alright so have my first paid event coming up in a week or so and and i am considering renting a lens for the event.THE EVENT: the event is a rather large birthday party 250 - 300 guests it is being held in a hotel convention room (indoors) the will be dj's, dancing, lights etc.so there may not be too much light to work with.MY KIT:i currently have a Canon T2i coupled with the kit 18-55mm IS lens, the only problem is that it is not a very fast lens by any means, F 3.2 (or some were right around there) i also have a Vivitar DF-383 flash that i plan on using as well.So taking all that into consideration, could i get away with the kit lens?RENTAL: i am considering renting either of these two lenses. Canon EF 20mm f/2.8 USM Wide-Angle Lens Canon EF 24mm f/1.4L II USM Wide-Angle LensAny thoughts or insightful tips is greatly appreciated!

You sure you want the responsibility of taking pictures?You don't even know the speed of your lens.How do you intend to light this shindig?Use your current lens.What is the deliverable?BAK

Do you have some sample shots of similiar events you may done? My guess is that you have impressed someone with your skills... but it would give us an idea of the type of shooting you do.The reason I say this is that I have been shooting portraits for the last 3-4 years and while I don't consider myself a pro and have no plans for it..... I do seem to take pictures that other people like.What I always do is start the process with a face to face meeting where we review the past portriats I have done and then talk about what the subject may have in mind. I may show them pictures I want to try that I have found on the internet and they sometimes bring a picture that they like as well. We talk about studio lighting vs natural light shots and determine what we like best. Usually we can come up with a few ideas that we want to try and then we set a date. No pressure from me and that is the way I like it. I am doing this for fun.The reason I tell you this is...We really don't know your style or the type of images you are trying capture. That would help a lot. There are a lot of great lenses/lighting choices to choose from. Just have to know the desired results you are looking to acheive.This is a big big project and deserves some face to face time and possible pre-event practice outings....but first you have to come up with an agreed upon final product.John

BAKwrote:You sure you want the responsibility of taking pictures? yep You don't even know the speed of your lens. no comment How do you intend to light this shindig?in my post i stated that i will be using a flash in the hot shoe (Vivitar DF-383) Use your current lens. thanks for your opinion What is the deliverable? what is a deliverable? BAK

i did post this a bit premature as i have not had the opportunity to talk with the client about what he would ultimately like out of the event. i plan on doing that soon.i also plan on checking out the venue.i will be photographing my client and many of his guests/family that are attending this event, i was thinking that a wider angle lens would be good so as to get large groups of people in frame with out having to be terribly far away.as far as my shooting style this is something that i still have not nailed down, i have done some portrait, some action sports, some indoor sporting events, but never a large party.so this means i do not have any photo's to show him of previous events.and this is not an intensely professional job as it may seem, i know the guy and honestly they are most like just going to be uploaded to his social networking profile. Maybe a print or two here or there.

congrats on your first paid gig! Do you know how to lighting is? I'd say go rent a EF-S 17-55 f2.8 (: Should be wide enough for group pictures, and it is f2.8I think they go for like $30/3-day rental or something, or it is around where I live. I think.. 17-55 + RAW + PP = YUM

If you are renting, the 17-55mm is a great blend of focal length and aperture that makes for a very versatile lens, stick on the flash for lighting and you are set.If you want to shoot available light, then one of the wide=normal fast primes would be ideal. 35/2 or 28/1.8 if you are buying outright, or if you can rent then options like the 35/1.4 and 24/1.4 for speed and a general use focal length.Really though, if you are shooting flash lit, just stick with the lens you have, the 17-55mm is the better lens, but is an extra cost when you already have something more than serviceable. The increased aperture only really comes into play when you actually need to use it - so narrow dof work or low light ambient shots. -- http://www.flickr.com/photos/narcosynthesis http://www.illaname.deviantart.com

Does the Vivitar flash autofocus assist lamp work with the T2i (sorry if this is a dumb question)? I think that is going to be important for proper focusing in low light and key to not missing a shot.

yes the flash does have an IR assist focus beam. (that is not a silly question at all!) oh and i will also have an omni-bounce on the end of it.i like the idea of the 17-55 F2.8 so thanks!!the idea behind the larger apertures was to let ambient light in while maintaining a decent shutter speed.

If you could afford to buy the 28mm 1.8, I highly recommend. If that is not in your budget right now, the 50mm 1.8 is very affordable. You need a fast prime for indoors. --Darkness is the monster and your shutter is your sword, aperture your shield and iso your armor. Strike fast with your sword and defend well with your shield and hope your armor holds up.

