Have you ever been in a tiny room that made you feel like it was impossible to capture a frame that seemed romantic enough to reflect the mood of the delicate speech of the father of the Bride? Lets face it, every once in a while we are all put in a position to shoot a room or in a location that is just NOT built for making beautiful photos. If we use our lenses and lighting skills to compose and light our subjects with finesse, the results will be show stoppers!

My friend Ben Chrisman was visiting this weekend and introduced me to the Apertura photo blog. These So-Cal photographers have some hot frames in their portfolio. There very first blog post stopped me in my tracks. I immediately wrote to Ray & Erwin of Apertura photo and asked if they would give me a a write-up on this rockin photo.

Ray writes:

It was a wonderful intimate wedding held in a small room in an Italian restaurant in Westwood. However, the room was pretty crowded with not much space to roam about and it also had a low ceiling to boot.

During the best men toast, I positioned myself to get the shot and kept moving around until I found this angle. I turned off the on camera flash and relied completely on the backlight for extreme drama. As much as I’d like to say that the flare on the glasses were intentional, it mas more of a happy accident.

Canon 5D - f/4.5 1/80 sec ISO 640
Flash 580EX II -1/32 power

I think happy accidents are a blessing and sometimes, these accidents are the difference in the excellent photojournalist and the average wedding photographer. Timing is instinctive and the quality of light used here is excellent. I love your balance of ambient and the use of the flash as it gives a sparkle of light through the glasses is exceptionally dramatic. You got an award winner here!

Check out some more Happy Accidents here:
Happy Accidents 1
Happy Accidents 2
Happy Accidents 3

And be sure to spend some time on Apertura’s photo blog for a little wedding imagery motivation. These cats work pretty hard to frame up some magical compisitions and will inspire you for sure!

Any comment love for these guys?

Cheers & thanks Ray & Erwin,

Mateo

Have you ever shot people toasting at a wedding? Every shot it from below? Yeah, we probably all have. If you haven’t yet, give it a whirl. If you use on camera flash and just blast them with light, it will be less desirable and likely a whatever photo, not getting a lot of interest.

This technique will help you visualize how to take a normal / standard exposed moment that you have seen a million times and add a little flavor to it. First step is to make sure you have evaluated the surroundings and know exactly where your ambient light exposures are in relationship to your flash power on your manual off camera flash. In this example, Sol has decided to underexpose the ceiling to contrast the glasses and the shape of the hands reaching out. Its crucial here to make sure that your exposure has some depth to make an impression vs a whatever frame.
Sol Tamargo dropped the ambient out of the background and had an assistant with a slave set to 1/16 power, extended on a monopod in the ceiling. I don’t know the actual distance, but likely 6-9 feet away. The key to this photo’s success is the angle that the light is coming from. I’m guessing it is 35 or 40 degrees from camera left, in the air over their hands.

ISO 200 1/200 2.8 | Sol Tamargo

The glasses light up, the ceiling goes dark, contrast rocks! I really love the subtle touch of the ceiling lights scattered between the arms. Those lights tie in the background and give this photo a magical feel! I also love the timing of arm coming in from the upper left. Love the fact that you squeezed the shutter before her toast clinked the other glasses. This is an excellent PJ decision that subtly changes the composition to be WAY more likable.

Great idea and nice shot Sol!

Cheers!
Matt

For my operating settings, I’ve got a few secrets that will help you snap quicker / better exposed photos when your flash is too hot.

My wife tells me that I’m too fast for this world so this trick my not apply or matter to some of you. del Sol Photographers all use Manual photo control when shooting our weddings. We have grown close to cameras performance and when shooting, we find it helpful to be able to adjust your shutter and aperture settings while also working some photojournalism in there. I know that everybody will have their own way to adjust these controls… if you open your mind to a little change now and then, you may become inspired.

This technique also has a little flashflavor advise built in as well. With a manual power slave flash, your exposure latitude is pretty short, not allowing much room for error with the brightness to darkness of your frame. the closer that slave gets to the camera, the hotter its going to be and vice versa going the other direction getting further away.

For example, if you were shooting a group of people who were gripping and grinning, your flash could be 2 times brighter than you thought it *should* be however, drastic measures are needed and quickly inside the camera to make the photo you are shooting that second, perfect! I enjoy rolling my right index finger on the top right dial on my camera, allows me to adjust my shutter. Think of it as a finger-roll technique. If you want to shoot a test but don’t have time to test your flash to subject distance, keeping in mind that photo moments happen way faster than you can remember, you aim and shoot. Your light’s intensity may be considerably high or low in relationship to how it *needs* to be. Roll the finger on the dial (front or back dial) as fast as possible to stop down or open up. I have calculated that there is a scale of how hard to how soft you can roll the dial, thus resulting in a multi f-stop roll, a single f-stop roll, or a little bit of a f-stop roll…. or something like that. I call that rustic technique the finger roll.

Just thought I would share this idea. For me, shooting Manual flash slaves can be a challenge and this technique has helped me in situations where I was totally unprepared with the power settings of my manual slave flash.

Here is my secret: Notice the index finger’s position, on the shutter control.

I give my camera’s shutter the middle finger.

I honestly didn’t even realize this until one of my assistants pointed it out to me at a wedding the other week… I don’t even know what they heck i’m doing these days, but glad some body has figured it out for me. Thanks Diego for pointing that out!

