Mayor David Miller for Vantage

vtography — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 17:06:18 +0000

I recently had the opportunity to photograph Toronto’s mayor, David Miller, for Vantage magazine. Vantage is published by the Greater Toronto Marketing Alliance to promote foreign business investment in Toronto.

The perils of working for something so high-profile became immediately apparent as I met the mayor in his office. He was in the middle of an interview and I had about five minutes to snap some shots of him talking, answering questions. There would be no posed pictures, no setups. Just candid shots as I circled around the mayor and the interviewer, all while trying not to add any noise to her audio recording of the conversation. I failed miserably at this aspect, as a long, loud beeeeeeep emanated from the wireless flash after each exposure to indicate success. There was no time to switch if off, though — the mayor is a busy guy!

Wait a sec — that last photo looks kinda weird. They mirrored it! If you glance at the top right corner, you’ll notice the “Mayor Miller Way” street sign is completely backwards. A totally bizarre editorial decision. Why not just leave the photo as is? Or crop out the sign? Or Photoshop it away? So many options. For reference, here are both the original photos:

Publishing weirdness aside, I was only able to fire off about 20 decent shots during the time I had. I used my trusty Nikon 17-55mm f/2.8 lens for all the shots. For lighting, I had a Nikon SB-900 mounted on the hot-shoe of my D300S, pointed up for a little ceiling bounce. On a small tripod to the mayor’s right was a Nikon SB-800 with a LumiQuest Pocket Bounce, fired with Nikon’s wireless CLS technology.

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Mayor David Miller for Vantage