Advice for Shooting Art Exhibit Opening Event

I've become involved with our small local Art Centre and volunteered to shoot the opening nite of an artist's art exhibit (painted canvas murals). I've never done anything like this before and seeking advice about equipment & settings.

I'd be looking at pics of the artist with his work as well as of the socializing and interaction that occurs at this type of event.

The room is lit with ceiling hallogen track lighting of some sort, mainly aimed at the walls.

I'd rather not use external flash, thinking it will surely negatively affect the look/colour of the art work itself. I will be hand-holding as well. I do have a 430EXII - do I need to use it?

I plan to use the 17-55 2.8 lens, I suspect the 70-200 F/4 IS will not be any good to me indoors. What aperture and shutter speed should I be aiming for to have the best results as far as exposure and sharpness are concerned.

Any advice at all or other tips would really be appreciated, I'm more than a bit nervous about taking pics for someone else. Thanks!

Depends on the lighting.

Mostly, you'll have either a dark room, or a mix of lighting (fluorescent, tungsten, daylight) which can be pretty hard to balance (both color and exposure- wise).

In both cases, flash might help, but it also creates its own problems (also; again both exposure and color wise).

I've done a few of those kind of events.

Here's one in a pretty well lit space. 1D3, no flash, ISO 1600, f/2.8 most of the time to get hand-holdable shutterspeeds (1/100 or up). IS will help there, but don't underestimate the shallowness of the DoF at f/2.8, nor the speed at which people can move.
Link

In a darker environment, with a 1D2 this time, I've used flash, bounced off whatever can be found. ISO 1600 as well, since you want to include at least some ambient.
Link (pages 1 and first part of 2 is without flash, rest mostly with fill flash)

Some issues with different (colored) light sources are very apparent in the last gallery, less so, but still visible, in the first.

Shooting only ambient is likely going to result in a lot of blown out white walls if you expose for the faces. I can't think of a gallery I've been in where the room lighting is anywhere close to the intensity of the artwork lighting (assuming there aren't any windows or daylight).

Thank you both for the advice.

Rene, your gallery images are very helpful in helping me see what I should be aiming for. If I can get anywhere near that level of exposure I'll be so happy! I also appreciate the settings advice which will give me a place to start.

Hoff, I didn't even think about metering, nor those white walls, assumed I would just use evaluative. Yikes. Are you suggesting I should use flash.

I should have mentioned that it is in the evening, so room lighting is all I'll have. I haven't used my flash very much and if I have to, planned on ETTL with the camera on manual or AV.

Well, it sounds like this will be the learning experience I wanted. I'm hoping to get there earlier than the start of the event and try different things beforehand and just take it from there as I go along. You've definitely helped, thank you again!

If the gallery is well lit, it's pretty evenly lit. (assuming no direct daylight) So I'd use Manual on camera.
If contrasts are too high, fill flash might be needed. As said, the biggest problem then is probably to balance the flash color to the ambient color. (That is something you cannot (easily) do in post)

Thanks for the additional info Rene.

It will be interesting to see what happens with this tonight but at least I feel like I have all the info I can to do this. I may have some follow-up questions tomorrow!

Well, that either went exceptionally well, or someone is hiding in the corner

Too funny Rene! I was away for a bit AND hiding in a corner the last couple of days.

I'm not happy with the results but what an interesting evening photo-wise. Many lessons, some unexpected. I wasn't sure which bad pics to post - remember now, small small town, small art gallery! It's obviously a converted small house.

Here are some general things that came up:

- art hanging and room distortion
OMIG, at times I didn't know what to line my pics up with thru the view-finder to keep them straight, no matter whether I lined up with a window edge, floor/wall line, picture hanging on the wall, ceiling/wall line, door frame etc, if one thing was straight the rest of the image was crooked!

I used my 17-55mm, 2.8 lens at different lengths. Mistake?

I ended up picking one vertical straight line in a door frame or the like and straightening to that. Advice?

I also found that in the small room, I was often running into heads, bodies etc in my road. I also didn't want to be in people's faces nor blocking their view. I yearned for more reach than 55mm but I also knew that my 70-200mm f/4 would not perform well in low light. Advice?

- Noise, OMIG, just awful but I expected that. Hated the work involved in post-processing even with Noise Ninja. The 50D is just awful for noise I find, I didn't go over 1600 ISO but the pics look bad and you can tell that a noise adjustment has been made, in my view.

I noticed a newspaper fellow taking pics and talked with him afterwards - he was using a full-format camera with a 50mm lens and a hand-held light meter, no flash and photographing right up to the people he was photographing. Just FYI for your thoughts.

