Finding new ways to create isn't always easy, so you have to keep your eyes open for inspiration. One day while making my way down the rabbit hole of YouTube, I stumbled across a video. These guys had created 3 colored shadows off this pencil while keeping a perfectly white background. What in the world was this sorcery? Turns out it wasn't sorcery, it was science.
If you’re like me and you’ve tried to attach gels to your lights in the past, you’ve likely resorted to using one of the many types of sticky tapes available. When I used to manage a studio, I would see all manner of tapes being used to attach gels to hot modifiers.
For many years, I have been modifying and adapting lighting and camera equipment to better fit my style of shooting. The process of altering lighting gear, as well as combining products that were not originally intended to work together, is of particular importance to me these days, as I constantly mix and match the best from many different brands.
When it comes to online educational content, there aren’t many photographers out there willing to share their mistakes when trying to create a photo. I think it’s fair to say that there are easily far more who only share their best work online and for good reason; as educators, you want to create an image of a photographer who makes little to no mistakes at all.
I got my hands on a pair of the new Profoto B10 for some hands-on shoot testing from Profoto. If you just want to see the photos, scroll to the end of the article. If you want to get a little background on the ideas and the tech, read on.
Highly stylized looks offer a great learning opportunity to the beginner or intermediate product photographer. When items are placed on a composite-heavy background, there are certain considerations we can make in-camera to avoid a headache in Photoshop.
Taking portraits in bright sunlight has been a bit of a no-no for a long time, but the truth is that you can actually get stunning results if you use a fill flash. The results look awesome and give a high-end feel to any outdoor portrait, and the best thing is that it's really not too difficult. You just need to understand how to use a fill flash.
Want to improve your macro photography game? Here's a great 12-minute DPReview TV episode in which master macro shooter Don Komarechka demonstrates some simple techniques and setups you can use to capture better outdoor shots.
Like most photographers who have been working for many years, I have my favorite, go-to lights. These include the Broncolor Para 88, 133, and 222; the Broncolor 'pre-2006 style' Flooters; the Elinchrom Zoom Spots; and Elinchrom Litemotiv Indirect.
How you light your subject is one of the key decisions you'll need to make when shooting portraits. The Koldunov Brothers published this 9-minute tutorial showing the impact the height of a light source makes and some typical mistakes photographers make in placing and angling lights.
Controlling and modifying light is a lot of what photographing with studio lights and battery-powered strobes is about. Especially when it comes to portraits, I like to work with my lighting setups so they add something that is not perfect or flat.
It’s photographer Jay P. Morgan here. Here's a new 11-minute video in which I compare the pros and cons of strobes vs. continuous light and conduct some indoor and outdoor lighting tests between the two for you to decide which one to use when you are shooting.
A year ago, Profoto launched the A1, its first on-camera flash and the world's smallest studio light. That light will soon have some serious competition: the increasingly-popular Chinese lighting brand Godox is getting ready to announce its own round-headed flash that will compete directly against the Profoto A1.
For the last few beauty shoots I've done, I was asked to emulate the "Natural Glow Look". This is a pretty common look in photography today! We see it in campaigns of big makeup companies such as L'oreal, Estee Lauder, Revlon, and L'OREAL, ESTEE LAUDER, REVLON, & Neutrogena, just to name a few.
How do you use high-speed sync? When would you use it? How do you set it up? These questions will all be answered by the end of this 5.5-minute video and the article below.
We are going to use 100 Lume Cube LED lights to teach you how continuous light can be used on a set. Using continuous light on set for still photography is a great way to learn photographic concepts and getting you comfortable with lighting techniques.
Back in February, I created several self-portraits using only lights from around my house. I wanted an exercise in something outside of my current comfort zone and to challenge myself to get back to my photography roots.
Color spots are a beautiful way to add atmosphere behind your still subject. By cutting out what would otherwise we a catalog black product shot, we can invoke a vibrant, moody look that has been popular for decades. The video above is a 15-minute exploration of this 2 light setup, and it’s colorful flexibilities.
The Hong Kong-based camera equipment company Cactus has launched the new RQ250, a 250Ws, Li-ion-powered TTL wireless monolight that is tiny enough to fit in the palm of your hand.
