From: Carl Weese (cweese@earthlink.net)
Date: 08/29/02-03:43:28 PM Z
Shannon,
Put on your backpack, pick up your tripod, and go out in the backyard. Pick
an imaginary subject out there, and set everything up. Now put it all back.
Now do it all ten times in a row. Now once more, paying attention to steps
in the process that cause bottlenecks. See if there's a better way to do
these steps. Practice the particular steps where you hang up. Now do it
another dozen times. After fifty times, you will be *amazed* at how fast you
can do it.
It's the same way a musician becomes proficient, the same way a marksman
gets good. You should be able do it all with your eyes closed. I do all
setup operations from behind the camera, without looking at what I'm doing,
because that's time I'm using to stare at the subject and make final
decisions (or think about what paper I'll make the Pt/Pd print with). A
quick check of the groundglass to fine tune focus (basic focus and rough
setting of rise/fall are done automatically as part of the setup) and you're
ready to shoot.
Very important tip: use a tripod with a bubble level in the yoke. Once you
have set up with the yoke leveled, mount and set up the camera and use the
tripod head controls to level the camera. Lock them down, and the next time
you set up you only need to use the yoke level as you set up the tripod: you
know the camera will be level when you open it.
---Carl
--
web site with picture galleries
and workshop information at:
http://home.earthlink.net/~cweese/
----------
> We're going to start calling you Quick Draw Carl. Seriously, how do
> you do this? It takes me ten minutes minimum to get the camera out
> of the backpack, put it on the tripod, open it, etc, etc. Maybe you
> mean your camera is already on the tripod over your shoulder and your
> other stuff is in the backpack?
>
> --shannon
>
>
>
> --
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