Catchlight Studios Photography

2011 in Review

2011 was a pretty good year for both Catchlight Studios Photography and Harmon's School of Photography. There was a good mix of wedding, portrait and commercial work, and we put on some great workshops that were well attended. We attended a few courses and workshops ourselves and enjoyed a great European vacation creating images for our own enjoyment. So in this final post of 2011, I wanted to look back over a few of our favorite images.

The first one was taken at the wedding workshop we ran in April at The Duncan House in Tavares, Florida. Our bride was lit with a PCB Einstein light in a beauty dish and the texture of her veil was enhanced in post-processing using the Tonal Contrast filter in Nik Color Efex Pro. A panoramic crop in Lightroom added to the flowing feel of the image.

In preparation for this workshop, we did a shoot at the same location with Susan's daughter, Robyn, as our 'bride'. We actually got some pretty unique images in the relaxed atmosphere of this 'pre-shoot'. In this image, I shot straight down on Robyn as she adopted a pensive pose. We again enhanced the textures in post-processing.

We did quite a number of engagement shoots, and we always like to shoot late in the day, avoiding the worst of the Florida heat, while hoping to capture a nice sunset. When we did Elizabeth and Phil's session it was cloudy and even raining a little as we loaded the car to travel to the location. We were very convinced that we would not be seeing a sunset, so we were amazed as we neared the end of the shoot to see color starting to appear in the sky. And then suddenly . . . BAM! The most vibrant sunset we have seen in a long while. Our happy couple were lit with an off-camera Quantum flash and this image was subsequently featured on Quantum's Facebook page.

The next image was captured during a Photo Safari organized by local fellow photographer Maurice Rodriguez. Our model was photographed against a cool wall in downtown Sanford (one of favorite spots for shooting seniors). The texture of the wall was enhanced using Topaz Adjust before monochrome conversion in Nik Silver Efex Pro.

Talking of seniors, we had two great sessions with brothers Trent and Shane this year. For the second of these, we went into the studio and played with a bunch of different looks and lighting - they were great sports. This image of Shane was created with three lights - two of which are providing those edgy highlights on the side of his face. The edgy feel was continued into post-processing using Topaz Detail and monochrome conversion with a Lightroom Develop Preset from Kevin Kubota.

We shot some great weddings with beautiful brides and handsome grooms. But no bride was more lovely than Erica. A wedding photographer herself, she knows the value of photography and we were honored when she asked us to capture her special day. I don't usually take my beloved 200 mm f/2.0 lens to weddings as it is large and heavy, but I knew this bride would do this magnificent lens justice and I was not wrong! All natural light for this image.

We did two shoots this year for Flashes of Hope. This wonderful organization provides professional photographs to children with cancer and their families. It is a blessing for us to be involved with them and we always come away with memorable images. Little Tyler, for example, was awesome to work with. He loved the camera, and the camera sure loved him!

In September, we became students ourselves as we attended David Ziser's week-long Master Class. We had an awesome time learning some new tricks and meeting some great people from around the country (who we keep in touch with thanks to Facebook). We captured a number of cool images, but this one stands out, not least because David subsequently featured the image on his very popular blog. We loved the vibrance of our model's dress against the monochromatic feel of the stone steps.

Susan captured the next image - a really beautiful shot of our 'bride' gazing upwards through her veil.

We had a full schedule of classes throughout the year, and we especially enjoy the 4-week Studio Lighting classes. Because we are together for 4 weeks, we get to know the students pretty well and a camaraderie develops between them. We also get some cool images of both models and students!

This image was lit with a Wescott TD5 Spiderlite and captured with the Nikon 200 mm f/2.0 lens. I love the dreamy quality that this lens gives when shot wide open.

Sometimes the students make great portrait subjects - we always make them photograph each other because it helps a lot to know what it feels like.

Not all our classes involve photographing people of course. Another popular one is our Night Photography Field Trip. In November we walked around Sanford and got a few cool shots including this one of the old pier. This was an HDR image with long exposures to get a silky appearance to the lake.

In March, Susan and I attended the huge WPPI convention in Las Vegas. It was a fun experience and we also got an opportunity to walk around this very unique city and grab a few shots.

Finally, we had a great vacation in September visiting England, Belgium and France. We especially enjoyed our couple of days in Brugges where I shot one of my favorite images of the year. This is an HDR image, but part of the post-processing involved adding a 'glow' effect which imparts a rather painterly feeling to the image.

