Dragging the shutter to control the background

In a previous post I mentioned using the shutter speed to control the exposure level of the background when shooting a sunset.  A recent wedding couple I photographed was kind enough to help me illustrate this idea.

The following series of images of Tamra and John were taken with a Canon 7D with a 24-105 f4 L IS lens.  I used a set of Pocket Wizards to trigger an off-camera Nikon SB-26 hotshoe flash set at 1/2 power.  The SB-26 was mounted on a lightstand to camera right about 10 feet away from the couple, and modified with a Lastolite Ezybox Hotshoe Softbox. A 1/4 CTO gel was added to the flash to warm the light up a little.

Everything on the camera was set manually - the iso was set to 400, and the aperture remained at f4.  The only thing that changed between shots was the shutter speed.  I started at a shutter speed of 1/30th and gradually increased the shutter speed until the sky darkened to my liking.  The total time it to make all these images was less than a minute.

Notice how the exposure level of the couple does not change throughout.  This is because the aperture, iso, distance of the light to the subject, and the power level of the flash do not change.  Only the shutter speed changes, which changes the exposure level of the sky.

1/30













1/60













1/100













1/125













1/160













1/250













The only limit to how dark I can make the sky is the flash sync speed of the camera.  In this case, the 7D has an upper limit of 1/250, which is pretty good (my 5D only goes to 1/160).  If I go higher than the sync speed, part of the image will be dark, because the shutter is moving too fast for the flash to expose every part of the subject/foreground. If I were to use a Canon flash, like the 580EX, I could go much higher using the high-speed sync mode.

Some people have asked why I use Nikon SB-26 strobes when I'm shooting with Canon gear.  Although I do have a couple of 580EX flashes that I use, I like using the Nikon flashes for a lot of manual flash work because:

a) They have PC sync ports which allow me to trigger them with Pocket Wizards.  Only Canon's newer flash has a PC sync port - the 580EXII.

b) The SB-26s have built in optical slaves so if I run out of Pocket Wizards, I can still trigger them with the pop of another flash.

c) They're durable and cheap enough that I don't have a cow if one breaks.  I've been able to find them in secondhand stores in Japan for around $100 each.  The Canon 580 EXIIs are about 4-5x the cost.

DIY Black Rapid camera sling

In my search for a better camera strap, I came across this system - the Black Rapid RS-7.

While it looked promising, I also found a lot of people who were making DIY versions of this. I decided to try making one myself. 

After digging around my closet for a couple of minutes I found the materials needed to do it. All I needed were two things:

a 3-point military sling from my airsoft MP5 submachine gun

and a Bogen 3157N Quick Release Plate









 


Assembly was simple:

 attach the quick release plate to the bottom of my camera

connect the D-ring on the bottom of the plate to the sliding clip on the sling.  That's pretty much it.

I've used this on a recent wedding shoot and it seems to perform pretty well.
There are a few minor issues with this DIY version - there's no adjustable brake, it's a little difficult to adjust the size of the loop, the clip does not lock like the Black Rapid mini carabiner, and I'm not sure how strong the D-ring on the Bogen plate actually is.  I'm pretty sure Bogen never intended for their camera plate to be used in this manner:



While my DIY strap not as fancy as this Black Rapid is, it does do about 90% of what the actual product does. I figure it will hold me over until I can check out the actual Black Rapid product in person the next time I hit the camera stores in Tokyo.

6 steps to shooting at sunset

Canon 5D mkII 24-105 f4L IS Lens iso 200  1/6@f5.6

Shooting a subject with flash against a sunset background using all manual settings on the camera is something that I struggled with learning for the longest time.  At first it kinda went like this:



When I first started shooting sunset portraits, I would usually put the camera in Program mode and set the on camera flash to ETTL mode.  Most of the time it would do a pretty good job, but there would always be the odd frame where the exposure went wacky and was either too dark or too bright. Usually it would be THAT frame where everything else was right - the model's pose, hair, expression, whatever.  It would have been the Perfect Shot.... if only the exposure didn't suck.