- I was able to fix the photos in post processing with WB adjustments to get the walls white, noise reduction etc. but way too much work! Hot spots were few and limited to where the track liting above the paintings struck.

- I was unprepared for all the shadows and dark corners etc - never really looked at a room before and only saw it when I looked at the pics afterwards - this has to be good learning for me! The walls are actually white.

Choosing which photos to ask you to look at was tough but I'll start with these. They are all RAW and out of the camer with no post-processing yet.

I went to the gallery before the sun went down to photo the room and each mural. There are two large windows in the front plus the lighting you see in the images so I did not use the flash. Definitely the way to go.

However, once the show started and night fell I resorted to the flash. I tried different things throughout the evening but found out quickly I needed more study with using my flash; I really wasn't making changes based on any reasoning and just confused myself. I used manual settings for my camera and left the flash on ETTL, I assume it acted as fill, as I don't see harsh shadows.

** My main question is, is this the best I can expect in low light, or can I improve on what I did?



- I'd love to know what you would say about the light available in this room and working with it, your thoughts and suggestions. I do have opportunity to go back and try again as the art is still there and I do have access to the premises.

I did like taking the pictures and plan to go back and try again... it was indeed a good learning experience if you can take the failure & humiliation!

The first two pictures are without flash and I'll put two more with flash in the next message section.

Image 1: No flash & daylight from 2 windows on the extreme right, track lights and the hanging lites you see on the right ceiling.
Manual mode, f/3.5, 1/30s at 17mm ISO 400

Image 2: No flash, as above
Manual mode, f3.2, 1/30s, ISO 400

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These 2 images were with the flash, RAW no post-processing, manual camera settings I used mainly were f/2.8 with 1/60-100s:

Image 1: There is still daylight from the front windows for this shot so the flash is acting as fill. With the flash I notice the walls are white and this is one of the better ones.

camera settings: flash ETTL, f/4.5, 1/60s, ISO 1600


Image 2: As above but no day light available, only interior lighting.

camera settings: flash ETTL, f/3.5, 1/60s, ISO 1600

- I would have liked a higher aperture than 2.8 once I was shooting people and groups but worked mostly on 2.8 to get the 60-100 shutter speeds.

Thanks Rene, I'll take any advice you have to give, altho I'm not sure I am giving you much to work with here.

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plbb wrote in post #8919965
- art hanging and room distortion
OMIG, at times I didn't know what to line my pics up with thru the view-finder to keep them straight, no matter whether I lined up with a window edge, floor/wall line, picture hanging on the wall, ceiling/wall line, door frame etc, if one thing was straight the rest of the image was crooked!

That's keystoning. Nothing to be done about it, except using the lens correction filterin PS afterward, or otherwise straighten in PS (transform).

plbb wrote in post #8919965
I used my 17-55mm, 2.8 lens at different lengths. Mistake?

best lens for the job I'd say. Maybe the 10-22 would have been nice occasionally, but then you'd really have to be careful with keystoning and distortion.

plbb wrote in post #8919965
I ended up picking one vertical straight line in a door frame or the like and straightening to that. Advice?

Either pick a vertical or horizontal line in the center of the image, and use that as a guideline. Then forget all about rulers, and just go by eye. If it looks good, it's okay

plbb wrote in post #8919965
I also found that in the small room, I was often running into heads, bodies etc in my road. I also didn't want to be in people's faces nor blocking their view. I yearned for more reach than 55mm but I also knew that my 70-200mm f/4 would not perform well in low light. Advice?

Fast prime and / or crop. Also: Being closer with a wider lens is entirely different then zooming in from a distance: First is more "involving", second is more "spectator".

plbb wrote in post #8919965
- Noise, OMIG, just awful but I expected that. Hated the work involved in post-processing even with Noise Ninja. The 50D is just awful for noise I find, I didn't go over 1600 ISO but the pics look bad and you can tell that a noise adjustment has been made, in my view.

What noise?
Seriously, ISO 1600 and probably even ISO 3200 should be just fine, provided you expose well. Unless you really want to print the images at over 8x12"

plbb wrote in post #8919965
I noticed a newspaper fellow taking pics and talked with him afterwards - he was using a full-format camera with a 50mm lens and a hand-held light meter, no flash and photographing right up to the people he was photographing. Just FYI for your thoughts.

Maybe a bit better high ISO and a bit wider aperture. But he would also be using high ISO. Principle is the same

plbb wrote in post #8919965
- I was able to fix the photos in post processing with WB adjustments to get the walls white, noise reduction etc. but way too much work! Hot spots were few and limited to where the track liting above the paintings struck.

