Taste Matters in support of Eva's Initiatives
I arrive at 10am for an event that starts at 6pm. It’s not that I am keen, though being part of a wine and food show brings out the eagerness in me, but that I want to capture the setup of the event. While I am certainly the first to arrive, there isn’t any activity to photograph.
I help empty the car of boxes of auction items and begin to lay them out under the watchful eyes of Melissa the event manager. I didn’t think when I set out to capture the set up of the event that I would set some of it up, take some pictures, set up some more and, well, you get the “picture.”
In walked a group of students, many dressed in blue t-shirts – the volunteers. I could now focus on taking pictures of their hard work. There is a fair bit of light coming through the windows from the courtyard, but I am afraid that this evening I will be stuck with chandeliers about 40 feet above the floor providing the only light. I will use flash now, but not during the event except at the presentation and speeches where people “expect” flashes.
Lots of down time. The vendors started arriving around 4pm and set up their tables. Around 6pm saw the guests begin to arrive and the place filled up quick enough. The food was excellent and there was a wide selection of wine, beer and coffee to choose from. As I said, it got pretty dark and I found myself shooting at ISO 3200 with a 35mm f1.8 but I’m pleased with the results. Gotta love modern technology.
Around 10pm I was pretty much done – 12 hours on my feet lugging around my equipment watching everyone else eat and drink. There were a couple of friends at the event and we sat in the courtyard and had a chat. One of them has a son in the band and he was playing that night. So yes, off we went for another three hours and 200 photos in an even more dimly lit place. While I’ll save that for another post, I did get a beer in case you were wondering. Or not.
Gary Slye Photography 