Tangents

photography tutorials, reviews & workshops

tangents photography blog
learn : discuss : share
  • Tangents
  • Tutorials
    • Flash Photography
    • Wedding Photography
    • Studio Photography
    • Posing People
    • Understanding Your Camera
    • Exposure metering
    • BFT
    • Best Photo Books
  • Reviews
    • Sony
    • Nikon
    • Canon
    • Fuji
    • Profoto
    • lighting gear
  • Workshops
    • Info: Workshops
    • In-person
      tutoring sessions
    • Online
      tutoring sessions
    • Workshops in
      New Jersey (NJ)
    • Workshops in
      New York (NYC)
    • Photo walks in NYC
    • Studio Workshop
    • Video tutorials
    • Workshop results
  • Books
    • On-Camera Flash (revised ed.)
    • Direction & Quality of Light
    • Off-Camera Flash Photography
    • Lighting & Design
    • On-Camera Flash (1st ed.)
  • Projects
    • Two Perspectives
    • B&W Infrared
    • Vintage lenses
    • Time-lapse photography
  • Info
    • About
    • Contact
    • My Photo Gear
    • Books by NvN
    • Join us on Facebook
    • Acclaim
    • Success Stories

Available light portraits – Composition, light and style

February 14, 2014 Neil vN 14 Comments

Available light portraits - Composition and light

Over time I noticed that my style in photographing portraits have gravitated to a specific look where everything is quite simplified - the lighting, the background and the framing of the shot. Whether I use the available light, or video light, or off-camera flash, or even on-camera bounce flash, there's a certain uncomplicated look. I'd like to think of it as elegant unfussy simplicity. Analyzing this, it is easy to see there's a specific method here. It's a method which helps especially when under pressure. Here, even allowing  Read more inside...

Anatomy of a time-limited photo session

January 27, 2014 Neil vN 11 Comments

Brian Friedman is an event and publicity photographer based in NYC. When I first became acquainted with Brian and his work, my reaction was, "damn! I wish I could shoot this type of work." Looking at his website, you'll see the kind of gigs that Brian shoots - interesting and diverse. Quite exciting. Brian was gracious enough to describe the behind-the-scenes activity of a recent photo session: “Kitten Bowl 2014”  

Anatomy of a "simple" photo session for a client

a guest post by Brian Friedman, New York portrait and event  Read more inside...

Environmental portraits – Speedway racer

January 16, 2014 Neil vN 16 Comments

Environmental portraits - Speedway racer, Courtney Lefcourt

When Courtney's mom first contacted me, she told me that Courtney is a race-car driver and that the camera loves her. Intrigued, I met up with her family at the Bethel Motor Speedway for on-location portraits of Courtney. To find out more about Courtney, check out her Facebook page, Courtney Taylor Racing. So the challenge here was two-part. The sun was very bright since it was 3:30pm in the afternoon. The other challenge is that while speedway racing might be an exhilarating sport to watch, the speedway race-track isn't  Read more inside...

Photo homage: A regal portrait with a ferret

November 25, 2013 Neil vN 6 Comments

Photo homage - Regal Portrait with a Ferret

While on a trip to Denver, I had some time free to meet up with my friend, Lynn Clark, one of the best boudoir photographers in Denver. I had asked her to be a subject for my next book, Lighting & Design, and she indulged me. I want each portrait to reveal something of the person I am photographing, and also have some interesting snippets of info for anyone who dips in the book, and of course, for anyone who follows the Tangents blog. So while Lynn is an accomplished boudoir photographer, I didn't want to go with the obvious idea of  Read more inside...

Photographing a vintage motorbike on location with Profoto lighting

September 23, 2013 Neil vN 19 Comments

Photographing a vintage motorbike on location with Profoto lighting gear

I'm getting to meet so many people while photographing interesting subjects for my book, Lighting & Design, that I was bound to meet some truly interesting characters. John collects vintage ... oh, everything. Most impressive in a way, is John's workshop where he maintains his two vintage era motorbikes and a Model A Ford. The tools in his workshop are all authentic to the era ... and they work. The way John describes it, it actually makes sense in the way he maintains  everything with hand-tools and lathes  Read more inside...