In closing out the year, Susan and I want to wish all our family, friends, clients and students every happiness and success for 2012, and to thank everyone for their wonderful support over the last 12 months!

David Ziser's Fall Master Class

Last week, Susan and I travelled to Cincinnati to take David Ziser’s Fall Master Class. Most photographers know David as one of the nation’s foremost wedding photographers and educators. His recent book, Captured by the Light, is a must-read for both aspiring and established wedding photographers, and David's blog is one of the most content-rich photography resources on the internet. The 18 participants came from all over the country, and even one from Canada. Most were aspiring professionals.

The workshop began on Monday morning with David talking about various aspects of posing, lighting and composition. The material about the use of leading lines, framing within interior frames and recognizing “vanishing points” for subject positioning was particularly interesting, and David amply illustrated all these points with a series of his typically gorgeous images. Perhaps unusually, David is an avid user of wide-angle lenses in his wedding photography and uses these to great effect to create unusual and striking scenes.

The second session of the day was entitled “what makes a beautiful image?” The answer came quickly – “it’s always about the light”. David talked at length about how to make your lighting exciting – coincidentally, that will be the subject of his next book – and by the end of the next hour or so, we were left in no doubt that the ‘loop’ style of lighting is his favorite way to portray his subjects. David explained how to position the off-camera flash (or position the subject in natural light) to make sure that you always get that flattering light on your subject. Although I had read this in his book, hearing him explain and demonstrate it really drove the point home and we all knew that we would soon get the chance put all this theory into practice.

On Monday evening we took the short drive from our hotel to David’s house and studio. We spent a very pleasant evening on the Ziser’s great outdoor deck enjoying adult beverages and the wonderful fall weather. And the education didn’t stop either – David held an impromptu sessions on sales techniques in the same area that he normally meets with clients. But as good as this was, the highlight of the evening was definitely the pulled pork!

On Tuesday morning we set off by bus to the very beautiful Mother of God church. Our morning was spent with David demonstrating a variety of techniques that we would get to try out later in the day. His Canon camera was wirelessly tethered to an iPad (using the Shuttersnitch App), which made it really easy for the participants to see the results he was getting.

After an excellent lunch at a local restaurant, we split up into our pre-arranged groups (with 4 or 5 students each). David had arranged for 5 models – 4 girls and one guy – so that we could shoot bridal portraits or bride and groom together. Each group was assigned a ‘coach’, one of which was David. The models and the coaches rotated among the groups so everyone got to experience each location, all the models and get help from all the coaches. Special thanks go to Quantum Instruments who provided complete lighting kits to each group of photographers. Being avid Quantum users ourselves, we were very comfortable with these flashes, so we could really concentrate on some of the posing and compositional stuff without being distracted by the technicalities of the lighting.  The models, Rebecca, Dawn, Laurel, Christie and Reed were awesome and were endlessly patient with us as we struggled to find new and different ways to photograph them.

The coaches, by the way, were excellent. Our personal favorite was Eric Cameron from Cameron Creative Imaging who was both highly personable and a natural teacher (that's Eric playing the voice-activated light stand below). I think everyone was shocked to learn he had only been a pro for about 7 years. We would love to entice him down to Florida to give a workshop of his own! Jason Lykins and Steven Easley also brought their own individuality to the process, and of course, it was great fun to have one-on-one instruction from David himself.

Wednesday morning started off with a talk by LaDawn Ziser on album design using Lumapix Fotofusion software. Susan and I have been using this program for a couple of years, but it was funny to see the jaws drop around the room as LaDawn showed how quick and easy it is to design great looking albums in no time at all using this program. I am pretty sure that Lumapix had a brisk spike in their sales after this!

The next session was devoted to a critique of images taken by participants the day before. We were each required to submit 4 images for critique by David and LaDawn and it was a really great learning experience. For many of the participants, it was probably the first time hearing a public critique of their work – but the overall standard was really good and the critiques were nothing but constructive. David even showed his own images from the day – unedited – and walked us through his thought process as he worked to arrive at a final image. Not only that, but he brought several large prints of his favorites to show the class.

In the afternoon, we headed out to beautiful Ault Park in Cincinnati.  Our models had changed into fashion wear for the shoot, and once again, we spread out in our groups with different models and coaches. Even though we were no longer in wedding mode, all the same principles applied and it was a lot of fun trying to find new angles, poses and environments to photograph these great models.

We weren’t done yet though. After we finished in Ault Park, we jumped back in the bus and headed for the riverside in downtown Cincinnati.  As darkness fell, we got to photograph the models with the night cityscape as a backdrop. Our group again spent some time with Eric who encouraged us to try lighting with a video light instead of a flash. The results were definitely worth it!

