PhotoStore owners click here to find out how to add the PhotographyFeed.com news feed to your site.

• Digital Camera Resource Page
• DCViews.com
• Digital Photography Journal
• Digital Photo News
• dpreview.com (News)
• dpreview.com (Reviews & Previews)
• ePHOTOzine
• Popular Photography (PopPhoto Flash)
• Popular Photography (Newswire)
• Popular Photography (Tests & Reviews)
• Cnet.com Camera Reviews
• Popular Photography (Photo News)
• Amateur Photographer
• PhotographyBlog.com
• Imaging Resource
• British Journal of Photography
• Digital Photo News
• Digital Trends
• CameraTown.com
• Photo News Today
• Digital Photography School
• JMG-Galleries
• Photocritic
• Strobist
• PhotoAxe
• Photografr
• PhotographyVoter
• Photopreneur
• photodoto
• NYCgraphix Blog Photo
• DIYPhotography.net
• fotohacker
• Digital Shot
• DSLRBlog
• letsgodigital.org (News)
• letsgodigital.org (Reviews)

Sell Your Photos Online

PhotoStore allows you to setup a complete photo selling website on your server or hosting space in just minutes. Perfect for professional photographers looking to sell their photos or prints to their customers online or anyone who would like to run a stock photo type site.

• Learn More
• Screenshots
• View Demo

Talkin' Trash: Free Light Mods

(Updates at bottom)

News photographers always keep a trash bag or two in the trunk of their car. They have lots of uses -- waterproofing in the rain, keeping your cold gear from fogging up when you walk outside on a hot day, cleaning out the trash in your trunk (nah)...

Enter my friend Aaron, who works at Google. FYI, he's the guy who manually types in the phrase, "Did you mean, 'vacuum?'" when you misspell the word in a search. Aaron just added a new use for white trash bags: Light diffuser.

He just wadded the bag up, stuck it (and a CTO gel) on his main light, shot on tungsten WB and left his rim light ungelled for this cool self portrait. Typical Googler, he is ahead of the curve on Lighting 102, where we'll be doing this same gel technique very shortly.

(You can see his photo bigger here.)

Pretty neat, IMO. So, to the list of free stuff offered to employees at Google (gourmet food, bikes, massages, etc.,) you can now add, "light diffuser." Just find the nearest trash can and have at it.

As for the look, Aaron was inspired by photos of the SF Jazz Collective. As jazz is all about improvisation, you have to think they'd approve of his idea.
_______

UPDATE: Just got a text msg from Aaron, who is on a work trip to NYC, has just stepped into the B&H retail store for the very first time. Be afraid, Jayita. Be very, very afraid...

UPDATE #2: Good news: Google sends you to NYC to lecture on the company dime. Bad news: Your trip coincides with a visit by Joe McNally (and free lecture) at the Mountain View HQ. (D'Oh!!!)

-30-

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

On Assignment: Controlling Daylight, Pt. 2

A couple weeks ago, in part one of this OA post, we talked about getting a good ambient exposure and knocking it down a couple of stops to use it as fill.

This is all well and good if the ambient has the right quality of light to use as fill. But what if the ambient looks like crap?

Well, you can always establish use a second flash to establish your desired fill light before creating your key light. The process is the same, and it gives you lots of control in less-than-ideal ambient situations.

The photo above was taken in roughly the same light as the photo in the earlier post. The quality (and quantity) of the ambient fill was fine, actually. But in this case I decided not to use it, to make a point.

In the same way I can use the ambient as fill and work a couple of stops above it with flash for a main light, I can also work a couple of stops above the ambient with my fill light, and then go a couple of stops above that with my main.


This photo is lit almost entirely with one flash with a shoot-thru umbrella, just above the camera. It is very soft, forgiving and wrappy. Also a little boring, IMO. Nothing wrong with it, per se, but if I was gonna use just this light, I would move it up a little, and maybe off to one side to get some nice modeling.

But as fill, it is ideal for laying down a base exposure and controlling the depth of my shadows when it is time to add the main light.


Okay, so lets add the main light now, in the form of a speedlight equipped with a Honl 1/8" speed grid at upper camera left. The ratio is so tight (not even a stop difference from my fill light) that it is almost not noticeable. But if you look closely, you'll be able to detect a "crispness" around Jessie's face that is not evident in the fill-only photo.

Subtle, to be sure. Maybe too much so. But the point here is that you can easily control the main-to-fill ratio, and get crisp, subtle looks from lights you normally associate with being sharp and edgy.

But the beauty in laying down fill light with a second flash is not only in being able to choose the quality, but also the ratio between the fill and the main. By simply dialing down the umbrella'd flash, you can set your internal contrast level wherever you want.

You do not need nice, even ambient to do this, either. SInce you are establishing your lighting environment with a second, soft flash, this can be done anywhere you can get a couple of stops up over the ambient. This is any indoor wall, for instance.


As you can see in this setup shot, the umbrella (a Westcott double-fold shoot-thru) is establishing a splotch of soft fill light and the grid spot is coming in to highlight her face. (My shooting position was tucked up under the umbrella.)

You do not have to stop with just establishing a lighting ratio, either. You can cool the fill light and warm up the main, too. In fact, in this shot I threw a 1/4 CTO gel on the gridded flash to accent her face a little more.


Looking at the top photo again, you should easily see all of the pieces for this lighting scheme easily falling into place: Lay down a nice, soft, neutral-colored fill. Drop it a coupla stops. Add in some warmed up grid at upper camera left to spotlight the face. Done.

Jessie has a great bone structure, and can take a little bit of edge in her light. I could do the same lighting scheme with a less forgiving face, but I would probably tighten the ratio up a bit. That way, you can go with a little edge to your light and still be kind to someone's face if they need it.

The takeaway from parts one and two is to be aware of both the quality and quantity of your fill, whether it is natural ambient or something you create yourself.

By gaining control over the fill first, you create exactly the palette you want when you add the final main light.

RELATED POST:

:: On Assignment: Controlling Daylight, Pt. 1 ::

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Somebody Get This Kid an Agent.

UPDATE:This photo was shot indoors -- Jeff posted a lighting setup shot here.
_________

One of the best things about running a site like this is watching people use light to elevate their family photos. Every day, someone drops a photo of a baby (or kid, or sweetie) into the pool that looks like it could have jumped off of the pages of a magazine.

Jef79m used a DIY beauty dish at camera left and a shoot-thru umbrella at upper camera right, both with speedlights at half power to overpower daylight. But that still wasn't enough soft light to fill in all of those Butterball wrinkles.

Note to the photographer: If you lose your memory card, it might be in Mackenzie's arm somewhere...

-30-

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Light Fare at The Bar

My favorite part of attending a week-long photo conference is hanging out with the other shooters and students in the off-hours. In Dubai, this meant almost nightly trips to the "Vista," a restaurant on the top floor of our hotel, seen at left.

The food, drinks, views and company were outstanding. And if we seemed a little sleepy while teaching the next morning, it was likely because we had closed the joint down the night before.

The last evening saw us too tired even to make it to the top floor. So we crashed at the hotel bar on the bottom floor. It had weird, low-level lighting and was full of tipsy sedate photographers -- a perfect environment for a Canon G9 and a slaved SB-800...

The fact that you can control the G9 in manual mode, and that the SB-800 has an excellent built-in slave, makes for an easy, impromptu off-camera light setup.

Everything happens in manual -- the G9's ambient exposure, the built-in flash, and the SB-800. This is what allows easy use of the Nikon and Canon gear together. If you are used to working in manual, this combo is very quick and easy. You just work out your most important variable, and go from there.


Pick Your Most Important Variable

In every flash/ambient exposure, you have to first decide what factor is driving the decision-making process. In this instance, it is something a little unusual: The camera's ISO.

