Whether it’s high noon, sunset or the magic hour it’s hard to beat photographs taken under the natural light of the sun. But how do you contend with the myriad of conditions it produces? Easy. You watch this video by RocketJump Film School as director of photography Jon Salmon walks you through most of the lighting scenarios you might encounter outside.
Every year Crankworx holds a Mountain bike event in Whistler, Canada that is a combination of downhill, slope-style and enduro competitions. They also host the Deep Summer Photo Challenge, where they put six photographers head to head, with the challenge to build a slide show that showcases mountain bike culture within Whistler.
In my recent Natural Light Tutorial with RGGEDU, I went through every aspect of natural light photography and retouching... Or so I thought. During a shoot this week, I realized I missed one thing: enhancing freckles with Photoshop.
In this tutorial I will show you how to setup your studio strobes for full length portraits as we shoot an editorial style lighting setup. First we will look at the entire gear list we used and you can use for a similar setup, from the backdrop to the studio heads. I will breakdown our lighting. with lighting diagrams and explanation of WHY we are placing our lights where we are.
The Profoto B1s are the battery operated smaller brother of the Profoto D1 monoblocks. One major advantage they have over their AC counterpart is that you can freeze super fast motion much easier than you can with the D1s.
Erik Almas, one of the best commercial composite photographers, has recently teamed up with the team at PRO EDU to create a fully comprehensive tutorial on his complete shooting and retouching process. In this video Almas takes us through an hour-long tutorial, retouching and completing the backplate for one of his tutorial images.
I remember meeting Peter Hurley for the first time. I walked into his studio and saw him shooting a client's headshot with 4 Kino Flo hot lights (normally used for video). I asked him why and he said "The quality of light is just better than strobe. It fills the pores on a human face differently." At the time I was intrigued, but I no longer believe it.
Amongst this years Broncolor Gen NEXT line up (a pioneering group of young professional photographers lighting up the future of photography) Gonzaga Manso throws in with his beautiful concept shoot, "The Pond". This photograph is meant to express the calm, sincere and deep love that comes from getting old alongside the person you love.
Most amateur photographers assume that they need to buy a ton of expensive gear in order to compete or reach the level of most professional photographers. I’m quite guilty of doing the same. As a matter of fact, I spent the first couple of years studying the work of photographers that I admired and I was quickly intimidated by their level of production.
I've always considered Time Magazine to be a pretty high quality publication. Getting your photograph featured on the cover would be a lifetime accomplishment for most photographers. That's why the current cover with Oculus Rift inventor Palmer Luckey is particularly shocking.
Some photographers like that soft, ethereal feel as they specifically seek out types of plastic to stick in front of the lens, or even go so far as to buy defocus control lenses and LensBabies that will allow them to distort an otherwise true image. That has its value. But this isn’t for that.
When you're shooting a wedding, every minute is valuable. There is often a compromise between the amount of time you spend on a shot and the level of quality you can achieve from that shot. That's partly what makes Fstoppers member Paul Keppel's ring shots so great. They take him almost no time to shoot and they look fantastic.
Holy butts. Sometimes the fact that I'm an artist and I'm allowed to get weird slips my mind. I don't have a boss, I'm allowed to create what I want, I'm allowed to try new things for the sake of playing, and I'm even allowed to start a blog post by saying "Holy butts." That rocks.
Have you ever wanted to create a dramatically lit portrait but you have felt limited by your lack of camera gear? Pye Jirsa over at SLR Lounge has just released a very technical video showing how you can accomplish complex lighting with just a single on-camera flash.
Light painting is difficult. Trying to paint something you can’t see while racing the timer of your cameras shutter is no easy feat. Legibly writing your own name can take a decent amount of practice. Watch as Julian Breton takes this act to the next level as he turns the intricate art of calligraphy into light paintings.
https://youtu.be/WUfqGrDldgc
We've all done it, be it blow drying our hair or plugging too many things into one socket. At some point in your life you've tripped a breaker. Now, imagine doing just that but you're in the middle of a shoot. Not only does it throw off your entire shoot, but it's embarrassing and can make you look unprofessional.
