Trevor Sherwin recently traveled to Kenya, and decided to use this opportunity to create some amazing images for his portfolio. Most people who travel to the area tend to focus on the wildlife, but Trevor wanted to focus on something else - people. He wanted to create dramatic portraits of the local tribes in a way that shows both the people and the location. Check out his great video explaining his method of shooting.
Before traveling, Trevor searched online to see what was done before: how other people photographed the tribes. He noticed that in most cases, people shot with just available light or low-powered flash. The results were OK, but not powerful, dramatic or interesting as the images he wanted to create. He knew he will have to bring a powerful flash or a strobe to overpower the bright sunlight.
Example for a portrait taken with just available light. Face is exposed correctly, but the sky is blown out.
Trevor traveled with one battery-powered Photoflex TritonFlash, Large OctoDome Softbox, ND8 3 Stop Neutral Density Filter and Phottix Odin radio Trigger. This is a very light way to travel. Everything can fit in one backpack, and easy to travel with.
The TritonFlash is a very powerful flash that works with a battery pack, which makes it great for location photo shoots. On top of it, it is very powerful and can help you overpower the bright sun light, and create a very even, detailed and dramatic shot. In the video above Trevor Sherwin explains everything about the technical aspects, how he shot it, why he chose the equipment he took with him, and also everything about his retouching and post processing.
To learn more, head to Trevor's blog where he gives a lot of additional information about his technique and equipment. In addition - to join one of Trevor's future workshops, sign up here.
[via ISO1200 and photoflex.ca]
his pictures look exactly like Joey Lawrence's... dunno which took theirs first but...
Lot's of people make these type of pictures. Even long before Joey Lawrence. In the B&W days there was Phil Borges. I guess everybody inspires everybody. Isn't that beautiful?
agreed... its the setting/concept that sort of hammer home the feeling of "sameness" regardless of how many times this has been done.
Great shots, and great explanations. Love that these types of things are possible with relatively little equipment.
he took a studio flash and a octo to his vacation in africa, is that little?
It's less than what many others take for their trips (tripods, light stands, few flashes, few lenses, 1-2 bodies, reflector/s and what not. Strobe sounds like a lot, but if you check out the one he took, it's not that big.
Given that part of the reason he travelled to Africa was for shots like this, I'd say it was. The average studio shoot involves much more equipment, and Trevor was able to recreate that look with the bare minimum of gear.
His pictures look exactly like Rembrandt's...dunno which took theirs first but...
Haha.
Don't see why he's not shooting at ISO 100 and 1/200 or 1/250 but at ISO 400 instead. A 300 WS flash should be sufficient to do that... Or you could just use a x100s or RX1 :-)
I used to be like everyone else. Now i would just bring a reflector. Works better, looks more natural.
I've tried that. My wife can't even open her eyes without them watering when I'm hitting her with a reflector in full sunlight.
You're supposed to feather it in full sun so it doesn't do this. Or have her close her eyes and count backwards from 3 and she can just open them at '1' for the shot then close them again :)
That happens some times. :)
Great shots, interesting video. But why were you shooting at ISO 400 if you were trying to reduce the exposure?
¯_(ツ)_/¯
lol the honest answer would be "I forgot to change my settings" but I'd like to hear the made up reason - maybe because it adds more grain or something.
Get some details out from deep shadows? You can't light and fill all the shadows with small flash. So, I guess maybe thats why?
(PS I haven't seen the video yet, but thats my understanding why ISO400 and not ISO100)
The problem is ISO affects both flash AND ambient light. Only the aperture affects the flash.
if you watch from vimeo, he explained why he used ISO400..
Quoted from him from vimeo
"Good question, its just the way I shoot. I typically shoot at 200 or 400 ISO when I shoot with flash in studio that way I can float the ISO instead of the Aperture and shutter speeds. Its just something I've become accustomed to doing.But yes I could have set up to shoot at 100 ISO and done exactly the same thing."
HUH?
How does the aperture not effect ambient light?
What kind of new fangled camera, sci fi magic is this?
Wow. Never looked into these Photoflex Triton Flashes. Less than $1k at B&H for 300w/s. Looked at the spec and it stated the flash duration is /1/3200 at full power, but couldn't find if that was a t.1 or t.5 spec. Anyone know where I can find/verify the t.1 duration?
if 1/3200 at 1/1 power is t.1, this is a viable alternative to Lumidyne action packs at half the price with 50% more power.
Paul C. Buff Einsteins are 640w/s, 1/13,000 second (t.1)...$500.
add a Vagabond lithium battery pack and you are set !
http://dickinsonphoto.blogspot.com/2013/06/new-gear-for-location-shootin...
The goal here was not to freeze action but to get the widest aperture in broad daylight. A super short flash duration would have been helpless...
But the Einsteins are a bargain - no question about it !!
does his work just remind me of Joey Lawrence?