Here's a 9-minute introduction to the three-point lighting setup! If you haven’t seen our video about portrait lighting, we go over five portrait lighting positions and what type of emotion you can get from those positions. So this is a follow up to that lesson and I recommend you watch it before diving into this one!
The new extension head for the Godox/Flashpoint 600 PRO is heavier than expected. The solid and sturdy metal swivel mount contributes a lot to that extra weight.
Elinchrom has announced a new docking station that lets you bring the 1200Ws power of the ELB 1200 into the studio for endless shooting.
Wedding photographer and Nikon Ambassador Brett Florens recently gave this 9-minute workshop demo on how you can shoot better portraits in harsh sunlight.
After seeing photographer Skyler Burt's experiments with lighting food photos using a cheap work light, photographer Jessica Kobeissi recently purchased that same $20 light from Home Depot for an experimental portrait shoot.
Since I purchased my first Godox product in late 2015, I’ve been extremely vocal about their product line because of their massive price to performance ratio. It’s a weird occurrence for one of the most capable products to also be one of the cheapest.
Godox has just announced the new AD400Pro (also called the Flashpoint XPLOR 400PRO TTL), an all-in-one outdoor flash that sits between the pint-sized AD200 and the heftier AD600Pro.
Here's a handy trick that may be useful for beginning photographers: did you know that you can bend your reflector to change the quality of the light on your subject?
Mixing ambient light with flash is a tough technique to get around. I can do it no problem, but when someone asks me to explain it I draw a blank. There’s a very good reason why it’s hard to understand: you’re smashing two distinct schools of lighting an image together.
Photographer Niels Kemp recently asked wedding photographer and Nikon ambassador Brett Florens for his best piece of advice for beginning photographers. His answer was the simple portrait posing trick in the 2.5-minute video above.
In photography, the "golden hour" is the time right after sunrise or right before sunset in which sunlight is warmer and softer -- a look that's valued by landscape and portrait photographers. If an hour isn't enough time for you to get your fill of the special lighting, you might want to visit the Arctic Circle, where you can enjoy "golden days".
A lot of the times when you’re shooting in direct sun, it’s very harsh on your subject’s face. Many people try not to put themselves in this situation because of it. Sometimes you have no choice, or maybe you like the location a lot so you have to put up with the challenge. Without any equipment, the sun can create harsh shadows and an unflattering look on your talent.
Godox recently released its new EC-200 extension head (AKA Flashpoint eVOLV 200) for the Godox AD200 TTL Pocket Flash (AKA Flashpoint eVOLV 200). Celebrity photographer Markus Klinko decided to combine four extenders and flashes into this unusual-looking quad-flash.
Apollo is a new "immersive illumination" iPhone app that lets you edit 3D lighting in Portrait mode photos. The app uses the depth map created by dual camera iPhones, allowing you to post-process photos as if they were 3D renders.
Here's a 6-minute educational video by Shutterstock in which filmmaker Todd Blankenship discusses the basics of diffusing light and introduces three cheap options for doing so... including a $5 shower curtain.
If you ever need to shoot a product photo of a beverage bottle, the concept might not seem too complicated, but seasoned product photographers actually have a number of tricks they use to take their images to the next level. Here's a helpful video in which photographer Max Bridge of Square Mountain shares 5 pro tips in 5 minutes.
At the WPPI wedding and portrait photography conference and expo this year, photographer Trevor Dayley taught this 1-hour class titled "17 Fast, Easy, Awesome Lighting Recipes." Dayley shares 17 lighting ideas you can keep in mind on any portrait shoot using a memorization story.
Portrait photographers Manny Ortiz and Jessica Kobeissi just did a shootout that pitted flash against natural light. The two each shot portraits of the same model in a studio, except Ortiz used an off-camera flash as his main light while Kobeissi only used the sunlight bouncing around in the space.
If you're not sure how to photograph a landscape, one primary factor you should consider is the current position of the sun in the sky. Here's a fantastic 3.5-minute video by CreativeLive in which National Geographic photographer Frans Lanting shares tips on harnessing different kinds of sunlight.
Lighting equipment can be expensive, but sometimes you can get great results using makeshift products that won't put a dent in your wallet. Here's a 15-minute video from Dustin Dolby of workphlo that looks at how you can shoot high-quality product photos using something as basic as an IKEA MELODI lampshade.
Here's an 11-minute video from photographer Sean Tucker that looks at how you can identify "good light" in street photography.