One of the most fundamental skills you can have when it comes to artificial lighting is learning to balance the ambient and strobe. This great video goes behind the scenes of a sunset portrait shoot to show how to do just that to get both a properly exposed subject and background.
Coming to you from Jay P. Morgan at The Slanted Lens, this video will help you learn to balance ambient lighting and strobes. The problem with shooting something like a sunset portrait is that if you expose for the background, your subject will be severely underexposed, while if you expose for the subject, you'll likely blow out the background. The way to obviate this issue is to introduce a strobe, allowing you to expose for the background and make up for the underexposure on your subject. The video will take you through the basics of balancing the two exposures to ensure you get a great result that simply isn't possible without artificial light. The trick lies in understanding how aperture and shutter speed work to control the two separate exposures and which one to adjust as the sun continues to set and the ambient light continues to diminish. Check out the video above for the full breakdown.
This is so wrong, no one shoots portrait outside with the camera on tripod and such slow shutter speeds.
He could shot in 1/200, higher iso e lower flash power to balance the light.
That is the fun, you could relay on auto iso or even TTL if this is too complex.
I took a look on your profile, there is not a single photo, outdoors, with slow shutter speed. I could no find nothing less than 1/200. Do you practice what your preach?
You guys should check out dpreview. Hands down the best place on the web for photographers to vent their rage at each other.
and the result looks just like a studio shoot with a sunset backdrop
I think it’s important to understand that you can tackle a shot like this any number of ways. However, the mistake they make in this video, IMO, is that they don’t really respect the light that’s provided in the setting they chose. The strobe light isn’t coming from the right direction and it’s too bright in relation to the background. The gels aren’t warm enough to reflect the backdrop so the image has a cut out quality.
It’s a good attempt and the concepts are sound, but I think a bit more attention should have been paid to the conditions they were shooting in.
Just my 2 cents for anyone learning lighting out there!
Very true.
A title that says "Balance strobes and ambient light" to me should make strobes almost invisible to the eye.
Also I can't stand Jay. Which is just my problem :)
Agreed!