Underexposing ambient a couple stops and filling in the subject with strobes? Reminds me of Atiba Jefferson without the moving subject.
It's not a new technique. Skateboard photographers have used it for years to minimize motion blur.
I would say it nods to it. Especially with the wondering monks project. But Joey's stuff has a bit more pop to it and he uses a medium format so the feel created by perspective distortion is different and (subjectively) more moody. These portraits are nice, but his tone choice has more of that subtle fade effect, I would say.
Joey is also WAY more committed to his subjects than anyone else I've seen. He literally spends years building a relationship with them. In fact, he's making a movie starring members of the tribe he photographed as told through their eyes and traditions. How many photo tourists can say they've done that?
That's a great point. One of the things that really stuck out to me about the way he gathered his subjects from the india documentary was that he spent plenty of time with them before he took there picture. He even mentioned that many photographers go to varanasi just to steal a few interesting pics and run away, but he wanted to know the people before he took their picture. I'm not sure which movie you're referring to but i think it's already been made. the whole thing is on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JB7kfnDKPEw
It's a beautiful documentary and I highly recommend it.
I think he's talking about Joey's "People of the Delta" project, but his Varanasi documentary was also awesome.
Hey Blossom, do you want to go listen to CD's and Sam Goody's with me and Six? Woah! (I don't think I ever actually watched an episode of Blossom, but Woah! Joey Lawrance!)
If you're looking to travel really light and overpower the sun.
Fuji x100s.
Two speedlights in a large softbox.
Misc radio slaves/stand/gels.
Done.
I just started the video and immediately understand. Nothing more then Photoflex advertising (Photoflex lighting school)....
Never understand why people want to overpower the sun, the end result is so unnatural, the perfectly sunny day is turned into a dark cloudy day. Especially bringing such artificial lighting to the portrait of tribe people, seems totally against the whole idea. In my opinion, just add a touch of flash to subject face, while keeping the environment as much as we can, is much better.
Isn't it great that we live in a world where people have different tastes and wants? There are plenty of reasons to overpower the sun. It's much more dramatic, adds interesting highlights, creates a lot of mood, and is just a different look. Nothing better or worse about it.
I don't think there is anything wrong with the approach. I am just saying, if you are traveling that far to photograph local tribes people. It seems to me that bringing in such bold artificial lighting and getting this artificial dramatic look, is kinda against the nature of who they are.
You appear to be making a reference to the "metaphorical" use of light. For example, strobe is artificial light so it tends match well with non-natural subject matter like modern and mass produced objects. Meanwhile, natural light matches up well with organic and hand-made objects.
A good example of what I'm talking about might be to consider whether film-noir style lighting would be more rhetorically appropriate for a shoot with a science fiction theme or an Amish farmhouse theme?
@MikeMoss. I am glad you bring up the cinema lighting.
Some comment here mentioned the photo look like Rembrandt, in the
surface, it
might seem that way, but if you look closer, Rembrandt's lighting style
(in his painting) is
always consistent with an existing light source, even if the source is
out of frame, may it be a candle, or a window. In cinema, it's called
motivated lighting - "When the lighting appears to come from actual
source established in the scene, such as a window or desk lamp, you can
increase audience allegiance and 'artistic integrity'"
The
photographs in this article, the man in red dress in particular, in which the flash becomes the key light of the scene. And it doesn't
align with the ambient light (yes, ambient light also has direction too most of the time). so for me, aesthetically, it's not pleasing. Is it wrong? of course not.
I am not saying not using Flash/Artificial light, I am saying using it
with delicacy, and making it (Flash/strobe) complementary to the
natural light, and this approach will probably works better for the subject in this article.
I am going to give a commercialized example here (see attached image), if you look at this picture Annie Leibovitz
took of Sofia & Francis Ford Coppola for LV core value campaign. She
did use strobe, a big one too, but she used it in such a way that it
blends really well with the environment, you still can feel the sun in
the picture. (you can also check out the behind the scene https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEzwtVIP6P4)
Again, this is totally subjective and my personal taste.
@samloves:disqus
The Louis Vuitton shoot is an excellent example of what we used to call flash-fill. I definitely agree with you about how that is a great way to preserve the direction of the motivational lighting.
What I'm talking about is the relationship between the type of light sources and the subject matter. For example, it might be possible to maintain the direction of the motivational lighting in a scene while using both flash or reflectors, In that case, how might a photographer choose? One of the ways he can choose is to think of how the light source relates metaphorically to the subject matter itself. So, if a photographer were really trying to preserve the direction of the ambient light in a scene to match a particular natural subject matter then he might not actually want to use artificial light like flash.
Basically, my original post was to try to get beyond the question of "how" and think instead about "why" ? Most photographers are very functional in their approach and can think of multiple ways to light a scene. In that sense, the "how" is very subjective to the individual photographer. But the "why" starts getting into the reason behind the lighting and that is more objective and open to criticism.