The main problem with shooting sunset portraits in Program mode with an on camera flash is that every time the camera angle or the distance to the subject changes, the camera and flash have to recalculate everything. Camera manufacturers love to say that the chips in the cameras are so powerful that they can instantly compare your image to hundreds of thousands of images in their databases in order to give you the correct exposure.  When you shoot a whole bunch of shots in a row however, you'll occasionally get a bad exposure because the camera isn't smart enough to know what exactly it is that you're shooting.  No matter how powerful the computer inside your camera is,  it will never be able to compete with the supercomputer that is between your ears.

Shooting on all manual settings can be daunting at first, but I've found that it actually makes it easier to get more consistent images and wastes less time in the long run.

When using flash as the main light on the subject at sunset, the aperture controls the exposure level of the subject and shutter speed controls the exposure level of the background.  This was the hardest concept for me to wrap my brain around when I first started learning how to use manual flash at sunset. What made things easier for me was learning to control or eliminate the variables that affect exposure (flash to subject distance, iso, aperture, shutter speed) in steps.

disclaimer - I am NOT an expert at this.  The following is just to show what I learned over the years so that I don't break out into a cold sweat whenever I am asked to do a sunset portrait.

Step 1 - Get the flash off of the camera, set it up on a lightstand and trigger it with a set of Pocket Wizards.  This gives me the freedom to move around while keeping the distance from the flash to the subject constant.  By keeping this distance constant, it eliminates one variable of the exposure I need to worry about. I'll usually set it up about 10 feet away from my subject at about a 45 degree angle off to one side.  I'll then use a 70-200 lens to zoom in and frame the lightstand out of the shot.  If I need a wide angle shot, I'll include the lightstand in the frame, but try to keep it on a "Photoshoppable" area of the frame (like against a clear sky) where it will be easier to take out in post production. Having the flash on a lightstand away from the camera position also eliminates the problem of "red-eye".

Step 2 - Keep the iso constant - usually for sunsets I'll keep it at iso 400.  This eliminates another exposure variable.

Step 3 - Wait for sunset light level to go down to where a shot of just the sunset sky looks good at camera settings of 1/125 @ f8.

Step 4 - Set the flash power settings to manual mode and set the power level to get a good exposure on the subject at f8.  Don't really need a super powerful flash to do this. At iso 400 I can easily get this with a small Nikon SB-26 set to 1/2 power at about 10 ft away.  Keeping this constant takes away another variable I have to worry about.

Step 5 - Start shooting at 1/125 @ f8.  If I want to make the sky darker, I change the shutter speed to 1/160 or 1/200, which is about the flash sync speed limit for my 5D mkII.  If I want to make the sky lighter, I'll slow the shutter speed down to 1/100 or slower.  As long as I keep the iso/aperture/flash power/distance from flash to subject the same, the exposure on the subject will remain the same and I only need to think about changing one thing - the shutter speed.  Having only one thing to worry about makes things hella easier for me and my Homer Simpson level brain.

Step 6 - Eventually it'll get dark enough where I can drop the flash power down to where I can get a good exposure on the subject at f4, then repeat Step 5 at this wider aperture setting.

The great thing about learning how to do it manually is that once you get used to it, you can have fun with it and experiment.  With the newer cameras that can handle much higher iso speeds and IS lenses that let you handhold at really slow shutter speeds, I've been able to do handheld shots like the one below at 1/4 of a second.

 Canon 5D mkII 24-105 f4L IS Lens iso 400  handheld at 1/4@f5.6

Light is from an AB800 on lowest power setting with a 5ft Octodome to camera left. This was long after the sun had set that day and I literally could not even see Skyler's face at this point (couldn't use the modeling light on the AB800 since I was running it off of battery power) and I had to guesstimate the focus distance.

