Second Nature

One of my goals is to practice basic lighting enough so that it becomes second nature and I can turn my attention to composition, capturing the right moments, and trying new, more creative lighting.  Toward that end, I asked DD if she would mind if I took an informal portrait of her five minutes before dinner was due to be served.  She graciously agreed. I ran and grabbed the camera, light stand, flash, and umbrella.  We all raced downstairs and out the basement door to use the sunset as our backdrop.

In almost exactly four minutes I set everything up and took two frames.  The first was under exposed so I increased the flash output by two stops (I used manual mode) and took the second frame.  And this is what we got:

 

38mm, 1/60th of a second, f/8, ISO 200, SB-800 flash shot through a white umbrella above and camera left at 1/8th power.

Notes: DD is pretty darn cute and it is hard to take a bad photo of her.  The lighting on her came out just like I had hoped so it seems like my "make lighting second nature" aspirations were pretty much achieved here.  There are a few things I'd do better next time, however.   There's way too much ground vs. sky in the background.  But. to get more sky, I would need to use a lower camera angle.  While DD is very cute, low camera angles are typically not the most flattering for people.  I'll have to put some thought into how I'd solve that, aside from climbing to to the top of the mountain.  Using a longer focal length might do the trick, but then I'd need a remote flash trigger of some sort so I could leave the flash right by DD and back up several feet with the camera.

I also would have experimented with faster and slower shutter speeds to see what effect we could get with the ambient light.  My guess is that a faster shutter speed that allowed in less light would have been more interesting and dramatic.  As it was, I had to darken (burn) the background in Lightroom to get it where I wanted it.

I purposely used manual mode on the flash because I've found something interesting with Nikon's CLS (Creative Lighting System).  CLS flashes like the SB-800 fire a series of pre-flashes to do their through-the-lens metering and to communicate to other CLS flashes wirelessly.  The problem with these pre-flashes when you're photographing people is that the pre-flashes often result in blinking eyes.  I cannot tell you how many shots of DD and EV I have with droopy looking eyelids when I shot with the CLS mode.  On the other hand, I try not to "throw the baby out with the bath water" and use CLS mode for subjects that don't blink, at least sometimes.

Manual mode, on the other hand, doesn't fire the pre-flashes.  This saves your batteries and prevents most blinking problems but it comes at a little bit of a cost: You're on your own to get the right exposure.  Fortunately, with practice, this becomes pretty much a non-issue.  I just take a shot, look at the LCD, adjust the power on the flash up or down if it needs adjusting and usually get the right exposure by the second frame.

So that's why I usually stick to manual mode.  And at some point I'd like to get some wireless flash triggers--so I'm not tethered with the hotshoe to flash cord.

Comments

[Katia Craig]

This picture reminds me of Mona Lisa, because of the background. But your subject has more spunk in her smile, that's for sure. Maybe making your subject stand on a platform would help? Not really sure, if that helps, though. Keep posting more pictures!