Lighting in Photography Part 9

Flash Options

Barebulb. Barebulb flash units are powerful lights that consists of an upright flash tube sealed in a plastic housing for protection. Since there is no reflector, barebulb flash generates light that goes in all directions. It acts more like a large point source light than a small portable flash.

Light falloff with barebulb is less than with other handheld units, making it ideal for flash fill situations; you can use as wide a lens as you own and you won’t get flash falloff with barebulb flash. Barebulb flash produces a sharp, sparkly light, which is too harsh for almost every type of photography except outdoor fill. The trick is not to overpower the daylight. It is most desirable to let the daylight or twilight backlight your subjects, capitalizing on a colorful sky background if one exists, and use barebulb flash to fill the frontal planes of your subjects.

Barebulb flash units are predominantly manual, meaning you must adjust their intensity by adjusting the flash-to-subject distance or the flash output.Many photographers even mount a sequence of barebulb flash units on light stands at the reception for doing candids on the dance floor.

Diffused Flash. As an alternative to barebulb flash, some photographers like to soften their fill flash using a softbox. In this situation, it is best to trigger the strobe with a radio remote. This allows you to place the diffused flash at a 30 to 45 degree angle to the subject(s) for dynamic fill in. For this, it is wise to equal or overpower the daylight exposure slightly so that the off-angle flash acts more like a main light, establishing a lighting pattern. For large group portraits, it may be necessary to use several soft boxes (or to use a single one close to the camera) for more even coverage.


Flawless Fill Flash Exposure

To ensure accurate fill flash exposures every time, meter the daylight with an incident flashmeter in “ambi” mode. Let’s imagine that the metered exposure is 1/30 second at f/8. Next, meter the flash only. It is desirable for the flash output to be one stop less than the ambient exposure; in this case, you would adjust the flash output or flash distance until your flash reading was f/5.6. You would then set the camera to 1/30 second at f/8. That’s it. You could then set the flash output anywhere from f/8 to f/5.6 and not overpower the daylight; the flash would only fill in the shadows created by the daylight and add sparkle to the eyes.

TTL flash systems are ideal for working in mixed-light situations and are virtually foolproof. They can be balanced with existing light and easily programmed to over or underpower the available light by simply dialing in flash exposure compensation in 1/3-stop increments. In TTL flash mode, the flash will react as programmed, cutting or increasing output as you desire in order to optimize the combination of flash and existing light.

Lighting in Photography Part 8

Reflectors for Fill

Reflectors should be fairly large for maximum versatility. Light discs, made of fabric that is mounted on a flexible and collapsible circular frame, come in a variety of diameters and are a very effective means of providing fill in illumination. They are available from a number of manufacturers and come in silver (for maximum fill output), white, gold foil (for a warming fill light) and black (for blocking light from hitting a portion of the subject). Generally, an assistant is required to position and hold the reflector for maximum effect. Be sure to position reflectors outside the frame and be careful about bouncing light in from beneath your subjects. Lighting coming from under the eye or nose axis is generally unflattering. Try to “focus” your reflectors (this really does require an assistant), so that you are only filling the shadows that need filling in.


Getting the Most from On Camera Flash

On-camera flash should be used sparingly because of the flat, harsh light it produces. As an alternative, many photographers use on-camera flash brackets, which position the flash over and away from the lens, thus minimizing flash red eye and dropping the harsh shadows behind the subjects a slightly more flattering light. On camera flash is often used outdoors, especially with TTL balanced flash exposure systems.With such systems, you can adjust the flash output for various fill in ratios, thus producing consistent exposures. In these situations, the on camera flash is most frequently used to fill in the shadows caused by the daylight, or to match the ambient light output in order to provide direction to the light.

One of the best means of evaluating flash output and the balance between flash illumination and daylight or room light is by using the camera’s LCD screen. While it’s not a perfect tool for evaluating subtle exposure effects, it’s definitely accurate enough to reveal how well your flash is performing. You can see at a glance if you need to increase or decrease flash output.


Know Your Flash Sync Speed

If using a camera with a focal-plane shutter, you have a flash-sync (or X-sync) setting. When working with flash, employing a shutter speed faster than the flash sync speed will result in images that are only half exposed. You can, however, use any shutter speed slower than the flash sync speed. When you do this, your strobe will fire in synchronization with the shutter, but the shutter will remain open after the flash pop, allowing the ambient light to be recorded. The latest generation of DSLRs use flash sync shutter speeds up to 1/500 second, making daylight flash sync at almost any aperture possible. (Note: With in lens blade type shutters, flash sync occurs at any shutter speed, because there is no focal plane shutter curtain to cross the film plane.)