I say that because great camera that the G9 is, I do not like to go above ISO 100 if I can help it. Small-chip noise starts worsening at ISO 200. And if I can get away with ISO 100 in a dark bar, I can do it almost anywhere.

I was shooting in full manual. In addition, I had the G9's internal flash set on manual at the lowest of three output levels. All I wanted was enough flash to set of the SB-800. Which ain't much.


Everything Else Solves Itself

So, back to the thought process. ISO 100 is driving the train. What comes next? Wide open aperture. For the G9 that means ~f/2.8 - f/4, depending on the focal length of the zoom. This gives the best least hideous shutter speed possible in the dark room at ISO 100. In the end, I was hanging out in the 1/4 - 1/2 second range. Sometimes I would hold the camera still and sometimes I would move it a bit for effect.

Now that you know an ISO and an aperture -- say, f/4 or the sake of argument -- your other values fall into place. Next in line would be to find a power level and distance for the SB-800 which exposes your subject properly. What I like to do is to choose a consistent working distance for the SB, and dial in my power level with a couple of quick test shots.

In this instance, it was at 1/32 power with a working distance of about 3 feet. I added a diffusion dome to make the light go in all directions -- bare bulb style. Now, anywhere I stick that flash I will have a properly exposed photo at a light-to-subject distance of 3 feet.

Generally, I would just put the flash on the table -- in the direction in which I wanted the light to hit. I also would put something between the flash and my shooting position to gobo the direct light.

All that is left to decide is the shutter speed. And in manual mode, this is easy. I just use the camera's meter to dial my shutter in so that the environment is ~2 stops underexposed. In most instances, In this case, we were down into the Hail Mary shutter speed settings. No problem -- the flash is freezing my subject.

I can also dial in whatever amount of flash/ambient contrast I like via the shutter speed. And everything else is already taken care of by the other exposure choices.


Drink With the Left Hand, Shoot with the Right

Take young Adam -- just 12 years old -- who came all the way from the UK take classes, ask questions, and offer to sleep on studio floors. Don't laugh -- that is exactly what I would have done at his age.

Among the students, it was very easy to see exactly who had made the decision to get the absolute most out of the conference. We had them pegged by the end of the first day. And between you and me, those guys had the right idea. Bravo.


After-hours at the bar just meant more time for editing and second guessing the day's work. The guys in Chase's class were particularly hard-driven. They did a three-day, full commercial assignment class. Soup-to-nuts -- real commercial brief, models, location, editing and post. Wish I could have taken it.

This may have been a first in the photo class of this kind in the world, especially given the authenticity of all of the components. I would have given my left tes right arm to have a class like this as a 22-yr-old.


Way down at the other end of the ambition scale, the instructors were totally prepared to relax and unwind in the after-hours. Witness Chris Hurtt (who spent the week getting people off of the "green square" and saving them money on post cards) pondering the intricacies of an orange vase lit from the inside by an SB-800.

I know what you are thinking: He's three sheets to the wind.

But if you knew Chris, you would know that this is a perfectly normal expression for him. I had better photos, but the customs folks made me delete them at the airport before I left the country.

Next time you have a fun, after-hours thing going on, give this stuff a try. The manual lighting and exposure process may seem a little complicated at first, but it is not. And it is surprisingly fast to set up -- even if one is not safe to drive at the time.

We did some fun stuff in the Dubai classes (and out in the desert) and I will be posting more within the next coupla weeks.
___________

Related:

Dubai Photo Set (still uploading)
Joe McNally: Overpowering the Sun in Dubai
Lifehacker: How to Hack Your Canon Point-and-Shoot

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Ray Flash Redux

There were lots of questions following the earlier review of the new Ray Flash Ring Flash Adpater.

I have tried to answer them best I could -- and found a video to boot -- after the jump.
_________

Ring Flash Q-n-A

Q: This is pretty neat with one exception. The design of it and the way it flops down, won't it block the infrared focus assist on the SB800?

A: Yes, it will block the AF-assist light on the SB-800. But FWIW, I am not sure that this thing is that much of a run-and-gun light source. (At least, that is not the way that I would use it.)


Q: What is this? No Konica-Minolta/Sony flash units? That's a pretty poor business choice... (Ditto other question, re: Sunpak/Vivitar)

A: Dunno which other flashes are coming, but you have to understand that Nikon and Canon comprise the vast amount of the DSLR market. They have to go where the numbers are, at least at first.


Q: A quick search for "Ring Light" or "Ring Flash" on eBay lists a lot of ring flashes that sell for less than $100. So what's the advantage of a ring flash adapter over such an eBay flash? Are the eBay ones restricted to macro photography?

A: I actually have bought, tried and discarded a couple of those types of flashes. They are far too weak (and the light source size far too small) to be very useful for subjects other than macro.


Q: Looks like this would block the front of the flash body. any idea if it kills the built in wireless flash capability of say a Canon 580exII? Could I use this unit and still fire another canon flash off-camera?

A: It does block the front of the flash, because it channels it to the ring light area. Being a Nikon guy, I tried it in SB-800 Commander mode to see if it would control other flashes wirelessly. It did.


Q: By saying "But they counter it by not releasing the light fully until they are an inch or two from the top of the ring, going around. Seems to work great." ... Do you mean that the light output is evenly distributed around the whole ring?

A: If the light were emitted all of the way around the ring, it would definitely be hotter up top, which would be closer to the flash. They balance this out by not starting to release the light until it is just a little bit of the way around the circle. The end effect is a pretty even lighting effect around the ring.

(You can see a good, albeit brief, visual example of this in the video below.)


Q: Okay, I'm operating on zero sleep, but what if you want to use your PWs in addition to the ringlight? Are you out of luck?

A: That depends on whether or not your camera will trigger a PW from the PC jack when a hot-shoe flash is mounted. Some will, some won't.


Q: Who wants to bet that there will be a $29 knock-off available in/from Korea within 3 months? It looks pretty backwards engineerable.

A: I'd eat my hat. This thing has a pretty complex light distribution system. Second thought, I would not be surprised to see a piece-of-crap knockoff. But this thing is actually more complicated that it looks from a distance.


Q: I've noticed it's $50 cheaper if you're a Canon user yeah!

A: FYI: That appears to be the older model. It is not as efficient as the new, thinner model.


Q: I'm sure the Gadget Infinity folks already have a prototype in the works.

A: We actually gave them an engraved invitation to create one about six months ago, and they pretty much dropped the ball. Shame, too.


Q: I'm a bit confused - is this the same product as that: ( http://www.ringflash.cz/en_index_go.php? )

A: That's the older, less efficient model. Same principle, though.


Q: I would like to see some evidence that this attachment wouldn't overtstress the the plastic hot shoe, otherwise add a new 580 EX II to the price package.

A: Can't speak for the plastic hot shoe flashes, but on my SB-800 (with a metal hot shoe) there did not seem to be much stress at all on the shoe or the foot. I would think that they would already know it if flashes snapping off were a problem. Having used it on mine, I am not worried.


Q: It looks a little small. I think you'd need something a lot larger (maybe 12-14" across) to get the proper ring light "look".

A: It is a little smaller than the ABR or other big-powered ring flashes. But at portrait distances, it seems to fine. Personal preference, tho.


Q: Anybody know where these are available in the UK, only one I managed to find was on Amazon.co.uk but it was a Nikon fit and I have canon 580EX II.

A: Yup. EU Types will want to look at Flaghead Photographic.


Q: Looks exactly like my Flaghead ring flash that I got for exactly 292 dollars US from Bob Rigby in the UK. They are fun to use and handy beyond. I use it with my G-9 and a canon speedlight. Needs a 1/4 CTO, just a tad bit cool straight out the cow.

