How many shots do you shoot?

[JulesJ]

Like you Chk, (a name would be nice), I don't shoot thousands of shots just to active a good one. Anyone who worked with film learned hiw to get a shot by actually looking at the subject and knowing when to oress the shutter. I worked in a portrait Sufis where the photigrapher would get great portraits within one, sometimes two rolls. That's 12 or 24 frames to the uninitiated. Digital shooters nowadays work on the theory that if they take enough shirts, they will eventually get a good one. They might, but they are not good photographers. They are picture takers.

It's not about getting a "good" one, it's about getting the best.

Not true. I have worked with a portrait photographer who shoots the best portraits and shoots relatively few images. They know when to shoot. Many amateurs are not experienced still looking and coordinating exactly when to press the shutter with this type of photography, so they just keep shooting. It is only luck that they get get a reasonable shot. A true professional (portrait photographer) will be able to get great shots sooner and without the machine gun effect of the amateur. This is a fact and I have seen it hundreds of times.

 

[chris102]

Like you Chk, (a name would be nice), I don't shoot thousands of shots just to active a good one. Anyone who worked with film learned hiw to get a shot by actually looking at the subject and knowing when to oress the shutter. I worked in a portrait Sufis where the photigrapher would get great portraits within one, sometimes two rolls. That's 12 or 24 frames to the uninitiated. Digital shooters nowadays work on the theory that if they take enough shirts, they will eventually get a good one. They might, but they are not good photographers. They are picture takers.

It's not about getting a "good" one, it's about getting the best.

Not true. I have worked with a portrait photographer who shoots the best portraits and shoots relatively few images. They know when to shoot. Many amateurs are not experienced still looking and coordinating exactly when to press the shutter with this type of photography, so they just keep shooting. It is only luck that they get get a reasonable shot. A true professional (portrait photographer) will be able to get great shots sooner and without the machine gun effect of the amateur. This is a fact and I have seen it hundreds of times.

I could not care less what a professional shooter does. I try to get the best photo I can, given my time frame and location. What else really matters?

 

[lnguyenh]

In a "serious" photoshoot lasting a few hours, I take something like 150-400 shots. I usually have a clear idea of the different setups/individual pics I want to do. So the more there are, the more pics I will likely take. Sometimes I ll use off camera flash, so there are a bunch of shots that are just setup/technical shots.

I had the chance to take pictures during my sister in law's wedding and took 1300 pictures.

The rest of my photography is family pics, and I definitely dont overshoot, but each time I pickup the camera, I may take like 5-15 pics.

Honestly I dont really care how many pictures others take. The one thing that may make me smile is someone REALLY spraying and praying, while the subject is not moving, ending up with 20 times the same picture. Even still, it is this person's right to do so.

The real thing in my opinion is the pictures you choose to show. Even if you took 2000 pics, but manage to be selective enough to show only one, the brilliant one, then all good for you. It might not be the most efficient workflow, but for me its the end result, the pictures you show, that matter. Some people might take only 30 pics, but arent selective enough and show 25 average pics to others. That sucks.

I disagree with some comments I saw in the thread about the non-importance of post processing ("most important happens before the shutter"). Photography both involves things before and after pressing the shutter. If you neglect the things happening before, I think something is missing, and if you neglect whats happening after, there is also something missing. The masters of the darkroom would be masters of photoshop nowadays.

 

[canonagain123]

Sometimes, I just shoot the one photo, get it right the first (or the second, or the third/fourth, if I have to adjust focus or exposure) time, and am happy with it. Sometimes perfectionism gets me and I get stuck on one angle, one shot; I found the perfect angle and composition, I got a good shoot the first time, but I'm not happy; I play around with the flash, add lighting, do 10-20 different lighting setups til I get the one photo I really find perfect, and then dump the rest of the 30-50 shots of the exact same subject from the exact same angle. This is only true for studio photography though, when outside in the real world, I take a lot less shots even if I don't get it right the first time.

I'm not that old, but I come from film cameras and polaroid, though only as a hobby. I truly began learneing photography on digital cameras, but I don't tend to waste photos. If I only shoot for myself I take maybe 1-50 pictures a day on most days. I'd say 70-90% (and rarely 100%) are keepers on a good day, 20-70% on a bad day. If I get stuck like I explained above, then it's a lot less, 10-20%, but I don't think of those photos as wasted, I think of them as something that helps me learn: I review every single one carefully before deleting them, to learn more about my mistakes as well as how the light interacts with the surface. Light (and its compliment, shadow) are such complicated things you can never stop learning about them.

