…was all about light.
Look how differences, some small, in light can make any picture very different from the others. Our lovely model Bryna, in a few snaps I snuck in while teaching:
And that’s why knowing flash is a skill that will serve you well. After all, with flash, you are in charge. Stand by for more, much more, in the way of workshops and other teaching and training.
You have heard me say it many times: “Bright pixels are sharp pixels”.
Nothing wrong with this:
But it does not make the subject stand out as the bright pixels. And it does not feel special. This one does, and is also much more dramatic:
And the subject i s now the Bright Pixels. Shot at 100 ISO, 1/200 sec, at f/11, using a 40mm lens on a full frame camera and lit with a battery-pack powered Bowens strobe fitted with a beauty dish. Slightly desaturated in Lightroom.
This was a picture I shot today in a class I taught at Sheridan College in Oakville.
Many more courses coming up, so stay tuned. I can teach you how to do this, quickly.
Black and white, or B/W, or Monochrome, is underused. Much, if not most art portraits are B/W. And why?
Well – colour, especially when desaturated, is not bad at all. Here’s today’s self portrait:
Not bad.
But the B/W version shows the mood better.
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B/W reduces an image to its essence. And coloured items do not distract. And white balance is not an issue. So for both creative and to a lesser extent technical reasons, try some B/W. Shoot RAW so you can do the actual conversion in Lightroom.
Here, finally, is another one, of one of today’s students, using a beauty dish:
Stands out, no? I love that beauty dish.
You have heard me talk about the “Sunny Sixteen” rule before. This is a very useful rule of thumb that allows you to shoot without using your camera’s light meter. The rule is:
If your shutter speed is set to 1/ISO (e.g. 125 ISO at 1/125th sec, 200 ISO at 1/200 sec, or 400 ISO at 1/400 sec, etc), then on a fully sunny day at noon, f/16 will give you the right exposure.
Like this, at f/16:
And if it is not sunny?
| f/16 | Sunny | Distinct |
| f/11 | Slight Overcast | Soft around edges |
| f/8 | Overcast | Barely visible |
| f/5.6 | Heavy Overcast | No shadows |
| f/4 | Open Shade/Sunset | No shadows |
(Source: Wikipedia)
This rule is a rule of thumb, so feel free to vary – I often expose two thirds of a stop higher – but since the sun is always the same brightness, it holds well. And it is nice to be able to expose without light meters, if only in order to be able to check your camera.
Bonus question: how do you expose the moon?
Answer: f/16. The moon at noon (there, so any time here, including night) is as bright as the earth at noon- they are the same distance from the sun!
Why you use a Shampooey Goodness light… from today’s corporate shoot. With, and without.. I am sure you can see the difference.
QED. You need that hair light, and you need to aim it very accurately, so as to avoid hitting the face or shoulder. You need to use a snoot.
Here’s a few samples from another family shoot I just did, of a friend (an ex student) and his family:
Fall is a great time for these portraits—in spite of the cold.
A few notes on a shoot like this:
To see what I mean: this is with flash:
…and this is without:
I encourage you all to have family portraits done. Because they last, and it’s the only time travel we do. You’ll be delighted later to have them, and the extra few hundred dollars are a small price compared to that.
I taught a special flash workshop over the past two days, at Sheridan College. Seven students, great crowd.
Here, a few images:
Next, a one flash portrait. Yes, you can do some great stuff using just one flash. The flash was fitted with a Honl Photo grid – without that, it could not have worked. Fired by pocketwizards. This student looks like Queen Nefertiti, we decided:
Funny, aunt and niece, who, contrary to what you might think looking at this image, both have a great sense of humour:
And finally, me, by one of the students. A standard four light portrait:
About this portrait:
And finally the easiest shot. Now I warn you, the sample below was shot from the back of my camera with my iPhone, and then further mangled by Facebook, so do not look at the quality. Look at the idea instead.
So simple. One flash, located behind the subject, aimed at the backround. And a part Harvey Weinstein lookalike in the foreground.
This, a couple of samples from a family shoot I just did, is why you probably want to hire a photographer for a family shoot rather than using an iPhone to just snap away:
Those are pretty much straight from the camera. So what does that take? Well, experience, insight, plus:
Simple once you know. And if you don’t know, I have two pieces of advice: One, learn (I teach, and I write books!) and two, start by hiring a pro.
Sunday I shot an event: a baby shower. In a back yard and inside, and in a tent. Portraits, with two strobes (one with umbrella, one with small softbox), as well as event pics.
The portraits, with or without props, looked like this—and you will see it is all about the light. Hence the strobes, and the subjects in the shade as much as possible. I used a 24-70 for this, as well as the 85mm f/1.2 lens.
Some spontaneous, like this – don’t forget to look for those spontaneity moments…:
Indoors shots were like this, shot with thew 24-70 f/2.8 lens and using a bounced flash—here too, look for people interacting or “doing things”:
And outdoors with a flash aimed directly at the subject, which gets us the subject as the “bright pixels” and saturated colours. And when there’s something happening, look for the right moment. either to get the right pose:
And if you pay attention you can often get “the decisive moment“, in this case the piñata falling to the ground in pieces.
Photos were, as far as I can tell, universally liked, and I bet those who did not have their picture taken regretted it in the end.
Oh and the human species will probably survive, judging by the number of pregnant women present. Like half of them, it almost seemed.
…is what I am shooting today.
As always, flash is key to a lot of my images.