A: (As if on cue.) Thanks for the gel tip. I'll try it!


Q: Does it work with high-speed (FP) flash?

A: Yes -- remembering that it is totally passive. It'll handle close-in portraiture outside using the FP synch stuff.
______________


For a better look at it's size, thickness, how it attaches, etc., check out this YouTube video, which we have conveniently dubbed for our readers from The Netherlands. Please bear in mind that this man is not a professional actor, but merely a normal photographer person such as yourself:

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

DIY: David X. Tejada's Beauty Dish

Corporate shooter David X. Tejada has been mentioned enough times on this blog to legally qualify us as stalkers.

(Hey, whatever it takes to let him know how much we truly love him. Besides, no one has issued a restraining order yet.)

But if we were not following his every move, then how would we know that he has taken a cue from some of the speedlight beauty dish designs floating around and created what is maybe the best version yet?

A cheap plastic pot, some paint, a CD case, and Dave's The Moment of Zen: A $2.39 convex mirror from an auto supply store. Check it out, here.

-30-

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Just Another Boring Monday at the Office

We wrapped up teaching in Dubai on Sunday, and some of us have a couple days left over for R&R.

Having figured out that there was not actually anything in the Dubai stores that we could afford to buy, Joe McNally and I spent the day in the desert shooting.

You'd think we could get through this vacation without having to work so much. But, nooooo -- he hadda drag our butts out to the desert with a Land Cruiser full of flashes and a Czech model named Lenka.

Lahf, she can beh such eh struggle, no?

We spent the afternoon and twilight there, where we learned things like how to set off seven SB-800s at a time and basic camel avoidance techniques.

I am pretty sure the UAE military saw all those strobes going off on their radar. They sent a Chinook chopper into the desert to strafe us take a look.

Much more to come later. We shot video, setups, sound, etc. -- all via my trusty little Canon G9. We'll be working up full posts on both blogs. FWIW, I have several posts to come out of the Dubai trip. We have been having great fun and doing lots of lighting.

McNally has been shooting rings around us -- with a point-and-shoot, natch.

But tomorrow, no more hard labor. It's time for a dip in the Persian Gulf...
_________

UPDATE: Whoa. It never occurred to me that our model, Lenka, could have been the same Lenka that was in the 2006 DIY ring flash post. But comparing the two photos, I am now about 90% sure it was the same person.

I will have to find out via email after I return. What an amazing coincidence if so.

UPDATE #2: I was 90% sure, and 100% wrong!

-30-

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Lighting 102: 6.2 - Gelling for Tungsten

In the last L102 post, we talked about some of the problems we have to face when gelling to work under fluorescent light. Gelling for tungsten yields similar, but different problems.

Fortunately, tungsten is easier -- and more forgiving.

First of all, when we gel for tungsten, we use an "CTO" gel, which is orange and converts our daylight-balanced flash to tungsten (or incandescent). This means that our little flash has basically been turned into a normal light bulb, as far as light color is concerned.

As you can imagine, this is gonna be pretty orange. But when you are shooting in a tungsten environment, you need to get your light consistent. And CTO'ing the flash makes the flash orange, so your flash and ambient now match. Setting the camera to the tungsten white balance setting (usually denoted by a little "light bulb" symbol) corrects for all of this and brings all of the lights back to daylight.

Except when it doesn't. And there is the rub.

Like fluorescents, tungstens are not always the "correct" color. In fact, a bulb's color can change radically - even moment to moment.

How? By being dimmed.

If you do not believe me, dim down a tungsten light in an otherwise darkened room. Watch as it gets redder and redder. They go almost pure red right before the dim to "off".


TIP: If shooting in a dimmed tungsten room, try to get the lights cranked all the way up. You will get a higher ambient level -- easier for balancing. And you'll get truer tungsten colors -- easier for gelling to balance.


Knowing this, you should now realize that you cannot perfectly balance for all tungsten lights with just a CTO gel. And even if you could balance for everything, you probably would not want to.

First of all, as with our fluorescents, when color converting we can only gel our flashes for something we can reliably correct with white balance settings. And custom white balance is not very useful, because you would have to match the flash's gel pack with the custom color to complete the process.

If you do shoot regularly in, say, the same room with the same whacked-out color, it might be worth it to test a build a gel pack that matches the room light for your flash. Then you could cancel it all out with a custom white balance. But on a daily basis, this is impractical when shooting flash.

Fortunately, flash and tungsten get along pretty well when not perfectly balanced. The main thing is to get your flash correctly CTO'd and balance that at the camera. Then let the ambient tungsten do what it is gonna do.

It frequently will not be perfect, but it will be much better than if you had not gelled at all. And you can also vary the background color effect by how much ambient you choose to include, remembering that the ambient component is controlled with the shutter speed. Balancing down lower with ambient (more stops underexposed) intensifies the color. So bring it up a little so smooth it out.

Long story short, the bad news is that with tungsten, you have a color problem you might not have previously considered. But the good news is that you do not need to be as exacting with tungsten light, so missing it a little is not a tragedy.

CTO and Window Greens explained, we will jump into some fun stuff next -- color key shifting.

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Lighting Tip: Neuter Your SC-17

Nikon's SC-17 off-camera TTL flash cord is a great little addition to your kit, and you do not even have to be a Nikon shooter to use it. They are so cheap, I have several. And I recently put one under the knife.

Keep reading for he how and the why.

The SC-17 is basically an extension cord for your hot shoe that carries all of the various TTL connections. A flash, connected to your TTL-enabled Nikon via an SC-17 cord, may as well be connected to your hot shoe as far as the signals are concerned.

But the fact that it is off camera allows you to get better light, of course. I have written about this earlier, when talking about the strobe on a rope technique.

No longer manufactured, the SC-17 cords have since been replaced by the new (longer) SC-28, and the more expensive SC-29, which includes an AF-assist light. I like the SC-17 because you can find them on eBay pretty cheaply now.

You can link up to three SC-17s and still retain all of the TTL functions. Or if you are handy, you can splice a CAT-5 wire in there and run it about 50 feet, still keeping TTL.

But TTL is usually not what I use it for. In fact, I am trying to kill the TTL stuff for a specific reason. When shooting both with my Canon G9 and with the Nikon D70s, the trick to getting high sync speeds is to fool the camera into thinking there is no TTL flash connected.

If the camera senses a TTL flash, it will lock the sync at a max of 1/500th of a sec. Which is not what we want. So, we want a dumb, hot-shot-based sync cord to fool the camera into thinking there is not a fancy, TTL flash attached.

To do this, we will unscrew the little screws at the camera mount end of the cord and snip a few wires. It's easy, really, so don't worry about having to be a surgeon or an electronics wiz.

When you open the case at the camera and, you'll see five wires. The two wires you want to SAVE are:

1. The wire that connects to the big center post in the bottom, and
2. The wire that connects to the fail on the side.

These two wires constitute a "dumb" sync circuit. These are the two you DO NOT want to snip. The other three wires carry TTL info. Snip them and the TTL connection goes away. This also makes the SC-17 into a very good little hot-shoe-based sync cord for any brand of a camera with a hot shoe. No proprietary Nikon circuitry to worry about, either.

And for ultra-high sync stuff, this is better than using a Pocket WIzard. Because the electronics in the PW actually self-limit your sync to about 1/1000th of a sec. Not so a dumbed-down SC-17 (or a straight PC cord, for that matter.)

Some have correctly pointed out that an un-neutered SC-17 will work just fine as a dumb sync cord on a Canon. Bu I prefer to knock out those TTL circuits all the same, just in case there is some weird crosstalk going on that might harm the camera. Also, I use the cord for the Nikon D70s for the same reason. So it needs to be snipped for that reason, too.