A better performing lens would be nice, but the biggest issue is going to be your flash. This is an event - you'll be taking hundreds of photos. Discuss with your client the types of shots they want. I'm going out on a limb they want people interacting as well as some "group" shots. It's a birthday after all. I don't know of a single pro that would suggest trying to do this available light. So you don't "need fast glass for indoors" - you need flash. Shallow DOF is a bonus, but flash is a requirement.The real challenge is: is your flash powerful enough to bounce? How will it handle the workload without external battery pack? That should be the real concern here. If you want to rent something - see if your camera shop will rent a 580exII and battery pack. You also need to find out about the room - can you bounce? If so, you're great. If not, then you need a flash bracket or you're going to be doing a lot more editing to remove red-eye.fast primes are great for a change of pace, but they're not the bread-and-butter for event work. You need the DOF flexibility flash provides and unless you've done a lot of event work you'll find the flexibility of a zoom extremely necessary.Also - if you've never done this type of thing before, be careful with whatever flash you use. Make sure you give it a rest - you can burn out a flash if you start rattling off a hundred shots in 15 minutes.Now, back to business. I don't care who it is - they're paying you, make sure you have a contract. Make sure you spell out exactly what is being delivered, when and what the terms of payment are. Even if it's a "friend" - when money is involved, it's amazing how things can turn ugly when your expectations and theirs don't agree. It's much easier hashing that out BEFORE rather than after. Putting things in writing just makes it easier - and, if it's not a friend, it protects you and them.Oh, by the way - keep in mind, you are now a paid "professional" - your homeowners insurance won't cover anything

When I shoot events, my wortkhorse lens is a 24-105 f4 L IS on my 5D. More important than the lens is my flash, a 580 EX II. You omni bounce is not good. Bouncing the flash is a good idea, but any light coming off the back is wasted in a large hall. I like the Demb 580 EX II flipit with Demb flash bracket. A flash bracket is almost a must. It gets the flash off the camera and lets you change quickly between vertical and horizantal.If this is an important, you will also need backup. What happens if your camera fails, your lens won't cooperate or your flash goes on vacation?I assume you are shooting RAW. WB is a real issue with mixed lighting. It is different in different parts of the hall.Are you sure you have not bitten off more than you can chew? -- Jim http://www.pbase.com/jcassatt

freeframedwrote:and this is not an intensely professional job as it may seem, i know the guy and honestly they are most like just going to be uploaded to his social networking profile. Maybe a print or two here or there.Can't be wishy washy on this. You are either being hired to do a professional job or you are the person who was just asked to take some pictures. Your opportunity to demonstrate that you are ready for the big leagues is in the balance.IF it were me... I would suggest a corner of the room for the opportunity to set up studio lights with a background to take group pictures thoughout the party. I would hire an assistant to take the group shots and then another to help with the party itself (300 people shots are not going to be possible with just one photographer). I would rent a back up camera (or two) and I would have a backup flash system as well. I would create an online gallery for the attendees to go to download the pictures after the event and I would charge for complete rights to all pictures I provided.Lenses would still to be determined by what style I was trying to create.There is a lot more to consider than just the lenses....John

It's a birthday party. None of the guests are going to pay for photos, so you're passing on the cost of a non-essential setup to the original client. This isn't a senior prom - the guests could care less about a photo of them at the birthday party. So, renting the lighting/backdrop and paying an assistant is a poor business decision, IMO. If I were the client and you were trying to fit that cost into the arrangement, I'd never pay for it. it's a birthday party. The guests don't need the formal "I was at the birthday party" posed shots.

And you are welcome to your opinion.... But to me a party with 300 people, a convention center, a dj, etc.... is a little more than a backyard birthday party. I didn't say I would pass this off to the customer... I said I would suggest it. I didn't say I would sell the guests the pictures.... I said they could download them for free.We do not know if this a black tie affair, sweet 16, 100th birthday, or a pin the the tail on the donkey event. But we are suppose to recommend a lens....John --Feel free to use any of these additional letters to correct the spelling of words found in the above post: a-e-t-n-d-i-o-s-m-l-u-y-h-c If you find any extra letters, please place them here for future use...

thanks for the advise!some of these thing i had not yet considered. i will have a better idea of what i am working with once i get to go over the logistics with the client and see the venue. ( hopefully the ceiling isn't 40 feet tall.)i knew going into this that it is really not an idea first gig, it is quite big and many factors will be out of my control, like lighting etc. however the guy was not even considering a photographer till i approached him.i am most certainly not backing out now! There will be ALOT of learning done at this event, i just wanted to put it out to you guys in the hopes that you could bring somethings to my attention that i might not have thought about, and you definitely have do that, so thanks! and keep it coming!ill post some of the photos that i took at the event for some C&C next week too.