Even at 1/4 of a second shutter speed, I don't have to worry too much about the subject being blurred since the flash freezes her movement.

Hope you found this post useful and that it will keep you from making the same mistakes I made when I first started learning this stuff.

Sunset shoot with Skyler and Mishka

 Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200 1/160@ f5.6

In one of the sections of his book "The Hot Shoe Diaries", photographer Joe McNally talks about the benefits of shooting near the water at sunset.  Since the reflection on the water's surface has almost the same exposure level as the sky, you can actually keep shooting long after the sun has gone below the horizon.

I recently had the chance to try this out with Skyler and Mishka, a couple of models who were visiting Maui.  We shot at a beach house that they were staying at on the southern part of Front St. in Lahaina.

We started off with a few sets in an outdoor shower.

I took these setup shots the following morning so my apologies that it does not show the actual lighting of the previous afternoon.  In this first setup picture, the sun was low in the sky to the right of this location. I setup a silver California Sunbounce Mini reflector to the left of the shower, intending to use it as the main light and the sun as a hair light.

  Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200 1/250@ f4

Because there were a lot of trees to the right of the shower, I soon started losing the edge light as the sun got lower in the sky. I then decided to reverse it and use the reflector as the hair light. I setup an AB800 with a large softbox and used that as the main light.

Since the AB800 was now my main light, I dropped the shutter speed down to 1/160 to match the flash sync speed of the camera.

  Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200 1/160@ f5.6

Would have liked to have more of the water showing, but we didn't want to get the model's hair wet for this shoot.

When we got down to the beach the water was perfectly flat, almost like a giant mirror.  There were several boats anchored just offshore which cluttered up the background, so I used a 70-200 f2.8L IS lens to compress the background and hide them.

 Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200 1/125@ f5.6

For these shots in the water I used an Alien Bees AB800 strobe in a 5-ft Photoflex Octodome, powered by a Vagabond II battery pack and triggered with a Pocket Wizard.

The Octodome has four interior reflective panels that can be set to silver or gold -  I chose to go with 2 silver panels and 2 gold panels to match the warm light of the sunset.

We didn't have an assistant for this shoot this first day, so I kept the lightstand on the shore right at the edge of the water and punched up the power setting on the AB800 to between 1/2 and full power.

 Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200 1/200@ f8

  Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200 1/125@ f5.6

Mishka was really brave for this shoot.  Got all the way into the water to get this shot even though the crabs were biting that day.

A couple of times the flash didn't recycle fast enough between shots and we ended up with silhouettes.
When things like this happen, sometimes it's interesting to just go with the flow and experiment with it.

  Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200 1/125@ f5.6

The sun was pretty much gone by this point so we played around with shooting some more silhouettes for a bit.

  Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200 1/30@ f5.6

As the light continued to fade, I kept dragging the shutter to compensate - even as slow as 1/30th handheld with a 70-200 lens (gotta love that IS lens).  Thanks to reflection of the sky in the water, we were able to keep shooting for a while.

I really liked how the light wrapped around them to add a bit of dimensionality to their forms.
What is also great about silhouette shots is that there is very little retouching to be done. All I had to do in post was clean up some stuff in the water, punch up the colors in the sky a skosh and that was pretty much it.

One thing I should have done differently is shoot it from a lower angle, so that the horizon doesn't cut through the middle of the frame.  If I could have gotten that horizon level into maybe the lower third of the frame, that would probably look better.

Night shoot in a jacuzzi

On a recent photoshoot I had the chance to do a night shoot, something that I've been meaning to do for a while.

Shooting outdoors at night is a lot like shooting in a studio.  Since the only light is what's coming from the strobes, the camera can be set similar to the settings for a studio shoot.

Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200, 1/125 @ f8

I had to work pretty fast on setting this up. This was towards the end of the day and since the jacuzzi wasn't heating up properly, we didn't want to keep model Skyler in the water longer than necessary.

