Portfolio Bolstering

I spoke to someone a few months ago who is the director of sales of a national oil and gas magazine. Upon finding out that I was a photographer he suggested that I should photograph drilling rigs and try to get into the industry as there are a lot of companies that specialize in drilling and rigging in the area that I live.

Having nothing at all in my portfolio to reflect my abilities in this new field, I set out to get an opportunity to get some pictures.
At first I simply started out by discussing my idea with a few friends, and as it so happened, my room mate at the time knew someone who worked for a rigging company. He made a phone call and I had a brand new contact.

after about 3 weeks of rescheduling and waiting for weather conditions, I drove about an hour to the drilling site, where I was met by someone who worked with the contact I had made. He showed me around the place and introduced me to some of the workers. They were all very accommodating and friendly.

My goals for this shoot were as follows:
1: Get something that would look like it could be a feature for a magazine article.
2: Capture the workers in their natural element, hard at work, without disturbing anyone.
3: Have fun and get some cool photos for my website.

For the sake of keeping it short, I will skip ahead to the photos so you can see what I came out with.












As time went on the sun went down and the images got pretty interesting. I had 3 lights spread around the platform once it got completely dark.
Once they were done their pipeline change, I shot a few portraits of the guys, and then packed up and headed home.

All in all I think it was a pretty successful trip and I got some great images for the site. check them out at www.radiantsquares.com/corporate and www.radiantsquares.com/people