For an indoor event I'd be thinking mostly about the lighting. F1.8 or so won't prevent blurry shots caused by movement of dancing people etc. One or two blurry dancing people looks arty. One hundred looks inept!300 people is twice what most weddings have..so you will have plenty to keep you busy.Find out exactly what the client is after - a shot of every person attending or an overview of the event showing its various main moments. Find out when important moments are going to happen.I'd plan to be near the door to shoot groups as they arrive (get them before they start drinking and sweating), then wait for the various scenes to unfold.I'd rent a 580EX or two early if you can't afford to buy and you can use your other one as a backup.Then practice using it. You need 3 sets of batteries plus extra camera batteries.At my last wedding (4 days ago) I used 80% fill flash in the day and all shots at night. I shot 1500 images for about 75 people. Ensure your cards are big enough.I only used one lens on my main camera - efs 15-85mm. I have also used this at a 3 day conference centre. The results were excellent.Conference centres usually have coloured recessed lighting which will play havoc with your white balance. Shoot important shots in RAW and do a manual white balance for anything with multiple light sources in jpeg. Check that people are not standing under recessed coloured halogen lights or you'll spend forever trying to get the skin tone normal.Good luck with your shoot.cheersMike

From the sounds of it this will be a great learning experience for you and will stretch your skills, certainly in the use of flash.I don't know much about the capabilities of that flash or details of the room but my guess is it's a high ceiling and lots of tungsten light. I'd strongly recommend that you forget about the omnibounce as it kills your flash power and means you can't bounce off a high ceiling. Set your flash to the highest zoom, I think that's 85mm on that flash. Point it straight up at the ceiling.Have you used gels to alter flash colour to match the ambient? Or bounce cards to bounce some light forwards as fill? I've recently put up an image with a bit of an explanation of how I've been doing this. I'm not a pro, still learning but you may find it useful.http://www.flickr.com/photos/tdr1/5544106679/I use a Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 and to be honest I think I would struggle with anything slower. I have tried using the canon 10-22mm wide angle but it was too wide and I had no real use for it.

I took some shots in a convention center, and everybody that was taking people shots (and knew what they were doing) was using simple bounce cards on the flash, with the flash set at about 45 degrees up. I had a Gary Fong diffuser, and realized that the ceiling was black (had never been in there before) and the diffuser just blinded everybody around me, and helped little for the photos. I put the flash away, set a custom WB put the ISO on auto up to 1600 and made the best of it with available light. I wasn't paid for the event, and they were looking for some overall images of the event, not casual portraits of the attendees (lucky for me), so they were actually very pleased with the results.So, you might want to see if the person paying you wants you to be using flash - it can get a bit annoying. And find out what photos they want - if you do't know yet, a lens is the least of your problems.-Johnfreeframedwrote:alright so have my first paid event coming up in a week or so and and i am considering renting a lens for the event.THE EVENT: the event is a rather large birthday party 250 - 300 guests it is being held in a hotel convention room (indoors) the will be dj's, dancing, lights etc.so there may not be too much light to work with.MY KIT:i currently have a Canon T2i coupled with the kit 18-55mm IS lens, the only problem is that it is not a very fast lens by any means, F 3.2 (or some were right around there) i also have a Vivitar DF-383 flash that i plan on using as well.So taking all that into consideration, could i get away with the kit lens?RENTAL: i am considering renting either of these two lenses. Canon EF 20mm f/2.8 USM Wide-Angle Lens Canon EF 24mm f/1.4L II USM Wide-Angle LensAny thoughts or insightful tips is greatly appreciated!

Yes, a black ceiling like that can be be tricky. For situations like that I carry around a much larger bounce card and a Lumiquest III Softbox which can fit on the flash to try and soften the light a bit. If you keep the flash suitably gelled, you can still increase the shutter speed/iso and get some ambient light in the background.The bounce cards built into the flash can be OK but if you can't bounce off the ceiling it's not doing much as your light source isn't any bigger. Also if you still want to try and bounce off the ceiling you can't hold the camera in portrait and rotate the flash to use the built in card to push light forwards.