01st Nov 2007
DQ Studios dynamic lighting
I got another killer shot from Dave & Quin Cheung of DQ studios to show you. I really love how they approach making beautiful portraits during a wedding. I am a firm believer that they are one of the best studios in the entire continent of North America… They raise the bar by challenging the ordinary portrait… a spoonful of flava 
Or shovels full, when DQ is in charge…
Quin describes her shot:
Jess and Rob wanted to take some portraits at a historic burnt out church, just outside of beautiful Banff, Alberta. Well, we couldn’t find the church, but the ruins of a small building would do. It was cold and windy this fall day, so we had to work fast to prevent everyone from freezing.
One of the difficulties of using multiple lights during the portrait time is engaging the couple in the experience, and capturing true emotion. This shot is one of my favorites from our time together because of Jessica’s easy smile and the capture of that magic moment-before-the-kiss.
How it was taken. Here’s a shot of us taking this shot (courtesy of a cool pro race-car-driver groomsman. Thanks Choi!).
A 580EX II was placed on the ground behind the dress and Dave was holding a Quantum T5d extended from high above on a light stand. The T5d was set to give roughly the same light output as the 580EX II and the frosted diffuser was removed to create a harder, more directional light. White Balance was set to shade to add a touch of warmth under the daylight balanced flashes while the exposure was set to overpower ambient by about 2 stops to add drama and darken the blue skies that are peaking through the broken walls of the ruins.
I love how this pose accentuates Jess’s figure. All we needed was to capture Rob coming in for the kiss, and the natural smile of Jess’s face makes the image all the more powerful.
Here’s the geek-speak:
Camera: Canon 30D
Lens: 16-35mm at 16mm
White Balance: Shade
Mode: Manual
ISO: 800
Shutter: 1/250
Aperture: f13
* Light 1 (from behind the dress): 580EX II at 1/16th power
* Light 2 (from above): Quantum T5d at 1/8th power (with frosted diffuser removed)
* Both lights triggered via Pocketwizards.
Double lighting takes more work and time to setup, but we love the results we achieve when we put the extra effort in. Don’t forget to have fun with your clients and make the experience a great one for all involved
Quin Cheung
DQ Studios
www.dqquikeys.com
I’m totally inspired by this!!!!!! If you are a photographer looking for a source of creative juices, make sure you spend the next hour or so digging though the DQ Studios Website. Dave & Quin are one seriously dynamic duo. They submitted a few other killer shots to FF in the past…
Check out This FF image that Quin shot with some definite added flava. Dave was flying HIGH with this killer idea.
Anybody have any comments for DQ? Are you as inspired by them as I am? Please, let them know!
Cheers!
matt
love it DQ. How much power is in that QuantumTD5? Is that a flash? or a bigger strobe?
My question is in a tricky situation (like a cold bride) do you pre-prep this with a “stand in” to test your lighting or do you just go for it. Additionally, do you trial and error most exposures by quickly checking your camera back or do you use a light meter? I’m assuming the former.
What I love about this is that you SAW this out of a relatively boring scene proving that COOL images can be made with some teamwork and a little help from the bride and groom.
PS love the hand of the bride… so elegant. VERY NICE detail.
Cameron, using two lights like that will take more time and if this was done on a wedding day I am sure they didnt have much time, so likely they chimped it to get it pretty close with a little trial and error. That T5d flash is a pretty powerful unit that is going to put out a good bit more juice than a normal on camera flash. Its basically a small strobe that can be bracket mounted. Many shooters use them at receptions around the dance floor etc.
I’ve been lurking at your site ever since David Hobby plugged you.
A small question though. I assume it was sufficiently bright on that day, but why did you have to go ISO800, instead of reducing the ISO and increasing your aperture size?
I understand maxing out the shutter sync to control ambient lighting, but why the aperture?
That was a wicked photo by the way!
If this were my scene, I would likely make a guesstimate on the power settings of the light that I wanted to be the primary light (in this case, I would have known that the TD is a tad hotter, so I’ll dial that in”, then balance the 580 to accent” BUT, all these settings depend on what I want ambient to do.
