Beginner Photographing staff at their desks

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dsolds

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Dom
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Hi All, I'm after some advice please. I've been asked to take some photographs of my colleagues at their desks, this is mainly for project newsletters during a time of very turbulent change.

The thing is, I'm a real newbie to this kind of environment and I've no clue about lighting and apertures etc. Portraiture I have practised, i.e. with a nice beige or white curtain behind and an off-camera studio flash. It's really not my thing as I much prefer the outdoors and wildlife but hey, the question has been asked and I have agreed to think about it.

So my concerns are:
Surroundings. Peoples' desks can be messy, or not depending on the individual. Should I flatten the depth of field with a wide aperture? Or perhaps not go too mad and try and fill the frame more with the actual person but worry less about DoF?
Lighting. Obviously carting a studio flash to every desk isn't going to work. I have an SB400 to go with the D750 but (as yet) no remote way of firing it. The hot shoe is my only option at present. Office lighting is flourescent and should be OK for a lot of desks but I'm concerned about shadows and harshness etc.

Add advice most gratefully received.

Dom.
 
Do you want to buy things to help you or not?

Cheapest way to fire the flash off camera would be to buy a cord, couple of quid off ebay or if you are going to keep the flash on the camera obviously bounce it from somewhere or make a diffuser to soften the light. Loads of tutorials on DIY diffusers on the internet. I've got one of these http://www.instructables.com/id/DIY-Gary-Fong-Lightsphere/ courtesy of some left over material my mother had.
 
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if you are concerned about desk mess may be ask them to tidy them up a bit first - i presume you'll be warning them not ambushing them while they are surrounded by jaffa cake wrappers and unwashed cups and logged onto facebook / photographic forums when they should be working ;)
 
big soft moose said:
if you are concerned about desk mess may be ask them to tidy them up a bit first
Click to expand...
+1. Warn them beforehand that you'll be going round taking photos of staff at their desk. Some might choose to tidy and clear up. Others might want to look like they're busy with stacks of work. I'd also make sure there's no personal identifiable information on display eg customer record on screen. If possible, view the areas/rooms/workstations/cubicles/desks so you know what you're up against eg large window next to desk with lots of light.
 
You've just described my desk perfectly :D

Yes, will be staged rather than an ambush. But one or two individuals might need to order skip :rolleyes:

So I work in that office. Not much daylight as meeting rooms have the outside windows. Mostly flourescent lighting although one or two desks are under air-con thingies so have no direct light. This is my biggest worry as I'm not very knowledgeable with flash photography; I never do it really. As above though, I've ordered a diffuser off the bay, was only a fiver with free delivery and it clips on to the SB400 I have. Looking for a cable and a long bracket now.

Thanks.
 
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First, and very important question.. do you have to:
  • Photograph people at their desks; or
  • Photograph people at a desk.
The advantage of the second scenario is that you set-up one desk, get your lighting sorted and then people come to that desk for their portrait rather than you have to drag the lighting around and set it up fresh every time - finding that the perfect arrangement you have in mind doesn't work at this desk because there's a wall in the way, or that desk because the ambient light is completely different. Allowing people a couple of minutes to personalise the desk for their portrait gets a bit of variation into the shots.

If the desk location is chosen wisely you may get a decent result with just your existing flash bounced off a neutral wall and ceiling. If you can get your boss to reward you with a flash trigger system, second flash, a couple of stands and softboxes the options open up a bit further. But knowing that this sort of thing is usually done on a keen-volunteer basis anything that puts the effort (the "studio desk") on the company and doesn't need you buying any more kit is a good thing.
 
I would always try the candid shots first as when people know you are taking pictures, it becomes staged which shows through the photo. This might not be appreciated by viewers whoo will see it as a forced situation.
 
Have you got a fast lens? If you can open up to f/2.8 or so you'll be able to throw the background out of focus, which can be helpful. And if the ambient lighting gives you reasonable cover you can probably work without flash. The D750 has a brilliant reputation for high ISO performance.
 
Well, I thought I'd report back. Having consumed the advice I bought a flash diffuser from e-blag (a fiver inc delivery) and used the SB400 on camera with a 60mm F2.8 Nikkor lens. ISO 800, white balance set for flash, F2.8, 1/250th and manual focus.

The above I got from experimenting with my desk colleage Taz, big respect to him for putting up with me whilst I found a sweet spot. I did also try a WB aimed at fluorescent lighting since that's what we have in the office but the results were all a bit washed out looking. I'm still reading up trying to understand why but looks like a mix of Floro and Flash is not the best idea.

So, not all were great but over 90% were better than my previous best straight out of the camera. A quick batch levels balancing in Lightroom and from 220 people I only had to go back and re-shoot 4. I'm very happy with that :) but more importantly so are the company. They reckon the results are much better and more realistic than the last time they did it with a meeting room set up as a studio. My boss even bought the beers on friday !!

Appreciate all the advice given though chaps. It helped loads and gave me the confidence to have a go.

Dom.
 
Well done.

For the fluorescent white balance to have worked your have needed to use a filter gel on the flash to alter it to the same color as the fluorescent lighting. As it was the flash was probably dominant and any tinge from the fluorescent lighting is probably only very slight. Reading the Strobist 101 will explain it all..
 
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