Category Archives: Light

Flash tip

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Today, a quick but important (and as far as I can tell, pretty unique) TTL flash tip.

So you want to know if you can do a certain shot? TTL outdoors is fighting against the sun. Do you have enough power to do the shot? It’s always a battle.

You can of course fire a test shot. If the flashed area is dark, try exposure compensation, maybe. Or spot metering, or using FEL (flash lock). Or rely on the LCD display on your flash to tell you the expected distance. All very time consuming and uncertain. What if I just want to know “do I have enough power in my flash to do this shot” and then if yes, figure it out from there?

I am glad you asked.

  1. Set your camera to highlight review mode (“blinkies” on)
  2. Set your flash to MANUAL
  3. Set power on the flash to FULL (100%, a.k.a. 1/1)
  4. Take the shot!

Now you know:

  • Blinkies means yes, you have enough power. Turn the flash back to TTL and go from there.
  • No blinkies means that however you compensate or meter, nothing you can do. Get closer, or increase your ISO, and try again.

Simple, innit? This trick has saved me countless times.

Tricks like this one, and many more, is what you will learn in Las Vegas next week, and in Mono, Ontario the week after. Come join me and David Honl in Vegas and me and Jospeh Marranca in Mono to learn more!

Quick flash tip

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It is July 4 in the US, so my American friends will all be taking pictures today. So here is a quick tip for you flash users out there!

If you want a slightly warmer look – the “late afternoon light” look – to your flash pictures, simply do this:

  • Put a slight warming gel (e.g. a quarter CTO gel, or a half CTO gel) on your flash (i.e. slightly yellow). I use a Honl gel with a Honl speedstrap on my 580EX flash.
  • Set your white balance to “flash”.

Result: your subject (close by, lit by flash) looks slightly warm.. instant late afternoon “golden hour” light even at noon.

Student by Michael Willems

Student, slightly warmed up

That was a student at last week’s “Creative Urban Photography” course. In not very warm light!

Flash tip of the day

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When you are using TTL flash (metered, automatic), you sometimes get too-dark foregrounds.

This can be because a setting is wrong, or because there is just not enough power available from your flash. It is important to know which one it is!

The settings that affect your flash brightness are:

  1. Aperture
  2. ISO
  3. Shutter, after a point (because exceeding the synch speed and using “fast flash” means you lose power)
  4. Distance
  5. Flash Power
  6. Flash zoom

My trick: to ascertain whether it can be done at all, fire a test shot using manual flash at full power!

  1. Set your camera to its max sync speed (eg 1/200th sec)
  2. Set flash to manual (take the flash off TTL and set it to M).
  3. Adjust it to full power (not TTL but M, and power at 1/1, or 100%).
  4. If your subject is centered, zoom in the flash head (lighting edges that have no subject only wastes power).

If your picture’s flash subject is now still too dark, it cannot be done. Open the aperture or get closer.

But if your flash subject is now blown out, it means your picture can be done with current distance. Go back to TTL, figure out what you are doing wrong, fix it, and try again!

Replacing the sun

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The sun, most photographers would agree, is not the friendliest light. It is like a studio with one direct light:

  • Too contrasty for the camera’s dynamic range to handle dark to light;
  • It throws shadows;
  • It makes smooth surfaces (like, um, skin)  look wrinkly.

So you get this, of Joseph Marranca on Monday at the Mono, Ont venue of the advanced creative light workshops:

Back yard in sunshine, by Michael Willems

Back yard in sunshine

Nice, but it suffers from all the problems of direct sunlight.

When you would rather have this, two seconds later when the sun went behind a big sky-mounted softbox: a cloud.

Back yard in shaded light, by Michael Willems

Back yard in shaded light

Nice and soft. Saturated colours. Smooth.

Now the only problem is that if you want highlights, you don’t get them. Can’t we have both?

Yes. And that is where flash comes in.

In the portrait shot below of Oakville’s mayor, yesterday, I first took away the sun, using a diffuser. And then I added a flash. Off-camera , with a Honl grid and a Honl quarter CTO gel (with my white balance set to flash). Plus a bit of fill flash on the camera.

Oakville's mayor Rob Burton, photo by Michael Willems

Oakville's mayor Rob Burton, June 2010

I think that being in control is better than just relying on too-harsh direct light. Do you agree?

Flash balancing, step by step

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Many of you have asked me to give a simple step-by-step instruction of how to balance light using flash. OK, so here we go.

Step one: the normal shot.

