I, Eye, iPad: A Photographer's Adventures with His iPad

When I recently posted a question about the iPad on our Facebook page, the feedback from one particular person prompted me to ask him to write a guest blog for me.

David Killingback is a commercial, editorial and documentary photographer based near the city of Bath in the south-west of England, UK. And if his comments don't persuade you to invest in an iPad, nothing will!

I've been a distant admirer of Apple's iPad pretty much since its UK launch in May 2010, “A nice thing to have”, I told myself, “but hardly essential for a photographer.” But when my 2003 vintage 12" Apple PowerBook died of a heart attack I took it as a sign to make my move into the world of iPads and Apps. So this is a brief account of my experiences so far.

The most obvious area in which I knew the iPad was going to excel was in my various "social media" outlets: Facebook, Twitter, my Tumblr blog, etc. It does this with such effortless ease I rarely use my desktop computer for these things now. But there are several areas I didn’t anticipate the iPad being so darn useful, and it’s these areas I’m going to tell you about.

I bought my iPad on a Thursday lunchtime; by Thursday evening I had all my accounts for the fiscal year in my iPad. The next morning I emailed them from the iPad to my accountant in .PDF and Excel formats. Job done.

If a client has given me responsibility for researching a location for a shoot it is incredibly useful having Google Earth with me at all times. Within a couple of minutes I can know where the sun is going to be at any time on the surface of the planet. I can also keep myself updated with the latest weather and tidal information. I can even velcro the iPad to my car dashboard and use it as a sat-nav so we can actually find the place.

This morning I've been to show my portfolio to an Art Director. I put my print portfolio and iPad in front of her and said with a smile, "Analogue or digital, take your pick." They chose both.

The iPad is a thing of beauty. You need to know this and be prepared. As I write this I’m having a cup of camomile in the cafe of the Watershed in Bristol. A random stranger has just come up to me and started a conversation because he saw me using an iPad. This can be an advantage or disadvantage.

Using Skype on the iPad for outgoing calls and text messages is incredibly easy as the iPad has a built-in microphone and speaker. If I’m in a public place I use my iPod headphones when making calls. For those of you who don’t use Skype, all I can ask is why on earth not?

Weight: this may not be important for you, but it is for me - the iPad weighs 0.73kg. I often find myself carrying big bags of heavy cameras, lenses, lighting equipment, tripods and accessories. This can take its toll on your back, which is why I do Pilates. The current 13” MacBook Pro is a shade over 2kg, that’s a big difference! If you’re flying you might want to check the rates for excess baggage - not cheap!

The iPad also has some applications which are specific to photographers. Last week I had a client stop by the studio for a half-day job. Using an application called Shuttersnitch and an Eye-Fi wi-fi memory card in my camera, I was able to have the images I was shooting transfer wirelessly to the iPad, which was in the hands of my client as they relaxed on a bean-bag with a cup of coffee. Magic! The client can see exactly what I'm shooting, they can point to the image immediately and say "Gimme more of that colour!", or "Can you make this area more out of focus?". The iPad is helping me to banish vague subjective terms from my shoots, such as "Can you give me an electric red?", I mean, what on earth is "electric red"? Anything I can do to help clients communicate with me in meaningful and accurate ways is always an enormous help.

After the shoot I asked the client if they would prefer me to email their invoice to them, which I did. There's even the possibility that clients may be able to pay you there and then via PayPal or other online payment methods, though whether this is relevant for you will depend on the nature of your business. Whatever, making it as easy as possible for the client to pay can only be a good thing.

My iPad has very quickly become my IT, social networking, business, financial management, travel and research multi-tool, it has 1001 uses and I really can’t ever imagine going back to not having one. The real test will come when I do some serious travelling with it.

www.davidkillingback.com
Twitter: dkillingback

In the studio or on location, the iPad is a photographic multi-tool par excellence, as well as many other things.

All words and images © David Killingback, 2010, 2011.