DO you have any crazy camera quirks that help your game? Wanna share? Tell us about it.

Cheers!
mateo

This is my very first image captured by utilizing the Radiopopper system. Thank you Kevin King for getting these to me, all the way in Mexico no doubt!

I am such a bad professional. I ripped the bag open to reveal my new set of RP’s just 45 minutes before I walked out the door to a wedding 2 days ago. I ran around my place like a crazy man testing for a few minutes, but really didnt do much pro testing on these units before I unveiled them at a pro gig… shame on me eh? My client will be so disappointed that I tested a new product out at her wedding…

Shame on me…

here is my first TTL RP frame

The down light is from a ceiling lamp in the bathroom…
the rp slave is located just in below the bride’s right arm, next to the sink in the bathroom…

I didnt use the RP’s too much at this gig, but I did play a little
More test results coming!

Cheers!
mateo

Edited to add…. If you are a pocket wizard junkie (like myself) TTL is a foreign language that takes some serious time to learn to speak. If you want to use baby steps to learn to speak the RP language of TTL, then try this technique…

This is a REQUIRED element for those testing the RP who are use to the PW system….

good luck

I’ve seen adverts for Elinchrom Skyports and until recently, hadn’t seen images from this system of transmitters until I ran into Jaco Fourie, South African photographer. Along with his wife Daleen, they are producing some amazing imagery that I felt needed to be seen here on Flashflavor. I have been keeping an eye on the Flashflavor flickr group and noticed his stuff along the way. His images are very romantic and his compositions are all very pleasing to look at! Not yet contributing to the Flashflavor Flickr Pool, please drop a few wedding shots off there!

Jaco writes:

Don’t you just love it when it all comes together? This image was a bit of luck on the one side. I had the lights set-up on the dance floor as I normally do. I like to use off camera flash on the dance floor and have them pointing at each other to get some cross lighting. This creates a more 3D look. I kept on moving around on the dance floor and decided to move the 2 lights to the same side pointing at me. As luck would have it the DJ blew some smoke on the dance floor when the father and the bride started to do their dance. The groom and his mother joined them and I saw that they were moving in a circle on the floor. I lifted the camera and waited for the moment when both the couples where in front of my lights. I did fire off a couple of shots just to make sure I had it. The smoke added some real drama to the image.

I have always been a big fan of video light photography. People like Jerry Ghionis had a big influence in my style of photography. But now off camera flash has added another dimension to our work. Thanks Matt for creating this blog and inspiring us to be better at what we do. Viva FlashFlavor.

Here is another:

Nikon D3
ISO 2000
F-stop F4.8
Shutter 1/13

Thank you for making inspiring images for us to see! Check a look at Jaco’s website if you need some inspiration this week:

Jaco has also taken his time to give us a tutorial and a review on the skyport. Check his handy work out:

Here is a link to his blog post where he has a few more video tutorials on the Skyports. Thanks Jaco!

Any questions for Jaco on this system? I’m curious to see if anybody else has been using / experiencing good results with skyports?

Cheers!
matt

I was unloading batteries today after a recent shoot. We stage all of our gear on a table as we pull old batteries out and put new ones in. I looked down at our equipment pile and got to thinking about a Flashflavor post. Since ALL our gear is mixed up, how the heck do we know whose is what? Once you start to build a nice equipment inventory, its about darn time that it get cataloged or labeled so you know what ya got!

We are a studio with 4 maybe 5 shooters at a given time. It is crucial to us that we have our ducks lined up in a row! Yeah, a Sb-28 is just the same as the next one but I have found that ALL my equipment seems to come to life and we experience problems with our gear at almost every wedding. How do you identify the problem what it is happening to? For at least 4 years, I worked with a pile of gear in and out of bags. When I found my wife, Sol Tamargo, I knew that something had to change. After the 2nd time of “hey, you got my batteries” or “do you have my pocket wizard, I’ve only got 2 and I should have 3″ or whatever.. I was SICK of that.

If you label your gear, you will actually know what is yours… novel thought eh? Ok, lets say that you are a 1 man / woman show and you know exactly what gear you have and therefore there is no need to label anything… Sounds like my thought train for my first 4 years. Guess what? Your WRONG!

Why? Everything we use BREAKS at one point or another. Especially in the world of pocket wizards.. I have pulled my hair out a time or two switching cables, changing receiver units, checking batteries…when something fails, its important to identify it and move on. We have experienced MAJOR problems with the Pocketwizard system specifically. The short PC cords are poorly made for our work environment. With tugs, pulls, and catches, these things fail.. oops, there goes another $20 to buy a new one. So we started labeling our PC cords… Yep, i have them all labeled. If we have problems with one on assignment, I pull it out of operation, make a mental note of the cord’s labeled number, tuck it away in a special place, and switch to a backup.

This kind of mindset works with ALL your gear. We have tons of slave flash units. Flash tubes go out (afterall, the SB-28 has been discontinued for years). PC posts break, zoom heads go out, flashes get thrown in the ocean…heck, a plethora of problems greet you at every wedding. Its about dang time that you can identify your problem unit, put it aside, and address it later in the shop if necessary.

Ok, I hope your getting the point. Check out these photo examples of my gear pile and their labels. I purchased my label maker for $29 at a local office store… you can too

LABEL IT.

