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3 NYC photo sessions

June 30, 2009 Neil vN 20 Comments

NYC photo sessions with models

I met up with 3 models in New York recently for a photo session with each.  The intention was to try out different lighting techniques, different equipment .. and just to have fun and see what we can come up with.

First we roamed the Meat-packing District and Greenwich with Aleona and Laura Lee, and then later on met up with Sasha in Brooklyn.  This video clip will be a glimpse of working with three gorgeous models in an ever-fascinating city. Enjoy! I think what might be interesting with this video, is to see the wider view in relation to the resulting image.

The lighting ranged from just available light, to using off-camera Q-flash with a softbox, and later on with Sasha, some video lights.  A flexible approach that allows for divergent results, helping to keep the final mix of images fresh.

The equipment: (B&H)
Nikon D3;  Nikon 24-70mm f2.8 AF-S;  Nikon 70-200mm f2.8 AF-S;  Nikon 200mm f2 AF-S 

[ For more videos, follow me on Vimeo / YouTube ]

Filed Under: flash photography, general photography, lighting, models, Uncategorized, video clip


 

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Neil vN

Books by Neil van Niekerk


 




20 Comments, Add Your Own

  1. 1Tom K. says

    June 30, 2009 at 5:15 pm

    Killer video Neil. Seeing you shoot makes learning techniques that much easier to understand. Keep em coming!

    Reply
  2. 2John W. MacDonald says

    June 30, 2009 at 6:10 pm

    Wow, Neil! That was breathtaking. Thanks for posting the vid of you at work.

    Reply
  3. 3Rene Skrodzki says

    June 30, 2009 at 9:55 pm

    LOL I had no idea you had an accent :)

    Excellent video, learned a little bit in that actually.

    Reply
  4. 4David says

    June 30, 2009 at 9:56 pm

    Hi Neil,
    A big thank you again for sharing a fantastic video which allows a better understanding of how you set you shots up.

    I notice the video stream defaults to HD content under Firefox browser (haven’t tested it with IE yet)
    With the video being played in a small window what is your thoughts on changing the default video stream to SD and allowing the HD switch if a user requires it?
    This would help reduce the data bandwidth on the server hosting your site.

    Either that or quickly ping the user, who is requesting the video content, to gain their computers connection speed, a script can then decide which stream to use, either HD or SD.

    Hope this is a helpful idea,
    kind regards.
    David

    Reply
  5. 5Tim C. says

    June 30, 2009 at 11:55 pm

    Throrougly enjoyed it! Have been following your posts for a while now, and first time I’ve seen you allow us to linger more into your shoots, and expose us to more of the equipment you use.

    Make us (me) feel a lot closer to you and your creativeness, that being photography. Applause and thank you. I look forward to seeing more posts that allow us to connect more.

    Reply
  6. 6Danny says

    July 1, 2009 at 12:38 am

    Awesome video, and awesome results as usual. It’s good to see how the photos came to be, even if it’s just a glimpse.

    That 200mm f2 is monstrous, by the way. But the results are mindblowing. It’ll also blow up some wallets.

    Reply
  7. 7John says

    July 1, 2009 at 11:48 am

    Neil
    Very Cool video. I cant wait for your book, any idea when it will come out?
    John

    Reply
  8. 8David Purslow says

    July 1, 2009 at 12:16 pm

    Neil,

    Now thats what I am talking about !

    cant wait to see more of your video’s, if you could include your thoughts about why you chose the direction of your flash, if its fill or overpowering main etc, this would be very helpful !

    Love it – got my first shoot while being filmed next week on a live TTD – eeek

    dp

    Reply
  9. 9Laura says

    July 1, 2009 at 2:15 pm

    neil,

    you are awesome! thank you so much for giving us insight as to how a shoot is done. your blog has greatly improved my photography and dared me to use flash (that is when my pictures started to pop!) when will your book be coming out? i’m definitely buying it.