Let’s be honest, there are a lot of advantages to using speed lights.
I’m always fascinated when a photographer uses their talents for a greater cause than themselves. SlickforceGirl is a commercial and creative pinup brand that helps raise awareness for women’s causes and breast cancer.
Venus recently released the KX-800 Twin Flash for macro photography which updates their previous KR-800 model. The new KX-800 model features stronger articulating arms that promise to hold their position better than before. In this review, macro photographer Thomas Shahan examines the Venus Twin Flash and goes over how to get the best results in real-world application.
When it comes to all things headshots and manipulating human expression, the best guy to seek council from is Peter Hurley. Peter's career has spanned about 15 years now, and over those years he has gained a tremendous amount of knowledge.
It has always driven me insane that I had to stock multiple sets of softboxes that are largely identical but designed for use with either studio strobes (of a specific brand) or speedlights (via some sort of proprietary bracket).
Rob Hammer knows all about stories, adventure, and experience. He is a San Diego-based commercial shooter. He has worked for many clients such as Nike, Adidas, Foot Locker, and Under Armour.
Canon just announced their latest Speedlite, the 430EXIII-RT. The update to the Canon 430EXII will be released in September 2015 at an estimated retail price of $299.99. Also announced are new accessories that will be familiar to Nikon users, the SCF-E2 Color Filter, and the SBA-E2 Bounce Adapter.
Some highlights of the third-generation flash include:
Jay P. Morgan of the Slanted Lens has recently created an image for Dynalite that is being used in their advertising. The concept for the image was to showcase a lot of motion, and the Dynalite Baja's motion stopping power.
Elinchrom has been renowned for its light shapers for a long time. Many photographers have been using the Rotalux line of softboxes even on other, more expensive strobe brands such as Profoto or Broncolor. The Rotalux system was also known for its quick and simple way of assembling the boxes.
Assisting for a photographer or videographer can be a rewarding experience filled with knowledge and new perspectives. An assistant often receives an insider's view into how a photographer runs a production, and gains networking opportunities that may not have been accessible before. However, being an effective assistant requires more than holding light stands or reflectors.
In the final part of the Dramatic Beauty Portrait Tutorial, we will look at how I do my Black and White conversion. This image is a dramatic image so it calls for a punchy and high-contrast black and white conversion. In this tutorial, I will show you how I stack blending modes and adjustment layers to get my image exactly where I want it.
My favorite part of the wedding day is the reception. After the traditional first dances, and speeches are done, and the wedding party starts to let loose. The party is in full swing and the best man is giving “The Dougie” his best attempt in an effort to win a dance battle against the bride.
For those of you who get into situations where you have limited time to set up, manually light and fine tune it to how you would like, well-known photographer Joe McNally shows how quick and easy using TTL can be when pairing an Air Remote with a Profoto B1 strobe unit. This would be great for event shooters, and setting up for quick portraits.
In my opinion, mastering negative dodge and burn is the key to any beauty retouch. There are many steps and many hours that go into a great retouch, but negative dodge and burn is as essential, if not more so, than any of them. The term "negative dodge and burn" is one that I first heard from fellow retoucher Pratik Naik.
Rings can be considered one of the most important details of a wedding day. The groom may have spent months trying to find the right ring, and even longer saving up to purchase it. When the bride first announces their engagement, all of her friends can't wait to see the ring. It’s the only item from the wedding day that most couples will have their entire lives (besides the images of course).
In Part 3 of the Dramatic Beauty Portrait Tutorial, we will finally get into the first main step of the skin retouching process. Basic skin retouching involves addressing subtle skin and texture issues on our portrait images. We will not only look at techniques for skin retouching in Photoshop, but also discuss the theory behind our decision process during the retouching process.
Anyone who likes to bring a light or two on-location knows the frustration of wanting soft, controllable light that won't weigh you down or break the bank. The Westcott Apollo Orb is, without a doubt, one of my favorite lighting modifiers.
