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Shooting big rig machinery with greased up muddy workers is a far cry from my other photographic passion (Wedding Photography) but there is a real sense of accomplishment when you get that perfect, crisp, clean, exciting, high impact image of something cold, lifeless, and well........boring.

Some people ask me why I would want to shoot mining equipment thousands of feet underground where it's practically raining, damp, musty, and everything your equipment touches leaves its permanently residual signature, or why I would walk through fields of man hungry cacti to get that environmental shot of a drill rig.

I have one simply answer. Money! Well that, and because I can experience environments I would not normally be in.

98% of the time these shoots take place in the middle of nowhere, or underground. These particular environments have their pitfalls. For instance, underground is dirty. Very dirty. Throw in humidity, mud, water, and darkness and you have a recipe for harsh shooting conditions.

The aboveground sessions usually take place miles from anything rural, surrounded by insects, wild critters, bush, rock and desert cacti. I really had to be selective when it came to my equipment, and how much I brought with me.

The first time I flew to the States for an assignment, I was denied access at the US border because I had too much equipment with me to go on the plane. Now I pack light. VERY light. Camera, lenses, and a few hand held flashes.

Hand held flashes? Yup, I break out the big guns don't I? Really, these small flashes are all I will ever need.

My choice of lighting all comes down to what I'm trying to achieve, and that is IMPACT. I want harsh shadows, crisp detail, and colorful images. If I'm aboveground I'll use the sun to my advantage instead of cowarding in the corner sucking my thumb because it's too bright out.

See, that's the good thing about industrial images, the sun is my friend. It's the most powerful, cheapest light source I could ask for on a shoot. Usually the Company Rep or their graphic designer will tell me just what type of image they are looking for, so I always follow a process before I will actually make the shot.

My thought process is basically the same:

1. Find out what the image is supposed to portray to the viewer (what the client wants the readers to think)
 2. Try to find a position where the sun can be used as a "kicker" light on the subject, or where it can make the most shadows
 3. Position one hand held flash for a main light so that the subject is illuminated. I usually have the output at about 1 stop more than the sun
 4. Make a few test shots to verify quality of lighting. Once I am satisfied, I bring in the subjects.
 5. Take the shot.

Most of the time I am on a site that is actually in production, so I need to be as unobtrusive as I possibly can. Think safety all the time.
If you accidentally trip over some piece of machinery you could bring the whole production to a halt.

Time is money for these workers and they do not want to stop working for anything especially some artsy photographer.

A lot of the times, I treat these shoots just like a wedding, get in, get the shot, get out. Some shots take 20-30 minutes and some take less than one minute, it all depends on how much time they will allow me to do my job.

There is another reason why I like to travel light.  For 95% of my images, I do not even use a tripod, as my shutter speeds are faster than 1/125 of a second (because I am trying to underexpose the sun). I use my Canon 20D body with a 17-40mm, f:4 or my 10-22mm f:2.8. If the shot calls for it, I will also use my 85mm f:1.8 but a lot of these images require a large field of range, so the wide angle lenses are utilized the most.

In Chihuahua, Mexico, I created this image to show the helper setting the bit with the drill rig in the background. The sun was full force at about f:11, so I positioned the sun 90 degrees to my right, just as I would if I had a kicker light. This adds a bit of shine and detail to the back of my subject, and gives more detail to clothes, and drill rig. I then brought in my flash to my left, down low. This illuminated my subjects face and also added some light to the pipes where the sun was causing shadow. The reason I shoot one stop over the ambient is because I like to have my sky go dark blue, and underexposing the sky by one stop does just that. Therefore if the sun is at f:11, the flash and the camera are set at f:16.

Heavy Metal Man was created a few hundred feet underground with 2 hand holds only. I placed one flash to my right at 45 degrees as a main light on my subject. The second flash was placed behind the subject on the floor pointing up. This served 3 purposes.
1. It added a pinstripe to the back of my subject. 2. It added light to the back wall. 3. Created shadows in the drill that the camera can see.

 

To expose the two images below

I used the sun and one flash. I wanted the sky a rich dark blue so I needed to underexpose the overall image and still have good exposure on my main subject. After measuring the ambient light on the sun side of my subject I set the intensity of my flash on the shadow side, to give twice as much light as I had just measured (one stop more). I used the flash output reading as the dominant light source and the camera exposure for the image. Because the flash and the resulting camera setting was for one stop brighter light than the overall exposure of the image, the overall image underexposed one stop, resulting in a rich blue, darker sky with a good exposure on my subject.

I love the contrast of shooting a wedding on Saturday and being underground on Monday. Both fields are on the total opposites of the board. Traveling, meeting new people, experiencing new situations, and creating dynamic award winning images gives me a feeling of accomplishment, pride and self worth.