If you do not want to ship your cord, you can always tape off the contacts at either the camera or flash connection point. But the cords are so cheap I prefer to just keep a snipped one along with my straight ones.

For multi-light setups, I will cord one hi-speed-sync flash and slave the others for multiple light setups in hi-sync situations.

Another thing: If you keep several SC-17s in your bag, you can chain the TTL ones together for a full TTL cord. But if you introduce one neutered cord into the chain, the whole chain goes non-TTL.

So, I keep three SC-17s in my kit -- two smart and the other one neutered. This gets me the best of both worlds when I am cording an off-camera flash.

Related posts:

:: How-To: Strobe on a Rope ::
:: Search SC-17 on Strobist ::

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

How To: Sync a Canon G9 at 1/2500th of a Sec

The Canon G9 is my knock-around point-and-shoot camera. It has 12.1MP, a fast lens, does video and actually syncs well above its nominal sync speed of 1/500th of a sec -- if you know how to do it.

There are a couple ways to pull this off, and the cheapest way is actually the best.

The first thing you have to know if you are going to sync the G9 (or G7) at high speeds is that the camera's onboard flash has to be turned off. Ironic, I know. But the engineers at Canon programmed the flash to sync at 1/500, so when the flash is on that is where your shutter is gonna max out.

So, now that we have turned off the flash, we'll be synching an off-camera flash via the oh-so-handy hot shoe up on top of the camera. The easy way is to use a Pocket Wizard, which works fine but will in practice limit you to a max of about 1/1000th of a second.

This is because of the very minor lag times introduced by the circuitry in the PW itself. This is even more of a hindrance with some of the other wireless remotes, to the point of not being useful at all for some other wireless trigger units.

What you need for really high-speed sync is a simple, dumb wire. This will mean you are limited only by the shutter speed and the power level of the flash.

Why the power level? Because power level (for a speedlight) corresponds to the actual duration of the flash pulse itself. A full-power flash lasts about 1/1000th of a sec. And no matter what synching method you use, you will not squeeze that flash pulse into a 1/2500th of a second's time.

So, first understand that you can expect a full-power manual flash to be fully deployed up to about 1/1000th of a sec. A half-power flash will buy you up to about 1/2000th of a sec. And beyond that, you'll need to limit yourself to a 1/4 power flash, max.

You may think you are synching a full-power flash at 1/2500th, but you are not getting all of it. Just mind the math and you'll be fine.

So, how do we squeeze all of this flash through, without a PW? We use a dumb PC cord. For the camera, you'll need a PC adapter, such as a Nikon AS-15, which converts a hot shoe to a PC cord. Then, you are all set, just as if your camera had a PC jack.

Connect the PC cord to the flash, either by straight connection or via a hot shoe adapter on the other end, and fire away. This will buy you the full synch capability of the G9, but it seems a little cumbersome.

Fortunately, you can bypass all of these steps with a simple, neutered Nikon SC-17 cord. Which is what we will be learning about in the next post.

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Greetings from the Land of Cranes

Finally over my jet lag in Dubai, where the temperature is currently 167 degrees. Although, that's fahrenheit, so that's not as bad as it sounds. The humidity is 132% and the breeze is zero mph. Or less.

But it is totally worth it, as I have been hanging out with the other intructors and learning loads about some really cool stuff without having to pay. More pix and some cool links after the jump.

Dubai is perpetually under rapid construction, with three new skyscrapers popping up in in my field of view during the time it took me to write this sentence. I have met some wonderful folks, and am very much looking forward to meeting those of you who have signed on for the next five full days (gulp) of seminars.

Among the cool people I have gotten a chance to meet for the first time is David Nightingale, of the absolutely lovely site, "Chromasia". As you can see here, David will do whatever it takes to get the photo, even if it means steadying his lens with a huge tripod and his hand with a "Stella" beer...

Seriously, go right now and check out Chromasia. You can see a few of his contruction shots here, here, here and here.

Here is Burj Al-Arab, the totally over-the-top hotel as seen from our hotel's roof. Our hotel is perfectly fine, of course. Until you compare it with the Burj Al-Arab, which is a "seven-star hotel" which is, like, three more starts than anyone else has.

If you have a chance, take a few minutes and explore Chromasia. I am loving David's stuff and wanting to know more about HDR now.

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Lighting 102: 6.1 - Gelling for Fluorescent

On their face, gels are a pretty simple concept. You stick a colored piece of plastic in front of your flash and it alters the color of the light accordingly. But so much is possible from just this simple trick.

In this, the first of a four-part section on using gels, we'll be looking at their most common use -- converting the color of your flash's light to the color of the ambient light in which you are shooting. This is called color balancing.

We first visited the idea of color balancing in Lighting 101 where the two most important gels were discussed. The "window green," (or "plus green") gel converts the light from a flash to nominally match that of a fluorescent light.

A "CTO" gel similarly converts your flash's light to match the light from an incandescent (i.e., tungsten) bulb. But for today, we'll be talking about just the little green gel. It's certainly complicated enough to merit its own post, as you'll soon see.

While the fluorescent conversion used to be a simple process, this is no longer the case. But for the sake of discussion, let's assume that it still is. At least for the moment.

Traditional fluorescent light is green. About 30 color correction (CC) units of green, to be exact. By placing a 30cc window green gel on our flash, you make the flash's light match that of a traditional fluorescent environment.

If our ambient is green, and your flash is green, you're okay. Because you can correct for all of this similarly green light by setting your camera on the fluorescent light balance, and all is white again. This is because the FL white balance setting just shifts everything over 33 units of magenta. This is what balances out the green.

Take, for example, this shot I made a couple of weeks ago at Western Kentucky University, while teaching the PJ students there.


(Sorry, Jeanie. You were my most recent example...)

This is a fluorescent-lit studio. In this shot I lit Jeanie with an SB-800 in an umbrella and the flash was gelled with a window green gel. My shutter speed was opened up to let the background of the photo burn in to make a decent exposure.

But in addition, the green gel, combined with the camera on fluorescent setting, brings the colors up pretty close to correct. None of that sickly-green cast that happens when you forget to gel your flash and the fluorescents just come in the ugly green way they really look.

Pretty simple technique, right?

But in practice, there are two little gremlins that usually come into play. First, rooms can often have a mix of fluorescent and daylight. Maybe even a little tungsten thrown in for good measure.

In addition to that, fluorescent lights are now all over the map, color-wise. In reality, they can now actually be warmer than tungsten.

Let's take these problems one-by one.

First, on the multi light sources, sorry to say that you have to choose a source color and go with it. But this can be better than it sounds. My first trick, if there is a lot of daylight bouncing around in a fluorescent room, is to ask if I can turn off the overhead lights while I shoot.

If the daylight is enough to cause light balancing issues, there is usually more than enough to work by with the fluorescents turned off. Then you do not balance at all -- just shoot in the daylight with normal flash.

If that solution is not available, I will close the blinds or drapes to minimize the encroaching daylight. (This daylight comes through as magenta when you are set on fluorescent white balance.) One other thing you can do to help are to work on the opposite side of the room as the windows, to minimize the daylight contamination.

If you have a mix of fluorescent, daylight and tungsten, do everything you can to lose the fluorescent light. Then shoot on daylight with no color correction gel on your flash. The daylight and tungsten will mix a lot prettier than any green/other combo will.

(And if all else fails, hope it runs in black and white...)
____________


And as we said earlier, fluorescents are no longer just 30cc's of green. And for us photogs, that really sucks.

