Denver was the start of the next series of workshops that I am presenting into the Fall of 2008, and I had to add a second date when the initial Denver workshop date sold out.  This was my first visit to Denver, and I found it a beautiful city which offered easy opportunities for us to go out and practice flash photography techniques out on the street with our two models. 

These two workshops were the first after I had revamped the material, basing it on the book that I had written on the subject of flash photography.  (The manuscript is at the publishers at the moment.)  These were also the first where I had restructured the workshop as a combination seminar presentation + practical sessions.

For me, the best part of the workshop is when the group goes out on the streets in the early evening, looking for settings in which to photograph our models.  Then there’s the chance to try out the techniques covered in the morning’s seminar presentation.

Thank you to everyone who attended.  I had a great time, and felt energised afterwards by your enthusiasm.  And a big thank you to Andrea and Aaron, our two models.

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Thank you to everyone who played along with the flash photography challenge during the past week. Now, before I get to the answers, I have to say that this was quite a tough challenge. The idea was to use flash so that it appears ‘invisible’ in the final image. Where we have a situation where we have a measure of available light, and surfaces to bounce flash off, it is usually quite possible to mix flash and available light so that the flash becomes much less obvious.

To put it another way, *I* too would’ve had a hard time with this if I didn’t happen to have shot these images and had the EXIF data to check. In looking at the available light, and then taking care with the direction, intensity and colour balance of the flash, we can be quite successful in blending flash with available light.  And this is at the center of what the flash photography workshops are about.

Here are the answers in short:
images 1, 4, 7, 9, 10 had flash in some measure.
The other images were ambient light only.

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Canon 1D Mark III - Canon 200mm f2 L IS USM - 1/300th @ f2 @ 125 ISO
[ click on the photo to see a larger image]

Canon recently upgraded their legenday 200mm f1.8 with an 200mm f2 version which has Image Stabilisation.  So out of curiousity I rented this lens from LensProToGo, to play with it and test it out.

This is the kind of lens which is best used (or in a way ONLY to be used) at its maximum aperture.  That wide aperture of f2 gives you an incredibly thin depth of field, and hence, that dreamy background.  This of course wouldn’t mean much if the lens itself wasn’t crisply sharp at f2 … and in fact, on checking my images at 100%, this lens proved itself to be count-the-eyelashes sharp at that wide aperture.

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Chicago, IL - Sept 17 (Wednesday) - sold out now.

Denver, CO - Aug 12 (Tuesday) - 2nd date - sold out now.

I’ve had great response to the Denver workshop date, which sold out quickly.  Now I’ve had more requests and have added a 2nd Denver workshop the next day.  There are 5 workshop spaces left for August 12 (Tues).   This workshop is now sold out as well.

Philadelphia, PA - October 14 (Tuesday)

Philadelphia turns out to be a popular location for the workshop, with the Oct 13 workshop already sold out. I’ve had enough requests for a waitlist, that I’ve decided to add another workshop - on the next day, Oct 14 (Tue). You can get more information and register at the Workshops page. The location will still be finalised.

Raleigh, NC - October 20 (Monday)

Due to the number of requests we’ve gotten to return to North Carolina after our sold out Charlotte workshop earlier this year, we’ve added an event in Raleigh, NC. You can get more information and register at the Workshops page. The location will still be finalised.
(As of 7/23, there are only 2 spots left for Raleigh.)

other updates:

Denver, CO - Workshop  Both workshops sold out / 5 spaces left in the morning seminars
St Petersburg, FL - 1 space left in the workshop / 10 spaces left in the morning seminar
Austin, TX - two only one space left in the workshop / 10 spaces left in the morning seminar

In the way that I approach flash photography - even on-camera flash photography - the idea is to have flash blend seamlessly with the available light. In fact, to try and make the flash appear ‘invisible’ to the final image.

So here’s a challenge - here are 10 images, 5 of which are purely available light, and 5 of which have flash to some extent. Let’s see if anyone can pick out which are which. And to make it more interesting, I’m willing to offer a prize or two to someone who figures it all out correctly.

[ entries are now closed!  Answers are posted here. ]

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Nikon D700 ..-. 1/125th @ f3.5 @ 32oo ISO.
[ click on the image to see a 100% crop ]

The Nikon D700 camera and SB-900 speedlight were released today, to my great anticipation. I expected to see D3 quality images in a body about the size of the D300, and accessibly priced for what it delivers.

