropped as a result,so even though I knew where to find the bush, what I found was a row of empty branches. Totally empty branches. Not one stubborn nub of a leaf remaining.

                 It was there on Friday!
 

I learned how slow the sumacs, usually among the first to turn and which change into several colors at once, were this year to start changing. I had hoped that of several large patches of them I'd scouted out, somewhere there would be more than a branch or two of color. One large patch just blocks from my house has been removed completely in the years I've been here only in summers. The only places with larger patches of color were along a 55 mph highway just after a curve with no shoulders to safely pull over on. We didn't even try that. What? Risk somebody's kid along a busy highway? There will be more eventually - sumacs, not kids.

The forecast was for more clouds than were actually in the sky. I'd hoped for less glare and contrast. We fought squinty eyes and, more surprising, glare on glasses which showed the entire skyline behind me when I tripped the shutter. Those photos showed trees, silos, even me in a couple shots in dark silhouette against bright sky. Those same photos got sun on half a face on occasion, but my software in my laptop eased the two-faces look by increasing the light levels, then made up for that with boosting the colors. The leaves mostly need that done anyway. The odd thing is the clouds/smoke combination have finally wandered over the noon sky, so we lost the blue sky now without losing the sharp contrast, if I were still shooting. I'll have to work on that. Maybe we'll get a foggy morning, but we're bumping up against school starting next week, so we'd only get weekends to try for, or perhaps late afternoons if this senor's job doesn't interfere. While the weather holds with nice temperatures, weekends around here are a nightmare of tourist traffic.

I did learn some good things, and passed the information along to my subject. The fields we drove along in quest of fall color happen to be full of sandhill cranes, at least in the mornings. There was also a  muskrat house unknown to this senior about a block from their family home, and this morning it sported a heron perched on top waiting for a passing meal. I was also able to pass along the location of a beautiful, recently upgraded, romantic park along the river which we used as a turnaround to get to the next location. I suggested it as a good place for a family picnic with fishing available, or perhaps a quiet place for an after school date with somebody they wanted to get to know better... once the driver's test had been passed, of course. 

I'm also looking at the cliff rising on the other side of the river at that park which I know would make a fantastic multi-hued background for photos, both of this senior, as well as the entire family as requested by Mom. We'll see if the colors cooperate in time. And the light. And the smile of the day.