Looking for a "Photographer's Workspace" thread.

[ChrisBrightwell]

I may be posting this in the wrong place. Mods, feel free to move this if you need to ...

QUESTION: Is there a thread around here (or elsewhere on the 'net) where photographers have shared images of their workspaces? Specifically, I'm looking for desks and post-production workspaces.

I've searched in several places, but come up empty every time.

My wife and I are moving into a house soon and I'll have a bedroom to dedicate to my freelance work (software development and photography). I'm well-acquainted with setting a workspace up for software development, but I haven't seen many workspaces for photography.

Any storage ideas for lenses would also be appreciated.

If it helps, I have:
- 15" MacBook Pro w/ 20" Dell LCD
- 2x Drobo (rotating off-site backup)
- A growing collection of Canon bodies and lenses.
- Flat-bed scanner.
- Photo printer.
- Wacom tablet.
- External keyboard and mouse.

Those are the essentials. I obviously have some books and data discs and what-not, but I'm planning to install shelves into the closet to hold most of the standard office-type stuff and hide it from view.

Any help? Thanks.

 

[CarlsonCustoms]

There is an awesome thread over at FredMiranda that's under "lighting studio technique" that is a post about show us your studio.. Its more geared towards professional studios but there's some takeaway from it..

I'll clean up my desk tomarrow and take a pic for you but basically its 3 ikea tables in a U configuration with left table for papers and printer, center for lamps, speakers, 24" imac, wacom tablet and right table for whatever. It usually holds my camera bag and accessories. I also have a small desk across the room that holds a lightbox to do product shots when I sell stuff.

I know words dont describe it well but I'll show you tomarrow what mine looks like for the most part

Zack

 

[PCMacUser]

Sounds like a fun thread!

I don't have much of a workspace... just a wooden computer desk covered in boxes of slide film hahah... Printer is on the floor, the film scanner's on top of my PC (which is also on the floor). My cameras are in the lounge. Hmmm. Maybe I need help too.

 

[termina3]

If you're shooting digital, which I'm assuming you are, a lot is going to center on where your computer is. I'd suggest ranking everything you want in this room according to how close you want it (or need it) to be close to your computer.

A card reader, for example, would likely need to be right next to your computer, but film could be in a closet or on a far shelf.

 

[ChrisBrightwell]

If you're shooting digital, which I'm assuming you are, a lot is going to center on where your computer is.

For the sake of clarity, I'm shooting 100% digital.

 

[CarlsonCustoms]

Guess I'll be the first...

Overview shot

Another overview, you can see my small lowepro camera bag on the desk and the bigger Kata 3n1-30 on the chair holding most of my stuff. Usually the camera and tripod are there too but they are in use here.

24" 3.06 Imac with 4gb ram, 500gig hd, and 8600GS vid card on the desk. Flanked by two Swans M10 speakers and two desk lamps.
I'm using stock apple keyboard with Logitech MX518 mouse and Wacom Bamboo tablet.

Crappy HP 3900 printer (not for photos, i use online for that)

Under the desk right to the right is my small table holding the subwoofer for the Swans M10 speakers and a card reader. Under the table is a Drobo firewire holding 4 500gig drives currently. Beside that is a single 1TB drive used for Timemachine backups.

In the closet off camera is also a Promise 4300 4 Bay NAS holding 4 1TB drives to dump all the data to for backups.

That's about it... I don't have a scanner or photoprinter.

For camera gear I have :
Nikon D90
18-105mm VR D90 Kit lens
50mm 1.8 lens
.42 ebay fisheye converter
ebay macro extension tubes
ebay macro lens reversal ring
2 8GB sdhc cards
cheap proline tripod
SB600 flash with gel filer kit and Stofen diffuser
Various lens filters and adapter rings
Macro ring flash for closeups
Lowepro small carry bag for short trips
Kata 3n1-30 large backpack to hold most of my gear for longer trips

Any questions fire away.

Zack

 

[unclegit]

I'll play.

Not shown - HP Designjet 130 Large format printer off to the left of the below images - I use an Ikea kitchen drawer unit below as the printer stand - the drawers are full width which is nice as it holds all the paper stock / mats.

 

[CarlsonCustoms]

Nice, what's the rectangular thing by the window next to your chair wheel on the floor?

