I like Peter’s early stuff, but lately, he seems to be drifting away from what first appealed to me.

The one who should do a YouTube channel is the guy from The Digital Picture.

In my community, we have a similar event each year; for our area, it is a huge event. Our little town has only one stop light, and our event will draw several thousand people for a parade of less than ten blocks. It is at night with few street lights.

I try to set up on the intersection or another location where I will have as much ambient as possible and minimal subject movement and average out my exposure settings. It does not work all that well. The float Christmas lights and the headlights from other floats blow everything out, and you can’t see much. Lower the ISO, and you can’t see the people, but the float lights look good. Flash is handy when it is effective, but often, it creates a mess of its own. Bracketing could work if everything was moving. Not every shot is bad bad, but most are with only a few mediocre ones. Rarely a really good one. I know what I am doing and I have good gear; it is just brutal lighting, any way you look at it.

As others have stated, go to the location prior at the same time of the evening and practice. It is street photography in the extreme.

If your senior photo is just for the yearbook, you should contact the advisor and see if they can just shoot the photo. I am a yearbook advisor and we get last-minute stuff all the time.

If you are shooting for your university you no doubt have contact with your local media. Talk with them and get some insight into how it all works.

Like others have already said, LightRoom Classic. I do this often where I work, but not often enough to purchase the correct type of scanner. What I do is photograph the photo. I use a 5dsr, EF 135 f/2, extension tubes, lights, etc. I shoot in RAW. Once in LrC, I convert the image to b&w. It is slow, but produces great results.

You can not fly a drone directly over the event. You will need to be off, away from people. In most locations that can be difficult. Consider a GoPro on a pole from your press box. Another option is to position yourself in an elevated position and do a stitched pano. If you know what you are doing, you get a decent stitched image handheld.