I’m wondering how they controlled spill on the TD. This head is pretty large, if I remember correctly. I don’t actually own one, but i’ve seen them. Snoot maybe?
This post has been great motivation for Sol & I!
Thanks for the submission!
Mateo
Great image! What is sandwiched between the hot shoe and the PocketWizard?
I LOVE this picture. I liked the other DQ image you posted a while back but I like this one significantly more. The shadow is what really does it for me. Her dress is ideal for this photo as well since she has such a great figure, talk about an image really coming together right!
Great Image. the lighting is very dramtic and well put together. As for the couple, they did this shot like a ROCKSTAR!!!! Excellent
Love your work guys. Very creative!
Can the Quantum T5d overpower full sunlight by 2 stops? I use a 580 EX with a Quantum Turbo battery but it doesn’t have enough power for me to overpower the high desert sun. I’ve been searching for a portable and compact solution to this.
Matt…It looks like a ST-E2 infared transmitter for the speedlite. A lot of people use those to focus in low light when using off-camera light sources. My guess is that they use that set-up so often that sticking the two together is just the cleanest way to work.
Keepin’ it simple.
Cheers,
Jay
Hey Guys,
Thanks for the kind words. Q’s been busy working on retouching our back-log of shoots, and since I’m the geeky one, I’ll respond to y’all
Cameron: The T5d is about twice the size of a 580EX and will need a battery (we use the Turbo 2×2) and trigger (Pocketwizard). It’s about twice as strong as the 580EX and, key for us, has a really short recycle time when at 1/2 power or lower. A lot more cumbersome than camera strobes, but more versatile too.
Re: Stand-in. No time. Q and I *love* working as a team: I’m the lighting/gear freak and she’s great at visualizing and posing clients. It’s a very synergistic way of working where I’ll have a lighting idea and will start setting up the lights while Q’s working them into the positions at the same time.
Re: Metering. I actually do carry a light meter with me at all times, but know my lights pretty well and, like Matt, will start with a rough power setting and tweak in-cam to get the desired effect.
Re: Hand detail. Great catch on that detail, Cameron! You can’t see it on this web-sized copy, but she has Henna on her hand which will print gorgeously as wall-art
Dr. Tan: Re: ISO choice. We started off shooting ambient light only with a shade reading of about 1/60th and f2.8-4. We switch back and forth from shooting with flashes and ambient very quickly by switching from Manual mode to Av mode and turning our Pocketwizards on and off. Being wedding photographers, we seldom have the luxury of much setup time, so creating ways of producing various looks quickly has become vital to the coverage we offer.
Hola Matt! Re: T5d. I really like the round shape of the head. Taking off the diffusion material makes a pronounced effect on the light fall-off of the unit and though I carry around black foam and gaffers tape with us to use as snoots, we didn’t for this shot.
Matt R: Jay wins the prize! it’s an STE-2. I never trust it for use outdoors, and in this shot, because the flash was covered by the dress, it wouldn’t have worked anyways. We keep both the STE-2 and Pocketwizards on all the time for maximum flexibility. Options are a good thing
Ben: T5d 2-stops over sun. At full power, just *barely* and only from about 5 feet or less! In reality, that’s what our Profoto B2 battery is for
Thanks again for the kind words, and thanks Matt, for the opportunity to share.
Blessings and peace …..
d
Great work, love it. Must be fun to see how your client reacted on this shot.
All my best!
Robert
That is perfect light for the before-kiss moment. Great idea !
How are the ste-2 and pocket wizard attached to each other?
As an aspiring photographer I am in awe of the amazing work that you do. Every time I talk to anyone about photography I mention this site and show them this photo first. I love the lighting and the emotion you bring out in your photography,
Absolutely beautiful work D&Q!
I heard about you both from your video on the DWF forum and your work is absolutely killer!
I am looking forward to pushing the envelope in my business for 2008 with much more of this sort of guerrilla-style lighting for us on the go wedding photographers.
Thanks and God bless,
Michael
Neil, I’d say that they use velcro to attach them. I once used the ST E2 and had a strip of velcro on the top to attach the PW…