This evening I drove in to Manhattan so I could roam around Times Square to test the low-light capabilities of this camera. This after all is what the D3 is renowned for, and the D700 promises to deliver the same image quality.  Outside Toys’R'Us, there was a line of Star Wars fans waiting for a pre-release party of the new Star Wars movie to start, and a few of them graciously posed for me - most impressively of all, a Darth Maul look-alike.  (I composed the photograph so that the ferris-wheel inside the shop radiates outward behind him to make for an even more striking portrait.)

The image you see there was taken with only the available light in Times Square.  And fair enough, the place is flooded at night with light from the numerous billboards - but I was able to get this image at 1/125th @ f3.5 .. which are ‘easy’ settings to use, but this was at an incredible 3200 ISO.  Click on the image to see a 100% crop of the area around his eyes to see the high-ISO noise performance.  This is from the straight-out-of-camera JPG.  I am impressed!

I’ll post a more in-depth review of this camera in the next few days. 

This idea of how to modify that black foam half-snoot that I use to flag my speedlight with, was sent to me by Randall Todd.  It allows the flag to be attached to the speedlight much easier than my less sophisticated method of using hair-bands.

“I have made and used Peter Gregg’s ABBC and found it to be very useful. Instead
of using his big rubber bands I went with a velcro design. The attached photos should
show if fairly well. It’s simply 10-1/4″ of the fuzzy side of sticky hook & loop material
on the outside and about 9″ of “3M” rubbery shelf liner on the inside. I used a piece
of double sided carpet tape to attach the shelf liner to the foam bounce card, and of
course, added a one inch piece of the hook material at the end. This really makes it
quick to attach and remove. As you can see I applied this to your flag idea.

Please forgive the background, I was outside enjoying an ice tea at the time.”

One of my major frustrations with the Nikon SB-800 flashgun (other than the clumsy controls to get into the master/slave settings), is that it doesn’t twist 180′ in either direction like the Canon 580EX speedlites do.  The SB-800 rotates 180′ to the left, but only 90′ to the right.  This difference is huge!

If for example you wanted to photograph a vertical portrait and bounce the light from your SB-800 over your left shoulder, you wouldn’t be able to. Instead you’d have to accept that the flashgun only rotates 90′ and you’d have to accept the paltry compromise that you’d have to bounce the light from your flashgun upwards into the ceiling from where you are.

Here’s an example of where it is essential to throw the light from the flash in a direction which is limited by the SB-800 ..

On the left, just the ambient light. On the right, light from a Canon 580EXII that was gelled for tungsten with a 1/2 CTS filter. In getting the correct angle that I needed the light from the flash to bounce back from, I had to bounce over my left shoulder .. NOT into the ceiling.

As I said, this limitation of the SB-800 has been a real frustration .. until now.

A while back Peter Gregg (of the ‘A Better Bounce Card’ fame), sent me this You Tube link ..

… to show how he had forced the flashhead of the Nikon SB-800 past the natural stop point.  Yes, he had managed to twist the SB-800 an additional 45′ which is perfect for what I had always wanted from this flashgun.

Well, when Peter told me about this on the phone originally, and later on showed me the clip, I was sceptical. Well, to be honest, I wasn’t so much sceptical as that I just didn’t have the balls to do it. Until now. I tried it …. and well … seriously, as Peter advises, don’t do this!  He can’t, and I certainly can’t take responsibility for this.  But here it is …. my Nikon SB-800 now rotates 135′ to the right.  Just enough for what I have always wanted it to achieve.

Now here’s the irony - I finally managed to pull together the guts to do this … on the eve of the release of the Nikon SB-900 which will rotate a cool 180′ to either side. That alone would make the SB-900 an automatic upgrade over the SB-800.

Photographers are more and more becoming the target for scammers and con artists.  The latest trick for them is to book the photographer for a date, and then pay via bank guaranteed check or via credit card. The scam comes into play in that they over-pay, and then ask for a refund of that portion of the money.  The bank guaranteed check of course is fake, or the credit card they used is stolen.  And the end result is that the photographer who is naive enough to fall for this, is out of pocket by whatever amount they refunded to the scammers.  

Here’s an example of an email I received last week:

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One of the ideas that has been mentioned here previously, is when using on-camera flash indoors, to approach it with a studio mind-set where possible.  Instead of bouncing flash upwards towards the ceiling, or even simply behind you, the idea is to think “where would I have placed my softbox if this were a studio?” 

Then it is simply a matter of pointing the on-camera flash in that direction, and flagging any spill light from the flashgun.  I most often use a piece of black foam to flag my on-camera speedlight.

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