Tag Archive for: models

Focus your light

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Don’t you just love playing with shadows

“Shadows are the soul of the shot” is one of those sayings I’ve been using ever since I started teaching lighting.
I never understood why people would use large softboxes and white backgrounds to eliminate every spot of shadow. For me it’s flat and not really something I love to look at.

Shadows can be tricky when you start out but in the end it’s the glue that sticks everything together and makes an image look more realistic and also creates depth. Of course we need light to create shadows, and the smaller the light source the faster the edge transfer (difference between shadow and light). In other words smaller light means sharper shadow edges.

But you can also work different with smaller light sources.
One of my favourite things to do during the workshops is using our Rogue magnetic snoot or the Lindsay Adler Gobo projector as my main lightsource.

The Gobo projector I will post some more about soon, but in essence it creates awesome projections on your subject that via a lens you can focus. There are also gobos with just a circle which you can use for shots like in this blog.

The Rogue magnetic snoot is a much cheaper solution. And the cool thing is that you can use it in 4 different settings, but also can take out the diffusion panel for another 4 looks. I love gear that is versatile 😀

Now when you start using these kind of very focused light sources straight on your model you can get some very striking an awesome results. Do be careful about the position of the model, this is a setup where movement is very limiting due to the shadow of the head. Wearing sunglasses can really help here. They don’t only look cool but also take the attention away from the eyes so you don’t miss the catchlights or don’t see the raccoon eyes 😀

These were shot during a session with our model Claudia.
Our workshops are mostly in Dutch, but if you visit the Netherlands and also want to visit a workshop, let us know a few weeks in advance and we can switch them to English, or contact us for a full day 1:1 online workshop, including model and full lighting in the studio walk through via 4 cameras.

Now you probably noticed something in the images?
If you only use the snoot/gobo projector or even a reflector with grid with a focussed lightsource the model will be lit but everything else will probably pitch black so for the viewer it’s not a nice image to look at.

This is why with these kind of images I often use one extra strobe with a Rogue Omnidirectional dome (also from our magnetic system) and in this case a blue gel. I place this under the same angle as my main light and a few stops below the main light (depending on the background and the mood I want). Now the blue gel will open up the shadows and when you point the strobe up you will have very soft (hardly noticeable) shadows and you can even include some cool lensflares by shooting over the strobe. And of course as you can see in these images I also experiment with placing the fill in strobe on the sides.

I call this technique light in light and it’s one of those things you can use in a lot of situations.

 

How to very easily find out your flash duration

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Flash duration and freezing motion

Freezing motion is fun

One of the things I always love to do during photoshoots is add some motion to the shots.
If you have ever tried this, you will probably know it’s all about timing. But even then, you probably noticed that sometimes the images are razor sharp and sometimes a bit blurred. How is this possible when you use the same strobes? Read more about flash duration and freezing motion.

The first thing you think is of course, that you probably timed it slightly differently.
But the reason is probably somewhere else.

Flash duration

You may have already noticed the flash duration in the specs of your strobes.
But how do you read this?
Well, that’s the problem when you see 1/1.000-10.000 T.1 or T.5. It probably doesn’t really ring a bell.
I will not make it too technical but see the flash duration as your shutter speed.

When you take a picture in your studio without strobes the images should be black. Because we have to take into account the X-sync in the studio (otherwise you see those nasty black bars) we shoot at 1/125 in the studio. Normally this would make it impossible to freeze motion. But because the flash is just a pulse MUCH faster than 1/125 it’s not a problem.

So that T.1 and T.5 values can be seen as your shutter speed (as a reference, it’s slightly more complicated).
For me, a T.5 value higher than 1/2000 is enough to freeze most motion. Anything higher than 1/5000 is awesome for really razor-sharp motion with models.

I already told you that the values don’t really tell the story. This is because they will vary over the output of your strobe.
Some strobes are super fast on the lowest setting, and some are the fastest on 75%
At first sight, you might think that it doesn’t really matter. But imagine shooting a jumping model on the lowest setting, that would not give you a lot of playroom with your depth of field. So, being able to shoot it with more power is very much needed. This is why most professional strobes have the fastest flash duration at 50-80%.

There are two ways to see the flash duration really fast.

Flash duration and freezing motion

Important gear for freezing motion

Sekonic 858

Although the Sekonic is a lightmeter it also has a great feature that makes it possible to measure the flash duration and even show the graph. But this is an expensive solution.