WE even label our rechargeable batteries. These things have a life expectancy so at some point, they will fail. We recommend that you put a few different color rings around them when you buy them new, make a note somewhere citing the date when those colored batteries were purchased. It helps if you can identify which photographer gets which batteries… Also, I’ve included our trusty labeler in the lower left, next to a few of our batteries

You can see that we actually label our gear with the first initial of the photographer who owns that particular unit. Everything has a label, lenses, camera bodies and tripods! Give this a try Hope this helps?

Cheers!
mateo

I was pleasantly surprised this week to find out that photohsop user magazine published a story I wrote about the trash the dress phenomenon. I was very excited to be featured (along with my wife) next some seriously talented folks. I had a chance to meet one of the photographers published in the article at WPPI, Cliff Mautner. I also parked myself next to the Nikon booth to hear him speak about making magical images… That guy is unbelievable! Check him out!

David Ziser was also featured (a talented photographer and photoshop artisan). I have featured David’s work here before on FF. I was hoping that I would get a chance to meet him at WPPI as well but with 1 zillion other photographers buzzing around everywhere, it was rather impossible to accomplish all my must see photographer goals…next time David!

SO, if you are in the neighborhood of a bookstore, pick up or sign up to receive a copy of photoshopuser magazine. Those guys working with Scott Kelby really have it going on… OH, I had a chance to meet up with Dave Cross at the Leaving Las Vegas shoot a few weeks ago. I’ve watched numerous episodes of him on Photoshop TV… Also, a special thanks for RC over at layersmagazine.com for asking / motivating me to write this article!

Anyway, keep your eyes peeled for the Magazine. Sol Tamargo & I have this very dramatic vision for the future of our Trash the Dress sessions. I’m not sure how long our clients are going to keep asking for them, but with the insane amount of worldwide buzz going on, I dont see it stopping anytime soon, especially with the destination wedding environment. We have 25 TTD sessions booked this year! Look out for some more crazy video’s coming soon!

Cheers!
mateo

PS, the photoshop guys & gals did a super job on the graphics… thanks again

I am very excited to see the birth of the Radiopopper this year. This write-up will serve as a initial preview of my experience with this revolutionary unit. In order to give a full review, I will need this baby on a few of my wedding gigs. I hope to be shooting with them at my first few weddings in April. We haven’t used TTL at a wedding with off camera slaves in a long long time. Heck, I can’t tell you when. I love to change up my game, so the popper is an exciting new tool in my tool box!

We spent an hour or so the other day with these units. Ordinarily, Flashflavor photo subjects will be wedding related. I ask for your forgiveness with this post as we didnt have time to organize any test bridal models during the short term planning we did to organize this shoot.

I spent some time with a few other photographers to get some play time with Radiopopper (RP). We each got a chance to set up a makeshift subject and shoot each one of these subjects to test the strengths of RP. We tested firing 3 different flash groups TTL using the 580 EX II as the master unit and 3 remote slaves all in different groups, set to different ratios. Group A, Group B, and Group C. I didn’t actually do any test shots with these flash settings but hopefully, I can get a copy of the images from Stillmotion to showcase here.

When it became my turn to play with the flash, we found our way inside Battista’s Hole in the wall, a rustic Italian food joint with some serious history in Vegas. I wanted to add a little life to my test subject and on the spot, I found a cute little old guy who made a SLAM of a subject. Sorry to bother you with the details but I believe if you add a story line to a test subject, the impact of the lighting efforts actually make a lasting impression. Call me a dedicated photojournalist if you will

In these photo examples, I used 3 flash unites in 2 different flash groups, Group A + Group B. (Remember, this is TTL folks). Group A 1:1 and Group B 1:4. We had 1 Radiopopper transmitter attached to the ST-E2 and 3 Radiopopper receivers attached to 580 EX II’s.

In this setup shot, I was shooting a Canon 5d with a ST-E2 wireless transmitter on the hotshoe . I had a RP attached to the top of the ST-E2. Group A was set to 1:1 and Group B was set to 1:4. Basically, I’ve told Group B to fire with 4 times more light than Group A. Group B’s units are placed behind subject on bench and camera right. I dialed my exposure in so that the ambient would hang out. What impressed me most about this is that we were limited here with time, with little or no actual test time to get ti done right. I shot 5 or 6 frames in this spot in the restaurant and I liked his expression best in these few frames. The RP allows you to set it and forget it. If this had been a Pocket Wizard setup (i still love my PW’s), I would have needed more time to set each unit up and get the job done. I took 5 minutes with this guy. With this kind of pressure, I’m starting to love the RP!

Here are my frames (all shot at ISO 400, 1/100th at 1.4)

Gordie has been playing the accordion at Battista’s for an outstanding 27 years. His listeners range from hookers and prostitutes to drunkards and party goers to the occasional superstars. His favorite musicians were the Oakridge boys! Batista’s ceilings are adorned with props and the walls are covered with their menus and wine bottles and different photos from the past. Battista is filled with low lighting and a moody atmosphere. I wanted to take a chance to add some light that would accentuate the mood that was plastered all over the walls.

I love how the backlight has added some dimension here. Remember, set it and forget it mentality.