Say you are shooting outdoors. And the background is bright. So you get this shot:

Flash demo photo by Michael Willems

1. Background too bright

OK for the foreground – but the background is too bright.

Step two: expose the background right

So you need to darken it. If, say, you are in Aperture mode, just use exposure compensation of, say, -1 to -2 stops. Now you get this:

Flash demo photo by Michael Willems

2. background ok, foreground too bright

Great, the lake is visible.

But now the foreground is too dark. So you need to brighten it.

Step three: expose the foreground with flash.

OK: turn on your flash. That gives you this:

Flash demo photo by Michael Willems

3. Better, now with flash

Much better. If the foreground is too bright, use flash exposure compensation (not exposure compensation!) to darken the flash. Or if it is too dark, you are probably too far away – get closer or use higher ISO, if able.

If your shutter speed exceeds your flash sync speed (around 1/200th second), reduce it or use Auto FP Flash/High Speed Flash (in that case, get really close).

Now you can make shots like this:

A Park Bench in Oakville (Photo by Michael Willems)

A Park Bench in Oakville shot with flash

(Can you also see the half CTO warming gel I used?)

And you can get more dramatic: here, I underexposed the background by two or more stops:

A Stop Sign in Oakville (Photo by Michael Willems)

A Stop Sign in Oakville (Photo by Michael Willems)

Have fun!

Battery tips

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Sunday’s country workshop in Mono, ON prompts me to talk for a moment about batteries.

Background: We used small speedlights Sunday, with simple and effective Honl modifiers and gels. The studio lights and large softboxes stayed packed away.

Tara Elizabeth in the rain, by Michael Willems

Tara Elizabeth in the rain

In a shot like this, you make the background darker by “nuking the sun”: overpowering the sunlight with flash.

Overpowering the sun takes, um, power.

In general, therefore, you will set your Pocketwizard-powered speedlites to full power. On many shots we have five speedlites firing at full power. Full power gives you not that many flashes – in the order of maybe 100 flashes if you are lucky.

To use flash effectively, then, here are a few practical tips:

  • Turn off the “Auto power down” on your flashes (this is in your flash custom functions).
  • Move the flashes as close as you can to your subject (remember the inverse square law).
  • Allow 3 or more seconds for the flashes to recharge before you shoot again.
  • Occasionally, fire a test flash to verify that  all flashes are still working.
  • Use NiMH rechargeable batteries.
  • Ensure these are “low self discharge” types like Sanyo Eneloop, etc.
  • Carry a lot of spares. Several sets per flash.
  • Before each new shot setup, replace them. So you never run out.
  • Use a “conditioning charger” that can discharge your batteries fully before charging. I have three of the Lacrosse chargers (check Amazon or the web).

And yes, go wild, and use speedlites for creative purposes!

Model Tara Elizabeth, photographed by Michael Willems

Model Tara Elizabeth

Tara Elizabeth, photographed by Michael Willems

Tara Elizabeth

Tara Elizabeth, photographed by Michael Willems

Model Tara Elizabeth striking a pose

Tara Elizabeth, photographed by Michael Willems

Tara Elizabeth and umbrella

Tara

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Model Tara, that is, today, on a workshop in Mono:

Model Tara Elizabeth shot by Michael Willems

Model Tara Elizabeth

How did I get the background to look blue?

By using a gel. A Honl photo gold/silver reflector plus a half CTO gel, combined with my white balance set to tungsten. That makes her face neutral but the background blue.

And notice the hair light is purple? That’s to match the dress.

Here’s course participants having fun:

Model Tara Elizabeth in Mono, Ont

Model Tara Elizabeth in Mono, Ont

A quick reminder for you:

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Namely… expose the background first, then the foreground.

Not like this:

(background too bright)… but like this!

Look at the background. That is what I exposed for using Aperture and Shutter and ISO,. Then I worried about the foreground (flash/TTL).

If you do not know this technique, now is the time to learn.

Now what?

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I shot a corporate event the other day, and it taxed me. I shall explain how, and how you can get good (meaning sharp, well lit and well exposed ) shots in bad light.

When I walked in to the venue, I saw the problems:

  1. Extremely bright on one side (direct sun); very dark on the other side (too dark to see the camera)
  2. Virtually no bounce (high black ceilings and walls)

Like this:

Venue with difficult light, by Michael Willems

Venue with difficult light

Except with 300 lawyers and corporate clients.

So I set to work. And here’s what I did.