@MikeMoss:disqus I see what you mean. if we go a little bit deeper, it's still about "how". Here is the deal, when using a flash, the light from it has a color temperature around 5500 k, but the environment almost always has a different color temperature, even a few hundred k different, the mixed color temp will show in the photograph.
What happen is, when using Flash/strobe in outdoor, without matching the Flash to the environment color temperature, (which I bet most of the photographers don't bother to do), the subject face/skin tone is always a little bit more white, it is even more obvious when using Flash as key. Now, if we are using a reflector, because no extra light source involved, there are no mixed color temperature, therefore, the photograph looks more natural. (of course, we are not talking about using a gold reflector)
Now, we are not Annie Leibovitz, we don't have high end retoucher to fix the picture, we do the post on our own, so without getting the consistent color temperature, our photos suffer. Some might argue that this is real minor, no one will notice. but in my opinion, it's this kinda of details pushing us to another level.
You're right about how people will mix 5500k flash-fill with natural light that isn't balanced to daylight and then get these weird mixed color temperatures. Of course, it's possible to fix that problem by using a color meter for the ambient light and then either working with filters or using additional lighting that has color temperature adjustments (like the high end Broncolors) On the other hand, shadows are naturally cool so any attempt to bring them to neutral deviates from nature.
In the end, there is a kind of "syntax" to the lighting whether or not most photographers are even aware of it. There is a standard based on nature and then any photography techniques that deviates from that are outside of the standard. In my opinion, if a photographer uses a technique that goes outside of the standard given in nature, then he can justify it as a creative decision as long as it is metaphorical. Otherwise, it's just the hackneyed technique of a dilittante.
@MikeMoss, I totally agree with you.
And just to add 1 point to what @Mike_Kelley:disqus just said - don't forget our eyes have way better dynamic range than our camera. So actually the flashed image is closer to what our eyes see than the blown-out photo ;)
But yeah... what Mike said.
When you are trying to over power the sun, it means you have overslept! The golden hour is one hour after sun rise and one hour before sun set. Technology just doesnt help set things straight. hur hur :)
Well.. I don't think this is anything new.. Who hasn't tried that type of photo yet?
And how is it a good idea to visit some kind of local tribes and literally overpower them with fancy unnecessary hightech equipment?
I understand underexposing the sky by a stop or so to increase the dynamic range and filling in the face with a speedlight. Why would you need a $1000 strobe with a $1000 battery for that?
I agree. Cameras today have a lot of dynamic range so all it takes is a little fill light and often not even that to capture someone. I blame the stobist guys for that. Just go to their flickr page and many of the pictures look like this. It's ok to take pictures that look natural! It's ok.
No, it's not new. But that's not the point of this post. He went and divulged his workflow and knowledge to the public. He took the time and effort to make this video. I thank him for that. Joey L's tutorials definitely cost more than the free cost of this tutorial.
Why do you think this is fancy unnecessary high tech equipment? He used what was necessary to keep shooting simple, light, and portable. High speed sync is necessary to forgo ND filters when getting shallow DOF shots with that amount of light. That's one less system to carry around. That amount of light is necessary to get that look he wanted. To get that amount of light, he needed a high wattage flash which doesn't come cheap. Especially at that portability. My "cheap" SB910 isn't enough to kill bright sunlight. 10 cheap yong nuos isn't exactly practical since he wanted portability. I'm now seriously looking into these flashes because they seem to be more convenient to carry around and are much lighter than my alienbees + vagabond.
You saying it's unnecessary to have such expensive equipment is like you saying that I shouldn't be bringing around my 5DmIII and should just be bringing my more reasonably priced G16 when I'm out on vacation taking pics of my SO. He's travelling around and happens to have that equipment. So why not use it. It's not like he spent all that money to specifically only shoot that tribe. The fact that he has that equipment shows that he does other things as well and is not just a hobbyist randomly shooting tribes. I shoot wildlife with my 70-200 2.8. I could easily shoot with a 55-200 4-5.6 and get the same shots with enough light. But why should I get that cheaper lens when I've already got what I have with me.
I doubt a SB910 or a 600EX or even a Yongnuo isn't enough. I did this kind of photo in bright sunlight with one of my Yongnuo 560 and it worked. I'm not saying you can't bring stuff you already have and should buy a cheaper camera if you're going to Africa. But don't tell me that a big studio strobe is more portable than a Nikon flash or something similar.
This is not even the point of my comment. I'm just saying that this technique is not anything new. I'm saying that, for me, the only point of this video seems to be showing expensive equipment. I'm saying that the title "Anything you need to know" is just.. hm.. I mean it's like saying "Anything you need to know about putting on jacket" and the article goes "Just put on a jacket". Wow. It's true! It's anything I need to know but was it worth writing an article?
Don't forget there are photography newbies who watch these to learn. To some people buying their first camera, off-camera flash and balancing ambient / artificial is a mystery.
I've been shooting 36 years, I still learn from others.