Initially, when we choose a location in the restaurant to shoot Gordy, we found a spot that seemed perfect. After my first several frames, I had botched exposures and misfires. After expressing my concerns that something wasn’t right, Kevin King (RP Creator), pointed at the link light on the side of the RP and noted that it was blinking, indicating that there was some type of interference. The moment I started to actually test this baby, I found a circumstance that actually challenged its performance. Apparently, the link light on the receiver unit that indicates it has a link with the other will stay a solid yellow upon its initial link up. After a fire, it will turn off and back on to indicate that it has linked up. If it intermittently blinks then it indicates interference. The receiving unit may or may not fire, depending on the circumstance. We walked literally 15 feet to another location in the restaurant and the problem went AWAY… hey, that was easy enough.

Ok, so now I’ve found a problem on the first frame I’ve tried to expose. In all honesty, this inst my first experience with Interference while transmitting to a slave flash unit… On numerous occasions, I have been using pocket wizards and experienced some sort of interference where my slave units WOULD NOT FIRE. I can recall one specific wedding where Sol Tamargo & I were both trying to trigger our Pocket Wizards. We each have 5 pocket wizards and 4 or so Slaves, each. So thats 10 pocket wizards, 8 slave flashes. In the heat of the moment, we tested all of our PW’s and slaves, traded sync cords, did just about anything possible to make it happen… NADA. There was some sort of interference going on and we could not nail it down. I’m not sure what went on as we never figured it out, but the point is that interference has happened to me before when using a device that transmits via radio signals. The bottom line is that I’m not too worried about this potential problem with the RP at this point. I’ll need some more testing time to give you more thoughts on this.

After my turn was up, Ed Pingol stepped up to the plate and took the RP’s outside. He wanted to test the high speed sync abilities and used 2 slave units. I don’t have any of the TTL settings at this point, but I do know that he used a ST-E2 on the hotshoe and 2 groups on the slaves, A & B. One unit was 3-4 feet away, camera right and the other unit was 6-8 feet away, camera left. I was a spectator

Camera: Canon EOS 40D | ST-E2 set to High Speed Sync
Exposure: 1/8000 sec
Aperture: f/2.8
ISO: 100 - Focal Length: 17 mm

The model is my wife, Sol Tamargo

I’m loving the use of high speed sync with these RP units!

Well, for now, I’m going to close with those photos of my HOT wife…thanks Ed! Thanks Kevin for giving us a chance to play with your new toys! I look forward to working with these units at my next gig. I will be doing a writeup on what it is like to use the RP’s in a live environment where the pressure is ON!

Thoughts or comments about the TTL system and Radiopoppers innovative way to use Radio Signals…. please give us a shout or feel free to drop off your ideas.

I’m really curious as to how many of FF’s readers actually use Manual slave flash operation or TTL…

Cheers!
Mateo

**Update**

I didnt have too much time when I originally wrote this post, so I’ve added one more image that showcases a long distance field test in “ideal conditions” meaning open range without any interference. In this photo example, i’ve added a field test shot at 300+ feet. I’m the spec off in the distance under the arrow holding the flash that is actually being triggered at that distance. We tried several frames where I would stick my hand in front of the antenna and some where Kevin would face the opposite direction to test if and when the slave would trigger. Anyway, here is the football field test…

F3.5 1/4000 ISO 50 ST-E2 trigger on Camera.

photo by Kevin King

and a zoom of this frame to see the slave being triggered.

***Update 2***

I got a few frames from Stillmotion’s tip top shooter, Amina Myriam Wojcik. We were all tag teaming along with the crew who was testing the RP’s. Here are a few of her photos and her 2 cents… She shot these with a Canon 5d and a Tilt and Shift lens… She also has added a cool X-process flavor to her shots…
Amina writes:

At WPPI, I had a chance to check out the Radio Poppers. The group went on two shoots with them, one at a really cool restaurant called Battista’s Hole in the Wall, and on in the desert just outside of Las Vegas.

But it was super fun, and we all got some awesome shots out of it

Above four images credit: Stillmotion’s tip top shooter, Amina Myriam Wojcik.

Thanks Amina & the still motion crew for your help!

I’ve been spending my time these last few days hanging out at WPPI in Vegas and finally got to meet up with Kevin King, creator of Radiopopper. Kevin is a pretty rockin photographer and an awesome entrepreneur as well!

Kevin let me play around a bit with this killer device and he even told me that I may be able to get my hands on a set pretty soon so I can experiment with them at my next wedding on the 29th. I hope to be doing some killer testing on this device as I just may have a new weapon to my arsenal! r….I fired this baby off TTL at 1/8000 at 1.4…(i’ll have to get Kevin to send me a few of those shots to post here as I was using his camera for the quick test).

I’ll keep you posted on my results…keep an eye on this guy, radio popper may be a big friend of FF very soon!

Ps, jump over to strobist to read about David’s meeting with Kevin recently….

Cheers!
matt

We have been very lucky in a sense that our clients commission us to fly all over the world and shoot in some super exotic places. One of the requested sessions is typically an after wedding session where there are no rules and the dress likely will end up in the sand or swimming in the ocean. This allows for total creative freedom.

I wanted to share another one of these sessions we shot recently in the Dominican Republic. We ended up spending the whole day with these folks driving across the entire country and exploring a few locations. Shooting in these conditions is risky as you never know what the locals are going to do to you, and sometimes, equipment is in danger. I’d like to cite a specific example where I was in the water with my wast belt of lenses and for this particular example, I was helping Sol with the flash and we were under exposing the background as the bride and groom were splashing each other. I was also shooting (bad idea). Somehow, I ended up tossing a Nikon SB-28 slave and pocket wizard into the ocean. Lets just say that was the end of those pieces of equipment. $130 for the flash, $189 for the PW and a nice SHOCK to my face as the flash does not like water… I had my SD-8A batter pack plugged in, when I unplugged it I got a jolt!

