Flash photography is one of those subjects that seem daunting from ‘the outside’. It might seem like you’re chipping away at something so big that it might even appear incomprehensible.
I actually do believe that flash photography is one of those subjects where you have to grasp a number of things simultaneously, before anything makes real sense.
This page has just been added to the main set of pages on flash photography techniques. My intention is that it might serve as a solid starting point in understanding flash photography, with links leading to various other pages within the site. Hopefully it all converges to the same point – some aha! moments where everything seem a lot clearer. And hopefully that page will help some in making flash photography more accessible a subject than it might appear.
As always, your feedback and questions on that page is welcome.
2009 was another crazy-busy year for me. As regular readers of the Tangents blog will know, the majority of my work is as a New Jersey wedding photographer. This also includes the various photo sessions, as well as the wedding albums that had to be designed. Adding to my crazy schedule were the 17 photography workshops that I presented across the USA; and 4 sold-out workshops in the UK and Ireland! Regulars here will also know that another major event was my book on flash photography that was released in August ‘09.
But, most of my work though centers around the weddings that I photograph. This year again I was fortunate in meeting and working with wonderful brides and groom and their families. As a wrap-up of the year – and also to show off a bit – here is a slideshow of some of my favourite wedding images of 2009.
Click on the controls for the slideshow to start. (There is music accompanying the slideshow.)
The question invariably comes up: why a piece of black foam and not a white card or a piece of white foam?
I have replied to this in the various articles here, using this image below .. but I think the reply tends to be overlooked as the articles are pushed deeper. So with that, I thought I’d resurrect my reply to this one specific reply to that question.
I wanted to place my light source (ie, the area where I am bouncing off), at some point to the right of me, and above me, but also a little to the front of the bride. This way her arm and back to me, are under-lit compared to her face (which we see here as a reflection in the mirror.) Instead of a plastic light modifier or something similar, I used a black piece of foam to flag the light from my speedlight.
An open card with white on the one side might have thrown too much light into the room again, flattening the lighting. I don’t want that. I want directional light. I want that interplay between light and shade. I want contrast.
And in an opposite way of reasoning, a snoot might be too specific, since I do need a fairly large area to bounce effectively.
I like this piece of black foam. I can roll it a little bit with my left hand, and turn it into a snoot if I want to. I can also roll it back and open it up. Ultimately, this piece of black foam is simple, yet flexible. And this is what I use if I need to bounce my speedlight with a fair amount of control over the flash’s light.
Then there are also two other perennial questions:
- if there are no bounce-able surfaces, then you have to make other plans. You either have to use different light modifiers, or use direct flash, or ideally, off-camera lighting. You will obviously not be able to use a piece of black foam to flag yourself and your speedlight out of all kinds of impossible scenarios. You have to be adaptable in how you use light.
As a summary, I want to emphasise this point again – there is no quick fix. I am staunchly against the idea of a cure-all approach to lighting and flash photography. Specifically, the idea that a single piece of plastic attached to your flash will give you the best results all the time – that idea will hold you back.
You have to constantly adapt your technique by considering your subject, the scenario you’re in .. and the results you’d finally like to achieve.
My daughter, Janine. She turned 16 in September, and I have so very few recent images of her. None of which are of professional quality. So I cajoled her into this, since we’re snowed in this afternoon .. and she loved the results. “Facebook profile photo FTW!”
The image is straight out of camera, aside from healing brush on a few skin blemishes. This is how I had set up my B&W images to look in my Nikon D3 bodies. I still shoot RAW though, so could always go back to the colour image. But I like these rich-toned B&W images.
A little more about the lighting:
The main light was with the Profoto beauty dish (B&H), using the Profoto AcuteB 600R power pack (B&H). I used a diffuser sock (B&H) over the beauty dish. The light on the grey backdrop is a Quantum flash, with the usual Q-flash diffuser disc over it .. pointed directly at the backdrop.
The sock over the beauty dish really helps me. It brings in more light into the shadow areas in how it disperses the light differently from the open beauty dish. I’ve read elsewhere that with a sock over the beauty dish you’re essentially no better off than using a softbox of the same size … but I still prefer the look of the ’socked’ beauty dish over the ‘unsocked’ beauty dish.
