Shooting Santa - Facing the fear...
It's not as bad as it sounds...
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“Can you come and shoot Santa for us at the Christmas Fair this year?”
And I said “Yes, of course, be glad to help…” …
… and about 15 seconds later, the fear set in. What have I committed to? Can I do it? And the Christmas Fair was a month away. That’s a LONG time for fear to work on you!
I know how to photograph an event - seen lots of Youtube videos on it, bought the gear and played with it at home, but I’d never actually done a real live photoshoot for a whole day where I was expected to shoot, off-camera flash, tethered, and immediately print shots for customers then and there. No processing time, no editing, get every shot right in camera first time, no re-takes, with a constant stream of paying customers all wanting perfection for their little darlings big moment with Santa.
No pressure so.
Was I mad? Yes. But there was some method in the madness, some intention, a proactive desire to push my boundaries and see if I could crack this mental barrier which I was aware I had let grow for a good while.
I know my way around a camera. I’ve taught and trained literally thousands of camera owners for more than the past 15 years in how to get good shots and get to know their kit. But that’s a well-worn track I know well, the questions are predictable, the pitch is one I’m comfortable on. This was different. This was a live, public event with people I know and see every week at the school gate, friends, acquaintances, parents of our children’s classmates. Lots of room for major egg on face if I screwed up. LOTS of room… SO MUCH room… You get the drift of my fears…
So a week before the Fair, I spent a morning doing a dry run at home. Set up the camera - my trusty Nikon D810, my Godox AD200 flash on a light stand with a nice 24” softbox to diffuse the light, triggered by my flash controller. Connected the camera to my Mac using a Tethertools cable, and fired up Lightroom’s Tethered Capture mode (this send the shots taken by the camera straight down onto the computer as you take them). Took me a while to figure out all the settings there, but eventually got a folder set up on the computer, into which photos I took with the D810 appeared a few seconds after clicking the shutter.
Unboxed the new printer which the PTA had bought for the event, loaded it with some A5 photo paper, and then spent a good 2 hours figuring out how to generate a nice white-bordered print straight out of Lightroom, suitable for delivery to the proud Mums and Dads as they exited Santas Grotto on the day. Eventually got it all working, and I’d only wasted half a box of photo paper. Sorry PTA!
Feeling a bit more confident now, I put the printer and other gear in a pile upstairs and counted down to Friday evening - setup for the Fair on Saturday.
The only time I could go to get set up ended up being before the grotto was put up, so I basically just set up my light stand, pulled a table out for the printer and then left for the night. In at 9.30 Saturday morning, a good 90 minutes before Santa was due to arrive. Tip - ALWAYS arrive well early. The unexpected always happens, and today was to be no exception…
The grotto had been moved upstairs. To an area with no powerpoints. And the grotto had been built with no room for even the smallest softbox. Immediate unexpected challenges (cue serious mental wailing and gnashing of teeth! Panic was sighted in the distance, but not quite there yet…)
Pulled out a 25m extension lead from the car boot - power problem sorted. Poked the camera on the tripod through the corner of of the grotto drapes at Santa head height, and put my flash unit on the light stand about 4 feet directly above the camera with a bare bulb, and fired off some test shots. After remembering to do a white balance to counteract the totally red lights inside the grotto, managed to get some OK looking shots of the solitary Elf helper posing in Santa’s chair.
Set up the TetherTools cable to the computer, fired up Lightroom, and wonder of wonders, it immediately recognised the camera was connected. YES! Panic begone, I’m getting this!
Not so fast.
The printer refused to connect. Rebooted. Twice. Tick tock, tick tock. Unplugged the printer cable, power cable, uttered some inventive and probably very inappropriate curses under my breath, and re-installed the printer driver.
Finally, a connected printer, and yes, it printed my A5 white-bordered prints just as they had worked at home. Time-check - 10.50 - Santa’s arriving in 10 minutes.
Once he’d come upstairs and got comfortable, we did a couple of test shots (one’s the top image here). Top Santa Grotto shooting tip - sit a little snowman on top of the camera lens so you can tell the children and Mums and Dads - “look at the snowman!”.
Otherwise, they’ll all look at the flash and have gazes averted heavenwards rather than at the camera. Only took us about 5 families to figure that one out…
We also learned to have Santa get the photo out of the way early in the session, which gave me time to get the right one from the 3 I’d shot chosen, and printed so it was ready as the family exited the grotto. Note to self for next year - figure out why the printer didn’t know I was using A5 paper and made me press OK 3 times to get past error messages every time I ran a print!
Almost 6 hours of shooting later, the last of 80 families had trooped through. I was on my third camera battery, the ink was running dry in the printer, and I don’t know how Santa managed to stay so fresh and make every child feel so special - but then he is magic!
I packed up and got home feeling tired but very satisfied. Everyone had loved the photos, there had been no major technical issues bar the flash going to sleep once, and I’d managed to pull off a successful live shoot. Roll on next year!
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