Here is Sol’s photo just moments before the flashes death…

I walked back to the shore to sulk and drop that now useless equipment and snagged this frame of Sol shooting…

Since we had tons of backup, I added a CTO gel to another flash and shot this frame of the bride on the sand (special thanks to our taxi driver for holding the light (he has a cameo in the slideshow with a brides reflection in his shades).

Here is Sol’s version of this a few moments later when the groom decided to enjoy himself…

If you want to check out our entire adventure across the Dominican, check out this TTD Slideshow.

Well, I hope you enjoyed these TTD del Sol moments. Maybe you had a smile or two after visualizing me tossing that flash in the water. Moral of the story, dont try to shoot and assist at the same time, just dont do it!

Cheers & thanks for checking us out here at FF!

Mateo

How much can I begin to say about the fun that we are having with our subjects. Our clients are escaping to a wonderful destination location and planning the wedding of their dreams. Why not dream a little more and go out on an exotic excursion to be photographed in the land of fairy tales? This is exactly what we are doing with our sessions and I often need to pinch myself.

Picture yourself in the middle of a muddy deep dark hole and bats are flying around, everywhere. Watch out, if you step in the wrong place, you will be up to your knees in quickmud and sinking fast. Oh, there are little round balls of bat poo everywhere… I am stepping on them with every step through this mud cave. Insert bride and groom in this non-friendly environment and you are slap in the middle of a del Sol TTD. It gets cleaner and eventually becomes a “Wash the Dress” session.

I’ve talked about one of our previous sessions before HERE and if you have seen that, you will see something familiar. We added a little color to the background again but this time, we used a mix between the amazing power of the video light and a red gelled flash flavor. The combo worked very well for the looooow light circumstances. I am hoping that my viewers can live vicariously through this session and help us keep the TTD phenomenon alive. You can do this by posting this TTD link in your blog. Show it to the world, tell a friend or neighbor about this insane video you watched. Del Sol is making a huge effort to keep an interest in the TTD session.

Many thanks to our friends Paul & Rachel at Playa Weddings for the awesome video work.

OK, OK, OK, I’ve used red flash gel in the past to add some sauce to the frame… Well, I thought the flava was oh so nice…. Anyway, here is a set of images that we got recently while doing a little spelunking.

Here are a few of my favorite photos… JUST an FYI. The del Sol studio has been undergoing a little brand development. Sorry for all the inconsistency… But you are beginning to see some of the results of our new face. This is our new blog template with the new logo. New blogs for Flashflavor and del Sol coming very very soon!

and this is the “scene setter” from the bat cave…

We we were getting stuck in some serious knee deep stuff in there… (shot courteous of Sol Tamargo)

Sol also snagged this killer frame. If you have been curious up to this point as to some specifics about our lighting, we would like to introduce you to the power of video lights. In ALL these frames, we are using a very inexpensive low wattage SONY Video light. Makes for some pretty sexy fill, eh?

100% Sol Tamargo…

and another one from Sol

Ambient light all over the background of the cave…. the sun was beaming into the cave producing this beautiful light quality that was being reflected all over the place by the ripples that we were causing by our movement through the water… her is an example of total ambient with a tad bit of low power flash flavor fill. In the video, you can see what I am talking about with ambient splashing everywhere.

This shot sets up the ambient beam of light that helping us with these frames…

Again, the movie file at: www.delsolphotography.com/ttd/ttd2 Please, throw the link to this around to share the love. The more people (clients included) helps our worldwide efforts to keep the TTD thing going!

Thoughts? We had some serious fun on this one. It is our hopes to perpetuate the TTD phenomenon for the next few years. We believe that fun times and exotic locations such as this continue to stir the imagination. Do you?

Cheers!
matt

I wanted to follow up with posting another set of images from one of the photographers I am keeping an eye on. Ed Pingol has recently contributed to a FF post on deleting the ambient. One of the things that really stood out about Ed’s photography is the effort he takes to set up some of his formals. I think that a LOT of us can take some serious notes on this one… I often get lazy and claim that formals aren’t my game… well, after looking at this stuff, I’m a little inspired to go out and try a tad harder.

Go to school on shooting some kewl formals….
Ed Pingol writes:
The Importance of a Group Formals

100iso 1/180th @ f13 - lighting set up consist of dual nikon sb-28’s triggered by a PW mounted on a monopod fired 1/1 @ 24mm beam spread (heads swiveled left and right to provide wider cover) - held high by Monica.

Ed, how refreshing to see this post! I’m very impressed that you actually take the time to set these up. I know your clients dig them. I love it when you mix bright sunlight in the frame and blast them with the flash, just hotness! Lets hope that we all can take some inspiration from this one and change it up a little next time you set up a group of formals!

Props Ed, thanks for sending me this submission. This is what Flash Flavor is ALL about amigo!

Cheers
matt

One of the blogs I’m stalking is from San Fransisco photographer, Anna Kuperberg. Anna’s eye is always fresh and exciting, so for me, its a huge source of inspiration. If you haven’t checked out her portfolio yet, let this post guide the way my friend….