 

Thursday began like Wednesday with image critiques. After lunch David really got into the business side of photography. He emphasized the need to develop relationships – not just with your clients, but also (very importantly) with your vendors. He discussed the importance of branding and the art of selling your client what they really need. The key is to “sizzle the client’s experience” and David explained how he accomplished this at every step of the process.

On Thursday evening we again adjourned to David’s home where we were greeted by LaDawn and a wonderful dinner. Once again, the education did not stop as both LaDawn and Jennifer (David’s studio manager) were giving mini-lectures in the basement studio and David was holding court on the deck.

Friday morning was devoted largely to recap and wrap up, and LaDawn handed out some great door prizes to all the participants. We wrapped by noon to allow David to hop on a plane to Florida where he was photographing a wedding the next day.

As Susan and I headed to the airport, we were conscious of how fast the week had gone. As photography educators ourselves, we knew how much had been put into the last 5 days – we would be hard put to imagine how much more could have been jammed into the course. Not only did we come away with a huge amount of practical knowledge, our course binders were crammed with every PowerPoint slide that David presented, lists of vendor contacts and a CD packed with software shortcuts, sample images and more. But wait – there was more. David recorded all the image critiques so that we could go through these at our leisure and continue the learning experience at home.

One thing that strikes you about David is that he is the consummate professional; polite, always well dressed and extremely knowledgeable about all aspects of the business of photography. But most of all, David is extremely willing to share his knowledge – from photographic technique to pricing - and I know this was greatly appreciated by all the participants.  Talking of the participants, what a great group it was. Many of us are already Facebook friends – including the models – and hope to keep in touch as we all go forth in our various photographic adventures.

We learned a LOT from this program and were able to put it into practice the very next day at an engagement shoot. Workshops like this are certainly not cheap, but we look upon it as an investment in our business, and since we also own and operate Harmon’s School of Photography, it gives us an opportunity to see how other photographers teach and run workshops. We also got some really nice images, although that wasn’t so much the point – we were there to learn HOW to get those images on demand for our clients. David even used one of our images in a really interesting blog post about claiming images taken at workshops as your own work.

Finally, if you are an aspiring portrait or wedding photographer, you owe it to yourself to check out one of David’s classes. He will be running the Master Class again in the Spring, frequently tours the country with one-day workshops, and is an important contributor to the on-line training available from Kelby Training.

 

 

Trash the Dress

We had a fun workshop on Saturday evening at Ponce Inlet Island, just south of Daytona Beach. The theme was "Trash the Dress" and to help us with that, we had four lovely models, Ashley, Kelsey, Lindsey and Rebecca. The workshop was led by local photographer Maurice Rodriguez,

We had 15 participants and four instructors, and everyone had a great time shooting the models on sand, rocks and in the ocean. Here are a few images from the shoot - all were captured on a Nikon D3s with either a 24-70 or 70-200 mm lens. Lighting was via a Quantum T5D-r flash triggered with PocketWizard Plus II transceivers.

Shane and Trent

We had a great time on Friday evening photographing brothers Shane and Trent. We headed for one of our favorite locations - downtown Sanford, Florida - which has a bunch of cool walls and alleyways. I used a Nikon D3s camera thoughout - mainly with a 70-200 mm f/2.8 lens, although occasionally switching to the 24-70 or even the 14-24 mm f/2.8 for some wider shots.

Most images were taken using off-camera flash - either on a light stand, or mounted on our trusty Home Depot paint pole. The flash - a Nikon SB800 - was fired with a PocketWizard MiniTL/FlexTL combination, and either mounted inside a Lastolite EZbox softbox or used without modifier.

Both guys were awesome to photograph! I think we will be seeing more of them in our future classes and workshops!

High Speed Sync Flash

Most of the time, when you are working with flash, you need to keep your shutter speed below about 1/250 second. This is because that is the highest shutter speed at which both shutter curtains are fully open. Go beyond that, and you will be rewarded with a dark band on your image, representing the shadow cast by the second shutter curtain.  In this example, the shutter speed was 1/500 second.

Unless, of course, you turn on the High Speed Synch (HSS) function of your camera and flash. HSS enables you to shoot at shutter speeds higher than 1/250 by allowing the flash to put out a series of flashes, instead of one short burst of light. In effect, your flash becomes a continuous light source, albeit for a very short period of time.