There is no good solution here. The important thing is that you have to be able to counteract your conversion gel with a white balance camera setting. That is to say that, even if your fluorescent light is not a perfect green, you pretty much have to live with the difference. Just green your flash and neutralize it (the flash) with the FL white balance setting. Sometimes the ambient will go a little weird. But it is better than not gelling at all.

For those super warm fluorescents, the ones close to tungsten, I will usually just treat them as tungstens. I'll CTO the flash, and set the white balance on the camera to tungsten. Again, not perfect. But better than nothing. And the flash-lit part will look good.

How can you tell where the fluorescents are, color-wise? The easiest was is to shoot an ambient-only shot and chimp your screen. If it looks more green, gel and balance for fluorescent. If it looks more orange, treat it as a tungsten. This is also a good approach for working in vapor-based light (sodium, mercury, etc.).

Your flash-lit subject (usually the most important part of your frame) will be okay. The ambient burn-in part may be a little off. But that's the price we now have to pay for having 57 varieties of fluorescent bulb colors.

And as for dealing with tungsten lights, we'll be hitting that in the next installment of Lighting 102.

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

New at Amazon: Minimalist Lighting, by Kirk Tuck

Minimalist Lighting: Professional Techniques for Location Photography is a new book by Austin-based commercial photographer (and long-time Strobist reader) Kirk Tuck.

For those of you looking to grow the small-light thing into a practice of shooting for editorial, corporate and advertising clients, Kirk's book serves as a road map in his effort to show you his lighting gear choices, philosophy and techniques.

The book begins by chronicling Kirk's own transition from Big Lights to using small flashes for his assignments. From there it grows into a full discussion of specific small flash gear and demonstrated lighting styles.

Minimalist Lighting is not a book on theory. It is nuts-and-bolts book with lots of examples, setup shots and lighting diagrams. Kirk also gets into DIY, talking about things like lighting with shower curtains, making your own high-capacity battery packs and waterproofing flashes with baggies.

He covers all the bases on various synching options, stands, clamps, light mods -- and a section on wireless TTL. There was even a piece on how to secure a flash to a wall using one of those little AS-19 flash feet and some tape. (I had never thought of that, actually.)

There are lots of books on light and lighting. But to my knowledge, this is the first one that specifically addresses so much of what you can do with small flashes while shooting in a corporate/editorial style. It's all about learning to use smaller-power light sources to "go with the flow" of the ambient of a scene, rather than just nuking the whole thing with a gazillion watt-seconds.

If your thing is shooting skateboarders at twilight with their hair engulfed in flames, you'll probably want to wait for the next train. Minimalist Lighting is not about cutting-edge, push-the-envelope visual stuff. Kirk's style is clean an personal, with a corporate look that keeps him busy as a professional shooter in Texas.

But if you are looking for a book to show you exactly how one man is making it happen, and to fill in the gaps in your own skills, Kirk will be happy to show you his way. This is a book for photographers who want to learn how to light clean and corporate, without buying (or hauling around) a ton of lighting gear.

Minimalist Lighting: Professional Techniques for Location Photography, is published by Amherst Media. It lists for $34.95, but will be selling on Amazon for $23.07. There is also an additional 5% pre-order discount if you purchase before the book ships, which is estimated to be on May 1st.

Kirk's Website:
KirkTuck.com

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Marry Me, Katharine Gammon

Wired Magazine, my favorite mag for just about everything -- especially photography -- blogged about this month's cover story and included lighting diagrams from the photographer. They were done Joe McNally style, on airline cocktail napkins.

Please, Katharine, let this start happening every month. I will link to you forever and ever, 'till death do us part.

-30-

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

On Assignment: Controlling Daylight, Pt. 1

Last week, I photographed Jessie Newburn, a local blogger and social networking maven. I shot in the middle of the afternoon to use this portrait as an example of how to light an outdoor portrait with a couple of small flashes on a sunny day.

(First step: Cheat.)

Being able to create a speedlight-lit photo like this any day, rain or shine, is a pretty straightforward process, if you take it one step at at time.


Tame the Sun, Then Use It

The first thing to do when choosing a location for a lit outdoor portrait on a sunny afternoon is to get rid of the sun. The Big Shots use huge gobos to shield their subjects from the sun. But those cost big bucks and you have to cart them around. My solution, find some shade.

Being in the northern hemisphere, for me that means finding shade on the north sides of buildings. So that is where I looked when selecting a background for this shot.

As we have seen before, shade is your friend for outdoor lighting. It kills the direct sunlight, and leaves you with diffuse light that is several stops darker. The lower quantity and more diffuse quality of the light both work for you when it comes to combining the ambient with flash.


Looking at this wide shot of the shooting location, you can see how a shade environment helps the cause greatly. We shot under an embankment that leads up to a town fountain.

Unless you live at the equator and you are shooting at noon on one of the equinoxes, you can always from a shady building side to shoot against.


Here's a quick available light test shot, taken at 1/160th of a sec at f/5.0 at ISO 200. I went with a normal, moderately high sync speed that just about any camera could hit. (No special camera hacks today.) Remember, if you can knock down the ambient, you do not need insane sync speeds to do this kind of thing in the middle of the afternoon.

What we are going to do is to use this shady area ambient light as fill light, and then use flash to create the main light. So, as you might be able to guess, the next thing I do is to knock that aperture down however many stops I want the fill light to be below the main light.

This is your choice, based on how much drama you want to add into your photo. I took it down from f/5.0 to f/11, which is two and one-third stops. This makes for a nice, contrasty lighting ratio for some real texture.


You can now see the ambient-light-only photo, shot at f/11 at 1/160th at ISO 200, which shows you what my photo will look like before the flash is added. I consider this process as setting up a "baseline" exposure for the photo. Whatever the flash doesn't illuminate will look like this.

Now, it's just a matter of lighting Jessie. Bringing an SB-800 in close, shooting at 1/2 power in a shoot-through umbrella, I bring her back up to a nice exposure -- with a much better quality of directional light. This is further enhanced with a 1/4 CTO warming gel on the flash, warming her but leaving the rest of the environment cool, for nice color contrast.

(BTW, we had taken a little break from the Lighting 102 course, but we'll be diving back into that very soon -- and the "gels" section is next.)

So we now have a dropped-down ambient and a warm-lit Jessie, which makes a pretty nice photo. But if you have an extra flash laying around, you can use it to add texture and dimension to the background of your photo.

In this case, I shot it at a hard angle against that back wall to splash a little (ungelled) light back there and bring out the wall's texture. Remember, if you are using your ambient as a fill light, at a ratio you choose, you can use your second light to add depth and texture to your environment.


As you can see form this sectional crop of the scene shot above, I raked the flash across the back wall. In this frame, it is on the right. It was set at 1/8 power and I was using a Honl Shorty Snoot to control the spill. The fact that there is no gel on the back flash allows us a little front-to-back color contrast in the frame, too.

(Click here to see it bigger. FYI, I was shooting from the left side of this frame, towards the wall on the right side.)


Looking at the top shot again, hopefully you can now see all of these elements coming together in a way that allows you to recreate this style in any full-shade environment. Sometimes when you look at a picture with three or four lighting elements going on at the same time, the reverse engineering can be difficult.


Again, the lighting elements being used are:

• The cool, ambient shade light, dropped 2 1/3 stops, becomes the fill light -- smooth and dark for a baseline exposure.
• Then we build Jessie back up with soft, directional umbrella light.
• We warm up the main light for nice skin tones and color contrast.
• We rake a little ungelled hard light across the background, for color contrast, texture and depth.


And while a high sync speed always helps, this shot shows us that you Canon 5D (1/200th sync) shooters can absolutely do this kind of stuff. And for those with a full 1/250th sync, the upshot is that you can shoot at a faster shutter speed, which means a more open aperture to get the same ambient exposure. Which in turn means that you can use the flash at lower power for faster recycling/shooting speeds.

