Earthwatch's 35th Anniversary

Shay Stephens

Just finished processing the photos from the event on Thursday. It was very cool, held at the Natural History Museum in NYC. The tricky part was the lighting...

The room was lit on the sides to light up the artwork on the walls. The central area is left dark. Not good for my needs, so I had to add lighting, but do it in a way that complemented the existing lighting and did not conflict with the ambient and blow out the artwork.

It took about an hour to setup, but I finally got it right. Then the event got under way, and about two hundred people showed up.


It was a beautiful spring day!



This is the general idea of the lighting combo (ambient/flash)



This was the new CEO of Earthwatch



He was from People Magazine



There was a toast during the speech

The whole event lasted about two hours. At the end, they went down the hall and into a theater and watched a new movie Earthwatch produced. I was packing up to leave at that time. Hope you enjoyed the inside scoop

Nikolai

Great work, Shay!

Shay Stephens wrote:

The tricky part was the lighting...

Do you mind describing your setup a bit more deeply? Like, what strobes, at what power level, what reflectors/diffusers, at what height, etc.

I know you swear by PW, so I'm not asking about that part.:-)

However I'm interested if you did put your light meter to a good use in this case (and which one is it:-)

Hope I'm not asking too much..

TIA!

Shay Stephens

Ahh good questions

Nikolai wrote:

Do you mind describing your setup a bit more deeply? Like, what strobes, at what power level, what reflectors/diffusers, at what height, etc.

In this example, I was using three Sunpak 555 flash units, two pointing at the ceiling, and one feathered and point to the speakers podium. I had to feather the light so it did not blast the floor near the light with too much light, yet still allow enough to reach the speaker. Power level was set to 1/8th on the lights bouncing off the ceiling (maybe 7-8 feet extended on the light pole).

However I'm interested if you did put your light meter to a good use in this case (and which one is it:-)

Yes, I used the light meter extensively. Firstly, I used it in ambient mode to map out the highlight areas and the darker people area. Then I used it in flash mode to adjust the light power to balance the ambient. I am using a Sekonic L-358.

Here is what the room looks like with just the ambient lighting: