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shooting ratio
I was wondering what a good shooting ratio should be I.e No of quality shots taken:Total No of shoots taken for a single light setup and single outfit, and how long should that shoot last. This would be helpful as a guide to see how much i have/need to improve my shooting. Thanks D Dec 03 12 05:20 am Link Deji Joseph wrote: Shooting ratio is irrelevant. Results are what matter. Dec 03 12 05:25 am Link That's going to change over time, with experience and your style as you evolve. My suggestion is for you to always strive to improve the "keepers":"total shots" ratio everytime you shoot, as well as the # of shots that you're happy with "out of camera" meaning before post production. The better an image is before post, the better it will be after post. If you keep these things in mind, consciously, everytime you shoot and learn from your mistakes your ratio will improve naturally. I also feel like you have to balance the above goals with the pace of the shoot and the model(s) you're working with. For me, I've found if I get to annal-retentive over the lighting and every shot all spontaneity gets lost for both myself and the model - and I don't like shooting that way; there's no "rhythm" to shoots like that and I feel they lack a lot of "creative juice". So, slow down enough to be quality conscience, but don't bring the shoot's pace to a crawl either. This is a personal preference - I know there are great photographers who do work this way with great success. What works for you will evolve over time, as you learn from your own successes and failures. Dec 03 12 11:50 am Link Deji Joseph wrote: the ratio doesn't matter. what matters is your ability to see. Dec 03 12 01:21 pm Link If using large format, you want something like a ratio of 1 Dec 03 12 01:35 pm Link Way back in the days of film I remember one definition of the difference between a Pro and an Amateur Photographer. An amateur shoots 36 photos and expects 36 will be good. A pro shoots 36 and hopes one satisfies the client. Ratios are meaningless. Depends on what you are shooting and what things you can control. The more you shoot the better you get, especially if you get good feedback from people whose opinion you respect. Dec 03 12 01:45 pm Link 1 quality image > X where X is the total number of images taken. Dec 03 12 01:57 pm Link Yes, realistically irrelevant as it depends on your own personal; definition of 'keeper'. But for me personally, it's running at around 1:178. Dec 03 12 02:02 pm Link Totally different genre but I believe Ansel Adams iconic images came out to something less than one percent of his total output. What percentage would have been acceptable to clients for specific jobs, close to 80% I would imagine after seeing some of his commercial work. Dec 03 12 02:09 pm Link -B-R-U-N-E-S-C-I- wrote: This is really the answer. Dec 03 12 02:15 pm Link I call it the (commercial) production ratio - I tell my new students to begin working towards 10% good production with about 1% making it to publication. (btw - the other side of this self-evaluation technique is what I call the "piss test" and in the old days passing this test is how I gave out large format photo paper for darkroom work.) This can be an aide for the photographer to evaluate their own skill level and has little to do with anything else. Hopefully it should increase in time. A little like target practice at a firing range. I will say that while shooting a large project tethered, clients are very impressed when they see the images coming fast and almost all of them have good consistent production value. There are those few that are born with the vision/eye. Then this kind of personal evaluation method is less meaningful and may actually be harmful. On an artistic level this kind of evaluation should go out the window and the student can buy their own paper. Dec 03 12 02:17 pm Link many of my shoots seem to last about 90 minutes, especially with paying customers. models can often go longer. at the beginning we used to do these epic 4-5 hour shoots but partly that was because i was training the wife to shoot. for mayhem you only need a couple really good ones. in the studio i have a lot of control and shoot into a TV so the percentage of decent ones can run fairly high. but only a few are ever awesome. but i had a