1000 pictures a day is insane. At that rate you'll go through a shutter in 3-6 months. How can you take that many pictures a day, unless it's specifically for a client?

 

[canonagain123]

I disagree with some comments I saw in the thread about the non-importance of post processing ("most important happens before the shutter"). Photography both involves things before and after pressing the shutter. If you neglect the things happening before, I think something is missing, and if you neglect whats happening after, there is also something missing. The masters of the darkroom would be masters of photoshop nowadays.

I agree with this part, with the note that most of the work does happen before pressing the shutter because your aim should be to minimize the need for post-processing. There's a difference between spending 2 minutes PPing one image and spending 20 minutes on it, especially if it's every picture. If you aim to be as consistant as possible with your exposures, it's possible to batch develop your raws with the same settings. If you are consistent with your composition, you can even batch crop your photos, if you crop your photos, or simply not have to crop your photos. Both before and after are important, but before is more important, because it defines everything that comes after.

 

[lnguyenh]

I agree with this part, with the note that most of the work does happen before pressing the shutter because your aim should be to minimize the need for post-processing.

Again, the end result is the only thing that matters I think. Of course you may feel better having to do very little post processing. But who cares if David Lachapelle spent 30 hours post processing one image? At the other end of the spectrum, I also dont really care if some war photographer spent 1 minute only on his great picture.

Some people actually enjoy post processing.

I understand if you have to spend time on all XXX pics you took during holidays you want to minimize time spent on them. But if your goal is to produce a very few selected images, where you ll spend anyway hours working on each one, then you dont care THAT much about spending a few minutes more.

Anyways, my point, I think , is that having the goal of minimizing post processing is a good personal goal, that is good to strive for just for time management sake, but it is just that, a personal goal, that the end viewer doesnt care for.

 

[canonagain123]

Of course it's a personal goal, it's a goal for personal self-improvement. I understand wanting to spend a long time for PP to get a really special image or to save an image with something that desperately needs to be fixed, I sometimes do that too, but I try to avoid it for most pictures. If you CAN get an amazing picture with 1 minute post processing, isn't that equally good? If you read my other answer you'll know that I don't take "hundreds of pictures" so that's not the reason. I think the more you push your limits, the more you challenge yourself to improve, but like we agree, it's a personal goal and a personal path. If you don't want to have that as your goal, that's up to you, not anyone else.

 

[Lightpath48]

Dozens: On Saturday our three-year-old granddaughter and my wife went sledding. I switched the drive mode to continuous, and followed their activity and many expressions up and down the hill, for over a half-hour. We took a number of stills at the top and bottom. When we got home the card had 194 files, and one movie. I have plenty of hard drive room, so kept the best 120 or so. Had I been shooting film, we'd have gotten by with one 36 exposure roll. But I have a large number of really good shots taken at peak motion, snow flying, great expressions, etc., that I never could've gotten but by luck, with few exposures. I may never use them all, but hard drive space is cheap. I'll probably replace the unit long before ever filling it.

One or Two: When I'm on a serious camera outing in nature I take time to compose and expose carefully, using the histogram, and shoot raw. I rarely take more than two exposures of anything. It's simply less work at home to not have dozens of redundant files.

 

[Basalite]

Not how you got it.
Of all the wacko excuses for one-upsmanship,
"I take less than you, so I am a better photographer" is just sad.

If you are taking less pictures but putting more effort and time into making those pictures as perfect as can be then yes you are a better photographer over someone who depends more on chance to get good images out of many more taken.

 

[JulesJ]

Like you Chk, (a name would be nice), I don't shoot thousands of shots just to active a good one. Anyone who worked with film learned hiw to get a shot by actually looking at the subject and knowing when to oress the shutter. I worked in a portrait Sufis where the photigrapher would get great portraits within one, sometimes two rolls. That's 12 or 24 frames to the uninitiated. Digital shooters nowadays work on the theory that if they take enough shirts, they will eventually get a good one. They might, but they are not good photographers. They are picture takers.

It's not about getting a "good" one, it's about getting the best.

Not true. I have worked with a portrait photographer who shoots the best portraits and shoots relatively few images. They know when to shoot. Many amateurs are not experienced still looking and coordinating exactly when to press the shutter with this type of photography, so they just keep shooting. It is only luck that they get get a reasonable shot. A true professional (portrait photographer) will be able to get great shots sooner and without the machine gun effect of the amateur. This is a fact and I have seen it hundreds of times.