Example: Instead of 1/160th at f/11 at 1/2 power on the flash, you can shoot at 1/250th of a sec, at f/9, and drop the flash power level down to 1/2 power -2/3 stop. (Or, 1/4 power +1/3 stop.)

Same look, faster recycling.

I shot a second look of Jessie at this some location. We'll hit this shoot again for a "Part 2" post soon, and also take a look at how to tame those umbrella and light stands, which pretty much turn to sails on a windy day.

Related post:

:: On Assignment: Shade is Your Friend ::

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Welcome, USA Today Readers

If you are dropping by after reading the story in Wednesday's USA Today, we're glad to have you.

Fair warning: You may at first be a little overwhelmed with some of the current lighting info on Strobist.

Don't worry, that's cool. We were all beginners at some point, too. To help make some sense of it all, read our Welcome Page to see what we are all about. Then get ready to hit the Lighting 101 section if you want to start from square one.

For the regulars, hit the "Keep Reading" link for a couple of videos from the USAT interview, one of which is a sort-of lighting demo. And kudos to USAT staff photographer H. Darr Beiser, who creatively avoided unnecessary work by making me light myself...


Videos from the USA Today Interview

They interviewed me at the local library, where I frequently go to work. I am there so often, it is kinda like the "Norm" thing, from Cheers:





When Darr went to take the photo for the paper, he had me light myself on the spot, and then video'd me while I did it:




Many thanks to both Jeff and Darr -- but next time, please use Adobe After Effects to skinny me up some, will ya?

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

RadioPopper-Palooza

The long-awaited CLS-eTTL extending RadioPopper P1s are starting to arrive to people who were early on the shipping list. I was able to get my mitts on a set, and spent last Friday evening at a local lighting meetup trying to get them to fail.

Keep reading for an unboxing video, an installation video and a torture test from our meetup.
__________


Zeke, over at nicephotomag.com, was so excited to get his P1's he fired up the video camera for the unboxing. He posted this on his site:




There is a little bit of a learning curve to installation and use of the P1s. It's not rocket science, but it is a little more involved than slapping on a pair of Pocket Wizards. Jared Platt has created an installation video, which has been posted to the RadioPopper site. You can watch in a separate window here.

__________


But How Well Do They Work?

I got to play with them for about an hour Friday night in a studio in Baltimore, where a bunch of locals were having a Strobist lighting meetup. Don "Wizwow" Giannatti was on hand, in advance of his East Coast lighting seminar.

The bottom line for the RadioPoppers: In a normal, large-room working environment, I could not get them to fail.

Full length of the 60-foot room? Fine.

No line of sight? No problem.

Firing with a TTL flash in an adjacent room for a little accent? Every time.

Once you get the hang of using them, it is basically just like using eTTL, or iTTL/CLS. But you no longer have the 33-feet, line-of-sight, 30-degree angle limitations. As with out in Phoenix, we tried some hi-speed FP sync stuff, too. Worked like a charm.


In fact, I had to leave the building to drive them to failure. Actually, to me more accurate, they were intermittent in this situation.

In the photo above, I had two SB-800s bouncing off of the third-floor studio walls in TTL mode with RPs. Firing my D300 three floors down from the middle of the Light Rail tracks on Howard Street at night, (which is just so stupid on so many levels) I got about a 50% firing rate. But the studio building is an old, brick. typical inner-city structure. This was a bit of a torture test, and pushed the limits of what they could do.

In normal working situations -- outside shooting, large interior room situations, etc. -- they perform very well. I think many people are really going to be stretching what they can do with wireless TTL.

One downside I note is that you have to remove and replace two screws to change the (AA) battery. This will be a bit of a pain for some, I'd think. But I am told the things sip juice pretty economically, so this will not be something you'd be doing halfway through a wedding.

The screws are metal-into-plastic. So use a little care and do not go Incredible Hulk on them so as not to strip the threads. This, BTW, was because the cases were off-the-shelf, which got around the need for the very expensive design molds that can add six digits and much time to the prototyping and production models.

One other thing you'll have to learn as a result of the RadioPoppers that has nothing to do with the RPs themselves. When shooting TTL from a great distance, you may have to dial down the light on your subject if it is a very small part of the compositional frame. This is a limitation of the TTL metering of the cameras themselves, and each system will behave a little differently. But I found it was very easy to dial in the right amount of flash from the shooting position via the CLS system on my D300.

I am not the only person out there playing with the RPs. Matt "Who Needs Instruction Manuals" Adcock jumped right in with them at a wedding shoot. Also, San Francisco-based photog Ed Pignol is playing with them here.

As you guys know, I am not much of a wireless TTL guy. But you CLS'ers and eTTL'ers will hanceforth have lots more capability built into your flash systems with the RPs. Congrats to Kevin King for all of the technical and economic hurdles he bested in getting a very complicated and sophisticated product to market.
_________

Read more:

:: RadioPopper.com ::
:: Brand New (Official) RadioPopper Flickr Group ::

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

By Request: Brendan O'Shea's Post Production

Several people asked for some details on Brendan O'Shea's Photoshop work on the cool band photo featured on Friday. Brendan was kind enough to check in and supply the added info:


Says Brendan:

"I got quite a shock this morning when I checked my inbox. A few people have expressed interest in the post production, although it never works for me if the lighting's not a particular way.

The front light is a shoot through umbrella high enough to light everyone in the group. The backlighting is two more strobes, usually just outside the frame. Once again I go to considerable effort to make sure everyone is lit. This involves juggling positions and placement of subjects before I can take any shots at all. If even one person in the group is unlit, it's not going to work.

In the shot above, there was simply no way to light everyone and have the strobes out of shot due to the narrowness of the alley, so I decided I would hide the right hand strobe in a doorway as best I could, and erase it later if it was too obtrusive. This lane was a through road in the city with traffic, so experimentation wasn't much of an option.
As for post, in this case everything was done in Photoshop, but it was nearly there out of the camera.

Here's what I did with this shot: Cloned out everything that didn't help the shot (cigarette butts, onlookers in the background if there were any, lighting equipment) then I cranked up the Radius on the Unsharp Mask, but kept the amount fairly low. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Really depends on the lighting.

Duplicated that layer, desaturated that new layer and changed the mode to overlay. Changed the opacity until it looked OK. Then I burnt in some highlights on her hair and pants to make them appear shinier. And that's it. Ten minutes tops.

I agree wholeheartedly with those who suggested a less Photoshopped look. I actually prefer the unretouched version (I'll put it up on flick as soon as I can) but when the average consumer can come up with some pretty great photos, I find I have to go a few steps further to give them a reason to hire me. Even if it means crossing the 'good taste' line.
I have no doubt shots like these will become this decade's version of mullets and platform shoes, but for now, and for a really good laugh in thirty years time, they're a lot of fun."
___________

Thanks much for the info, Brendan!

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Like Martin, Only More Spartan

After seeing the Martin Prihoda Delirium video recently, fellow west-coaster Andrew Jorgensen decided to see if he could get close to the look with a trio of speedlights.

Light is light, and if you can find ways to allow for the differences in power levels, you can do many things with your speedlights that the Big Boys do with their Profotos.

Jorgensen shot four guys from "djHere," a San Diego-based promotions company, for an article in Pacific Magazine. The location was Shelter Island, near San Diego.

He used a Nikon D300, with two SB-800's and a an SB-24. He set one of the SB-800's to slave to the others using the SU-4 slave hack.

That's actually not what the SU-4 mode is really for, but it works great. He used a splitter to sync the other two strobes via one Pocket Wizard. I would have probably just PW'd he SB-24 and set both SB-800's to slave to save running a wire. But his way worked fine, too.