If exposure is constant, you need to do all that "work" just once in the Raw converter. Then copy-paste the settings to the other shots. Any Raw converter allows this.

plbb wrote in post #8919965
- I was unprepared for all the shadows and dark corners etc - never really looked at a room before and only saw it when I looked at the pics afterwards - this has to be good learning for me!

Hahaha. Know that feeling.

plbb wrote in post #8919965
The walls are actually white.

Yeah, but with different colored light sources, they likely won't all be white in the images
Then again: It can add a certain "mood".

plbb wrote in post #8919965
Choosing which photos to ask you to look at was tough but I'll start with these. They are all RAW and out of the camera with no post-processing yet.

Not too bad. Mixed lighting for sure, but I don't mind a bit of a color cast on the walls.
I think I'd try to get the paintings close to 'neutral', as long as the cast on the walls doesn't go overboard.

Bit on the dark side in the shadows, but well exposed for the highlights.
You might get away with a bit longer exposure and recovery in the raw converter, but that's pretty raw converter and camera specific... It would help a bit for the noise in the dark parts, but you run the risk of blowing highlights.

plbb wrote in post #8919965
I went to the gallery before the sun went down to photo the room and each mural. There are two large windows in the front plus the lighting you see in the images so I did not use the flash. Definitely the way to go.

Bit high contrast though. Fill flash would help there. (Mainly in the first)

plbb wrote in post #8919965
However, once the show started and night fell I resorted to the flash. I tried different things throughout the evening but found out quickly I needed more study with using my flash; I really wasn't making changes based on any reasoning and just confused myself. I used manual settings for my camera and left the flash on ETTL, I assume it acted as fill, as I don't see harsh shadows.

Worked quite okay, and is the way I usually work. Here's a good link on flash photography done right: http://planetneil.com …h-photography-techniques/
These images are way easier to work with exposure, white balance and noise wise I'd think... Only "problem is the color cast from blue to yellow from closer to further in the scene, because you didn't gel your flash. So more flash = more blue

Bouncing would have helped a bit. It would have prevented the shadow behind the guy in the last image.

plbb wrote in post #8919965
** My main question is, is this the best I can expect in low light, or can I improve on what I did?

You did pretty well I think.
Bouncing the flash (something like a 430EX2 or so) would have helped a bit.
First images are perfectly usable as well, but will require a bit more work in the Raw converter / PS. But even the differences between daylight and tungsten lighting can be lessened quite well in these. (Localised adjustment in Lightroom or Photoshop)

plbb wrote in post #8919965
- I'd love to know what you would say about the light available in this room and working with it, your thoughts and suggestions. I do have opportunity to go back and try again as the art is still there and I do have access to the premises.

First image is the most difficult location I think: Ton of daylight on one wall, almost nothing on the other, and the paintings are unevenly lit.
Bounce the flash behind you if you can. If there are no people in the shots (or even if there are, some moving people can be nice!) a long exposure with the camera on a tripod might be nice, and it will allow you to use a lower ISO as well.

plbb wrote in post #8919965
I did like taking the pictures and plan to go back and try again... it was indeed a good learning experience if you can take the failure & humiliation!

No humiliation in getting better IMO

plbb wrote in post #8919965
ISO 400

I'd use higher ISO for sure.
Images I posted are ISO 1600 or 3200 on a Mk3...

I can post a 100% crop or mail you a full res if you're curious.

Then again, this is high ISO on a 1D2. Fine by me & prints fine with a bit of PP:
ISO1600, underexposed
ISO3200

Oh my goodness Rene, thank you so much for using your time for this very thorough response. This is all soooo helpful.

The Neil van Niekerk site is excellent, thank you! I'll be spending a lot of time there, his book just might be worthwhile having around as well.

I need to relax about the noise, I didn't know how to batch process with Noise Ninja & just used Lightroom sync, but installing an update I found to make that possible. Since the art was the subject I did try to post-process based on the art work and it worked pretty well for most of those pics.

I was bouncing flash - but straight up off the ceiling AND with the diffuser on, duh. I clued in part-way through when I saw the dark results of the crowd but didn't know where to bounce it - I do now!

You sure can read the light, that front corner with the two pictures was awful, did not post-process well either.

One of the most frustrating things when I try something new is not knowing what to aim for, so this is really valuable for me. Onward now, to absorb and practice all this over the next while - can't wait to get back there as I can experiment all I want without the public there.

Many thanks Rene, I really appreciate it. Maybe I can post back some better results in awhile.

Pat