This past May I spent a few days making some portraits of gauchos in Chilean Patagonia.

I prefer to work in available light, and indoors if possible. The light in Southern Patagonia has a cool colour temperature, so skin tones etc don’t tend to be as warm outside as I’d like.

While visiting José’s cabin at the estancia he works at, we had a lot of soft warm light stray into his kitchen area. It really helps if you can get light that allows the subject to glow if possible.

I must confess that I am no expert at lighting. I have often thought of bringing reflectors with me (I invested in a set when I got home from this trip).

Most of the time, whilst shooting the gauchos, I found the light levels too low to hand-hold the camera. This is the downside of shooting film - although the technology has improved a lot - Kodak’s Portra 800 ISO film is no more grainy than the 160 and 400 equivalents (they look identical to my eye last time I did a test), I still struggled to keep the images sharp. I am so rusty that it had not occurred for me to bring my monopod along.

I love shooting the Contax 645 with the 80mm lens. It can go as wide as f2, which results in quite dramatic bokeh, but it can often be too much - sometimes the plane of focus is so thin that I end up with one eye of a subject in focus and the other soft. So I am forced to use f4, which guarantees the eyes will be in focus, but it does mean I lose a stop.

So next year (as I plan to return), I am bringing my monopod, and reflectors. My friends Sabine and Alberto will be put to good use as assistants to hold the reflectors.