Here's the setup. Even more than the idea of translating Profotos down to speedlights, I like love the Voice-Activated Boom he used to get his main light, shooting through an umbrella, high enough to shoot under it with no stand in the way.

He came fairly close, but was not able to get his backlights high enough because of the distance involved. No secrets there, you just need taller stands, closer distances (for a better angle) or more voice-activated light stand extenders.

Australian photographer Brendan O'Shea used the same triangle light (all small Sunpaks) to shoot the group, "Modern Legion" in an alleyway. (His was done in late March.)

Like Jorgensen, he used a little post work to pop it. Seems to work well for this light. And to O'Shea's credit, he not only was very close to Pihroda's look, but was out there before even seeing that video on the big light technique.

Just two quick examples to show that the idea of looking at the big light stuff and translating down to speedlights can work. You just have to be able to make accommodations for the differences in power.
_________

Related Links:

:: Andrew Jorgensen's Flickr Page ::
:: Brendan O'Shea's Flickr Page ::
:: Original Martin Pihroda Video ::

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

On Assignment: Par For the Course

UPDATE: I am seeing all of the questions in the comments about the G9 sync hack, getting it above 1/500th, the "neutered SC-17" thing and the various LumiQuest softboxes. I will be answering each of those areas in a subsequent post. So if you have more Q's, just stick them into the comments of this post.
________

Last week I went to Severn, Maryland to photograph a young female golfer who is sixteen year-old sophomore in high school.

She competes on the men's team and drives form the mens' tees. Before you start feeling sorry for her, she drives 240 and recently shot a 68 on a par-72 course. She can bring it.

I was shooting her for The Sun, and decided to do the job with my Canon G9. That little point-and-shoot might not look like much compared to the other guys' Nikon D2xs and D2Hs bodies, but it does some neat things that makes it very useful as an always-with-you camera.

I usually will do anything I can to hedge my bets or improve my odds before I even get to an shoot, and this time was no exception. The assignment gave me the basic details, and told me to meet Kaitlyn and her coach at the school's baseball diamond after school let out.

Baseball diamond?

Surely we can do better than that. So the first thing I did was to call her school's athletic director (the only contact number I had) and leave a message asking if we could meet at a local golf course instead.

But I was getting no love from the AD, who never did get back to me before the assignment. Thus the headline for this post. But you at least try.

So I decide to go with Plan B, which is to go with the only setting I had available, and knock it down some by using flash to raise up the relative values on my subject.

Problem is, the assignment was for 2:30 in the afternoon, so I was going to need a lot of watt-seconds to overpower daylight -- or a fast sync speed to make my speedlights appear to be more powerful. Which is why I decided to shoot the assignment on my Canon G9.

It'll sync up to 1/2500th of a second without using any kind of a power-sucking FP mode. You just have to tweak it a little so the camera does not know to limit it's shutter to 1/500th of a sec for flashing.

It makes nice files, too. It's 12 megapixels, but the smaller chip size means there is some inherent noise because of the pixel density. So I tend to think of it as an equivalent of an 8MP chip for blow-up purposes and not stretch those pixels out too far.

Anyway, it shoots as low as ISO 80, 1/2500th of a sec at f/8. Which, if you go with the "sunny-16" rule, tells you that it can sync a flash while underexposing daylight roughly three full stops. So it's got that going for it. Which is nice.

But I'm never one to just go with the math -- I like to test things. You know, see them for myself.


So I went out into the front yard grounds of Strobist World Headquarters. I hand-held a flash off-camera, aimed at a tree, and underexposed (cloudy) daylight by two stops. Worked just fine, and I still had some shutter speed / aperture stops left to go for safe measure. Cool.

The next day, when I got to the baseball diamond that would have to substitute for a golf course, I found a shooting direction that would give me a good tree line. The baseball diamond is still there, of course, but I was gonna drop it down to not be so noticeable. I am shooting into the sun, on a partly cloudy / sunny day.

I like shooting into the sun when I am lighting, as the sky can look really cool when you knock it down. Also, your subject is in shadow, which makes them easier to light and they are not squinting into the sun.


As is usually the case, my stand-in while I waited for Kaitlyn was my left hand. It has proved to be a dependable lighting model, if not a muse, for many years.

I cranked my ISO down to 80, and my shutter to 1/2500th (that is so sweet) and dialed in the sky exposure I wanted via the aperture. Nothing technical -- just chimping and looking at my screen on back.

Why this way? ISO 80 gives me the best image quality, which is especially important on a small-chip camera. And the 1/2500th shutter speed meant that I could use the biggest aperture opening possible for ease of flash balancing.

The sky looked best at 1/2500th at f5. Next step is to adjust the flash to give me a good exposure on my hand at f/5. I stuck a Nikon SB-800 on a stand, and softened it a little with a LumiQuest Soft Box II. From about 6 feet away, my hand looked good at about 1/4 power. I synched it with two daisy-chained SC-17 cords -- one neutered and one straight.

So, now I have my shooting aperture, shutter speed, ISO and main light power level all ready to go. Takes way longer to write about it than to do it, actually.

But want a little separation light, too, so I stick a second SB-800 opposite the main light, set to slave with the SU-4 hack. It was pointed pretty close to right back in my lens, so I gobo'd it off with a Honl shorty snoot and a speed strap.

By the way, I have become a big fan of speed straps and will be doing a piece on them (and how to make them) very soon.

This was set at 1/16 power, based solely on the way it looked hitting the left side of my hand in the shooting position. Speaking of shooting position, I always use a marker on the ground for consistency when I am setting up light before a subject arrives. Makes stuff much less complicated.

So, now I'm all set when she gets there.


When she arrives, I back myself up with a quick mug shot right off the bat. For this, I used a Sigma 50-150/2.8 on a Nikon D300.

Why the backup shot, different body and different lens? Lotsa reasons. It is insurance against a bad card, bad camera and/or a malfunctioning lens. Or if something happens and she (or I) have to go before we do the lit shot. Also, it gives the paper a file mug for later, when she shoots a double-eagle and we are not there to see it.

From here on out, everything is easy. As far as the technicals are concerned, she is pretty much the tree in my front yard. No surprises, no complex thinking. I can relax, get her to relax (which is more important) and shoot. I did make one adjustment -- she was a little bright so I dropped my shooting aperture a third of a stop down, to f/5.6. No big whup.


I shot about 45 frames, in B&W and color. I knew it was going to run in B&W inside the sports section, but shot color to have some just in case. They always convert the color originals to B&W, but I think the stuff shot in B&W looks better. Plus, shooting some frames in B&W first helped me to visualize it better for after the conversion.

You can still see the home run fence in the top photo, but it is very much muted. You can't clone it out for the paper, either. That's a real ethical no-no. Fortunately, the paper's repro quality (or lack of it -- we print on Charmin) is such that will mute the line even more if not kill it altogether.

Finally, if you get a chance, take a look at it the top photo bigger, or even full-sized. (Not even full-sized, actually, as I cropped it a little.)

That Canon G9 is a trusty little always-there sidekick that's currently going through the PJ ranks like a hot knife through butter. You can shoot real assignments with it, do amazing stuff with your suddenly-more-powerful flashes, record audio and even shoot full video for the web. That's a lot to like.

Here is the location kit I put together, packed for easy travel and opened up to show what's there. in a waist pack and with minimal shoulder wear-and-tear, I have a high-sync body with a a whole range of lenses, three light sources (SB-800's) with stands, grids, gobo's, umbrella, gels, etc., and SC-17 sync cords for close work. It's ridiculous how much you could do with something that takes up so little space and weight.

