A time-lapse clip of ... well, the clouds on the day of the 2017 solar eclipse, where we had 71% partial eclipse viewable from New York City. My initial intention with this time-lapse clip was to show how the environment became darker, but the continuous cloud cover made it something different.
I did have another camera for close-up photos of the solar eclipse. (The photos are shown lower down here.) There were short moments when the sun did peek out, so that we could see the progression of the eclipse. Even then, it was magical to see.
Here is my Read more inside...
With the article on lighting a white seamless studio backdrop in the studio, the question came up how you would do that in a home-based studio where there is less space. The answer? In pretty much the same way. This tutorial video on how to set up a small home studio using speedlites, will show you that the techniques remain the same, whether it is a speedlite, or a powerful studio light.
A few notes about this video:
For this video, I ended up going with B&W images only of our subject, Matt. I liked the result. It worked very well with Read more inside...
Profoto: How to use gridded strip boxes as the main light
My favorite light modifiers when working with studio-type flashes like the Profoto B1 and D1, are gridded stripboxes. In the studio where I have space, I tend to prefer the larger Profoto 1’x6’ strip-box (affiliate). When I have to travel with gear, or work with kids, then the Profoto 1’x4’ strip-box (affiliate), is my preference. Both of them with a grid on them. That egg-crate grid on the front helps control how the light spills.
This video explains how I use them as the main light, and what makes gridded stripboxes such Read more inside...
This video clip and photo shoot are the results of a discussion with a friend, Cate Scaglione, one of New Jersey's best boudoir photographers. At a photography convention, the topic came up whether male and female photographers approach their subjects differently (whether male or female). My take on this is that there is such a diverse range in styles and skill levels, that it would be impossible to make any clear grouping on styles depending on the photographer’s gender. Cate believes this does have an influence. And from that, the idea Read more inside...
We took one of the organized trips out to the sandbar in Grand Cayman, where large groups of stingrays converge at what is known as Stingray City. Walking on the sandbar, you are surrounded by stingrays. (They come for the bits of squid that the tour groups bring.) I've been told this should be on everyone's bucket list, and I agree. It was an incredible experience for me since I've had a deep lifelong fascination for nature and animals. This is how I got into photography in the first place as a youngster - wanting to record the wild birds that I Read more inside...
Those of you who have followed the Tangents blog for a while, will have noticed that over time I've expanded the range of photography that I do - in addition to weddings and portraits, I have taken on commercial photography and corporate photography as well. This has included small commercial video shoots as well. One of these was a promotional video clip for a company - Buddy Bagz - to introduce their innovative variation on sleeping bags for kids.
The photo and video shoot was produced by Cheryl Galante, and the video edited by Wendy Read more inside...
For the birthday celebration of two of the members working for Modern Gypsies productions, a bunch of their friends were invited to help assemble a Chinese Dragon ... and then the group of us wove our way down the sidewalks of Brooklyn where we ended up at a night-club. This was also a perfect time to test my new DJI Osmo camera and gimbal (B&H / Amazon). The camera offers up to 4K resolution, and has a 3-axis gimbal for stabilization.
The video clip above is a 3 minute long compilation of video footage that I shot with Read more inside...
I met Marco when he attended one of my photography workshops - he is charismatic and with that photogenic ruggedness, I thought he'd be a great subject to photograph on location. He was visiting New York from Germany for a few days, and I asked if he would be up for a photo session. And here we are.
With this photo session, I also wanted to try out something I saw Dani Diamond does - where he has an on-camera stabilized gimbal for his Go-Pro, to give a wider point of view from the photographer's perspective. A kind of Read more inside...
First steps in shooting video with a stabilized gimbal
[Testing out the Defy G2x gimbal, with a test run one evening in Times Square. Here is some of the (random) footage as I played with it to get a hang of its response and handling.]
That smooth, fluid movement when shooting video with the camera moving, used to be the domain of cinema or higher-end productions because of the cost of the gear. Recently however, stabilized gimbals have appeared on the market around the $5,000 mark ... and then the more accessible, smaller units at around the $2,000 point. Suddenly, these items Read more inside...
Many of the tutorials and articles on the Tangents blog deals with getting the best from your on-camera flash. My approach has always been one of - what technique would give me the best light? Of course, there are so many different scenarios we could find ourselves in - so we have to adapt to where we are, and what we want to achieve.
With on-camera flash, I've always pushed back against the idea of there being a single do-everything device that will make your flash photography look better. Specifically with light and lighting, We Read more inside...
