AN INSIDER'S VIEW: HERDING CATS

February 21, 2015 • Leave a Comment

HONOR FLIGHT SUMMIT 2015

PHOTOGRAPHY:
PLANNING, LOCATION, PHOTO WORK-FLOW AND CREATING A VISUAL DATABASE

Memorializing and maximizing your Veteran’s short visit to the Memorial is important. Keeping them comfortable while you make this image is vital. Getting the group shot is traditional for history and a keepsake for the families of Veterans. It is also evidence of your good work and so your best fund-raising tool! I put this piece together as a reference for planning the big photo. There are locations that work photographically with different size groups. Planning this group photograph should be part of volunteer training as if it is delayed, everyone suffers.

You should advise bus captains and Volunteers to be “on time” for the group photograph. The bathroom break upon arrival should be fifteen to twenty minutes long so Volunteers and Guardians should plan on being in place fifteen to twenty five minutes after your arrival on Homeland Drive.

****If you have a group of more than five Veterans, the curved walkways by the state pillars DO NOT make a good background for group pictures. They are however great for individual shots if your state is conveniently placed.

John Bonk’s advice: (He has photographed sixty Honor Flight Chicago flights)

“Assuming 90 Veterans, begin by lining up the first wheelchair between Lincoln and the Washington Memorials and then spread 24 wheelchairs in front (twelve to a side), another 26 wheelchairs behind them and the rest of the Veterans standing...

-Assemble as quickly as you can...Ten to fifteen minutes for bathroom,

-Stagger the wheelchairs so you can see everyone’s face, do a salute shot, check the background for stray tourists,

-One of two Volunteers should be working with photographer

-Volunteers should place their veteran, take a “quick picture and step back twenty five feet.

-Nurses can duck behind the wheelchairs.

There are a number of photographers in the Capitol Region who you can hire and who are also volunteers of our DCA Honor Flight which incidentally makes me so proud of Washington. We accomplish so little here that it’s nice to see DC step up!!!!

Assuming you are using a lot of photography, I recommend Zenfolio.com to be the easiest and cheapest image storage and distribution system. It is also a complete website solution which

can be adopted to the “Honor Flight” style and additionally is excellent for social media . Using Zenfolio, you can blog, email and sell products. You can also store your event photos in folders and make them available (OR NOT) to the public. You can assign passwords and allow printing and if you like, pay for the prints through sales to family members. UPON INITIAL

SETUP, DO NOT ALLOW PRINTING until you have gotten a grasp of the system. Smug mug and Photo Shelteri are commercial websites which also do an excellent job.

As to cameras, think WIDE ANGLE! The cameras offered with 20x zooms are slow and are not wide enough to make group pictures. If you want to get closer, let your feet do the zooming!

• I believe the Honor Flight Network paperwork has a built-in photo release. If not, one is included at the end of this presentation.

• Decide on your photo location (with an alternative) and make it part of Guardian training.

• Volunteers should place their Veterans on the Memorial, take a “quick picture” of the Veteranalone and then step back so the group photograph can be made. Most are not wide enough

• to take a group picture so GIVE THE PHOTOGRAPHER SOME ROOM! Using a web based photoplatform, everyone can retrieve the pictures.

• John Bonk also used a device named “Wolverine”, a portable hard drive to collect the volunteer

• photographs at the airport at the end of the day.

• Regarding photographs: “Take prisoners and find out who’s guilty later!” With a 16 mega-byte card, you should be able to record about 4000 pictur

CENTER POSITION

I favor the center position as you get maximum visual exposure with the Veterans,the sky, the fountains, the columns and pillars, Wall of Stars and President Lincoln in one shot.That's a lot of visual information built at great cost which you should be incorporating into your picture.

In this photograph, the sky was gray and cloudy so I used a tool called “lighten shadows” to lighten the clouds and give them authority raised the level of green in the trees, fixed the grass in front, selected the Veterans using a special tool and sharpened their faces and lightened the shadows. All of the areas of the image should be mentally separated by tonality so the men, the trees, the grass, the columns, even the white in the sky can be altered. Because almost everyone is wearing a baseball cap, the filter “Adjust + Lighten Shadows” is used at about thirty percent of full strength. This one filter alone makes Photoshop worthwhile.

