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Any one who is involved in photography can tell you that working with professional photography equipment, shopping around for, and buying it really does turn out to be half of the fun involved in practicing photography. On top of this truth, possessing the correct photographic equipment for the task is critical for performing it right. This article discusses the various elements of professional photography equipment, including camera equipment and lighting equipment.

Apple Boxes

Apple boxes are found in every film studio and lot in the world. These can be utilized in myriads of various ways. When you are working with filming a person, they may be employed to effectively raise up a shorter individual. With several of them, you are able to boost the height of a table or a desk. Since they come in different heights, you may employ several arrangements of boxes in order to precisely reach the desired height.

C-Stands and C-Stand Accessories

This stands for Century C Stands. Their capability of being put together literally right next to each other is maybe their greatest benefit that they offer over competing forms of light stands. The height of every leg is different, permitting a photographer to align the stands next to each other by putting the leg of one stand beneath the leg of the next one.

The C-stands' arms are ideal for keeping differing C-stand accessories, such as light controls in the air including scrims, flags, reflectors, clamps, mirrors, etc. You are even able to arrange lights on these light stands. Such C-stands are available in varying sizes with differing features offered.

Light Meters

These have mostly become obsolete with the advance to digital filmmaking. But in the so-called golden days of filming, when films were shot using real film that was expensive to buy and to develop, light meters were essential. They saved the photographer both money and time. The majority of photographers would employ them to take light meter readings in order to know what the lighting exposure would look like when the film was developed. This avoided under or over-exposed filming of movies. But in today's technologically advanced age, all that you have to do when using the digital technology cameras is to press the button and you have instantaneous, free, test shots (you do not even require a Polaroid camera for test shooting anymore.). If your exposure turns out to be off, then you just take another picture. It your light is too little or too much, you simply adjust it. Very few professional photographers utilize light meters any longer.

Strobe Light Sources

The majority of photographers at some point utilize electronic strobe lighting equipment, also known as photographic electronic flash. Numerous competing brands and kinds of flash and strobe lighting equipment are available.

These include bare bulbs, which are strobe heads that do not contain a reflector; small reflectors, which offer wide or narrow sprays of lighting; large reflectors, useful for bouncing light off of ceilings or into walls; grid spots, which are used to keep light from spreading out; light boxes, which are used to precisely focus where a light source will shine; Freznells, which are very large and heavy lights that double as adjustable types of spot lights; optical spots, which are more or less a slide projector and a flash tube lying behind it; and ring lights, which are flash heads formed much like a donut that permit you to shoot film through the hole to achieve a nearly perfect light fill.

For more information on photography equipment, visit http://pfe.com/p158216-understanding-the-basic-photography-lighting-equipment.cfm.

Feeding your Film Crew

I learned from shooting two independent features Consignment & In With Thieves that craft services is important. I can not stress enough the point of feeding your hardworking crew well as your budget can afford. Good food will go a long way to keeping your crew busting ass for the 12 hours or more a day it will take to get your indie film done. I always dedicate a nice bit of my production budget to quality craft services. It's not the fare you'll find on a Hollywood set, but everyone that has eaten on one of my film sets has never complained about the food. i know some filmmakers that say screw wasting any money over what is the bare minimum needed to keep the crew fed. I can put the money saved into another area of the movie more important. In my opinion their is no more important area than your film crew. It doesn't matter if they are paid or volunteering their valuable time. The crew is the lifeblood of your production. i am in no way discounting the major importance of the cast, but the crew is their an hour or more before the first shot goes off and an hour or more after the last breaking down the equipment for that days shoot. Talents times vary from a couple of hours to an entire day depending on what's on the days shooting schedule. Crew is always there working. Setting out good food shows that you respect your crew as people and appreciate their efforts. When days run long they're much more likely to keep working past the 12 hours to make the day if they have been well fed.

I was on a shoot in Northern California that helped lead me down the road of discovery to realize feeding your film crew well is always a good thing. It was a well funded short being shot on 35mm. Production had sprung for a fully loaded 4 Ton Grip Truck, John Deere E & E Movie Quiet Generator, the rental of an incredible farm as the primary location, and hired a rock & roll German camera crew. The producer and director, who were married, gave a pretty damn good speech to the troops about how important the crew was to the production. Call times the next morning were 5:00 AM for crew and 6:30 AM for the cast working that day. I get to the set to find a lot of the crew is ticked off. The crew craft service table was set up with generic brand decaffeinated coffee, generic store bran powdered donuts, and gallons of an orange colored punch. Even though I don't drink coffee I know it's the eye opener for many a film crew. This was not the best start for production. We broke for lunch 2 hours late. Craft services was worse than the morning. You have a hungry crew that busted ass 2 hours past lunch to try the make days shot list and their shown to a table with a completely generic make your own sandwich set up. Production set out the exact same thing 3 days in row. This must have loaded up on generic stuff at a discount warehouse store.

