Historically, I don’t do much portrait work.  Over the years, I’ve gotten more comfortable photographing people, and these days Ido look for opportunities to take more portraits.  Recently I was asked by a friend to do some homecoming portraits for her daughter and her friends.  It ended up being sort of the last minute thing, but I did have enough time to at least plan out a shot list, shot locations at Cox Arboretum, and really think about the gear that I wanted to use.

The camera was the easy choice – I used my Canon R5 Mark II.  for lenses, I knew I primarily wanted to use the Canon RF 85 mm f1.2.  Being familiar with Cox Arboretum, I knew there may be some opportunities to use a long lens to shoot a single portrait or couple shot standing on a bridge. So I brought along my Canon RF 70-200 f2.8.  The big experiment for this shoot would be using some of the new lighting I’ve accumulated this year.  Of course I brought my Westcott FJ80 II speed light.  But I also dragged along one of my two new Westcott FJ400 II strobes with the Westcott Octa-M modifier, and an iFootage A400 light stand.  I sketched out shooting locations within Cox Arboretum, Create a pose list, and had all the equipment packed and ready to go.

LESSON ONE: BEST LAID PLANS…

Once I arrived, I quickly discovered that the Saturday night that we decided to meet up at Cox Arboretum not only had about half of the available parking blocked off for a wedding, but also appeared to be the homecoming night for every other school in the county.  All of the prime, planned shooting locations within Cox Arboretum were mobbed.  So I had to quickly pivot and take our group to other suitable locations within the park.  And the clock was ticking because our young couple had to make it to dinner and of course the homecoming dance.

LESSON TWO: IT TAKES A VILLAGE

God bless photographers that can do these types of photo shoots by themselves.  I brought along my wife who was critical in helping me complete the photo shoot.  I had badly injured my back two days before the photo shoot, so she helped drag the equipment around in the park, and set up the lighting.  We used a friends sports equipment wagon, which worked well for transporting all the gear around in the park.  Despite all the adversity, I did end up getting some really nice shots – here’s just a few of the better ones:

As you might imagine, our friend and her daughter were absolutely thrilled with the results.  I’m looking forward to continued experimentation with my lighting equipment – I’m hoping to do more portrait photography over the winter months.