The fan

A much cheaper, but less accurate, and more fun way is to use a fan.
Put the fan on full power.
Place your camera on a tripod, adjust the strobe from lowest to full power, and take an image every stop (of course adjust the aperture).
In Lightroom you can now easily see in which images the blades are frozen most.

In this video, I tell you a bit more about freezing motion.

And some of the images from the video.

During the workshops, we talk a lot about technique, lighting, coaching the models, retouching, and in essence every topic the attendees want to learn about.
Do you also want to visit a workshop?
Most workshops at fotografie-workshops.nl are in Dutch, but if you let us know a few weeks in advance and we can switch them to English.

flash duration and freezing motion

How to shoot fire works or Christmas lights 

More about the light meter 

Using the foreground to add dimension to your images

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Sometimes we need something extra

We all know that when we want to show scale it’s handy to include something to show the scale.
In the case of a mountain we can of course place some people in front but today we are doing something else.

During the workshop “on location in Emmeloord” the challenge is to find locations that look not so interesting but still create some cool images.
If you ever visited our studio you know there always was an old building just in front of our studio, it didn’t look nice but it had some great walls to shoot against 😀 one of them actually made it into my signature ClickBackDrop backgrounds.

Recently they demolished the building and we ended up with a large empty building area.
Of course a great option for this workshop.

The lighting setup was pretty simple, one Geekoto with a large reflector shooting on manual mode.
During the workshops we have to shoot with so called universal triggers due to the different camera brands that are used during a workshop, this means we can’t use extra options like HSS and ETTL.  

The setup itself was ok.

But I wanted something more. Something to give the image more dimension and framing.
Because I’m shooting from a very low angel I decided to include a few of the flowers in the frame.

This already made a huge impact.
But because Nadine is pregnant we also needed a slightly different pose, and I slightly tilted the camera for a nice effect and include the sun.

I also shot on extra image from a slightly higher angle to experiment with.
I ended up with a darker look which to my surprise became the favourite image for Nadine 😀
So always shoot something different, you never know what hits the spot.

Now that we talked about the setups and the framing of the shot, let’s take a look at the video from this setup.

Also want to visit a workshop?

Today I showed you one of the  different sets we did during the workshop outside with Geekoto strobes “on location in Emmeloord” with Nadine.
During the workshops I always try to use 3-4 different setups explaining different techniques and of course it’s a great way to get a good addition to your portfolio.

If you think “that’s for me”
Than visit photography-workshops.eu for the Dutch workshops.
But if you are not living in the Netherlands or don’t speak Dutch we also have other options.
If you let is know 2 weeks in advance I can teach the workshop you want to visit in English.
Or if you can’t travel to our studio we also now offer the option to get a full 1:1 experience with 5 different camera angles, lightroom/Photoshop view and a talkback channel, you also get all the raw files and retouched results from the workshop. Visit our online workshops page for more info.

Working on location with strobes and making something boring interesting

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From the workshop on location in Emmeloord

During the workshop “on location in Emmeloord” we scout for locations that look not so interesting but the challenge is to create some cool images anyway. This is a great training exercise because let’s be honest in most cases working on location is not as superb as often hoped for, but we are still expected to deliver awesome images.

For me there are a few different things I use to make a location look more interesting.

The first is of course the location itself, I try to find angles or other details (small or large) that I can use, or that I don’t want in the shot.
In this location we loved the onion crates, they blocked off the sunlight for a large part, which is always handy when working in the bright sun. The less direct sunlight on the model the better in this case.

After I have something in my mind for the general location I’m going to use in the set it’s of course time for the lighting.
In this case I’m using the Geekoto strobes aimed at our model Nadine from the side to create a nice light patten on the crates. Although this was nice we wanted something more, so I added a blue gel to the set. But as you can see in the video and images we started with a more flat lighting setup.

Of course we can talk about, but often a video is much better, so here we go 😀

And also lets take a look at the images separately

Also want to visit a workshop?

Today I showed you the results from one of the sets we did during the workshop outside with Geekoto strobes “on location in Emmeloord” with Nadine.
During the workshops I always try to use 3-4 different setups explaining different techniques and of course it’s a great way to get a good addition to your portfolio.

If you think “that’s for me”
Than visit photography-workshops.eu for the Dutch workshops.
But if you are not living in the Netherlands or don’t speak Dutch we also have other options.
If you let is know 2 weeks in advance I can teach the workshop you want to visit in English.
Or if you can’t travel to our studio we also now offer the option to get a full 1:1 experience with 5 different camera angles, lightroom/Photoshop view and a talkback channel, you also get all the raw files and retouched results from the workshop. Visit our online workshops page for more info.