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April 2, 2012
even with high ISO settings, you still need great light
Still having fun with the new Canon 5D Mark III (B&H), I met up with Elmira again in New York. Elmira is the model I used in my initial tests of the Canon 5D Mark III high-ISO performance. Being a delightful model to work with, I decided to use her again as a subject.
New York was cold on this day, so shooting indoors just seemed a lot more attractive. We went to Grand Central Station – a grandiose building, but with light levels quite low. Low enough that I was glad that I brought the Canon EF 35mm f1.4L (B&H) along.
camera settings: 1/100 @ f/2 @ 3200 ISO
Even with a high ISO like that, I had to use a fast aperture.
An approach that I strongly believe in though, is that “using the available light” is not random decision. It needs consideration of what your light is actually like, and whether it is flattering. What I did here was to pull Elmira towards a light source, so that the light would come in from an angle over her shoulder …
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February 22, 2012
bounce flash portrait – a consistent technique
WPPI 2012 took place during the past week – as always, a crazy-hectic and exciting event. I once again presented a Master Class at WPPI. But I also took time to present a private mini-workshop to the first 3 people that signed up. We went over a condensed version of my full-day workshop, covering most of the material in the 4-hr long mini-workshop. Like last year, I called on my favorite model in Las Vegas, Shawna. Actually, she has since moved to L.A. but she was quite happy to make the trip back to Las Vegas to be our model.
The start of the practical part of the flash photography workshop is always on-camera bounce flash. For this article, I thought I’d use some of the demo photos, to show that there is a consistent technique here. A consistent approach that guarantees at least a successful basic portrait with nice light and a pleasant background.
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November 11, 2011
observing and using the available light (model – Anelisa)
With a few top-end point & shoot cameras to test, I met up with Anelisa on this crisp late-Fall afternoon in New York. Similar to how I often work, the idea was to walk around and explore and find interesting places and interesting light to take photographs in. So when at this particular spot in Bryant Park, and I saw the light was just incredible, I ditched the point & shoot cameras, and grabbed my Nikon D3 with the Nikon 35mm f/1.4G (B&H) lens on it.
Since the idea with today’s photo shoot was to *find* interesting and flattering light – as opposed to creating it with off-camera flash – I had no additional lighting with me. Not even a speedlight. It was all about observing and using the available light. And this is how we found ourselves here in this particular spot …
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October 12, 2011
example: direct off-camera flash vs softbox (model: Ulorin Vex)
Ulorin Vex posing for us during part of the on-location session of the flash photography workshops which I presented in San Francisco earlier this year. Ulorin Vex is of course absolutely stunning, as always. While I often direct models how they should pose, this one is all her doing . Not even I can improve on that.
The image here at the top was shot with an off-camera softbox – my usual preferred Lastolite Ezybox softbox. The direction of the light here should immediately reveal the approximate position where the light was positioned. Just as comparison, we removed the two baffles of the Lastolite, to see how direct off-camera flash would compare. We kept the softbox hull in place, so it did help contain the spread of light a bit. As you’d expect, the results look more dramatic.
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September 12, 2011
photo session: urban ballerina – Oktavia
Oktavia is the stunning model on the cover of my book on off-camera flash. We’ve intended to do another photo shoot ever since then, but busy schedules kept us from that until recently. A theme that Oktavia wanted to explore, was that of the Urban Ballerina. The idea with the urban ballerina is the contextual dissonance of having a graceful dancer in the middle of some urban setting. There’s no real meaning to it other than contrasting art & beauty against the harsher urban setting.
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September 9, 2011
Lea – moving portrait – Canon 300mm f/2.8L IS II
Canon just released the Canon 300mm f/2.8L IS II (B&H), an update to an already highly-regarded lens, and I was able to get a review copy courtesy of B&H. I tried this lens out during a photo session with a model, Lea. Instead of just photographs, I decided to shoot video and create a “moving portrait” of her.
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August 28, 2011
exposure metering & observing the available light
As a photographer you’ll often hear instruction to just “look at the available light”. Great. But this advice is also often given without clear examples of what we’re actually supposed to be looking at. So let’s explore that a little bit using a sequence of images of our model, Aleona, photographed during a recent individual photography workshop.
This is also keeping with the loose theme over the past few weeks, that for a photographer “using the available light” is not a random thing or just a meaningless catch-phrase.
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August 10, 2011
photo session (available light) – Ekaterina
Ekaterina, (or Kate, if your tongue trips over her name), was the model at the top of my recent review of the Canon 8-15mm f/4L fisheye zoom lens. Since the fisheye makes everything bendy, and it must be the least flattering of lenses for portraits, I wanted to show a handful of images from the rest of the photo session with her. These should portray her graceful beauty much better.
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July 25, 2011
Ulorin Vex – Hotel Monaco foyer (photo session 4)
During the same afternoon that I had the opportunity to photograph Ulorin Vex, I took several other sequences of images of her in other costume. Here we worked in the foyer area of the Hotel Monaco in San Francisco. (If only all other hotels had such a diversity of immediately photogenic areas!) With this image, I wanted a near-symmetrical image, with just Ulorin Vex’s posture slightly breaking the symmetry up. Just enough to make a stunning subject even more eye-catching.
A little more about the train-of-thought to getting to this image …
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July 22, 2011
off-camera flash – creating separation with back-lighting
Another image from the photo session with Bethany, when I was in San Francisco earlier this year. This interesting background is part of the lobby area of a San Francisco night-club. I knew the wooden panelling and subdued incandescent lighting would make an interesting background because of the repetitive pattern and glow. A slow shutter speed brought the background light in … and then I used flash to light her. I didn’t gel my flash – specifically so that the background light would go that warm. The pull-back shot will show the simplicity of the lighting …
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