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

Bits and Pieces, 4/15/2008

Nothing to tax you too much on Tax Day here in the US. Just a couple of things of interest to lighting photographers. Now if you'll excuse me I gotta get back to seeing if I can figure out a way to classify my SB-800s as dependents...


• Adorama will be hosting "An Evening with Joe McNally" on May 8th, in New York City. (Assuming Joe is past his jet lag from the workshops in Dubai, that is.) It's $25, but you get a $25 gift certificate if you attend. Which makes it free-ish. I'd jump on this pretty quick if you want to go.

• Quest Couch, the man behind all of the LumiQuest Light Modifiers, is looking for feedback on what, if any, kind of a DIY kit they should offer. If you are looking for this kind of stuff, now's your chance to make yourself heard.

• Finally, there's a new issue of The F/Stop out. But I don't think I am smart enough to understand it...

-30-

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

HonlPhoto Speed Grids: Controlling Contrast

While hanging out with the Western Kentucky photojournalism students this weekend, I got a chance to play around with David Honl's new speed grids for a bit. Long story short, I like his better than my DIY versions -- for several reasons.

I have been spending a lot of time lately reverse engineering the light of a few photographers whose work I really admire. What I am seeing is that it is not the light that calls attention to itself so much as the light's ability to draw you into an image in a specific way. I love the idea of subtly -- or not so subtly -- highlighting a portion of an image to draw the eye in.

In the past, I would go on the assumption of the quality of the fill light somehow being less important than the quality of the main light. I'd pay less attention to the feel of the fill light, as it was just there to keep the main light from leaving the wrong kind of shadows.

But recently, I have been paying more attention to my fill light -- even creating it first -- and then laying main light down on top of that. For those of you who do not use a flash meter (as I don't) this can be a very helpful approach to creating exactly the lighting ratios you want.


Take this portrait of (WKU PJ student) Emily, for example. In the photo at left, I sat her in front of a metal case in the WKU photo studio and shot her with a shoot-thru umbrella straight on.

I did this purposefully, to create a specular highlight that I would then have to control. Basically, I wanted to give myself some excessive contrast to then knock down.

Looks fine, except for the line going right through her head. But this wasn't going to be my final photo -- or even my main light. I wanted the straight-on umbrella to be my fill light. But I created my fill with the same level of attention as my main would get.

Then I dropped my flash's power level down two stops. Now I have a darkish photo, lit only by my fill light. But the fill light has the same attention given to it as a main light, and I know that it is filling exactly two stops down.


Now, I bring a second SB-800 at camera left, with a warming gel, and fire it through one of Honl's grids. I used the 1/8 grid, which throws a tighter beam than the 1/4.

As I bring the gridded light up on her face and choose my power setting to get the best exposure, my grid becomes my main light and my umbrella becomes my fill. And the fill is exactly the quality and the quantity that I want.

As far as the grid itself, I really liked the smooth falloff at the edges of the beam much better than my DIY versions. The light was more uniform and the pattern was a little looser, too.

Not to poo-poo my DIY grids, because they have served me well. But the store-bought grids are also smaller (cubic inches are always at a premium in my case) and had a very rugged build. You could probably run over them with a car and they'd be fine.

But back to the light, this is something I will definitely be experimenting with over the next few weeks. I am putting together a portrait series as a long-term project. And I think that hard light, coupled with the right kind of fill, will be a good fit.

These production sample grid spots are going to get a lot of use over the next few months. (So, sorry, Dave. These are not coming back.)
_______

Related links:

Gear used: Nikon D300 | Tamron 17-50/2.8 | Nikon SB-800 | Honl Speed Grid
First Look: Honl Speed Grids
DIY Grid How-To's: Cardboard | Straws | Coroplast
WKU Photojournalism Program

This month's feeds are sponsored by:

How to Give a Seminar in Your Underwear

Ever have that dream where you wake up, totally unprepared, and have to go to school to take a test in your underwear?

That's what pretty much happened to me this morning.


__________


SWA Sends You an Extra Reservation, Just for Good Measure

If you'll indulge an OT rant, here's how not to start a trip off very smoothly.

Back story: I am heading to Bowling Green Kentucky this weekend, home of Western Kentucky University, possibly the most kickass photojournalism program in the country, to do an in-house lighting seminar.

Looking forward to catching up with my former colleagues Fran and Kurt, and eating on the university dime.

I throw all of my clothes in the wash.

My Friday flight leaves at 5:20 p.m., gets into Nashville an hour later, nonstop, no lost bags - easy stuff. I check in online on Friday at 10:00 a.m., because it is just an hour flight and I really do not care where I sit on SWA's first-come boarding service.

I pull the reservation for my 5:20 p.m. flight. Only, hey, look -- now says that I am on the 10:05 a.m. flight, which presumably is now climbing towards its cruising altitude.

Two seconds of silence. Followed by about a minute of

(The following paragraph has been edited by Blogger.com for content and language)

Motor BOATER?!?!? My motorboating reservation is for motorboating 10:00 a.m.???? Flock!

FLOCK!

Flockflockflockflockflock!!!

(Picture Hugh Grant in the opening scene of Four Weddings and a Funeral, only without the dashing good looks at the proclivities for cross-dressing hookers.)

Okayokayokay. Check flights between now and tomorrow morning. Everything full except a 12:40, which is close to full. Gear is packed. I think. Close enough -- just go with what is packed. Clothes are (MotorBOATER!) in the wash...

What's clean? two pair of shorts, some T's, some second-string underwear and a few pairs of mismatched socks. Doesn't matter. Gotta go. Now.

Susan drives me to the airport ASAP to save the short term parking expenses. Instead, all it costs me are helpful reminders from her that I maybe I should think about keeping a calendar.

(For the record, I do. It's just not written down. And thanks for lowering the stress level, hon...)

Get to BWI and to the check-in person to plead my case as a frequent flier of Southwest Airlines.

Only, hey, look, Mr. Hobby -- turns out you are still on the original 5:20 p.m. flight! Turns out we accidentally sent you two completely different reservations by mistake, just to keep you on your toes. No problem. You're all set.

Wait. You sent me a reservation for my flight, and an extra, "DoNotOpenUnlessYouWantAHeartAttack" reservation for a flight that leaves six hours earlier?

Yeah, oops, that happens sometimes. Sorry about that! Want some peanuts?
_________


So, now I am at BWI, six hours early, where I am either gonna catch a stand-by on an earlier flight or do the $9.95 internet-for-a-day thing and try to get some work done.

And try to get my friggin' blood pressure down to pre-Southwest levels.

So, if you are coming to the weekend lighting gig at WKU, and I look a might disheveled and about 20 years older, now you know why.

And thanks for letting me vent. I feel better already.


UPDATE: Sorry For the Screwup. $66.00, Please!

This just keeps getting sillier.

When I arrives at the airport only to find out that I had been sent the "special" extra reservation, Southwest check-in lady apologizes profusely and offers to stick me on standby for the interim flights.

"The 12:40 is only oversold by 2 people," she says. "Should be no problem!"

Well, that's something, at least. Maybe I will not have to wait at BWI for six hours unnecessarily.

So I put my name on the list for the 12:40 flight -- first in line past the oversold folks. Which means I have to check my hard case (stands, umbrellas, ring flash adapter, all the other not-too-fragile stuff) on the 12:40 in case I get the earlier flight.

12:20.

Hey, first good news of the day -- there is one seat available on the flight. (Gate agent man is cracking jokes at this point, asking if my last name happens to be "Hamilton," or perhaps at least "Jackson".)

It might be "Washington," I reply. At least someone still has their sense of humor today. Which is a good thing, I guess.

"That'll be $66.00 for the schedule change," gate