Mitigate the problem:

  • Shoot by the window using natural light and high-ish to very high ISO if anyone looks at the window
  • Shoot outdoors, when people move outdoors.
  • Find one or two spots where the light does kinda work and concentrate on those.
  • Move people to a wall where you can bounce a bit.

Handle the problem:

  • Use super high ISO if you must.
  • Use fast lenses.
  • Shoot RAW.
  • Use TTL – and know it.
  • Watch your meters carefully.
  • Avoid moving too much – even when you move half an inch it can put people in totally different light. See the previous point!
  • Be ready quickly. I carried three cameras with three lenses. Ouch. a 1Ds MkIII with a 35mm f/1.4, a 1D MkIV with a 16-35mm f/2.8 lens, and a 7D with a 70-200 f/2.8 lens.
  • I used bounce cards (Honl Photo reflectors, and outdoors,a 1/2 CTO Honl Photo gel) and a Fong thing (I even used a Fong Lightsphere with a Honl bounce card Velcro’d behind it – worked am charm).
  • Work out your best settings for each area and if the area is consistent as an area, set those in manual mode.
  • Shoot a lot.
  • Also shoot things that do not move, like food and furniture.
  • Do more then usual post-production. Yes, some prints will be under-or over-exposed all or part, but if you know your craft and get “close enough” in camera, then you will be able to finish them on the computer.

This way I got prints like:

Indoors, in a good(-ish) area:

Good area in a bad-light location, shot by Michael Willems

Good area in a bad-light location, f/2.0, 800 ISO, 1/50th sec

Outdoors, with a half CTO gel:

A couple shot at an event, by Michael Willems using a half CTO gel

A couple shot at an event, by Michael Willems

Indoors, long and with a 7D at 3200 ISO using available light:

Naural light shot using 7D at 3200 ISO, and a long lens, by Michael Willems

Naural light shot using 7D at 3200 ISO

Food:

Food at an event, shot by Michael Willems

Food at an event

At this event I used all the tricks I know, and it was hard work. But I got good pictures, of course.

If you want to learn some of the lighting tricks of the trade, and hone your skills in the flash area, join Joseph Marranca and me in Mono, Ontario tomorrow, Saturday 26 June. There are only two places left!

Outdoors with flash: what mode?

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Let’s assume you follow my advice and use your flash, as fill flash, outdoors. Say for pictures like this.

A baseball team

A baseball team

In that case the question will be, what mode do you use on your camera? You want aperture in a certain range to ensure sufficient, but not too much, depth of field, and you want the shutter in a range that ensure sufficient stability but that is limited at the upper end by the flash sync speed (normally around 1/200th second).

  • Program mode: this will work, but you get no control over either aperture or shutter speed. Not the preferred mode unless you are in a hurry.
  • Manual mode: you meter for the background and set your camera accordingly. Flash lights up the foreground. This is practical when you know aperture and shutter speed and their effects well, and when the light does not vary too much.
  • Aperture mode: good for determining the depth of field. But there is a drawback. Outdoors, if you open the aperture, your shutter speed could easily exceed your flash sync speed. Result, an overexposed picture. Or if you stop down the aperture, the shutter speed could get so slow you get blurry images.
  • Shutter speed mode: if it is bright, you can set your shutter speed to just below your sync speed, say 1/200th second. The camera will now choose whatever aperture suits this. The risks are fairly low – worst case, you get a wider or narrower aperture than you wanted. If it is dark and your ISO is low, you can get an underexposed image.
  • “Aperture and shutter priority”: on some cameras you can select “Manual exposure, plus auto ISO”, which effectively means “aperture and shutter priority”. If you set your aperture and shutter wisely, the ISO will be in an acceptable range. The danger is that you need lower than available ISO (overexposed picture results) or that you need high ISO (noise, or “grain”, results).

As you can see here, there are certain strategies, but there is not one perfect one that is easy to use at all times. That is why photography has a technical aspect you need to learn.

A different approach: Rather than worry about modes too much, look at what they do. You need to look through your viewfinder and be aware of shutter speed, aperture, and ISO. Look out for:

  • Shutter too slow: blur
  • Shutter too fast: flash sync speed will be exceeded, and overexposure results
  • Aperture fully open: overexposure will occur, and depth of field will be narrow
  • Aperture too closed: too much will be sharp
  • ISO at its lowest: overexposure may result
  • ISO too high: noise (“grain”) will result.

Then adjust whatever you like to get all three variables into the right range.

For the shot above, I used shutter speed priority with my shutter speed set to 1/200th second. I chose an ISO of 200 to get into an acceptable aperture range (I was aiming for f/5.6).