That night at a local bar a lot the crew decided to let off some steam with a healthy session of drinking, pissing and moaning about the crap the crew was being fed. People were already spending money out of their own pockets to buy their lunch when anyone would go on a food run. I felt that was bad, but it worse when college kids working for free as grunt production assistants had to buy their own lunches or be stuck with the cold sandwich routine. We had a late call time the next day, so we stayed out drinking until the bar closed down. i kept listening to the rest of the crew vent about how much bullshit it was to expect us to work long days without showing the respect of putting out some decent food. On day 4 it all came to ahead. Crew pulled a 15 hour day. Production offered to buy everyone a dinner for their efforts. Dinner was pizza, which is cool if you haven't been given a steady dose of cold sandwiches three days in a row. The German DP went ballistic and walked off the job with the entire camera crew. I had much respect for what they did. Production was shut down on day 5. It wasn't a problem for cast because there were only four actors on set at any one time, plus they were given a per diem for lunch. Crew had to, for the lack of better term, eat shit sandwiches. Production finally woke up, put out real coffee, juice, and a mix of pasteries, and ordered take out to be delivered for lunch the rest of the production. Cutting corners on the craft service budget caused a wasted day of shooting that cost them extra on rental time. If you spare no expense on equipment make sure you're taking care of your crew too.

I was hired by a low budget indie movie to shoot behind-the-scenes footage for the making of featurette they were going to add as a bonus to the DVD. Even though this was a indie flick with an unknown cast production felt it necessary to have separate craft services for cast and crew. I was by the the craft service table for cast when a dolly grip cruised by taking a cookie from the table on his way to grab some gear. The lead who at one time was a semi-regular on a popular daytime soap told the producer one of 'carnies' took cookies that he had brought for cast only. I could not believe how f@#cking petty this guy was. I see everyone from the production assistant to the lead in an independent film as a part of the team. I believe everyone should eat from the craft service spread. I learned a valuable lesson about the politics of craft services.

You don't have to spend a fortune to put out decent craft services to keep your crew and cast relatively happy. I've learned you won't please everyone with the food and beverages you put out each day, but if you show a genuine effort you're trying to take care of the people on your film set it will go a long way in getting the most out of everyone. I have done my best on my movies CONSIGNMENT and IN WITH THIEVES to fed everyone well as my budget will allow. If I'm calling the shots on a film shoot I will never have different craft services for crew and cast. i feel the people that have been on set the longest hours should go to the head of line. I can't say enough about the members of the crew on both film shoots. Everyday they gave their all. I've also been fortunate to have worked with a tremendous casts that brought no primadonna attitudes or egos to the set. i felt the least i could do is put out the best craft services I could afford. Always feed your crew and cast as well as you can.

I don't want to go into specifics and plan a menu for your film shoot, but I do have some things to share that can help you with your craft services that I did on my two independent features CONSIGNMENT & IN WITH THIEVES.

1) Send an email out to crew and cast asking if anyone is vegetarian or allergic to anything?

2) Always serve quality coffee (regular & decaf) that is fresh and hot. If the coffee has been sitting change it out.

3) Don't just offer sugary foods (candy, donuts etc.). Mix in whole wheat bagels, a veggie platter, and some fruit.

4) An industrial coffee maker is a must!

5) Always have more water than soft drinks.

6) Splurge for hot lunches as much as possible.

7) Do not buy expensive energy drinks, most of them end going home with people.

It's always better to have too much than not enough

9) Don't believe the hype that if you stuff your crew at lunch they won't be worth a shit the rest of the day. That's bull. On my shoots that one meal has to keep people going long hours.

10) If you can get someone willing to cook homemade meals do it.

About the Author

A Sid Kali film is known for it's provocative characters, authentic dialogue, and conflict filled plots. Sid Kali's goal is to produce four in-house films a year while exploring joint efforts with producers and production companies that do not shy away from creating films that are intense and entertaining.
Sid Kali website

How many professional photographers still shoot film?

And why is that?

Not so many. It's a good question, though. I've been lucky enought to work with many of the top shooters (titou just did French Vogue!), and was myself a model and successful photographer based in Paris.

First, many of the REALLY top fashion guys still do shoot film, and some of them exclusively. I won't name them because I think it's a betrayal of professional confidence to reveal what I've seen during shoots. But suffice to say many of the top advertising and editorial spreads you see in magazines are done on film -- even 35mm, though as a rule it's medium format. Last time I spoke with 'ELLE Decor's' photo editor, I was told they only accept film for their editorial work.

