The Joy Of High Speed Sync

Earlier this year, back in February, I was teaching at the Santa Fe Workshops.  My class wanted me to demonstrate high speed sync for them.  We stepped outside in the snow and I photographed a student with the chapel on campus in the background.

Nikon has this wonderful function called high speed sync (FP) that allow us to use our Nikon flashes above our native sync speed of 1/250th of a second.  This first photograph show our subject photographed using our normal sync speed of 1/250th at f/7.1  

Shooting with an aperture of f/7.1 provide too much DOF for my taste.  Using high speed sync allows me the choice to shoot this photograph using a much shallower DOF.

By opening my lens to f/1.4 and raising my shutter speed to 1/5000th of a second, I was able to produce a much different looking image.

One of the downfalls of using high speed sync is that your flash looses a tremendous amount of power.  I believe the power setting on the flash for the photo above was set to about 1/4 power.  I was using a Nikon SB-800 shot through a Lastolite Tri-Grip just outside of the right frame of this photo.  When I moved to high speed sync, With the flash at the same position, the power needed to be increased to full power.  Here is the resulting photo showing a much shallower DOF.

Nikonian Lighting Workshop

I always love visiting San Francisco and the surrounding Bay Area.  I was actually born and raised in California, Southern CA to be exact.  I've spent a lot of time in the Bay Area, it is always a treat to visit. 

I conducted a Nikonian Lighting Workshop there recently, a Nikonian workshop is very similar to a SSBR workshop.  The workshop is designed for just Nikon users, hence the name Nikonians.  In these workshops we use the Nikon CLS method to fire our strobes remotely, rather than Pocket Wizards.  On the second day of the workshop, we had a wonderful model to photograph, her name was Sujan.  She came to us via Model Mayhem.

The workshop was held at the Crowne Plaza hotel in Union City, just south of Oakland.  This photograph of Sujan was made in one of the large conference rooms located on the hotel property.  I used two Nikon SB-800's for this shot.  The key light was a 43" Westcott umbrella used in the shoot through position.  The second light was placed in the rear of the room and shot through a decorative wood lattice which created a nice pattern on the back wall of the room.

I shot this using my 80-200 f/2.8, lens was set to about 140mm and the aperture was f/2.8.  I set my ISO to 800 and my shutter speed was 1/100.  I was collecting a bit of ambient coming through a set of windows at the right side of the room. In the photo below you can see the set up.

You can see that a reflector was used in front and below the model, it was placed just below the frame in order to bounce light back into Sujan to open the shadows as well as provide an extra catch light in her eyes.  In the photo below you can see the background light, which I might add, had a full CTO over the flash head to add warmth.

If your interested in learning more about using your shoe mounted strobes off camera, and creating studio quality light on location, join me at a workshop. I have several venues coming up you might be interested in.  I'll be in Maine at the Maine Media Workshops teaching a week long location lighting workshop in September.  Maine is a wonderful location and there still are a few spaces available.  For more information about that workshop, visit the Maine Media Workshops website.

My Chives Are Open

About this time every year, I look forward to the chives in my garden opening. This morning, as I walked around my pond with my morning coffee, I noticed that a beautiful clump of chives had opened. For the first time in several days, the wind has stopped and the morning light was perfect for some photography.

When I shoot flowers and the sun is perhaps a bit harsher than I'd like, I pull out a 5 in 1 diffusion panel. I place the panel as close to my subject as possible, too far away provides only shade. I want the panel to be the light source, the closer you move the panel to your subject the more of a light source the panel becomes.

Here is a quick set up photo of the diffusion panel in place. When I travel on business or vacation, I will always include a diffusion panel in my bag.

I have a Mentor Series Trek coming up this July. I'll be leading a trek to Newport Rhode Island, July 23-25th. I understand their are a few more space available, if your interested in joining me you can find more information HERE. I will also be in Maine at the Maine Media Workshops teaching a lighting workshop called "Lite & Compact Small Strobes on Location" Sept. 12-18th. More information regarding this workshop can be found at their web site.

The Corporate Headshot

Being a corporate photographer who specializes in location work, I often have to shoot a lot of  corporate "headshots". Many of the companies I shoot for have the need for a simple "corporate headshot" used for media and other uses.  I was asked to shoot this portrait in Denver to match an existing style shot by another photographer in another city.  Being able to reverse engineer the existing photo is key to successfully executing this assignment.

I was provided a jpeg of the existing example, I converted that to a pdf and loaded it into my iPod Touch as a reference I could refer to on location. I use an App called GoodReaderUSB, this is a free APP at the Apple Store.  As a side note, when I travel, I convert all of my contact emails, reservations and anything else regarding a particular trip into pdf's and just carry them on my iPod.

Even thow I might want to choose a different lighting style, it is my job as a professional to supply my client with what they need.  Being able to read or reverse engineer a simple photo provide by a client is key.

I am not showing the sample photo in this post as I do not permission to do so, trust me that the photo shown here is almost exactly a duplicate of the one provide to me as a reference.

I want to show you the entire set up to create a corporate headshot such as this.  I used two light to create this shot. The key light is a single Niikon SB-800 in a FourSquare and the background light is a single Nikon SB-800 with a 40* Grid.  My ISO was set to 200, the key light set at 1/32 power and the background power set to 1/64th power. I also used a 42 inch 5 in 1 reflector to provide some bounce on the shadow side of the face.

I was given a medium sized conference room to accomplish this task. I used two SB-800 strobes, the key light was a FourSquare Softbox and the background light was fitted with a 40 degree grid for the glow on the gray seamless.

I was shooting at ISO 200 and my selected aperture was f/2.8.  With these settings, the power on my key light was set to 1/32th and the background light at 1/64th.

Each of these strobes were powered using my Quantum Turbo SC, not really necessary with particular set-up, just my normal thing.

You will also notice that I'm using a reflector to bounce some light back into the shadow side of my subjects face.

Notice in the photo at the left that the FourSquare is positioned well in front of my subject, this is know as feathering the light.  Using the box in this manner, the subject receives the softest portion of the light and the reflector grabs more of the key light for a more effective bounce.

Positioned behind the subject is a small Bogen Nano stand with a gridded SB-800.  The strobe is quite close to the seamless and therefore, the power was set very low.

I put up a couple of other production photos for your reference for this shoot.

I also wanted to mention that I'll be teaching in Vienna and London later this summer, for more information follow the this LINK

Thank You Dallas

This past Tuesday I was the guest speaker at the May meeting of the Dallas chapter of the PPA (Professional Photographers Association) I wanted to extend a special thanks Elena Hernandez for the invitation to Dallas.

What a treat it is to meet the many friends I've made via this blog face to face. We had a packed house, I'd say about 100 or so crammed into the hotel conference room. Thanks so much for making me feel so welcomed. I look forward to my next visit to the Dallas area.  DT

I have several up coming workshops I thought I'd mention to you.  I'll be teaching in Vienna and London for PhotoPress Productions, for more information regarding these workshops click HERE. 

I'll also be in the North East teaching at the Maine Media Workshops in Sept.  A full week of loction lighting Lite & Compact using small strobes.  More info HERE.

I also have two Mentor Series Treks later this year.   Newport Rhode Island & Egypt

Some Personal Time

I'm currently in Oakland, I'm here to conduct a two day Nikonians workshop.  I had today to drive around and shoot for myself.  I took a short drive to the Port of Oakland looking for some large ships to photograph.  The port was a bit quite, not certain way.  Security is really tight, cops driving all over the place.  Kinda makes it hard for regular photo buffs to just shoot for the hell of it.

Hope you all have a nice weekend.  DT