The image in this post reminds me of Hollywood! I was once one the set of the television series “Touched by an Angel” and I specifically remember a scene that was being filmed inside a limo with intentions to be at night, however it was 2pm. The car was moved into a warehouse and all ambient light was completely controlled. I was amazed how the technicians set up this shot to work. The car never moved with the exception of a few guys on either side outside pushing back and forth, to give the perception of movement. The real trick with achieving perceived movement was all in the light setup! They had boom poles with lights that they would swing from left to right, turning lights on and off and then resetting them and going through different sequences. They even had rear headlight boom lights that gave the perception of cars approaching… Anyway, it was way cool experience. I hope I gave you enough of a visual on the experience to begin to “see the Hollywood possibilities” with your creative lighting.

Anna Kuperberg was seeing the Hollywood vision when she made this killer image…

Anna Writes:
This is Maya and Boris. Their wedding was at a lodge up near Lake Tahoe. The room had two windows, one of them is not in the photo (it’s to the left). I had my assistant pull the window shade out from that window and hold the flash behind, pointing it through the shade. After a few experimental photos I was able to get these amazing diagonal stripes from the blinds. It looks like there is a car passing by or something. I remember how excited I was when I was doing this shot, and how thankful I was for digital, because I could tell the light was working! I would never have experimented like this with film. The client was very happy with the photo, too.

The technical: I was using two Canon flashes, a 580 and 550. One was on my camera and the other was in the assistant’s hand. I simply used my on-camera flash to trigger the other one.

Anna’s blogs here
Anna’s website here

Sweetness Anna! Your work is exceptionally motivating. One must not forget about TTL off camera flash exposure…Thanks for sending me this submission, I love it!
Wanna read about another amazing TTL shot previously discussed on FF… Check this one out. It too is absolutely amazing!

Please leave comments for Anna, I’m sure she would appreciate some FF love!

Cheers!
mateo

I was browsing around checking out a few websites that I stalk from time to time and found a photo that I really liked! I thought this was one of those images where I kinda spoke a little out loud “whoa”… Have you ever done that? Anyway, Dan & Anne Almasy have been rocking out some images in Atlanta. Check out their stuff, they are pretty rockin photographers…

Dan writes:

I think that this particular shot is pretty representative of the way we approach lighting at weddings, and that includes two elements, simplicity + interest.

-Dan

Great shot Dan! I totally agree, simple and interesting. I’d say that timing in that PJ moment helped a tad too

After seeing this shot on their homepage, I recalled another shot that Dan’s wife Anne captured back in 2006. Being that this is a husband and wife duo, I felt like they both deserved some spotlight for their flash lighting props!

Anne writes:

I shot this at a wedding in April of ‘06, and it was really the shot that got us excited about using lighting in a different way to enhance our wedding work. We were still pretty new to the industry at the time, so finding new ways to grow and improve were especially thrilling!

-Anne

So you think that shot was luck eh? How about some props for placing that as the top dog 1st place shot in the WPJA’s quarterly contest for Bouquet & Garter toss? If anyone reading this blog is looking for a little inspiration prior to this weekend’s wedding go check out their BLOG and their website too! Remember, we grow stronger with our own vision with the help and influence of our peers!

Anybody else like these images? Give them a shout!

Cheers,
mateo

Have you ever been shooting and had this miracle blessing where an off camera strobe (not your intentional flash) just appeared from the background / foreground and illuminated your frame, thus delivering a magical image that was totally unplanned and seemingly excellently executed? If so, then you should be thankful to be LUCKY

Well, in our few years of shooting we have been lucky enough to see a random strobe appear.
In this photo example, Sol Tamargo squeezed off a pretty cool shot of the bride leaving the church and kissing her mother. You can see the camera toting dork in the background (me) with my associate just next to me, holding a remote flash. Sol was not intentionally triggering this flash when she composed this frame, it just happened. The resulting photo is….luck!

I like this photo because it is a strong exit moment. Bride embraces mother prior to getting in the limo. I’ll take luck

Accidental flash flavor can also come as a gift from the typical film shooting family grandmother or family relative. In this frame, our our associate Melissa. She was shooting the processional with a 24-70 when the mother of the groom squeezed off an award winner. Timing a camera shutter from a handheld P&S camera is impossible… try timing that to ISO 1250, 2.8 at 1/40th. I’ve been lucky enough to get a handful of frames with a shutter going off. I really liked the effect this one had on our image.

Lastly, I wanted to finish up with some humor. Sorry if this offends some folks, I laughed out loud after I shot it. The bride saw this photo on the LCD and just about made me show it to the entire dinner table. This was just some random golfer at a golf club. The groom was terrified to see this out of the corner of his eye…Anyway, my associate was using a flash and had placed the strobe on the top of the lockers. Having no idea that it was actuallly receiving a signal from my transmitter or that it was even there! I got this lucky nicely lit bounce light frame. Wow, sometimes when you dont plan things, they still come together! YEAY!

I’ve talked about a few other random accidents before…
Accident 1
and one of my favorites
Accident 2

Anybody else have any happy accidents to share that involve a strobe or some crazy flash moment. Please share your images with the Flash Flavor Flickr image pool

I know everybody is totally annoyed with me that I only update this blog once every 7-8…ok, maybe 9 days or so. SORRY. I’m busy shooting and traveling, really, I promise! Anyway, I need that time to muster up content that is actually worth something, so this week, I want to post something that I think will help a few of my readers grow closer to actually nailing the shot they initially envisioned!