family of three in yesterday and i swear those guys couldn't take a bad picture -- nearly every image was great. for paying customers who buy our digital package we promise 25-35 images but often give more. obviously these aren't all fully retouched. Dec 03 12 02:19 pm Link -B-R-U-N-E-S-C-I- wrote: +1 Dec 03 12 02:30 pm Link I have this theory, which I call the "Keeper Ratio". It's more relevant to film. Y'see, processing film in the darkroom is a big investment of time, and the bigger the format, the fewer the exposures, and the greater the darkroom time investment. When I first got started, I used a 36 exposure roll of 35mm film, and I could develop 2 rolls (or 72 exposures) at a time. When I got started, I only had a 2-5 "keeper" in a 72 exposure batch. After a while, I became more deliberate when making exposures. My "keeper" ration improved 2 maybe 20-30 "keepers" in a 72 exposure batch. That was when I got my first medium format camera, which had 15 exposures on a 120 roll. I still could develop 2 rolls, or 30 exposures, at a time. So, my "keeper" ratio was effectively down, with only 5 or so "keepers" out of a batch of 30 exposures. Again, I became more deliberate, and my "keeper ratio" improved to 15-20 "keepers". So, then I got my second medium format camera, with 10 exposures on a 120 roll film -- I still could develop two rolls at once, but my "keeper ratio" went down. After a time, it improved. So then, I moved to 4x5 because I had a good expectation that I'd get some "keepers" out of all the work I did. So, a "keeper" ratio was an important indication to me, telling me when I was ready to move up to a bigger camera that required a bigger time investment. I should say that digital photography kinda screws up my "keeper theory", because there isn't a big time requirement that is proportional to the number of exposures. But it was a good theory for a while. Dec 03 12 02:36 pm Link I found this an interesting read. I read it a LONG time ago... Surprised I found it. http://photo.net/learn/portraits/intro "Elsa uses a 20x24" Polaroid camera. Film costs about $50/exposure, so she limits herself to two exposures per subject." Dec 03 12 02:55 pm Link Ratio of keepers improves automatically everytime the following milestones are reached: You buy a better camera but you're using the same old computer. You get a "Space critically low" warning on you 8TB raid backup. The realization that 100 nearly identical shots look just as identical zoomed to 100% in Lightroom. The realization that choosing the best picture is not nearly as satisfying as taking it. When you upload a file dump through Dropbox and it takes more than a day. If you click "next" fast enough, it looks like motion-capture. When you can't order enough fuses for your strobes to last you one shoot. When your model is panting, and you're doing a figure shoot. Dec 03 12 02:55 pm Link I always admire the shooting ratio of Buzz Aldrin.  . Dec 03 12 02:58 pm Link -B-R-U-N-E-S-C-I- wrote: +1000 Dec 03 12 03:01 pm Link Raoul Isidro Images wrote: He cropped the feet, so this image is worthless. Dec 03 12 03:02 pm Link Raoul Isidro Images wrote: Extrosy wrote: Seriously. And how hard could it have been to get the horizon even close to level? Somebody forgot to put a grid screen in that Hassy. Dec 03 12 03:10 pm Link Extrosy wrote: The website (where it was lifted) cropped the image. The original is bigger... Dec 03 12 03:15 pm Link AgX wrote: Raoul Isidro Images wrote: Seriously. And how hard could it have been to get the horizon even close to level? Somebody forgot to put a grid screen in that Hassy. At least you can photoshop in more black space to level the horizon, but you can't photoshop in more feet. I guess they could just schedule a reshoot at the studio these were taken at. Just dust off the backdrop. Dec 03 12 03:15 pm Link Raoul Isidro Images wrote: This just makes me wonder what else they cropped. Dec 03 12 03:17 pm Link Extrosy wrote: The rest of the studio set it was shot on. Dec 03 12 03:23 pm Link MainePaintah wrote: Um, I don't think so. Verified transcripts from the lunar landing: Dec 03 12 03:27 pm Link Raoul Isidro Images wrote: Its funny...That image is wrong in so many ways yet it is so priceless... Dec 03 12 03:31 pm Link Extrosy wrote: That golden pipe in the foreground is a touch-sensitive probe extending about 3 feet vertically from