High-speed sync enables daylight flash at wide apertures by changing the way the flash fires.

According to the 1931 song, only “Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the noon day sun.” Thanks to high-speed sync, flash photographers can now be added to the list. High-speed sync enables shutter speeds way beyond the norm for flash photography. It also opens up a new realm of creative opportunity.  Many shooters are intimidated by high-speed sync. In reality, it’s really easy to use if you [Read more →]

The Strobist - David Hobby

I had the great fortune to get a seat last Sunday for David Hobby’s Strobist lighting seminar in Los Angeles. [If you're a student of lighting and just said "Stro-who?", then let me be the first to welcome you to our planet. Check out the Strobist site and we'll see you back here in a couple days.]

To say that a ticket to the Stobist workshop is a hot item is an understatement. Two days x 50 seats = 100 happy photogs. 24 hours = more time than it took for both seminars to sell out. If you’re among the legions who wished they could attend a Strobist workshop, then let me ease your pain (or pour salt on your wounds) by sharing some of the highlights of the day. [Read on, I promise you'll also find links to sources of info on virtually every concept presented during the seminar.] [Read more →]

As flashmasters Joe McNally and David Hobby have proven again and again, the first step to getting an amazing photo with your strobe is to uncouple it from your camera and move it to the side/back/top/bottom of your subject. Combine a unique flash angle with TTL flash control and you have a dynamic duo.

TTL (Through-The-Lens) metering of flash is one of the amazing windfalls of digital photography. Not only can your DSLR figure out where to focus and what shutter/aperture combo to use, it can tell your flash when to fire and for how long. Wireless TTL works by sending a series of pre-flash light pulses from the controlling unit atop the camera to the remote unit(s). Both Nikon’s i-TTL and Canon’s E-TTL provide wireless solutions that enable the camera to maintain control of the strobe(s) if… if there’s nothing between the camera and the strobe, if the strobe is not too far from the camera, if there’s not too much sunlight, if it’s not raining, if… Enter RadioPopper, destroyer of the IFs.

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I met Atlanta-based / editorial / music / headshot photographer Zack Arias yesterday… not face-to-face, but through the digital matchmaker, David Hobby over at Strobist. David posted a handful of blurbs - one linked to my other blog, PixSylated, and one linked to Zack’s incredible 5-part white seamless tutorial.

I’ve now spent the better part of, well let’s say, way more time than I really have cruising Zack’s websites. I was totally sucked in and tangled up (is that why it’s called the “internet”?). My conclusion, Zack is a guy that up-and-coming photographers (and open-minded, old-dogs, like me) need to study.

Zack’s story is typical of many (”will probably be recognized as great someday”) photographers. He shoots not because there’s tons of money in it (which is a becoming a universal truth). Rather, he shoots because it’s who he is. You can tell by looking at his photographs. You can tell by reading his websites. [Read more →]