Sound easy enough? Well, with some practice and some studying, its totally doable! In this post, I want my readers to consider the tools that help us do what we do! Before anybody gets started reading this post, I would like to give some tips that will help ANY photographer, regardless of skill level, reach the next level!

Lets start with my toolbox. First off, we use Canon 5d’s, L series Glass, off camera flash triggered by pocket wizards and we also use PHOTOSHOP.

I want this post to feature a little Props to Adobe for engineering such an amazing piece of software…Before I get into the description of how we use PS, I would like everybody to know that we shoot JPG files on our 5d at the 1 step compression Large setting. Sol & I have been shooting weddings for 6 years now and combined, we haven’t yet shot a RAW file for a client. I DO NOT want this to turn into a raw vs. jpg argument, because I really want this post to be about that topic… But what I do care about, is that you understand that we shoot JPG files and we think that shooting the correct color balance, exposure and composition is extremely important to get RIGHT when you squeeze the trigger. Raw has its benefits and I love the format however for us, it doesnt work for our production process.

That said, for the sake of the following photos, I’d like to throw some props to some of the resources that we have found very helpful in the development of our creative vision. Anybody heard of NAPP (National Association of Photoshop Professionals)? Well, if not, I recommend you rush and join their association and start sucking in all the excellent resources available through their network of professionals. Scott Kelby, Dave Cross, RC, Matt Kloskowski and you may want to check out PhotoshopuserTV. I have spent many a days logged into NAPP’s website following video tutorials and studying techniques to better my imagery… If any of these sites are new to you, I’d recommend taking some time to indulge in them!

I think its paid off. In the following example, I’ve got an image that showcase before and after techniques to emphasize how photoshop helps us make a prettier image We don’t rely on PS 100% for our imagery, but sometimes, it sure helps us tweak our images into some super magic!

This particular image wasnt shot with the best framing and exposure. PS was needed to “rescue” it. We were saved by the tools that PS offered us! I don’t want to explain exactly what I did as it took me about 8 minutes or so to make this photo work and look seamless. Just understand that sometimes, PS can make the difference in a saved shot vs a shot that makes the cut, but isnt quite the “one”.

In this photo example, we used a slave snooted speedlight (nikon sb-28 triggered by PW) that was set to 1/8th power with a full CTO gel. This photo was cropped, and touched up in PS using curves, patch tool, cloning tool, and history brush with a few masks and some custom actions to achieve the end result. I’ve included the BEFORE & AFTER images for full impact. The results are subtle and more appealing to my eye.

Canon 5d, ISO 50 2.8 1/160th with a 16-35 L at 16 mm.

After a little Photoshop Help…

To back up the usage of the CTO gel… I decided early on during this portrait session was shadowed by a setting sun with some very beautiful directional light that was very orange colored and replicating this look was something easy enough to do with the CTO.

The following image is NOT a Flash Flavor image, but included here to emphasize the available light quality and color and back up the decision I made to use the CTO gel.

here is another one that was shot with a snooted speedlight, a tad blown out. Slave was set to 1/4 power and just TOO close to the subject. Canon 5d, ISO 200 2.8 1/160th
As you can see, the color version is just a tad hot…its actually pretty blown out. BUT, contrast is ok, and with few custom PS actions and a B&W conversion, the contrast is sexy!

Anybody got PS or love it as much as I do… Isnt it a blast to use this software? Editing can get you down, but when you really know how to use the software, its a total BLAST!

Thoughts?

Cheers!

Matt

Our job as a documentary photographer is to showcase the mood and ambiance of an event. Often enough, 5-7 hours into a wedding is enough for us photographers to start to get tired and lazy on our feet. Have you told yourself or assistant “hey, we have shot this dancing stuff for hours, I’m going to start shooting less”? Well, I would totally agree that 50 drunk folks on the dance floor can start to look redundant!

I would suggest that the moment this question comes to your mind, OPEN YOUR MIND and start exploring the possibilities of creativity! What a better place to experiment with the flash! Heck, the flash doesn’t even need to be part of your creative exploration as your camera is a wonderful tool to play with.

Because this is flash flavor, I’ve included a few examples of our team using flash to SPICE up our time…

In this photo example, we decided to exaggerate the movement of the dance floor. I chose a moment when the bridesmaids decided to get on the floor and turn circles around each other. The blue color of their dresses helped the photo moment too. I cooled the photo down in PS to blend with the tones in the dresses and such. Our assistant can be seen in the upper right hand side of the frame with a flash stick. The slave was triggered by pocket wizard and set to 1/8th power bouncing off a very tall ceiling, meant to spill enough light on the entire room but not overpower the dragging movement. Its really a mix of the strong ambient and flash.

Canon 5d ISO 250 2.8 at 1/2 second

These two images came from a Greek wedding where they were throwing money at the bride and groom during a traditional Greek dance. I used many different approaches to get some great shots here, but these two occurred when I started “experimenting” with my flash. With the help of an assistant hand holding a slave triggered by pocket wizard, we set the flash to 1/4 power and set the head to a 28mm zoom. The instructions I gave him were to go over to the middle of this chaos and hide from me, aiming the flash in many different places.