Why? Because although prohibitively expensive for everyday use -- film can always be scanned to digital, but you can't do it the other way around. It's not exactly like the difference between drawing or painting with a computer in place of using pencil or paint -- but pretty much in many ways.

The thing is, digital has become the everyday expectation, and imposes its own demands as well as providing freedom and above all certainty. You see, back in the day a crew would be assembled, often at great expense, and only the photographer knew what was going to be on the film afterwards. But you'd be surprised just how little many photographers actually know about the necessities of shooting fashion pictures! Now they look at shot after shot until everyone gives the OK, and then it's just 'button pressing', and of course the photographer's role as a director (and icon).

An example: I was happy to find after taking a four-year sabbatical from the business to find that an old pal had become Photo Editor at 'Womans Day' in New York. I'd done lots of work of this type -- some fashion, but also lifestyle and illustration of everything from sweater patterns to recipes. The editor looked at my book and asked, "What format do you use?"

I answered "35mm". He looked at me incredulously. "Oh no! Film? I have to have medium-format digital and a wifi hookup so I can edit here at my desk online in real time!" That was that: I never worked with him.

Now, this is ridiculous. Pictures in Womans Day are printed on pretty poor quality paper, and as often as not aren't full page. Even if they were printed that way, the kind of resolution that the setup he insisted on is complete overkill. It's like going to shoot bees with an elephant gun. The price of a digital sensor goes up exponentially as it gets larger. That's why a DSLR that shoots the same 10 Mp as a modern compact costs 10 times as much. The digital back that replaces the film canister on a medium-format camera costs about $30,000. But using one "means you're a professional".

So, like the days when enormous sports lenses were popular for fashion -- you HAD to use one so that the client felt he was was getting his money's worth; so it is today that the latest big-format digital and computer setup is considered "necessary" today. It's baloney. Remember when cell-phones were carried around in a briefcase?

As it is though, only the very top photographers can impose using the equipment they want. There's SEVERAL who use the fabulous Yashica T4 pocket 35mm camera (about $150) to shoot all their MAJOR campaigns, and others have done billboards and some of the most prestigious art books with it. When I finally got one after being told to do so for years, it revolutionized my own work. Annie Leibowitz always has a Konica compact film camera around her neck, and so on. "Secret" lenses abound -- the 'amateur' Nikon Series E 75-150mm F3.5 Zoom lens, for instance: I've done posters that were blown up to 3X4 meters in size for the Paris subway walls with that one, as have others. Out of production for years, but you can buy one online for about $100.

Not that digital photography isn't a great advance -- especially for the casual shooter and so many professional applications. No more worrying if that crucial wedding shoot will "come out". Ditto that sunset picture on vacation. Or a big-time beauty shoot. But bigger doesn't always mean better. Just look at the newest posters in the windows at Victoria's Secret. Ugly as hell, with that flat and 'dead' look that the previous answerer described. Who knows? Maybe that's what people want these days -- the reassurance of something mediocre that they identify with and understand presented as luxury, like the 'Girl-Next-Door' in American Apparel ads, or the art world's phenomenon of "Bad Painting" and so on, or silly "gourmet" dishes at Olive Garden.

The thing is, there was such a race for more and more megapixels that many of the newer digital cameras were stretched beyond their real capabilities. It's like the guys I see driving around in the South Beach traffic in Lamborghinis and Ferraris. Pointless, and in the end an exercise in style more than a useful tool. A good rule of thumb is get a good quality compact (Canon A590IS is great and cost less than $150) and shoot at 3 megapixels or so -- that way the sensor can really accommodate the data it's receiving, and the results are actually better, and look more like film than if you use the full 8 or 10 megapixels: not to mention saving space in memory and producing files that your home computer can manage.

EDIT: Remember that scene in 'Little Big Man' where Dustin Hoffman's character goes to General Custer and asks for a job as an Indian scout? He's spent his whole life among the Indians and knows everything there is to know -- but Custer will have none of it. Looking down from his horse, he squints at Hoffman, twirls his moustache and says, "No. A scout has a certain LOOK about him. Kit Carson for instance. Look at you. You're obviously a mule-skinner." And that's pretty much how it goes between Art Directors and photographers these days.

Email me, and I'll give you a link to my website and you can see for yourself. Starring your question.

Pawan Kalyan acts in Ramoji Film City
Pawan Kalyan is busy finishing his pending duties for ‘Komaram Puli’. Sources say the Komaram Puli’s unit was spotted in Ramoji Film City to shoot a song.

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