Lighting in Photography Part 7

Working with Direct Sunlight

When forced to photograph in bright sunlight, begin by turning your subjects so the direct sunlight is backlighting or rim lighting them. This negates the harshness of the light and prevents your subjects from squinting. Then, fill in the backlight with strobe or reflectors (being careful to avoid underexposure). It is best to add 1/3 to 1/2 stop exposure in backlit situations portraits in order to “open up” the skin tones.

Images made in bright sunlight are unusually contrasty. To lessen that contrast, try using telephoto lenses or zooms, which have less inherent contrast than shorter, prime lenses. If shooting digitally, you can adjust your contrast preset to a low setting or shoot in RAW mode, where you can fully control image contrast post capture.

If the sun is low in the sky, you can use cross lighting to get good modeling on your subject. You must be careful, however, to position the subject so that the sun’s side lighting does not hollow out their eye socket on the highlight side. Subtle repositioning will usually correct this. You’ll also need to use fill light on the shadow side to preserve detail. Try to keep your fill flash output about 1/2 to one stop less than your daylight exposure. Watch the Room Light Many hotels use coiled fluorescent bulbs instead of tungsten-filament bulbs in the room lamps. Be on the lookout for them, because these fluorescents will not have the same warming quality as tungsten bulbs and could turn things a bit green. You may have to change your white balance, or use an auto or custom white balance setting, in these situations.

Take Advantage of Window Light

One of the most flattering types of lighting you can use is window lighting. It is soft, minimizes facial imperfections, yet provides a directional source for good facial modeling with low to moderate contrast. Window light is usually a fairly bright light and it is infinitely variable, changing almost by the minute. This allows a great variety of moods, depending on how far you position your subject from the light.

Since daylight falls off rapidly once it enters a window, and is much weaker several feet from the window than it is closer to the window, great care must be taken in determining exposure (particularly when creating group portraits, for which you will usually need to use reflectors to balance the overall light).

The best quality of window light is found mid morning or mid afternoon. Direct sunlight is difficult to work with because of its intensity and the fact that it will often create shadows of the individual windowpanes on the subject. However, you can diffuse overly contrasty window light by taping some acetate diffusion material to the window frame. Light diffused in this manner has the warm feeling of sunlight but without the harsh shadows. (Note: If the light is still too harsh, try doubling the thickness of the acetate for more diffusion.) With the light scattered in this way, you may not even need a fill source unless you are working with a larger group. If that is the case, use reflectors to kick light back into the faces of those farthest
from the window.

Lighting in Photography Part 6

Evaluate Your Options

Weddings involve almost every kind of light you can imagine open shade, bright sun, dusk, dim room light, and every combination in between. Savvy wedding photographers must feel at home in all these different situations and know how to get great pictures in them.

For example, imagine a courtyard where the main light is diffused daylight coming in through an archway. Here, the ambient fill level would be very low; there may be no auxiliary light sources nearby. Unless your goal was to produce high contrast lighting (not great for brides), you would need to raise the level of the ambient or fill light. You might add light locally (i.e., on the subject via a silver reflector).

This is a quick solution that could be ideal if you are pressed for time or only need to make a couple of shots in the area. Alternately, you might add some fill universally, raising the overall interior light level by using ceiling bounce strobes. This solution involves more setup time and effort, but it could allow you to shoot in a number of locations within the location, not just the one closest to the archway.

Learning to control, predict and alter whatever type of lighting encountered will allow the photographer to create great wedding pictures all day and all night long.


Find and Use Open Shade

Open shade is soft light that is reflected from the sky on overcast days. It is different than shade created by direct sunlight being blocked by obstructions, such as trees or buildings. Open shade can be particularly harsh, especially at midday when the sun is directly overhead. In this situation, open shade takes on the same characteristics as overhead sunlight, creating deep shadows in the eye sockets and under the noses and chins of the subjects.

Open shade can, however, be tamed and made useful by finding an overhang, like tree branches or a porch, which blocks the overhead light but allows soft shade light to filter in from the sides, producing direction and contouring on the subject. This cancels out the overhead nature of the light and produces excellent modeling on the face.

If forced to shoot your subjects out in unobstructed open shade, you must fill in the shade with a frontal flash or reflector. If shooting the bride or the bride and groom, a reflector held close to and beneath your subjects should suffice for filling in the shadows created by open shade. If photographing more than two people, then fill-flash is called for. The intensity of the light should be about equal to the daylight exposure.