the base of the footing. Dec 03 12 03:51 pm Link We're pretty anal here about lighting. It may take me 10-15 minutes to get background, costume, lights, pose, etc. set to something I'm satisfied with. Then, 6-10 snaps with variations for the model's poses and expressions, and we move on. It's not unusual to get only 50 or 60 shots in a 2-hour session designed to capture just a handful of finished images. If we're doing a concept shot for a product (poster, greeting card, t-shirt, etc.), I'll be looking for just one image. I know what I want, and there's little point in capturing a bunch of superfluous images I know I'm not going to use. Ratios are largely irrelevant, imo. If a client comes in for an executive portrait, you'd better be prepared to get a usable image in 15 minutes or less, and if it takes more than a half-dozen snaps, you're gonna look like an amateur. I had a billionaire CEO once warn me that his time was worth $60 a minute. I was set up when he got there, took a sober shot, a smiling shot, and we were finished in five. OTOH, when you're photographing children (or pets), you'll have a limited amount of time to accommodate their limited attention span, so I tend to fire off a lot of shots per minute while I'm bantering with them to hold their attention. I think more experienced photographers tend to be more efficient in their shooting ratios, especially if they're old farts like me who came from the film era where "spray and pray" could get REALLY expensive. I notice the difference most often with weddings. Unlike a lot of new shooters who offer the couple a thousand images on a CD, our biggest package promises a maximum of 150 FINISHED shots, including prep, ceremony, and reception. Being able to recognize and visually tell their story in under 200 targeted photos is my job, and that discipline is why they hired me in the first place. Dec 03 12 04:06 pm Link Sometimes ratios matter, sometimes they don't mean shit. Back in April, I shot 241 photos one morning. Only 2 photos mattered, and they were taken 11 seconds apart.   Dec 03 12 08:55 pm Link  That was a two shot stitched image, only took two shots total.  That is 4 or 5 stitched together, and took around 50 shots total. It doesn't matter how many you take as long as you get what you want. Andrew Thomas Evans www.andrewthomasevans.com Dec 03 12 09:47 pm Link well, when shooting editorial fashion, it takes about 2hrs per look to produce the look (hair, makeup, wardrobe) and based on our 8hr day schedule I have 30 minutes or so to shoot it. Generally I have my setup and lights ready. Generally I could quit shooting in 5-10 minutes as I already have the shots I really need by then. But I like to shoot for 20-30 just to let serendipity operate. When I'm done, at least half of the images are "keepers" but I will only use 1/10 in the story..... When I'm shooting art projects like today's "Angelus" series the model was jumping and dancing around to catch motion shots - we did this for probably 20 minutes per look. Most of the shots are interesting, perhaps 1/10 really capture what we were trying to do.... Dec 03 12 09:55 pm Link Deji Joseph wrote: This is one problem of the digital revolution. I find my ratio is very high. Today's 4 hour shoot I took just over 600 images in 6 or 7 concepts. And many of them will be unusable. I am partially blind and sometimes have difficulty with in camera composition. And so I take many more than needed. Dec 03 12 10:02 pm Link um as many as it takes to get what you want...1 to a 1,000..."the better you get the less you shoot" Dec 03 12 10:04 pm Link Any time you can get an image that you really, really like, it is a successful shoot. The ratio just boils down to billable hours and possible licensing fees, really. But if you can walk away with a 'holy crap!' image, then it is a day well spent. Dec 03 12 10:10 pm Link MainePaintah wrote: Yeah and my boyfriend is a French model. I met him on the internet. Dec 03 12 10:14 pm Link This is one that goes under the kind of silly question. Depends on the shoot. I had llamas shoots were I shoot 2-3 exposures with a viewcamera and shoots were I have shoot 1,000 plus images with a DSLR. I was ask that question by a wedding couple once how many images to expect, I told them I do not work that way. I will what is needed for the best quality of images. Dec 04 12 01:11 am Link |