Why would you need HSS? Well, if you are shooting outside, especially in sunlight, and need a wide aperture to blur a busy background, your shutter speed may need to be very short for a correct exposure.

In this first image, 1/50 sec at f/11 with flash correctly exposes the subject, but the large depth of field clearly reveals the car in the background.

In order to blur the background, I wanted to use an aperture of f/2.0 with my Nikon 135 mm f/2 lens. This required a shutter speed of 1/1000 second, which is only possible if I enable the HSS mode in my Nikon camera (Canon users must enable HSS on the flash body).

Now we have both a correctly exposed subject and a nicely out-of-focus background courtesy of the HSS mode. This begs the question - why don't we just use the HSS mode all the time? The answer lies in the fact that HSS is an inefficient use of the available flash power, and as a result, the light output drops dramatically.

To illustrate this, I photographed a plain white wall with a Nikon SB800, set to manual flash at full power, and positioned 10 feet away from the wall. I took a series of photographs at the same aperture (f/2.8) and ISO (200), but at decreasing shutter speed.

The images are shown here overlaid with the histogram (from Lightroom) and the shutter speed used. Obviously, the effective flash power starts to drop immediately the standard synch speed of 1/250 second is exceeded. This clearly illustrates the trade-off in using HSS. In other words, the flash would either have to be brought progressively closer to my subject (since it was already at full power), I would need more flashes, or I would need a more powerful light.

As in most things, there is no free lunch . . . . 

 

 

Classes this Week

Classes at Harmon's School of Photography kick off this week with a session devoted to the Nikon Creative Lighting System (CLS) of flash photography. We will be covering all aspects of this powerful - but complicated - flash system that enables the photographer to have wireless control over a virtually limitless number of off-camera flashes.

Taught by John Francis, this class will also touch on the Radiopopper and PocketWizard systems of wireless flash control as well as discuss modifiers for off-camera flash photography.

On Wednesday, we will be continuing with the 3-part "Introduction to DSLR" class. If you missed this one, we repeat it on a very regular basis, including weekend classes.

Finally, on Thursday evening we offer the first in our 2-week class on Photoshop Elements. This class is taught by Amanda Myers and is ideal for the newcomer to this inexpensive - but powerful - photo editing program.

Flash Power Compared

Like many photographers, we use small (shoe-mounted) flash as well as larger, studio-type units depending on how much power we need. Although other things, such as portability and recycling time, factor into the choice of lights for a particular job, more often than not, power is a large component of the decision. We also use Quantum flashes as they tend to sit somewhere between the other two in the terms of power, but have faster recycling and less overheating issues than the small flash units.

Trying to directly compare the power output of these various units is an exercise in frustration as small flash power is typically expressed as a "guide number" while studio strobes use the "watt-second". The latter is variably calculated by different manufacturers, complicating any comparison still further.

To create my own comparison, I set up various lights exactly 10 feet away from a Sekonic 758DR flash meter and measured the light output after triggering the flashes manually. All lights were used in the manual mode and set to full power unless stated otherwise. The studio lights were fitted with their standard 7" reflector.

The contenders were two Quantum flashes (TD-5r and TRIO), two Nikon Speedlights (SB900 and SB800), and three studio strobes from Paul C. Buff (Einstein, Alien Bee 800 and Alien Bee 400). All light measurements were taken in duplicate at ISO 200 and to an accuracy of 0.1 EV. Duplicate light measurements never varied by more than 0.1 EV. The results are shown in the chart below.

A few observations can be made. First, the Quantum TD-5r is about 1.5 stops more powerful than the shoe-mounted TRIO (no surprise there) and adding the diffusor discs to both flashes robs about 1.5 stops of power from each of them. Using the Quantum bare bulb enhancer (which provides 180 degrees of flash coverage with the flash head pointed straight up) lost only about a half stop compared to the diffusor (in the indoor setting used for this test).

Second, while the undiffused larger Quantum out-gunned the Nikon SB900 when the latter was set to its minimum head zoom position (24 mm), the smaller flash performed more powerfully when zoomed to 200 mm. Adding the Nikon diffusor dome (which also limits the zoom) reduced effective power by about one stop. Similar results were obtained for the Nikon SB800, although its lesser zoom capabilities (maximum 105 mm) gave slightly less maximum power than its bigger brother. I imagine that the Quantum would regain the advantage when fitted with its telephoto reflector (which I did not have available for test).

