each one, teach one

posted by nick

so if you read my last entry here and have been following my personal blog at all, you know that there was an orange county smugmug meet-up this past tuesday. it was hosted by group leader jasmine star and featured special guest speaker jessica claire. it was the second ever OC “smug” gathering and my first time mingling with my <ahem> peers. yeah, that word doesn’t roll off my tongue easily since i still feel like i’m on the outside looking in. i mean, i just feel like everyone and their mother is an experienced, working photog, meanwhile i’m the one lonely soul on the planet that doesn’t quite have all the answers and is laughably bringing a knife to a gunfight. 

but i’ve shared my insecurities with you before. in fact, i feel like when i’m not sharing my insecurities, i’m left without much to say. no, no … i’ll leave this to my personal blog. back to the smug …

there were a few points of shop talk that i thought i’d share here. jessica (if i may pretend that we’re on a first name basis) went through her shootsac to share with us what glass she fancies. she said she currently goes to the 35mm 1.4 a lot. the 24mm 1.4 is also at her fingertips. she spent a little more time on her next lens: the 50mm 1.2. i’ve long observed that a lot of the pros i follow worship at the church of 50 1.2. 50mm seems like a money focal length as tien first endorsed it to me when i took the dslr plunge last year. i bought a camera-body-only and a 50mm 1.8 as my sole lens. it was an adjustment at first because the concept of fixed focal length was brand new, but the quality felt second-to-none. meanwhile, tien and steve were living the highlife with the 50mm 1.4. buttery indeed! recently, nlp friend lew at lk imagery bought his first dslr (a nikon) and after playing with the kit lens for a while, finally followed our strong urgings to go 50mm. he got his, and the results are fantastic. even more recently, resident gadget evangelist steve put an offering into the collection plate at that same church of 50 1.2. though he has a propensity to visit but never stay (translation: buy, then return), he did admit to me the other day that, despite his inevitable relinquishing of the lens, it is buttuh. and back to my original point (sorry for the LONG tangent), jessica spent extra time talking about the 50 1.2 because it’s the lens she found her photographic identity with. how cool is that?? are lenses and photogs kindred spirits walking life looking for their soulmates? and some day, photography-gods willing, their paths may cross and it’s love at first focus? 

jessica said she used to shoot with a few zooms (i think the 16-35mm 2.8 and 24-70mm 2.8 were in there), including the 70-200mm 2.8, a very popular wedding lens. she said she doesn’t use any of them anymore, except maybe using the 70-200 occasionally. she also said she likes to shoot her lenses wide open. she shoots as much natural-light photos as possible, which is made eons easier with every additional stop these nicer lenses afford us.

also in the way of bodies, she offered another perspective to the eternal 5D or 5DM2 debate we’ve covered here before. she still uses a 5D! she reasons that there is not a lot of difference between the two bodies aside from better iso performance for the mark ii. as far as focusing, she perceived no discernible difference. for just a bump in iso performance, the price of admission is not worth it to her. i’ve heard similar sentiment in a becker vidcast. i find it interesting that focus performance gains seem to be at the top of their list. iso gain, no so much. so the scoreboard (as far as i’ve been able to research) goes like this:

jessica claire: 5D
jasmine star: 5DM2 (with back-button focus enabled)
JD “star” (jasmine’s husband/usual second shooter): 5D
becker: 1Ds M3 (nothing like the top of the line!)
bonnie tsang: 5D
jason q tran: unknown

beyond my natural tendency to lust on the equipment and keep mental tally of who’s using what, there was a lot of talk about selling your unique self in your business. “no one can out ‘you’ you,” is what jessica said. it’s basically the same credo i read in dane sanders‘ book fast track photographer, and hear this group repeat time and time again. in sharing this philosophy with my nlp brothers, tien suggested i read dale carnegie’s how to win friends & influence people. i’ve put that on my reading queue. 

in the end, i didn’t win any friends or influence any people at this thing, but i got to hear a couple pros i follow share some of their stories and professional preferences, which is good stuff to hear. i hope it helps me calibrate where i am and where i need to point myself. jasmine said they hope these smug gatherings will become a regular monthly occurrence, so i hope to be back in the mix next month. maybe by then i’ll learn not to be a tiny face in the crowd, but someone people remember.

the missus and myself are circled in red. a blue arrow points out a guy in the front row whose hair i distinctly remember. image courtesy jasminestarblog.com. arrows/circles courtesy me.

p.s. major props to the mesa verde country club in costa mesa for hosting the event on the cheap. it was a beautiful facility and was told they were very gracious to smug’s needs. if i ever take up golf, i’m THERE!

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~ by hapa17 on July 31, 2009.