A couple of weeks ago I had a chance to shoot with the Broncolor Siros Monolights for the first time. Until now, my light of choice has been the Profoto D1. I, like many of you, have seen reviews on Broncolor's new monolight, and like many of you as well, have been a bit skeptical about their delve into competing with Profoto's D1 and B1 Series for the high-end monolight market.
Beauty photography is something that I have become drawn to over time. Setting a mood, imagining a makeup style, and finding or even creating props to fill the frame with my model’s face is something I came to love more than anything else. In any genre of photography, I feel like it is important to develop a style that is recognizable.
If you are one of the thousands of professional and amauter photographers in the industry at some point you’ve probably hit a creative rut in your work. It happens to the best of us. Lighting setups can quickly become repetitive and boring after shooting for several months.
A question asked very often by photographers is "How do I fix red or mismatched skin tones in Photoshop?" As with everything in retouching there's hundreds of ways to achieve the same thing.
Recently I went to New York City to do a week of headshots. As many of you know, part of my cinematic style involves shooting outdoors, but flying from Los Angeles to New York City to put this on meant I couldn’t rely on the weather. Figuring out how to translate the look and feel of my style indoors was the only way to make it a success.
In Part 1 of our Dramatic Beauty Portrait Tutorial, we looked at the lighting setup, gear breakdown, and shooting of our dramatic beauty shoot. In Part 2 of the tutorial we will now look at two different ways of exporting and preparing your image for retouching. The first method involves creating versions in Lightroom and exporting directly to Photoshop.
When Nashville-based photographer Jake Harsh was tasked with coming up with an original photoshoot where he could flex his artistic freedoms, things turned slightly dangerous. His brave subjects for this shoot, the electro-pop band Hand of Hearts, would stand in a room with 18 pounds of fireworks being ignited and what transpired after that would be unpredictable.
This is Part 1 in what will be an 8 part series for a dramatic beauty portrait. In the series of tutorials, we will go through everything from the gear used, to the lighting setups, and all the way through the complete retouching process. In Part 1, I will breakdown my gear list used for the shoot and I will thoroughly go through my lighting setup.
Ryan Brenizer is famous for his shallow depth of field panoramas known as the Brenizer method. In addition to this, he has photographed presidents, singers, athletes, and has more than 350 weddings under his belt. He was named one of the "10 most sought-after wedding photographers in the world” by Rangefinder Magazine, so when he talks, you should listen.
High-speed sync has been around for quite some time now, and has mostly been limited to speedlights. With Profoto’s recent adoption of the technology into its B1 and B2 Series lighting systems, they are signaling a change that has the potential to bring some much needed relief to the strobist community.
The Russian photographer and mother, Elena Shumilova, is making a big splash again by sharing some great photo advice. In early 2014, her whimsical photos of her children went viral and inspired parents and photographers all around the world.
Photographers and filmmakers alike need to understand the basics of controlling the exposure of an image. It’s one of the foundations of their crafts. Cinematographer Eve Hazelton does a wonderful job of explaining the five ways to expose an image in this short video where she also details the unique creative side effects that come along with each method.
Learning how to light your subjects with one light is easy. Learning how to light a subject in a variety of ways using one light and one modifier requires a bit of creativity. When you're using one light, each inch you move your modifier ultimately affects your scene. Lighting at that point becomes very purposeful.
Shooting in harsh sunlight is always a challenge. Recently I shot a test while out on a trip in Los Angeles. Due to scheduling we had to start shooting around 4 p.m., so we were dealing with hard sunlight. In this post we will look at five different setups you can use to shoot in and manipulate these less than ideal lighting conditions.
"A Book of Beards" is exactly what it sounds like. Dudes and huge gnarly beards documented in black and white by photographer and art director Justin James Muir. What started out as a simple idea, evolved into something much much bigger.
Benjamin Von Wong has never been one to turn down a challenge. He consistently creates mind-blowing images in some of the most desolate of places under extreme conditions. This recent venture for Huawei's new smartphone, the P8, is no exception!