I could not care less what a professional shooter does.

Well that is your loss.

I try to get the best photo I can, given my time frame and location. What else really matters?

Amateurs try, pros do it.

--
http://101-365.com/

 

[JulesJ]

In a "serious" photoshoot lasting a few hours, I take something like 150-400 shots. I usually have a clear idea of the different setups/individual pics I want to do. So the more there are, the more pics I will likely take. Sometimes I ll use off camera flash, so there are a bunch of shots that are just setup/technical shots.

I had the chance to take pictures during my sister in law's wedding and took 1300 pictures.

The rest of my photography is family pics, and I definitely dont overshoot, but each time I pickup the camera, I may take like 5-15 pics.

Honestly I dont really care how many pictures others take. The one thing that may make me smile is someone REALLY spraying and praying, while the subject is not moving, ending up with 20 times the same picture. Even still, it is this person's right to do so.

The real thing in my opinion is the pictures you choose to show. Even if you took 2000 pics, but manage to be selective enough to show only one, the brilliant one, then all good for you. It might not be the most efficient workflow, but for me its the end result, the pictures you show, that matter. Some people might take only 30 pics, but arent selective enough and show 25 average pics to others. That sucks.

I disagree with some comments I saw in the thread about the non-importance of post processing ("most important happens before the shutter"). Photography both involves things before and after pressing the shutter. If you neglect the things happening before, I think something is missing, and if you neglect whats happening after, there is also something missing. The masters of the darkroom would be masters of photoshop nowadays.

This may well be the way some so called pros shoot today. I personally don't think the ten monkeys with ten typewriters is the way to do it, but if you can get away with it and fool the customer that you are a pro then you are lucky. As I have stated, I have seen a true pro work woth medium format film, 12 to a roll and thre or four beautiful sellers in two rolls. That's a pro. They worked with the group, talking, coaxing and getting them relaxed and looking good and eventually shot. It was how all the great photographers worked, they knew exactly when to press the shutter. I recently heard of a windo cleaner who became a photographer. Every amateur thinks they are a pro nowadays, they have no idea what pro portrait us. They get a picture, the client bugs it. But they are not great photos, they are passable.

 

[JulesJ]

Sometimes, I just shoot the one photo, get it right the first (or the second, or the third/fourth, if I have to adjust focus or exposure) time, and am happy with it. Sometimes perfectionism gets me and I get stuck on one angle, one shot; I found the perfect angle and composition, I got a good shoot the first time, but I'm not happy; I play around with the flash, add lighting, do 10-20 different lighting setups til I get the one photo I really find perfect, and then dump the rest of the 30-50 shots of the exact same subject from the exact same angle. This is only true for studio photography though, when outside in the real world, I take a lot less shots even if I don't get it right the first time.

I'm not that old, but I come from film cameras and polaroid, though only as a hobby. I truly began learneing photography on digital cameras, but I don't tend to waste photos. If I only shoot for myself I take maybe 1-50 pictures a day on most days. I'd say 70-90% (and rarely 100%) are keepers on a good day, 20-70% on a bad day. If I get stuck like I explained above, then it's a lot less, 10-20%, but I don't think of those photos as wasted, I think of them as something that helps me learn: I review every single one carefully before deleting them, to learn more about my mistakes as well as how the light interacts with the surface. Light (and its compliment, shadow) are such complicated things you can never stop learning about them.

1000 pictures a day is insane. At that rate you'll go through a shutter in 3-6 months. How can you take that many pictures a day, unless it's specifically for a client?

What do you call a keeper? A sharp, well exposed, in focus photo? But is it any good, is the content goid, would a viewer look at it and say they wanted to pay for a copy. That's the sort of keeper we need in our business. I think you are on a different parallel.

 

[canonagain123]

Why would you press the shutter if you hadn't already set everything up to get the shot you want? I call it a keeper if it has everything in focus, bokeh is correct, subject placement is correct, colors are correct, composition is correct or croppable to correct and it requires minimal post-processing AND it's a photo I would gladly print. The photos I keep are the photos I include in my portfolio when I send it to potential clients for review. What makes you say I'm on a different parallel? I don't understand.

In case I was unclear: If I say "I get stuck" and "10-20%" are keepers, that means I shot 50 pictures of the same angle, kept one, shot 10 other pictures, kept all 10 of them, so 11/50 = 22% were keepers. Does that make sense?

 

[Lee Jay]

1000 pictures a day is insane. At that rate you'll go through a shutter in 3-6 months. How can you take that many pictures a day, unless it's specifically for a client?