Over the course of the past year or so, I’ve made a steady attempt to move this blog away from being wedding-heavy, and take the material more towards general photography, and photographing people.
However, since the most of my work is as done as a wedding photographer in New Jersey, I still get a large number of questions which relate to wedding photography - and specifically, photographing the reception. So I thought I would expand a little on the techniques I use in photographing wedding receptions.
Other reasons for not using additional off-camera lighting at receptions usually have to do with the logistics and space, and shape of the reception room. Quite often there just isn’t space to safely put down a lightstand or two. Also, more and more receptions venues are lately using up-lighting. This already helps create a more colourful and interesting background, and additional flashguns would just destroy the mood.
This enigmatic image is my favourite from an event I helped photograph this weekend. A performance artist at a Bar Mitzvah party had this incredible act with a massive balloon which he’d manipulate, and dance with, and dance into, and dance out of. You really need to see a video clip of it. One of the many images I took during this sequence was this one where he moved right into the guests who were watching him.
The lighting on him was from the videographerwho was kneeling next to me. Since his act was so unique, and so fast-paced .. and the lighting changing, I wanted to make sure I covered all bases. I therefore shot alternate frames as fast as I could .. with flash, and without flash. This way I can always pick out afterwards what works best. I really like having both options to choose from iin situations like this. I want some photographs with flash to make sure I have well-lit images … but also some without flash, just in case the flash completely destroyed the mood and look of the photographs.
The way that I easily disable the flash with a button push, is by setting custom function F6 on the Nikon D3 body to disable flash output. It is the same for the D700, and if memory serves me, it is similar for the D300. With F6 set to disable flash with the push of the button with my thumb, it is very simple to take images with and without flash.
This is how I do the comparative images on this website, where I show what the ambient light looked like, and how an image looks with flash added. Unfortunately there is no easy way to do this on Canon D-SLRs.
In post-processing the image, I had to bump up the Exposure in raw processing by 1 stop. To saturate the colours like that, I went in to Lab mode and made a few adjustments. (More about that in follow-up posts on how to make your images pop in Photoshop.)
I’d like to present another in the ongoing series on giving your images more ’snap’ in Photoshop. This time, I’d like to specifically look at Topaz Adjust- a neat plug-in for Photoshop. What I like about Topaz, is its simplicity of use – but if you want, you can delve much deeper into it. The possibilities are wide open. (Also nice is that it is relatively inexpensive as software goes.)
There are hundreds of ways you could use this program, because you can blend the different effects in different ways on a single image. So what we’re going to cover here is but one way of using this program to enhance an image in Photoshop.
This image of our model, Anissa, is nearly straight out of the RAW converter. I did retouch a few skin blemishes and stray strands of hair. But the starting image here is essentially un-retouched. By the way, the lighting is entirely available light – the open shade behind a building.
Here’s the original image:
.. and with a sprinkling of some Photoshop fairy dust, we end up with this image above: [ click on either photo for a larger image ]
The Photoshop fairy dust in this instance is a combination of different effects in Topaz Adjust,
and blending them in a specific way ..
(btw, if you’d like to order any Topaz product through that affiliate link, use the discount code ‘planetneil’ for a 15% discount off any item in your shopping cart.)
The effect in this instance was done by over-smoothing the image, and then running two effects on that over-smoothed layer which both accentuates the overall contrast and local contrast in some way. Even if you don’t use Topaz Adjust, it will be of interest to see how things are done, since you could try this combination out with other Photoshop effects with good results.
With flash photography, suggestions are often given that you should use rear-curtain sync. Most often for the wrong reasons. So here is when NOT to use rear-curtain sync flash … whenever you don’t need it. Sounds confusing? Well, let me explain …
Rear-curtain / second curtain sync
Your camera’s shutter consists of two curtains that open, and allows the light to hit the sensor or film.
This is true for all focal plane shutter film cameras, (as opposed to those with leaf shutters),
and true for all digital cameras that have a mechanical shutter, (as opposed to an electronic shutter.)
