Tag Archives: Flash

One more quick recipe

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Quick recipe for you.

Remember this shot, done in the workshop I taught three days ago in Las Vegas with David Honl?

Yasmin Tajik in Las Vegas, by Michael Willems

Yasmin Tajik in Las Vegas

Shot how, you ask? I mean – at what settings and such?

  • Camera: 1D Mark IV with 35mm f/1.4L prime lens.
  • 100 ISO.
  • Camera on manual, 1/320th second at f/16 (slightly exceeding the 1/300th sec synch speed).
  • Flash is an SB900, also on manual (“M” rather than “TTL”); set to full power (“1/1”).
  • Flash is on a boom, and is fitted with a Honl Photo Traveller 8 softbox (notice the nice round catchlights), and is held a couple of feet from Yasmin’s face.

And you know that at full power, with a softbox, an SB900 will give you those settings.

A 430EX will need to be about twice as close to her face.

Try your own flash at those settings: how close do you need to hold it to ensure proper exposure, using the modifier of your choice. Once you know that, it will always be the same. Simple, really.

Note: the SB900 flash will overheat at these settings, especially in Las Vegas. A dozen shots in you will suddenly get no more flashes. The Nikon flash cannot be used at full power, while the Canon flashes can. With a Nikon SB800/900 flash, I would simply go to half power and live with that. If I needed more light, I would add another flash.

Want to know more? Want to learn all this and go home with a few cool portfolio shots? There is still space on the all-day Advanced Flash workshop Sunday in Mono, Ontario. Book now to get a spot.

Oh, one more thing. Am I cheating? Is this just sunlight lighting up Yasmin?

I think not. Here is the same shot without firing the flash (always a good thing to do to test your settings!):

Silhouette, no flash fired No flash fired

I rest my case.

Setting sun

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Look at this photo I shot of Yasmin Tajik, Sunday in Nelson, outside Las Vegas, NV:

Yasmin in Nelson, NV, photo by Michael Willems

Yasmin in Nelson, NV

Nice late afternoon light, and lit by the late afternoon sun.

Except it wasn’t. Yes, it was late afternoon, but Yasmin was not lit by sunlight. She was lit by my flash.

  • The flash was on camera, since I was traveling without light stands. I would normally take it off camera. But when you can’t, as long as you are mixing light, it is OK to shoot with the flash on camera. Outdoors, therefore, straight into your subject’s face is OK, if you have to.
  • Since both I and the subject were moving constantly, I used TTL rather than manual flash.
  • The nice late afternoon colour on Yasmin? Glad you asked. A 1/2 CTO Honl Photo gel on the flash’s Speed Strap, and the camera’s White Balance set to “Flash”.
  • I ensured that the shutter speed would stay below the camera’s sync speed of 1/300th of a second, in order to give the flash maximum range (“Fast Flash/FP Flash” would decrease available power drastically, which at this distance is not a good thing). Doable late afternoon, when the light is not as bright.

As you see, even very simple means can lead to well-lit pictures.

Sample

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OK, one more sample from the fun series of Flash seminars I did with David Honl at Studio Pet’ographique in Las Vegas.

We filled up the room both days and had a lot of fun. I love sharing what I know, and doing practical shots makes it even better. More later but now I need tocatch a plane to Philadelphia and on to Toronto tomorrow morning.

Gel, grid, and softbox were used fior this picture of a student volunteer:

Photo by Michael Willems

Looking at the light.

Offline soon!

Flash tip

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When your flash is grossly overexposing your pictures…

  • The flash is not seated correctly, or the contacts are dirty
  • The flash is set to MAN (manual), instead of TTL
  • You are using + Flash Exposure Compensation (or on a Nikon, also Exposure Compensation).
  • You are simply too close.

Those are four obvious starting points.

Here is me, pictured by David Honl in Las Vegas the other evening. Using a Leica X1 with off camera flash equipped with CTO gel and Honl Photo Traveller 8 softbox.

Michael Willems, shot by photographer David Honl

Michael Willems, shot by David Honl using a Leica and flash

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!

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!

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

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!