Best Business Practices for Photographers [23]
Specialized Equipment: From Gyros to Blimps to Generators
Not every assignment can be completed with a 50mm lens. Almost all require a range of lenses, from wide to zoom. Although this might seem like a given, at what point do you begin to have specialized needs? Some photographers will need a range of 24mm to 200mm, and they're A-OK for 98 percent of their assignments. For the other 2 percent, fisheye or 300mm to 600mm+ lenses become necessary. At some point, you'll be called on to utilize specialized equipment, and you can opt to purchase it (recognizing that your ownership of this equipment makes you more valuable to a client) or rent it when necessary, passing along that cost to the client.
Whatever your specialized need, make sure the client understands that you are capable (whether by ownership or by your previous extensive experience with rented equipment) of delivering to meet his or her needs.
Recently, I was called by a major financial cable news program to do photography on set in Washington during an interview. Setting aside the egregious rights demands for the purposes of this example, the client wanted to ensure that I had experience shooting on set and that I had a blimp. A blimp is a customized box that encloses the camera and lenses and dampens the shutter and other camera noises to nearly imperceptible levels from even two feet away. In the past, I've used towels, suit jackets, blankets, and even padded rain shields in an effort to reduce audio on set, and they all pale in comparison to the real thing. Once you've used a blimp, you realize that doing work on a movie set, TV studio, or any other place where your camera's noises will be a distraction is a must. There are other manufacturers out there, but the Jacobson Sound Blimp is the gold standard, and some movie sets require that particular brand be used or you are not allowed to shoot on set. You can find out more information at www.SoundBlimp.com. Further, using the words "camera sound blimp" on search engines will yield additional information on these products and their necessity.
I also find myself being called to deliver photography from either extremely low light locations or from unstable shooting platforms (from the back of a motorcycle to an off-road vehicle or from watercraft to helicopters). If you've ever tried your hand at this, you know that your ratio of sharp/in-focus to blurry images leans significantly to the unusable side. Having a tool such as a Kenyon Gyro (www.Ken-Lab.com) will tip the scales significantly toward the sharp/in-focus side. Once you've used a gyro, you will understand and begin to consider other applications for its use so you can deliver higher-quality finished results to your clients.
On occasion, I end up working on location where my battery-powered strobes won't meet all of my needs. Whether it's more watt-seconds that I need, or computer power, or other power needs that the car's cigarette lighter won't handle (or can't handle because it's not close by), a generator has found its way into my resources collection, and more than once it has been a significant benefit. I've outfitted the generator with multiple power-calming protectors— in-line plugs that ensure no surges will be sent down the power line to fry my laptop/light packs and so on. These plugs will trip before damaging my equipment. To date, I've never had one piece of equipment damaged by the "geni" (my affectionate term for it, pronounced "Jenny"). In fact, following a hurricane, the neighborhood where