Martin Koswig – Reportage Shooting

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Yes, I love reportage!

It is challenging in every way, because every moment is just a moment, a second of the day. It has to be captured, emotionally charged, the way that second is experienced in that moment. That second means you have to get everything right! Light and shadow, perspective, technique, facial expression, gaze, details, framing, background… If one of these factors is not right, the pictures will not be appreciated by the client and it is impossible to retouch 3,000-10,000 pictures.

Reportage is versatility.

Another thing I like about reportage is the wide range of genres it covers: Portrait, product, food, vehicles, landscape, sport. Each picture should look perfect, as if it had been staged, when in reality it was only a second, a moment that passes so quickly.
Reportage photography lives from its variety of photographic genres. The art is in creating an atmosphere, a mood that captures the whole event or journey in all its diversity.

The art of proper image editing

In addition to wedding reportage, I am mainly booked by companies, with a focus on travel reportage, but also day events and conferences. I often accompany 70 to 180 people who all experience the event with me. They experience the same atmosphere, the same impressions and the same overwhelming colors as I do. Now comes the art of correct image processing. I can and must alter the colors to enhance the atmosphere I have captured. Sunsets, candlelight evenings, dinners, kayaking, walking tours, safaris – each situation requires its own color mood and everything in the pictures should look as it was felt by all participants. It’s an art, as such a view is very individual, so not necessarily an easy undertaking with over 80 participants. Experience is essential for me at this point. To optimize this process, I also like to use a grey card, the Spyder Cube to define a correction preset during RAW conversion, which I can then apply to the entire series. If I am working with several camera systems, it is even useful to use the Spyder Checkr to compensate for possible ” color interpretations” of the different systems. For me, this is the starting point from which I can do color grading if necessary.

One image, multiple output formats

The images are published after each trip. On the web, in company magazines, exposed and printed prints, albums, large-format images for the office and living room. This means that the colors have to be right for all applications. This is definitely not always guaranteed on home monitors, as everyone has their own color preferences or has never adjusted their monitor at all – in fact, almost all monitors are shipped with the default setting of 6500 Kelvin, which is of course too “cool”. Of course, we don’t have this problem with conscientious service providers, because they work with a profiled or calibrated workflow based on 5000 Kelvin – neutral, white light.

I, of course also work in a profiled 5000K workflow. I.e. my prints or prints ordered from a service provider as well as albums are color identical under my 5000 Kelvin norm lightbox as on my 5000 Kelvin calibrated monitor. It should be mentioned that I work with a hardware calibrated monitor in my studio. Of course, I don’t have this monitor with me when I’m on assignment, so, while travelling, I have to rely on my Spyder to make sure that my measuring technique profiles my laptop monitor in the best possible way. I have been using Spyder products for a long time. The Spyder provides me with measurement data for hardware calibration and ensures correct color and brightness reproduction “on location”! Why is this important? Every day, my clients expect me to select about 30-50 retouched images, which are then published on internal company networks, as well as on social media. They are also used for albums that are distributed to every employee immediately after the trip. So I have to be able to work on the spot with absolute color accuracy so that there are no misprints during production. Misprints mean a lot of hassle, cost, stress and time – I can’t afford that.
I usually review the day’s shots in my hotel room every evening and make a pre-selection. Depending on the job and the client, these are then edited directly on the laptop and prepared for the respective output format. Sometimes, I do this on the plane on the way home.

Do-it-yourself printing & fine art printing

In my studio, the output is of course also profiled. Both my A2 printer and my large format printer run on color profiles I measured myself for the respective printer / paper / ink combination. For a long time I used the printer manufacturer’s own paper, which was very easy to profile – the quality was consistent, which saved a lot of time and money. I do my own profiling with Datacolor’s Spyder Print. Nowadays, I use Tecco and Ilford papers. I use Tecco’s high quality photo papers for my daily work and Ilford has a very wide range of Fine Art papers for inkjet printing. High grammage watercolor papers and some gallery papers are my favorites. In general, it’s important to me that I don’t have to profile each time I place a repeat order, which speaks for the quality of a paper, meaning the quality is consistent from one batch to the next.

Spyder Print Studio

As you can see from this article, I’ve been using the Spyder product range for a long time. Color management is indispensable to me and is the oil in the gear of my photographic workflow. It helps me to save time, deliver high quality to the customer, avoid complaints and minimize misprints. It ultimately ensures consistency and high quality. That’s why I like to recommend the Spyder Print Studio, which includes all the color management tools you need when printing photos by yourself.

About Martin Kosweg


Since 1997 I have been working as a freelance photographer on location and in my own studio in Freiburg. After more than 20 years my business and private clientele extends beyond the German borders with a focus on Germany, Austria and Switzerland. However, my radius of action extends around the globe.

The focus of my photography is the human being. Business and artist portraits are my passion as well as the reportage of company events, travels or projects.

Consult and lecturer for:

Datacolor AG Europe
EPSON Deutschland
Hasselblad Vertriebsgesellschaft mbH
Adobe Systems GmbH

Website:
www.koswig.de

Email:
martin@koswig.de

Posted in Blog.

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