If you find the title of this article a touch intimidating, please stick around and watch the video. It is important to understand how The Inverse Square Law affects bounce flash photography, and creates a specific result where the background appears brighter when the flash is bounced properly without on-camera flash modifiers. I know that is counter-intuitive, but that is what happens when you bounce your bare flash behind you instead of using a light modifier on your flash. The accompanying video, linked to below, explains this Read more inside...
The Profoto A10 flash (Amazon / B&H)is an update on the already impressive Profoto A1 flash - it is powerful, and it recycles fast - just 1 second from a full power burst. The controls on the A1, and now the A10 are easy to use. The same for the menu system - everything is obvious. With this video review of the Profoto A10 flash, we are going to look at some of that features -- but also the way that you can now control the Profoto A10 via an app on your phone, using the bluetooth connection.
Another improvement that the A10 has over Read more inside...
Off-camera flash with the Profoto A1, A1x, A10 flashes
Profoto has a huge array of light modifiers which use their proprietary speed-ring and collar. The Profoto collar is especially easy to use in how the light modifiers fasten to the Profoto flashes. All fine .. except that until now, there was a big gap preventing you from using the Profoto A series flashes with those light modifiers. Profoto took the obvious next big step by adding the Profoto OCF adapter (B&H / Amazon) into the mix.
You can now use your Profoto A1 series flashes with any of those light Read more inside...
The video tutorials that I created for the Craftsy platform was very popular and received really good feedback. Then sometime during the past year, Craftsy changed hands, then rebranded, and then folded ... and has now been resurrected again! The video classes are available again. Check them out if you're not familiar with them.
Portraits with on-camera speedlight
Off-camera flash photography
Wedding photography – The romantic portrait session
Wedding photography – Posing family groups Read more inside...
How to make your on-camera flash NOT look like on-camera flash
I was quite honored to be invited by the team at Zeiss Camera Lenses Americas, to take part in their series of Youtube Live events, appropriately called 'Conversations'. My friend, Tracy, who you might remember from a previous "Two Perspectives" video, where we photographed headshots on location in New York. The topic that Tracy asked me about, is one that regular followers of the Tangents blog will be familiar with - How to make your on-camera flash NOT look like on-camera flash. This Youtube Live event was held via a Read more inside...
Another in the series of Two Perspectives videos -- this time with my friend, David Patino, a commercial photographer also here in New Jersey. The challenge this time was product photography. We both photograph two items (in our respective studios), with different approaches.
The product photography that I do, is generally catalog work done on a white product table and only requires this simpler way of shooting. David has a more creative approach, and it is fascinating to see him work with an idea.
I mostly use the Manfrotto large Read more inside...
High Speed Flash Sync is a topic we have covered several times over time here. With this tutorial though, I wanted to visually run through the settings and discuss the implications of the settings, and what we see on the back of our flash. There is a certain consistency here that will help us evade guesswork, and that will help bring a systematic approach to our flash photography. So here it is -- a video tutorial on High Speed Flash Sync. As always, I welcome questions and further discussion in the comments.
Two of the previous Read more inside...
Creative studio portraits with continuous lighting - two perspectives
When my friend, Marco Leibetseder, a commercial photographer in Germany, came to visit, it was time to play in the studio again. Continuing within the theme of 'Two Perspectives' we decided on using only continuous lighting in the studio, and see how we could create portraits that had a bit of depth to them, rather than just being straight-forward renditions of the person in front of the camera. We decided the theme should be: Creative studio portraits with Continuous Lighting.
The concept behind the Two Read more inside...
video: Creative studio portrait session - two perspectives
Continuing with the loose theme of 'Two Perspectives', I invited my friend Dave Block into the studio during one of his visits to New York from Seattle. The concept behind the initial Two Perspectives video was that I get to meet upwith a fellow photographer, and that something might be revealed in the contrasting styles and ideas during some kind of photo shoot - hopefully informative and of wider interest. The 1st video was the intimate male portraiture shoot-out with my friend Cate Scaglione. The 2nd video was with Tracy Read more inside...
I like the concept behind the initial Two Perspectives video so much that I wanted to continue with that idea - myself and another photographer discussing and mostly, photographing something. Hopefully in that there will be a video that is informative and of wider interest. The 1st video was the Intimate male portraiture shoot-out with my friend Cate Scaglione.
For the next Two Perspectives project, I contacted my friend Tracy Bosworth Page - an outstanding Georgia-based photographer who specializes in headshot photography. She is Read more inside...
