27th Jul 2007
storytelling
We use our remote flashes to tell stories about our subjects, and in this case, I was again inspired by the flash inside the frame to post another one of Sol Tamargo’s image sets. This post is about using the off camera flash more dynamically when that flash is located directly across from the field of view of your lens.
Sol had her eyes on these children the entire time as they played with their toys all night long. I credit her for pursuing a strong photojournalism moment and then going one step further by telling a story with the light.
These little guys were playing just as Sol was sneaking around the corner to get the shot. The first shot, you can see the little girl is shooting the little boy, BANG, your dead. I like her choice to light them with the off camera strobe included inside the frame, powered at 1/4 power. She also added some bounce fill from her on-camera 580 to give us facial expressions. We see the flash burst in the frame, accentuated by the BANG of the little girl’s gun, pretty much like POP BANG, in your face, your dead.
What amazes me is that Sol had the wherewithal to watch this scene unfold and anticipate this little girl’s escape from the crime scene. By placing the flash behind the boy’s head and putting emphasis on the shadow on the wall showcases the movement and the quickness of the great escape! My jaw drops with her execution of this scene!
Way to go Sol… thanks for the inspiration! AND, if you haven’t had a chance to hit her BLOG recently, you may want to RSS feed that baby. She has some pretty motivating content.
Comments? Thoughts? Inspired? Please post your shots on The Flash Flavor Flickr group
Cheers!
matt
Great stuff Matt! Just curious, was the flash triggered using the 580? Triggered with PW’s?
Hola Nick, We pretty much 100% of the time trigger remote slaves with PW’s. PW’s are typically taped to the back of the 580 most of the time, or directly on the hotshoe if we aren’t using the on camera.
:)
cheers & thanks for stopping by, again!
Matt
Thanks, just been looking for a way to attach the PW w/paramount adaptor to 580 (no pc sync) on the cam, but trigger the other flash using the PW’s. Special hot shoe adapter that has pc synch on it?
Wow. The second shot is just awesome.
If it was me then I probably wouldn’t show the client the first shot. It’s a great shot but the second just blows it out of the water. Or would that weaken the story? Tough call..
jonathan,
I think the 2nd shot is stellar too… but, the first one puts the 2nd into prospective to me… We edit very very tightly and highly discourage redundancy…
kids too… they are just cute
cheers & thanks for giving us your thoughts!
Nick, Regarding the PC adaptor for the 580. You can use several brands that have a terminal you stick the 580 on, but I’d recommend a custom modification by michael bass on the 580. trust me, highly worth it!
http://michaelbass.blogspot.com/2006/11/canon-flash-auxillary-sync-mod.html
Wow! Pretty fast reflexes there.
That second shot is wonderful. All it needs is a small splash of retouch and its wppi print winner!
This is really storytelling with pictures and flash!
Great work from Sol capturing this moment, especially in such a great way!
Greetz,
Bjorn
http://photographyluna.blogspot.com
Second vote for Michael Bass. My 580 is much better now.