For this frame, a 45 degree bounce off the floor, aimed camera left. Notice camera prospective!

Canon 5d ISO 1250 2.8 1/60th

Here, I change camera prospective and the flash is aimed at pretty much the same prespective. Added emphasis to make compositional lines drew your eye to the kid

Cheers!
mateo

Sol: Spanish translation for Sun

Sol Tamargo recently used a technique that I think is often overlooked but when used, the results are beautiful.

We were shooting a bride getting ready in the formal bridal room. We were blessed with open windows and cloudless skies with afternoon directional sunshine peaking its way through the glass panes. I would urge every photographer on the planet to make an attempt to photograph natural light in this situation and reap the benefits of amazing natural ambient light!

BUT, if you have the power of flash, why not add a small amount of flavor? In this case, Sol had her assistant zoom the SB-28 Flash head to 85mm and the resulting spill was minimal. The slave flash was triggered by Pocket wizard at 1/8th power. I’d be willing to wager that the untrained eye would pass this photo over without any regard to how it was shot. Sometimes, causing attention to a subject with the power of the flash isnt necessary… But a kiss of light to match a sun burst from a window will make the photo blend aesthetically.

Canon 5d ISO 200 1/200th at 4.5

And this one all ambient. This photo is equally as beautiful as the flash flavor image above… I love that Sol was thinking about her options here and gave this bride a dynamic set of images!

Canon 5d ISO 200 1/200th 2.8

Pretty simple idea eh? The lesson here is to always think in terms of shooting a subject with all the tools in the tool box.

Cheers!

matt

Flash Flavor has been slowly seeping its way into the printed press! Apparently, someone thinks we have some interesting ideas on this site! I think this is proof that if you add a little flava to your game, the imagery will start to look better!

I’m stoked that we were featured in 3 magazines in December, each featuring our FLAVA…

Check these out:

What is the stink all about? I shot this image with an overhead rig, on a painters pole with a off camera flavor slave dropping red accents to the background! I’ve since tried to do this again, but can’t seem to get it nailed down as good as this one time! Anybody else out there get anything good from trying this technique? I’d like to see it! Drop it in the Flash Flavor Flickr image pool or send me an email with a submission for FF!

Read the writeup on this image HERE

Sol Tamargo was featured in this Ukrainian Magazine last month,opening image all about some Flavor! There are so many amazing photos throughout the whole magazine… I just wish I could read IT! The article features a few other photographers who have some amazing portfolios… Becker, Joe Buissink & Ken Sklute

Congrats Sol!

Flash Flavor is open to submissions. Remember to keep the subject wedding or engagement couple friendly. I’m looking for something that I haven’t done before or a twist on an ordinary technique. Does your photos Will your image WOW the masses? Send it to me! matt at mattadcock dot com.

Gracias!

mateo

merry new year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We have been traveling and traveling and I have landed in Atlanta for a week for a wedding. We are headed back to the Mayan Riviera on the 8th though, this cold weather stuff is not for me!

I wanted to share my new christmas present with you all, a box of goodies that every photographer likes to see under the tree.
We picked up a few more lenses, but I am most happiest about my new 85 1.2 and my new 35 1.4! How much fun and exciting is this!!!!!!!!!!! We are actually training another associate photographer and most of this stuff is for his camera bag…all the zooms and such. But nonetheless, can’t wait to try out my new 85 tomorrow. I am shooting a wedding in a big beautiful church tomorrow and a reception to follow in a HUGE Biltmore hotel ballroom! Images coming soon!

end of the year present

And for a little flash flavor:

I shot this wedding back on 11/3 in Atlanta. Last wedding of the year in US actually. This setup is all about mixing the ambient and your strobes so that you can emphasize keylights on our subjects and keep MOOD and ambiance in the room while at the same time, concentrating on strong compositional choices. The gentleman in the center is the bride’s father and was singing “The way you look tonight” with his buddies, a song that the groom requested that must be “played” by the band.

I set up 2 speedlights on 1/4 power, triggered by my sturdy Pocket Wizards. I had strong ambient light coming from camera right and from the band’s stage lighting. I wanted to balance those lights so that my strobes, set to bounce, could come down a tad softer on their jackets but also bounce far enough to light up the bride & groom, sitting 20 feet away, watching the performance.

Her is the best I could do with my images to tell the storytelling of the evening:

Canon 5d | ISO 500, 2.8 1/80th on ALL frames.

Here is my frame showing the placement of the 2 speedlights. Notice the strong band light coming from behind the speaker. The band’s light was my friend I used a PJ technique to add emphasis to the frame, layering the subject, waiting for the perfect moment where the bride & groom looked at each other with smiles. The bounce light is just barely reaching them and adds a keylight on their forehead…

This one from the other side, using the same layering technique.

Here is a better shot to showcase the results of my lights.

This one was just for fun, shot with my 200. I wanted to isolate dad on this one.

Ok, thats it for now. Hope this inspired you to shoot a room with more than one light, and consider the mood as well as compositional choices to make your storytelling dramatic. Remember, any HACK can put 2 lights in a reception hall. Telling the story is with your lighting and composition by preserving mood and ambiance is the way to go

Please share you compositional lighting storytelling at Flash Flavor Flickr image pool. Or drop us a comment here and show us por favor!

Cheers & have a happy new years!