If you are the designated photographer, move in on a photograph like this and catch the leadership for organizational purposes. For this photograph, I contacted Dave Smith and we had people working with me to push the crowd back almost to the Commemoration Stone. In all , I don’t think we took more than fifteen minutes. Allow Guardians to photograph Veterans while set up is going on and then move back behind photographer. Just think, if you have twenty five Guardians who each hold up the photographfor “just a minute”, it’s twenty five minutes your Veterans are missing at the Memorial. As we are all aware that time is growing short, lets not waste it

Secondary angle to your main shot but the background is terrific. The primary photographer should be able to get three images in one session but better you designate three people to cover ceremony.

A nice clean shot with 40 people in it. A small group like Franklin County benefits as much from all the symbolism as does a large group like San Diego

FORTY FIVE DEGREES TO PACIFIC

SOMEONE ELSE HAD A PERMIT FOR THE CENTER SO I PHOTOGRAPHED FROM THE TOP OF THE RAMP.
IT WORKS BUT IT WAS AT THE EVERY EDGE OF MY WIDE ANGLE LENS.

FORTY FIVE DEGREES TO ATLANTIC

From beneath the Pacific Arch. If the fountains are running high, you miss the eagles but certainly get a nicely balanced

picture. Three are 39 Veterans and Guardians. It is a difficult position because it’s hard to keep the foreground clear.

Well-executed with the flag. Plenty of time to move around. The wide angle lens give you the ability to orchestrate the elements in your photographs. This photo would have been better if taken from left as Veterans would be in background. However, you can’t interrupt the ceremony although you can move about “stealthily.”

Plan for Senator Dole. He comes at 10:30 and leaves about 12:00. If you are planning to do a big group picture, I would choose to go around him and then let your Veterans tour the Memorial and then get back to him. He is most likely to be there on Saturday although....he pops in like he owns the place...and he might!!! A difficult call as sometimes you will lose your veterans to the Senator which can throw all your planning out the window.

PANORAMAS

This is a panoramic picture composed of four pictures stitched together. It’s a nice place to assemble but lacks any visual impact in the background. ***If you get stuck in this position, you can take four images which overlap by forty percent and I can stitch them together for you. About fifty people here.

Here a few tight shots which make good visuals.

I also use a variety of photo filters to occasionally "save" a bad picture. Color is your friend!

DOCUMENT YOUR HUB

PHOTOGRAPHING THE LEADERSHIP AND KEY FIGURES ON LOCATION IS IMPORTANT FOR WEB USE, PUBLICITY, ETC. MAKE SURE YOU USE THE MEMORIAL LOCATION TO ITS MAXIMUM EFFECT. HERE EARL MORSE, ROLLAND KIDDER, VICE CHAIRMAN AND FOUNDER OF FRIENDS OF THE WWII MEMORIAL, JEFF MILLER AND GEORGE KERESTES WERE ASSEMBLED FOR PEOPLE MAGAZINE SO I MADE USE OF THE TIME.

If you have the opportunity, get the leadership with Senator Dole. He doesn't endorse many causes and his name value is extraordinary.

If you get an extraordinary guest like General Powell, make sure you have someone at the Homeland Drive parking spot to greet them and escort them to the veterans.

If you have a celebrity like General Powell, make sure you have an assigned person to meet them and guide
them to your group. If they have a pleasant experience, they will take the opportunity to come back. It's as good press for them as for you.

THIS IS ALSO A GOOD TIME TO TALK ABOUT FILL FLASH.

IMAGE STORAGE AND CORRECTION

Here’s the image as it came off the camera. You don’t have to live with that if you get a basic mastery of Photoshop or hire someone for about $35.00 per hour.

Cropping the image. On the left, you can see the various filters that can be applied to the image and on the right, a number of “adjustment panels”which allow you to enhance the image.

It’s my personal opinion that if we let the camera define what we saw, then we are allowing ourselves to be deceived. The original picture is fine but it’s not cropped and color corrected to capture the spirit of the day.

Be Ready!!!

Photo Organization and Distribution

I use zenfolio to store my images because it works both as a phenomenally inexpensive backup for my images, a gallery with print capabilities and also does my social media and can be used for slideshows and presentations.

FOLDERS OF IMAGES FOR EACH EVENT AND TRIP CAN BE USED FOR FAMILIES, SOCIAL MEDIA, SLIDES SHOWS FOR FUND RAISING,

IMAGES CAN BE USED FOR PRESENTATIONS, SLIDE SHOWS, ETC....THEY ARE ALL STORED FULL RESOLUTION

PRINTING INTERFACE ALLOWS YOU TO SELL PRINTS, GIVE AWAY PRINTS, SHIP PRINTS

The advantage of a digital system like this is that you can send prints off from your desktop rather than going to the store and they will be delivered wherever you specify eliminating packing and the trip to the post office...