It was no surprise that the Einstein at full power was the most powerful light source, which is why it is currently our first choice for overpowering the Florida sun for on-location work. The AB800 and AB400 lights were slightly less powerful than the Einstein turned down to 320 and 160 w/s, respectively, even though they should theoretically have been the same powers.

So there we have it - a comparison that at least I can use when choosing the best flash unit for the job at hand. The biggest news (to me at least) was just how potent the Nikon SB900 became at its fully zoomed position which opens up some real possibilities for location work where you want to really knock down the ambient light. Watch this space for some future real world applications of this.

 

 

Wedding Workshop

We had a great time yesterday at our 2011 Wedding Workshop. The weather was kind to us, The Duncan House in Tavares, Florida provided a wonderful location and we had a great group of participants.

We also had six great models - Robyn, Rachel, Brooklyn, Dan, Reggie and Christiaan. Christiaan van Breman also provided us with outstanding hair styling for the event. Here are a few images - there are more on the Harmon's School of Photography Facebook Page. Please stop by and LIKE us!

The first one is possibly my favorite image of the day. The model is the lovely Brooklyn Wallace who came all the way from Miami to be with us for the workshop. The image was shot with a Nikon D3s and 24-70 mm lens (1/250 s, f/14, ISO 100) and lit with an Einstein strobe at full power (640 w/s) and a beauty dish.

Model Reggie Peters features in this image, also shot using the Einstein strobe at 1/250 s and f/22 to reduce the ambient light as much as possible.

Christiaan van Breman posed for this image under similar lighting conditions, but shot with the Nikon 70-200 mm f/2.8 lens.

I love this image of Rachel Panoff taken in front of the mirror. This shot used the Nikon 70-200 lens at f/4.5 and 1/25 second, and was lit with a single Nikon SB800 to the left of the model in a Lastolite Ezybox and fired with a PocketWizard Plus II transceiver.

Here is Brooklyn again, photographed with an identical lighting system as the image above.

Dan Reinecke and Robyn Germyn together in a pose inspired by great wedding photographer, Doug Gordon. Shot with the 70-200 mm lens and lit with the single SB800 in the Lastolite Ezybox.

Here's Robyn laying on one of the many beautiful beds in The Duncan House. I love the dreamy, high key feel of this image, again lit with the single SB800 flash.

Here is Dan standing on the second floor balcony. Just available light for this one - Nikon 70-200 mm lens, 1/160 s, f/2.8, ISO 1250.

In addition to the individual brides, groom, and couples shots, we set up a mock cake cutting, and plenty of detail shot opportunities for the participants. I took an opportunity to photograph Susan's wedding dress hanging on the end of this amazing 4-poster bed. This is a 3-shot HDR image.

And finally, what wedding would be complete without a wedding party jump shot! This image of all our models catching air was captured with the Nikon 14-24 mm lens at f/10 and 1/250 second, and lit with a single Einstein studio strobe and dish reflector at full power (640 w/s).

Thanks to all our models for their hard work, Christiaan for hair styling, Reg Garner for acting as co-instructor and Linda from The Duncan House for making this amazing property available to us. Finally, a big thank-you to all the workshop participants for coming and making it such a great day.

 

Follow us on Facebook!

You can now keep up to date with what's happening at both Catchlight Studios Photography and Harmon's School of Photography, by visiting our new Facebook Pages.

Catchlight Studios Photography is at: http://www.facebook.com/CatchlightStudiosPhotography

Harmon's School of Photography is at: http://www.facebook.com/HarmonsSchoolofPhotography

Please take the time to visit and LIKE our Pages - we have all sorts of cool stuff in the works!

This Week's Classes in Digital Photography

It's back to the basics this week at Harmon's School of Photography. On Tuesday evening we have our class on Basic Digital Photography. Taught by Susan Francis. this session is suited to new users of both digital single lens reflex (DSLR) and point-and-shoot cameras.

On Wednesday, we are offering our regular class for new owners of the Canon Rebel series cameras. As always, our camera-specific classes are designed to get you up to speed on the dials, buttons and menus of these cameras, and are not aimed at providing instruction on photographic theory or techniques. For this, we recommend students look at our Introduction to DSLR classes.

We finish out this week on Friday evening (NOT Thursday) with our class on the small Nikon cameras (D40, 50, 60, 3000 and 5000 series). Once again, we will be concentrating on the features of these cameras, not on photographic technique. 

Finally, don't forget about our Wedding Workshop on the 28th April. The workshop has very limited space and is filling up quickly, so don't wait until the last minute to sign up! We will be at a very cool location, and you will be able to capture images like this one: