Deanna Mushins
Hey everyone, I am Deanna from D Images and what an awesome community we are all part of and thanks Mark for the feature :)
I am one of the privileged people in the photography industry that gets to play with and photograph little people and have done for the past 10 years. I specialise in newborns and babies but also photograph children, families and Christenings. Which means lots of very intense photographic sessions and lots of patience.
I have set my kit up to be very specific to my shooting style and sessions, I keep my bag which is a Lowepro Pro Runner 350 as light as I can as a lot of the time I am chasing toddlers and children!
Prior to starting my own business, I shot canon for other companies but my personal kit has always been Nikon.
The first film camera I was given when I started in high school was a Nikon F65, which I guess a collector’s item now. Since then I have worked my way through the every Nikon digital SLR on the market, here is a little peek into my gear right now.
I use 2 camera bodies at every session, which are Nikon D800’s, whether it be a newborn shoot with my
Nikon 50mm f/1.4 – Nikon F and Nikon 105mm f/2.8G IF ED Lens on or at Christening or Family portrait session with my Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8 and Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 on.
It may seem obvious to experienced photographers but for beginners, I cant stress how important it is to have a back up camera body in your kit, so if one fails your session doesn’t!
I shoot raw ALWAYS which means big files are being created by the D800 so that means lots of compact flash cards! I use Sandisk Extreme pro III 64gb cards mostly. They are the most reliable I have found and have the best upload speed which I need as I shoot up to 5 days per week. They live in a mini Sandisk card wallet.
Because I shoot 5 days per week I like to have lots of extra batteries and I always buy genuine Nikon ones. Most of the time the spares are not used but the security of having backups gives me peace of mind, as you never know when a battery will fail you.
I also have a Nikon SB-800 speedlight which is the oldest thing in my kit now, I use it every so often as fill but I shoot natural light 99.99% of the time so it really just sleeps in my bag.
As a newborn photographer I also carry the “Baby Shusher” in my kit, it helps to soothe restless babies and drown out the sound of my shutter :)
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