Most of the time however, it will bite you in the a** if you don’t have a plan. A good photographer/videographer/editor/magician always has a plan. Get in a habit of creating a shot list before you go and take your pictures or video. For example, if you’re going out to do a family photo shoot, make sure you sit down and create a list that the family will want.

- Just Mom and Dad

- The kids

- Candid shot of the family laughing

A wedding shot list. I know I couldn't remember all of those!

So on and so forth. If you just trust your brain on the day of the shoot, you will forget something. Make it a permanent habit in your brain that before you go out to a shoot, you make that list! It will save you from the embarrassment of a re-shoot, which you most likely will NOT get, which in turn will save you a client, which increases your wallet size.

Take care!

Daniel

Why your camera’s built-in flash just doesn’t cut it.

Many modern cameras have a flash integrated into the camera itself, allowing for quick, on demand light when the need arises. Awesome right? Wrong. Despite years of R&D and countless improvements to power output and recycle times, your camera’s on-board flash can ruin more pictures than it can help and here’s why.

1. Position
Your camera’s pop-up flash tends to be located very close to the lens which means that the light it emits blasts out at a very unnatural angle. This causes those harsh shadows commonly found in photographs illuminated by a built-in flash. It also gives your subject that “deer in the headlights” look in portraits which, no offense to any deer reading this, is not very flattering.

Imagine the poor motorist who stumbles upon this fella.

2. Fixed direction
As far as I’m aware, there aren’t any cameras on the market that have a built-in flash capable of tilting or swiveling which means that the light will always be blasting out in one direction. When coupled with the previously mentioned positioning dilemma, the light output becomes very harsh and unattractive. There are ways to mitigate this issue, be it using an aftermarket flash diffuser or a simple blank note card to redirect the light. However, this is done at the expense of reducing the flash’s overall power output.. which leads me to the last big issue.

3. Power
This is one of the biggest shortcomings of your camera’s built-in flash. The on-board flash is inherently limited in its output due to its small size and the fact that it has to run off the camera’s internal battery pack. This means that the flash will have far less usable range and, in large rooms, will leave your backgrounds severely underexposed.

External flash to the rescue!

The addition of an external flashes can make all these problems float away.

Metz 50 AF-1 with Janco Omni-Bounce Diffuser

When mounted to your camera body, the flash head is elevated much further away from lens alleviating problems caused by the built-in flash. Furthermore, most modern external flashes, commonly referred to as speedlights or flashguns, allow the flash head to tilt (move vertically) and swivel (horizontally). This opens up the wonderful world of flash bouncing which I’ll cover in my next entry. Bouncing your flash allows you to send the light pulse towards a wall or a ceiling before arriving at your subject, creating far more natural lighting. This obviously makes sense as we are most accustomed to overhead lighting like, oh say, the sun. It takes some practice, but with a decent external flash, you can make any room like it’s rocking a skylight.

Now that's a happy, properly lit, camper.

Note how the lighting falls evenly on our dapper subject. Gone are the harsh shadows and blown out highlights.

So, the lesson here is… invest in a good external flash! Flash photography opens up a world of possibilities for your craft so why not take advantage of it?

Now get out there and shoot some photos!

- Mark

Ok, well maybe not all about it, but it’s a big part.

Mark just recently bought a Metz 50af1. Beautiful piece of equipment. Basically that thing makes headshots a breeze. Background too bright? Pshh fill light that baby.

Outside

Portraits outside are easier than inside, in my opinion. For an average day around 12-1pm, throw your ISO to between 100-200, shutter speed around 1/160 – 1/60, and a fairly deep f-stop, say f3.5 or f1.8 if you can get it (If you go to f1.8, you may have to increase your shutter speed to compensate for the increased light intake). You want to isolate your subject. The less background, the better. Tighter is usually better as it does not allow for distraction. Try to follow the golden spiral rule when composing your shot. Here’s an example from one of our recent shoots:

Now, using a fill light, shutter speed is technically less important, but it is a good habit to get into. If your shot is too bright, take that down. For this shot, I just used the built in flash for my Canon T2i (blasphemy!) without a diffuser with the subjects head facing  the sun. I used a 50mm f1.8 to get the really shallow DOF.

Inside:

Ahhh, inside photography and flash. You must diffuse your flash, otherwise your pictures will make any skin look greasy and very white. If you can’t afford a flash at the moment, grab yourself an Opteka Pop-Up Flash Diffuser. It mounts right on your hotshoe on your camera and does exactly what it’s supposed to: diffuse.

I recommend these settings:

ISO 200-400

f3.5 – 1.8 (As low as you can get it)

Shutter 1/100 – 1/60

Of course, you should always be playing with the settings. Take my recommendations as a start, then play from there.

Here’s an example:

Mark used his flash and bounced it off a nearby wall (I think he is going to write a blog soon on the art of flash bouncing… Stay tuned) to snag the shot. He had the model look down first, then counted backwards from 3, and had her eyes look up. This makes the subject look more candid, and less “deer-in-the-headlightsy”.

Comments, suggestions, ideas? How do you take your portraits? We would love to know. Submit a comment below.

Thanks!

-Daniel

Welcome to our new home. If you’re new here, welcome to Clubhouse Media. Artists first, we approach our work with painstaking care and attention to provide our clients with quality photographs and videos.

We value your visit and hope you would stay around! Check out our pictures and our flickr (Which has a lot more of our stuff).

Thanks again!

-Daniel