How I Got the Shot: Rich Myers

Posted by: on Jul 17, 2020

How I Got the Shot: Rich Myers
Photo Credit: Rich Myers

Nomad Supply Co. is a local skate and surf shop owned by a friend of mine, Chris Blackway, who was in need of updating his newly launched website with some of the new brands and clothing options he’s offering. After a few weeks of photographing everything as an overhead shot of just clothing lying flat, he received some feedback asking to see how the stuff actually fits and lives in a real-life situation. That’s when Chris reached out to me.

After a few conversations, we finally decided to go ahead and shoot some on body stuff with his collection. Now that we had our location, we talked mood for the look and how we can keep it consistent and be able to do pickups whenever, whether it be me or someone else, we’ve created a recipe for his online shop and started the library. In order to stick to the recipe, we opted to shoot available light. That way we can shoot year-round and incorporate the mood of the season and let the images maintain a simple look without getting into too much modeling to the light. In the future we may need to add a fill light or emulate the available light with supplementing artificial lighting into the scenario, but only at a worst-case scenario. This method also kept it organic, and allowed us to move around the location without any thought, keep gear to a minimum and allowed us to shoot and work quickly. Without having strobes or LED’s, we didn’t have to worry about power, moving lights, bringing sandbags or modifiers, just the subject in the outfit and the photographer and his camera.

Photo Credit: Rich Myers

Since this is very dependent on client approval, we chose to shoot tethered. This allowed us to shoot a look and review on location and make sure we were sticking to the layout and getting images that work for the brand. I chose to work with the Air Direct for this project. I’m a huge fan of tethering, and make my living off of it, so anytime I shoot, the first thing I think of is how can I tether safely and efficiently enough to add value to the job but also convenience and something reliable that won’t take away from the task with troubleshooting and gear issues.

Photo Credit: Rich Myers

The Air Direct was the perfect tool for this job. We wanted to tether and be able to move about without any restrictions or safety issues. Now that we were on location and we had picked out the marks for our crops and locations, we start shooting. I brought along a 15” MacBook Pro running Capture One Pro 12 and Tether Tools ADC for image review. In order to make the review process even easier, I mounted the laptop on the Tether Table Aero. The Tether Table Aero was great for location due to its size, as it gave me a large surface to work with and storage options below with the XDC attachments. In order to maintain a cordless set, we opted to run the laptop station on the Tether Tools ONsite Power System. Using a D-Tap battery and an ONsite Versa V-Mount to hold the AC adapter, my laptop was able to maintain a 100% charge and run at full capability and we didn’t have stingers running across the back lot. Being completely wireless means, no one has to touch anything, it means I can place my kit wherever it needs to be and not worry about anything other than shooting and keeps everyone safer.

Not every job is the same, not every production has the same expectations. Being a swiss army knife doesn’t mean you can’t be good at multiple things; it means you don’t want to be mediocre at anything and always prepared. Have multiple options, be prepared and push the envelope.

Photo Credit: Rich Myers

Technology is never going to stop expanding and changing. The best thing we can do is to adopt it and work together to improve it and enhance it to the way we want it to perform. If something doesn’t meet your expectations, sometimes you need to reanalyze what you want out of it and find a work around. I’ve found some really rad things by accident and have expanded the capabilities of things based upon experimenting and looking for solutions to make things work for me.

About Rich Myers

Richie Myers is a Digital Tech from Philadelphia, PA. Always on the lookout for his next project, his computers have taken him all over the world to capture just about anything imaginable. From iconic key art in the desert to winter athletes in the back country. He has a deep understanding of technology, meticulous attention to detail, fascination with innovation and a love for creating images. Rich’s art is taking all of the pain points out of a production and allowing his Photographers and DP’s to have complete creative freedom with knowing that he has their image pipeline dialed in.

This is part of a series called the Insight + Inspiration: On-Location Guide. To download this guide, please visit here.