On-location corporate headshots – Efficiency and speed

September 16, 2013 Neil vN 29 Comments

On-location corporate headshots - Efficiency and speed

That's me, all set up for on-location corporate headshots last week. Five speed light & Softbox set ups, to be placed in a different area each, to efficiently give 5 different looks. My client wanted head-shots of a list of people, with varying backgrounds around their offices. And also with different sets of clothes. We decided that 5 different looks would work best, and give them variety. I considered the options I had. Two of them amounted to too much disruption: - dragging one light around, and setting it up every  Read more inside...

Gelling your flash for warm light at sunset

August 16, 2013 Neil vN 23 Comments

Gelling your flash for warm light at sunset

Since the light from a speedlight is relatively quite cold, (ie, blue-ish), it can create an unpleasant color cast when you use flash with existing warm ambient light. A typical problem situation would be the Incandescent environment that we often find ourselves in at night. But there are other times when the WB from our speedlights (typically around 5400K) is just too cold (blue) compared to the light we have at sunset. (The Daylight WB preset relates to color of daylight during the middle of the day.) Then we need to do something with our  Read more inside...

Photo session – Modern Gypsies – golden birds

August 1, 2013 Neil vN 9 Comments

Photo session - Modern Gypsies - golden birds

Another series from the recent publicity photo session with the Modern Gypsies, with two of the girls in costume, as golden birds. With costumes this detailed and complex, I wanted a simpler background. One that didn't intrude, and somehow complemented the subjects. Classic architecture! Here are the behind-the-scenes images to how we came to some killer photographs for them ...  Read more inside...

photo archives: Nelson Mandela

July 18, 2013 Neil vN 15 Comments

Nelson Mandela / Madiba

To celebrate Nelson Mandela's birthday - July 18th - here are two images from my archives. 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. The challenge with this photo-shoot was that no camera flash was allowed. Which is especially tough inside a dimly lit marquee tent in early evening. This no-flash rule was an attempt not to aggravate eye problems the president experienced. So all  Read more inside...

Off-camera flash with a small softbox

July 14, 2013 Neil vN 10 Comments

Off-camera flash with a small softbox

Most of the images shot as part of the Sigma 35mm f/1.4 DG lens review, were with available light only. But for one sequence, I used off-camera flash. I didn't intend carrying a lot of equipment, so I stripped it down to the minimum. That meant forgoing my usual softbox, the Lastolite EZYBOX 24×24" softbox (affiliate). Instead, I opted for the much smaller Lastolite 8.75" speedlight softbox (affiliate). And instead of a light-stand, Nicole's friend, Andrew helped out on the day by holding the softbox and slave speedlight. In  Read more inside...

  • « Previous Page
  • 1
  • …
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • 6
  • 7
  • …
  • 14
  • Next Page »

categories

Articles & Tutorials

  • • About myself & this site
    • Books by Neil vN
    • Best photography books
    • Black foamie thing
    • Photographers’ success stories
  • • Flash Photography Techniques
    • Natural looking flash
    • Flash + Ambient light
    • Dragging the shutter
    • Bouncing your flash
    • On-camera flash outdoors
    • Exposure metering
    • Flash exposure compensation
    • Bounce flash examples
    • Which is the best flashgun?
    • Flash brackets
    • Off-camera flash photography
    • Flash photography basics
    • Using video lights
    • Flash photography tips
  • • Photography workshops NJ / NYC
    • Models @ photography workshops
tutorials:
flash photography
Photography
Workshops

All rights reserved. Copyright © Neil van Niekerk 2025 · Customization by The Traveling Designer

Copyright © 2025 · NvN on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in