1st Strobist Attempt

iamnothim

Had a photoshoot with a band yesterday, and judging by some sample photos they'd sent me of other bands that they liked, I knew I was going to have to bring some class of off camera flash with me. I've had a set of Wireless triggers for a while but I've only been using them for experimental stuff, nothing with bands at all.

Anyway, I'm pretty happy with how these turned out - but would love some advice on how to improve them.

They were shot with on flash to the left about 6 feet away on full power, fired in a silver umbrella. Stopped down to f/8 ISO100 if I remember correctly.

xshayx

1. Tell them to get haircuts ;-)

nah, seriously, very good shots, the only thing that sticks out (bad) to me is the sky, looks like it was burned in PS, but very hard to shoot a scene like this with sky included. And the second one doesnt look as contrasty or saturated as the first one..... liking the first one

melekalikimaka

brilliant shots, well suited, just getting heavy into strobist myself and love these... suits the characters well.

4sb

You've got very good interaction with the band members.

With regard to the sky, you might try using higher flash output and expose accordingly, thereby making the background (sky) darker. You should be able to get a much moodier shot that way.

melekalikimaka

i love the sky in the second

iamnothim

@ xshayx & 4sb - I agree, the sky is a bit of a cop out. the flash i already had was already on full power and only just a little outside of the frame so I had nowhere really to go with it. the sky was nearly completely blown out in the original so I used the ND grad part of lightroom to reintroduce the colour and detail into it. The vignetting might be a bit over the top and is probably distracting from the subjects which is definitely a no-no

@melekalikimaka - thanks for the comments. i'd love to see some of your strobist shots, must have a gander through your flickr

af_thefragile

they all have the same hair.......

Pretty good shot though. I bet the band is delighted!

Valentia

Excellent!! I have no problems with the sky at all. It suits the shots completely.

Borderfox

Great shots.

Overblood

I like these types of strobist pics, but... Why are they in a field? Are they a farmer themed rock band? I'd choose a more interesting rock n roll background.

I like the two points of view you have, one from low down and one face on, how about trying a view from higher up? Like standing on a chair or something? Could be fun.

And on a side note, do these lads remind you of anyone?:

Valentia

Overblood wrote: »

I like these types of strobist pics, but... Why are they in a field?

That's a bit like asking "why are they on a zebra crossing"

If you don't get it you are a lot younger than me........

bovril

Really nice shots. I think I prefer the 2nd one but they're both great. Sky is cool in both.

quilmore

I started with a white umbrella stuck with duct tape to an old flash with an optical slave
the sb800 on the camera was on manual, and because I don't own a lightmeter it was more of trial and error than science/theory

Overblood

Valentia wrote: »

That's a bit like asking "why are they on a zebra crossing"

If you don't get it you are a lot younger than me........

Yeha the beatles I know.

iamnothim

@overblood. point taken, but I should point out that I was working to a spec. The samples I was provided were from these two bands...
www.myspace.com/bmth and
www.myspace.com/everyavenue both of which had equally unrelated background, so a field in a quiet suburb in castleknock became the loction. We did a few locations in the one session, but these were the only ones where I was really getting to grips with the off camera flash.

@quilmore - i was totally on trial an error too. i think i set the shutter speed to 1/200 and ISO to 100 and just fired off a few test shots at different apertures to see what worked best. my flash is old too - it only has one power setting, i think i might invest in a canon 580 or similar, give me a bit more control over the shots. my internal flash is broken too, so optical slaves are no good. i have one set of 'poverty wizards'. if i buy a new flash, i'll get a second reciever so i can keep using the old flash too

quilmore

if you're not going to use TTL don't buy the 580, a waste of money
get some el cheapo flashes like this one or this one

eas

I think you did ok, the 2nd one works much better in my opinion. Mainly because the horizon is placed well below head level. From a composition view, when people and horizons meet I'd always try and have the horizon either well below or above the head.

From a strobist perspective, I think all you've really done is added fill light, which is not a bad thing. If I was to shoot these young fellas I'd probably use a much harsher light. 2 flashes crossed on each side, I'd set them both 2-3 stops above the ambient and use a wider angle.

Really, unless you have direct sunlight you're flash should be able to become a strong key light.

This shot was taken with one bare flash, hand held. ISO 400, 1/250 f22. I set my flash exposure 3 stops over ambient.





I really like the band stuff that Joey Lawrence does. http://www.joeyl.com/

quilmore

eas wrote: »

I set my flash exposure 3 stops over ambient

how did you measure that?

eas

quilmore wrote: »

how did you measure that?

in this case I didn't measure anything, the camera and ttl did all the exposure.

This is what I do with bright skies - in S mode I'll set my shutter to highest sync speed (1/250). In the example above, the ISO should probably be set at 200, but for ease on my flash + batteries I used 400 (or maybe I just forgot it was at 400 ). I set the exposure comp on the body to somewhere between -1/-3 depending brightness and on effect required. I then set flash comp to +1/+3 (exact opposite of what I set the exposure comp to). This keeps the exposure nice and balanced.

The above is for Nikons, I think with Canons when you set exposure comp on the flash head it automatically compensates the cameras exposure....not 100% sure on that.