Also is your tablet wireless or is it just routed behind the desk?

 

[peskaa]

I've since added a shelf to hold the camera gear (or some of it at least).

 

[unclegit]

Nice, what's the rectangular thing by the window next to your chair wheel on the floor?

Cat scratching pad for the beings that really run the show

Also is your tablet wireless or is it just routed behind the desk?

Just routed behind the desk.

 

[Nicholie]

Flickr Link for notes on stuff.

I still live at home, so I take whatever "space" i can get!

 

[PeteB]

Well, there's this thread (or set of threads) in the Picture Gallery section

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/593787/

It's about Mac setups, but I don't really see how a photo-processing workstation setup would be significantly different from many other setups.

 

[Digital Skunk]

I'll chime in as well. I had to get a cheap random cabinet from Target a few days ago to hold all of stuff and pull my lighting equipment from underneath the bed in the second room, and off the floor. May get another one for $50 so I can put it all in my office and bring it out of the bedroom.

The one with the multi macs is my workstation. I am still in the process of finding the best option for storing GBs upon GBs of HD footage, so I can keep my own archives, and not risk loosing them at the paper.

p.s. Sorry for the white blotches, gotta keep the anonymity.

 

[PCMacUser]

I am still in the process of finding the best option for storing GBs upon GBs of HD footage, so I can keep my own archives, and not risk loosing them at the paper.

Without sidetracking off topic too much, if it's a disk-based backup solution you're looking for, try something like this, with a bunch of 1TB HDD's. I just bought the eSATA version for maximum performance and a Samsung Spinpoint F1 drive to go with it.

 

[dlegend]

I've since added a shelf to hold the camera gear (or some of it at least).

What are the 2 things underneath your desk with the blue circles? Also what's the big gray thing on the right?

 

[peskaa]

What are the 2 things underneath your desk with the blue circles? Also what's the big gray thing on the right?

The blue circles are Western Digital MyBook Premium 500GB external drives (two of them, obviously) and there's a Nikon Coolscan IV tucked down there as well. The big grey box is a Canon IX4000 A3+ printer.

 

[DEE9299]

Guess I'll be the first...

Overview shot

Another overview, you can see my small lowepro camera bag on the desk and the bigger Kata 3n1-30 on the chair holding most of my stuff. Usually the camera and tripod are there too but they are in use here.

24" 3.06 Imac with 4gb ram, 500gig hd, and 8600GS vid card on the desk. Flanked by two Swans M10 speakers and two desk lamps.
I'm using stock apple keyboard with Logitech MX518 mouse and Wacom Bamboo tablet.

Crappy HP 3900 printer (not for photos, i use online for that)

Under the desk right to the right is my small table holding the subwoofer for the Swans M10 speakers and a card reader. Under the table is a Drobo firewire holding 4 500gig drives currently. Beside that is a single 1TB drive used for Timemachine backups.

In the closet off camera is also a Promise 4300 4 Bay NAS holding 4 1TB drives to dump all the data to for backups.

That's about it... I don't have a scanner or photoprinter.

For camera gear I have :
Nikon D90
18-105mm VR D90 Kit lens
50mm 1.8 lens
.42 ebay fisheye converter
ebay macro extension tubes
ebay macro lens reversal ring
2 8GB sdhc cards
cheap proline tripod
SB600 flash with gel filer kit and Stofen diffuser
Various lens filters and adapter rings
Macro ring flash for closeups
Lowepro small carry bag for short trips
Kata 3n1-30 large backpack to hold most of my gear for longer trips

Any questions fire away.

Zack

what table model is that?

 

[termina3]

Where do your feet and legs go?

 

[peskaa]

The cupboards under the desk aren't as deep as the desk itself, giving room for feet & legs.

 

[dlegend]

moving soon and need some inspiration. Anyone have anything new?

 

[dimme]

I don't have a picture to post but I have worked in Pro Digital Photolabs and Prepress for many years. One big NO NO is bright light coming in through windows in you photo editing space, as seen n CarlsonCustoms space. The lighting in the space should be controlled and constant. Not to interfere with what you see on the screen.