    Reply
  10. 10Neil says

    July 1, 2009 at 3:11 pm

    Laura and John … I have the pre-release copy of my book already! So I guess the book will hit the shelves in the next few weeks. I’ll announce it properly when it does.

    Neil vN

    Reply
  11. 11Justin says

    July 1, 2009 at 9:05 pm

    What is on the lens hood of the 70-200? It looks like it has flames painted on the side at 0:54. That would be very cool.

    Reply
  12. 12Neil says

    July 1, 2009 at 10:10 pm

    Justin .. I use my lens hoods as storage space for strips of gaffer tape, and for pieces of gel for my flash.

    I didn’t use the gels on this shoot, but they are always handy to keep around.

    Neil vN

    Reply
  13. 13RON LEMISH says

    July 2, 2009 at 7:52 am

    Keep feeding us the videos.

    However, would like to know the following
    f-stop, shutter speed, and were you on manual or aperture preferred mode.

    Do you ever use program mode?

    Last but of great interest –
    you were wirelessly setting off the light box, but what was that sync cord I saw briefly in the video? Was your transmitter not positioned in the hot shoe of your camera??

    PS – thanks for the fast reply re my SB-900 question.
    I’m going crazy how I am missing an SB-8000. Dammit, 2 in 2 years.

    Happy 4th of July

    Reply
  14. 14Neil says

    July 2, 2009 at 2:09 pm

    Hi there Ron ..

    I will post some of the images (and a few others) over time, with more of an explanation. I always feel that just the settings alone doesn’t impart that much information .. as opposed to an explanation of the method and thought-process.

    I’m nearly always in manual exposure mode on my camera .. and when I work with flash it *has* to be in manual mode on my camera, especially when the flash is manual.

    As for the sync cord you saw, it is part of the Quantum wireless system, as explained in a previous post on the portable lighting set-up I took with me when I photographed a wedding in Las Vegas. (It’s seen here in this photo on the Canon 1D mk3.)

    Neil vN

    Reply
  15. 15Jason Smith says

    July 8, 2009 at 3:57 am

    Neil

    This is great – thank you. I pre ordered your book months am looking forward to getting my hands on it.

    In the last session with Sasha where you have the sun setting in the background – did you use any flash or is that just available light.

    Is that the Medium Photoflex softbox in the first shoot that you mentioned in a recent post.

    Cheers

    Reply
  16. 16Neil says

    July 12, 2009 at 6:09 pm

    Hi there Jason ..

    The images of Sasha that is so heavily backlit was with the available light only. Also the photo of her where I used the decrepit van in the background, was also just available light.

    In both those instances, the light falling onto her face was soft and even, and I didn’t need to use flash. Nor did I want to balance my foreground exposure with the background.

    And yes, it is the Medium Photoflex softbox, (B&H), that I used here.

    Neil vN

    Reply
  17. 17hoddo says

    July 15, 2009 at 11:48 am

    Neil

    As TomK says up top, using the videos is a great tool to reinforce your blog posts.

    Where you using just one light in these shoots?

    Oh and does that softbox also have an internal diffuser? I’ve recently bought the Lastolite Ezybox which comes with two and really knocks the flash output down.

    Reply
  18. 18Neil says

    July 19, 2009 at 3:40 pm

    Hi there ..

    Where I used flash, it was just the single light through a double-baffled softbox. It does bring down the exposure .. but the Q-flash (with the diffuser disc) has a tiny bit more power than a speedlight, so that does help. And then I can always pop the Q-flash’s diffuser disc off for more power.

    Neil vN

    Reply
  19. 19Paul says

    September 29, 2009 at 11:30 am

    All your pics got their subject in the centre of the frame, why did u do that?

    Reply
  20. 20Neil says

    October 1, 2009 at 4:58 pm

    Paul .. that’s how I preferred the composition to these simple portraits at the time.

    On the subject of framing .. how would you have framed them differently?
    Mechanically constrained by the Rule of Thirds?

    Neil vN

    Reply

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