If you have a day with a lot of activity, why not? How about taking your kids to Disney for 14 hours, or going to an airshow for 8 hours? I've taken 2,000 shots at a single airshow. Lots of airplanes, constantly changing in angle and background, clouds coming and going...you need a lot of shots to get some that are really good.

I went to the National Air and Space Museum, with very limited time, and took 351 shots in an hour and a half. The vast majority of the exhibits got exactly one shot. What's wrong with that?

 

[MRM4350]

I have a D7000 that will be 3 years old in April 2014 that currently has less than 6,000 shots. I use 8 GB cards, but rarely shoot more than 100 shots on any given day (say my grand daughter's birthday party). So I am shooting a lot more than I did when I had film in the camera.

 

[canonagain123]

Did you have a tripod? Did you have a lens long enough for the subject to fill the frame enough? Fast enough for a shutter speed that would give you a crisp image? Did you anticipate where the plane would be at the time you took the shot (not at the time you were planning the shot) and point your camera at that location? Did you focus manually insted of expecting the AF of your camera to keep up with a plane? Did you see the photo you were going to take before you took it?

The more photos you take to get a keeper, the more that keeper costs you. Better planning = less shots. What's complicated about that?

2000 shots in Disneyland sounds a bit crazy. How many attractions did your daughters go to? 200? 5 shots of each girl in all 200 attractions? Again, it doesn't matter if the subject is moving at the speed of a child or at the speed of an airplane, if you plan correctly (not press the shutter when the child is in front of an ugly trash can for example, unless that's the shot you WANT) you will need a lot less shots. How many of the shots at the airshow did you take/keep? How about the Disneyland? I can understand some difficult situations having a smaller keeper rate, especially if you use manual focus lenses, but if you see nothing wrong with taking 100 pictures and keeping one, then all I can say is 1000-2000 keepers = $2500-$5000 camera = $2.50 / keeper. If you sell enough of them to make that back, that's good, but if they're all just for your own collection, I'd call that pricey. Even if you replace the shutter after it dies, it's still about the same price per picture as if you were shooting film, and when you shoot film, you don't discard 99 of 100 of your shots. I do it occasionally, discard all but one of the 20-50 shots I take of the same subject. Occasionally. Most people here seem to do it every time they take a picture, and that's what I call crazy.

 

[Lee Jay]

Did you have a tripod?

No, it's a hindrance when shooting high-speed subjects

Did you have a lens long enough for the subject to fill the frame enough?

Yes.

Fast enough for a shutter speed that would give you a crips image?

Yes.

Did you anticipate where the plane would be at the time you took the shot (not at the time you were planning the shot) and point your camera at that location?

No, that's a very, very ineffective approach. I was tracking to control framing and focus, and to be able to use slower shutter speeds and thus lower ISOs.

Did you see the photo you were going to take before you took it?

Impossible. You don't know what maneuvers they are going to do or how the lighting is going to change as they move past you at hundreds of miles per hour.

Surely you didn't see 351 good photos in your head and only get it right once? Did you plan the photos or just snap away?

One shot of each exhibit, just as I said. There are lots and lots of exhibits.

Were you happy only coming out of the show with one photo?

I had many more than one.

Are you okay with taking 100,000 photos and only keeping 285 of them?

No.

 

[canonagain123]

I misread what you wrote first, and corrected my first reply accordingly.

You're right, tracking does sound like a better option, I have never been to an air show so I wasn't thinking like someone who has that experience.

A tripod with a good ball-head that has fast locking gives you a lot of freedom, but again, I haven't been to air shows so I don't know how well that would work out in practice.

We seem to agree on the main points, really. Clearly you plan your shots and the strategies to take the photos you need the most effective way. I'm not sure what we're disagreeing on, other than I misunderstood some of the things you said on first reading.

 

[Ron Poelman]

If you are taking less pictures but putting more effort and time into making those pictures as perfect as can be then yes you are a better photographer over someone who depends more on chance to get good images out of many more taken.

 

[Lee Jay]

A tripod with a good ball-head that has fast locking gives you a lot of freedom, but again, I haven't been to air shows so I don't know how well that would work out in practice.

I've found ball heads to be vastly inferior to fluid heads. I can do this sort of thing with a fluid head, but it's harder than doing it handheld mostly because of the rapid changes in vertical angle, which is hard to deal with when the camera is on a tripod. You end up on your toes or bending your knees to keep your eyes on the viewfinder.