(I took these setup shots the following morning 'cause I forgot to take them that night so that it would be easier to see.)

We used 3 lights for this setup. The main light was a White Lightning 1600 in a large softbox mounted on a C-stand above the camera.  Powered with a Vagabond II Battery pack and triggered with a Pocket Wizard.

To light the water, I setup a Nikon SB-26 with a blue gel and another Pocket Wizard trigger behind the jacuzzi and aimed it down into the water behind the model.

To keep the SB-26 from flaring into the camera, I added a set of barndoors to the flash.

These barndoors are made by SP Studio Systems and you can get them from B&H for around $10.  They just barely fit around the edges of the SB-26 - a pretty snug fit.

For the edge light, I used another SB-26 with a cardboard snoot to camera left, standing it up on the edge of the jacuzzi.  I didn't have a spare Pocket Wizard to use for this one (need to buy some more soon) so I set it to optical slave mode.

I used the snoot on this flash because I didn't have room in my camera bag for a second set of barndoors for this 2nd SB-26 (although I should probably buy a second set, but I've already got too much stuff in the camera bag as it is).  The result with the snoot was a little too tight of a light pattern - in the first photo of this post the light was only hitting her arm and not her hair.  I ended up having our other model Mishka stand on the edge of the jacuzzi and hold this flash up to better aim it at Skyler. I also had her angle the flash head at a 90 degree angle so that more light would hit Skyler's hair.

The final image:

Canon 5D mkII 70-200 f2.8L IS lens iso 200, 1/125 @ f8

In retrospect, I would have liked to have added some color to the edge light by gelling it with a CTO gel but, like I mentioned, we were pressed for time.

A big Mahalo goes out to Skyler for being so patient and braving the cold water so that we could get this shot. Also Mahalo to Mishka for helping with this shot and not falling into the pool with the SB-26. :-)

Wraparound light

Canon 5D mkII 85mm f1.2L II lens iso640 1/100@f2.8

The wraparound light is a technique I picked up from photographer Carlos Baez's See the Light DVD.

While I was in Japan this past December, I shot two photosessions at the White Studio in Edogawabashi.  One of the nice features of this place is a wall of frosted windows in one section of the studio.  In both sessions I did some sets where I had the models stand in front of these windows and shot without flash or reflectors.

Since the model is backlit, it can trick the in-camera meter, so a handheld meter works better in this situation (or using the camera's spot-metering).  By metering for the face and letting the backlighting overexpose, the light comes in through the window and wraps around the subject.  It makes for a very soft romantic high key image.

Canon 5D mkII 85mm f1.2L II lens iso800 1/80@f2.8

This shot of Kayo actually took several tries, mostly because we wanted to position the shirt to show as much curvature as we could without being too revealing. It's actually a lot harder to do than you might think. ;-)


For Miyu's session, I tried this same lighting technique near another window in the studio.  This was later in the day, and the light level from outside wasn't as strong as before.  For this shot of Miyu on the bed, I had to bump the iso up to around 1600. Thankfully the 5D mkII handles higher isos extremely well, and there wasn't much noise to deal with at all.

Canon 5D mkII 85mm f1.2L II lens iso1600 1/30@f2.8

I also had to drastically change my camera angle for this image to get the window positioned correctly behind Miyu.  The bottom edge of the window was slightly higher than the edge of the bed, so I had to shoot this while lying on the floor, between two recycling bins underneath some metal shelving against the opposite wall (it was a very small studio).

In the original shot, there was a part of the window frame that stuck out of Miyu's head which bothered me.  By blowing out the background with this lighting technique however, the window frame nearly disappears making it much less distracting and eliminating the need to Photoshop it out in post.

Canon 5D mkII 85mm f1.2L II lens iso1600 1/160@f2.0

This last shot of Miyu is one of our favorites from the session.  It was one of the last shots of the day, right before we ran out of studio time.