When one time isn’t good, there’s another opportunity waiting in slumber. I had hoped to have done a shoot with another artist earlier this year, Emma Jayne Heather, but timing worked against me… or did it? I later setup another shoot with her, but was limited in only doing a remote shoot because of long distance. At first glance this seemed like it would deter creative ideas, but it in fact showed me just how close you can get to a real in person shoot without actually being present in the room with another. Although that is still very much a big desire.
Doing my best to avoid being like a salesperson (though it does feel good when the product is this cool) I gotta say this is a nifty, and even almost obvious idea. It’s called TeamViewer, and this program allows you to remotely control another person’s DSLR that is hooked up to their computer via vethered shooting. I control another person’s laptop as if I was there in person, and I had control over the shutter, F/Stop and damn near anything you can do with it.
Framing and other obvious tasks that involve physically moving the camera of course had to be handled on the model’s end, no software can do that (so far). And yes there is a small delay to account for when you click on the shutter, which doesn’t actuate the real shutter button till a second later, but that is a small caveat for what is otherwise amazing tech and computing.
If remote shooting seems like it might hinder you from seeking work with models that aren’t in your area, or face difficulties in resuming with in person shoots, consider looking up this software and pass it on. And check out her work to see how well this style of shooting can go.
