I did a huge job the other day, the sort of job that requires your “A’” game for an extended period (5 hours), no slip-ups, no excuses.

100 school groups, from teams to student year and social groups, one every five minutes for two periods of about 2+ hours each, a cast of 10 or so staff, and potentially 1700 students.

I did everything I could to nail the process short of double shooting it (2 cameras).

S5 Mk2 at ISO 800 for clean ISO performance with a 50mm for distortion control at f4-5.6 (depending on group depth). M43 was the obvious option, but the space is notoriously dark, so I went with the ISO performance of the full frame.

Markings on the floor for consistent central seat placement and shooting alignment (at three locations for different sized groups).

New camera with 2 formatted cards, tons of batteries, a 5” screen on top, manual everything, tripod on wheels.

Two things still went a little wrong, one important, one just annoying.

For some reason known only to my inner ear I suspect, I shot the whole day with the tripod head tilted slightly down, so I spent way too much time later re-aligning every one of the shots to be perfectly straight. I deliberately used a simple two-way Manfrotto monopod head to reduce movements, but the only one it had, bit me.

I could not do a batch straighten when I sorted white balance etc, because I was not perfectly consistent with my setup. Next time 2 bits of tape will be used, not one to get the front wheel of the tripod lined up exactly straight with the camera.

Annoying, but only I know about all the time wasted in post.

The second one really pisses me off, is that I trusted in camera peaking in manual focus and it failed me.

Controlled space, plenty of depth of field and a wall of red peaking colour all over the subject, only taken from the camera screen for guaranteed accuracy. I did not have peaking set on the 5”, as I was only using it to compose and check faces etc, which is why after a half dozen shots, I realised, they were all just a little out of focus.

Not terminally, but noticeable in processing and eventually on the bigger screen.

That feeling, when looking at a small size preview that there is a lack of delicacy, confirmed on closer inspection.

It seems the vagueness of peaking in that specific circumstance was enough to give me too large a range of acceptance with too small a range of accuracy. It even covered people walking in front organising seating, but was actually falling slightly behind the group!

F&$k me, what is this S&@t any good for if it cannot be trusted to do the one job it is assigned?

I compounded the issue by applying ON1 Tack Sharp on auto (which sets full strength de-blur) hoping the printed size would hold up, but unfortunately when the printing proofs came back with their own applied output sharpening, it was not nice. Clown makeup might be the closest way to describe it, Groucho Marx style.

Peaking is a good tool, but it’s big down side is, depending on the target, is it may get so busy it can actually distract and mislead you and you cannot tell. I could actually see perfectly well to focus with the 5” screen alone, even without magnification, a much more accurate tool, but the wall of peaking colour actual obscured the targets.

If I had not used the bigger screen I may have checked the results, but maybe not, so not sure whether the bigger screen saved me or damned me.

I switched to face/body detect AF and no misses for the rest of the day (94 groups x4 images in 3 locations).

Lesson learned and I guess disaster avoided…..mostly.