To allow light to hit the sensor (or film), the first shutter opens, and then some short time duration later, the second curtain closes. Now, in using slower shutter speeds than max sync speed, most D-SLRS and speedlights allow you two points at which you can sync your flash.
You can either have your flash fire right at the point when the first shutter has opened, (first curtain sync), or juuust before the second curtain (rear curtain) closes.
This gives two different effects when your subject is moving laterally across your frame. The way the ambient blur records in relation to the flash-frozen moving subjects, looks different for those two ways of syncing your flash. If you’re photographing people (or any subject) in low light, and you use flash .. while that subject is moving, then rear curtain sync will most likely give you the best effect. (More about that in a follow-up article later on.)
However, when your subject is static, there really is no difference in how your photograph will appear .. except when you’re using TTL flash, and you’re photographing people looking at the camera.
Digging deep into the archives again, re-scannning some 5×7 prints in my portfolio:
I had the pleasure of photographing Nelson Mandela, then president of South Africa, at a function in March ‘98. I was one of several photographers covering the event where he addressed people attending a function.
What made this photo-shoot difficult was that NO camera flash was allowed. This was in an attempt not to aggravate eye problems the president experienced. So all photographs were taken with ambient light alone. Which is a challenge inside a dimly lit marquee tent in early evening. I remember being the only photographer there with a tripod.
Date: March ‘98 - Johannesburg, South Africa
Equipment: Nikon F90x; Nikon AF-D 80-200mm f2.8
Exposure: spot-metered; tripod; 1/15th @ f2.8
Film: Fujicolor 800 Super G Plus
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President Mandela obviously enjoying the Imilonji Choir, as he dances to their vibrant singing. His warmth and lack of officiousness have endeared him even more to South Africans and people across the world. President Mandela was also affectionately known as Madiba, an honorary title adopted by elders of Mandela’s clan. The title came to be synonymous with Nelson Mandela.
Date: March ‘98 – Johannesburg, South Africa
Equipment: Nikon F90; Nikon AF-D 35-70mm f2.8
Exposure: matrix; handheld 1/8th @ f2.8
Film: Fujicolor 800 Super G Plus
.. .
As an unrelated anecdote: On one occasion, I even had the opportunity to shake Mandela’s hand – even if it was quite accidental …
Sony released the Cybershot DSC-WX1 digital camera in August ‘09 – a nifty little P&S camera for which they claimed unprecedented low-light capabilities. This compact digital camera has a number of interesting features, of which one of the more interesting one is the Sweep Panorama Mode. It automatically stitches a panoramic image as you sweep the camera around in a near 180 degree angle.
Before we check out the rest of the spec, a little more about the Sweep Panorama feature. It is simplicity itself to use. You simply dial the camera to that setting, hit the shutter button, and sweep the camera around you in a steady motion. That’s it.
Here are a few examples where I tried it out in New York. Now, the obvious way to use this camera would be in a landscape mode, capturing a sweeping vista around you. But in Manhattan, it just made sense to try the WX1 out in vertical mode.
I cropped the images here in a square format to post on the blog, so you will have to click through to the larger image to see the vertical sweep.
Times Square, New York Here I captured a near-180-degree sweep overhead. I started the capture looking South down Times Square, and swept the camera overhead and backwards to capture part of the buildings behind me. Pretty wild! Click through the image and see.
. Flatiron Building, New York
Similarly here, I used the Sony WX1 in an upward sweep.
Click through onto the actual image to see the vertical panorama.
I found this quite impressive. Actually, my response was more, “Cool!”
The beauty of this feature though is that the camera does this automatically for you, on the spot. No need to stitch it together in Photoshop.
You do see some artifacting, especially to the extreme edges as the camera tried to stitch together disparate parts of the scene. Also, if there are people or cars or such moving across the frame, it will give a jagged staggered rendering. This sometimes adds to the effect. But generally, this mode works better on static scenes and subjects. If your motion is unsteady, or the camera can’t stitch a panoramic image from what it is capturing, it will stop and inform you.
Here are two more images, in the more conventional horizontal panoramic mode.
(Once again, click through to see the larger image)