 

[snberk103]

If you are going to be entirely digital and virtual (no hardcopy) then I would think that a photographers work area is very similar to software development, except the archiving of images takes extra space. Keep in mind the lighting suggestion that dimme mentioned.

If you are going to be printing, requirements change considerably. You will need space to store paper, in boxes that are slightly bigger than the biggest paper your printer uses. As time goes on, you will acquire more and more boxes.

And of course the finished the prints. Finished prints should be stored flat, and not in big piles. Try to find a plan drawer for storing prints in. Also, tables for laying prints out on when they are being produced, and some way of attaching to a wall for inspection. Magnets on sheet of metal is one way of doing this, but inspecting prints flat on the table is not the same as attaching them to a wall and looking at them the same way as the client will see them. The lighting on the print inspection wall should be "white" and/or variable to match the expected lighting at the client's home or office.

Cheers

 

[Digital Skunk]

Personally, I think this thread should have gone a lot further. Especially since many photogs now have to deal with multimedia and HD archiving.

That changes the game a whole lot.

Without sidetracking off topic too much, if it's a disk-based backup solution you're looking for, try something like this, with a bunch of 1TB HDD's. I just bought the eSATA version for maximum performance and a Samsung Spinpoint F1 drive to go with it.

I don't think it's off topic, and I've been looking hard at the Drobo and Drobo S for archiving and redundancy. I don't see the need for off-site backups for myself so 2x Drobo or 1x Drobo and 1x Drobo S in RAID 5 for archiving and storage and redundancy.

Then my 2TB LaCie 2Big (down to 600GBs) can be used for photo storage in mirror. That's still a lot of power outlets, but it'll be 3 instead of 5-7 depending on setup.

moving soon and need some inspiration. Anyone have anything new?

I don't have anything new, but I do have much less gear now then I did then. I am down to a Nikon D80 (from D200/D2xs/D2hs) and a few lenses, and a Panasonic HVX200. I am looking for a MacPro to replace my long gone G5.

This thread will be old by the time I get my new work space setup.

 

[snberk103]

Personally, I think this thread should have gone a lot further. Especially since many photogs now have to deal with multimedia and HD archiving.
...
I don't think it's off topic, and I've been looking hard at the Drobo and Drobo S for archiving and redundancy. I don't see the need for off-site backups for myself so 2x Drobo or 1x Drobo and 1x Drobo S in RAID 5 for archiving and storage and redundancy.
...
This thread will be old by the time I get my new work space setup.

I'm hoping the thread goes further too.... I'm in the process of setting up a new workspace... so ideas are welcome. I'll post photos when done.

This is definitely a "do as I say, not as a I do" piece of advice. And not just directed at you, but at any one setting up a new workflow.

Your images are your more valuable asset (aside from your skills). To archive them off-site is just part of good practice to insure that should something bad happen, you are still in business afterwards. Theft, fire, flood are the usual "dangers" to justify off-site storage.

Theft is Theft, so no clarification needed.

Fire can be big and house or neighbourhood sized - or can be small. Like if your computer power supply shorts out. A small fire that takes out your computer, the external archive device sitting on top of it, and the shelf of CD archives on the wall over it - but does no damage to the house, can still take out every single image you own. If you live in a rural area a wildfire can crop up at any time. Especially in the summer.

Flood is usually thought of as basement drenching, whether by an overflowing river, a tsunami (I live in tsunami country - so yes, its an issue I think about), etc. But can also be something as small as a backed up sewer in the basement. Or if you live in an apartment, a backed up kitchen drain in your upstairs neighbour's apartment, a broken water pipe (yours or a neighbour's if in an apartment), etc etc. However - - it can be as small as a glass or pitcher of iced tea that tips over and takes out the RAID enclosure sitting on top of the computer. At least your CD archives are safe from a flood... unless it starts a small electrical fire.

My next project is figure out a system of storing an external HD off-site, and researching some of the "cloud" based storage systems.

 

[Digital Skunk]

.....

True, very true, but one may as well say the bank/storage facility your drive is in may burn down.

Or one could get a safe to lock the redundant drive in.

I agree with you 100%, but I am not sold on off-site backups just yet.

Cloud storage is probably going to be my next option . . . but only when they find a way to store more than 3TB+ of info for a reasonable price per GB.