[Jones]

Maybe it’s just me but I always found that flash brackets didn’t offer me the quality I was looking for for the trouble they were. Anyway, all the weddings I shot with my mentor Jenny we used large studio strobes off camera bouncing into umbrellas for reception halls. All flashes were triggered by radios. Bouncing off ceiling or direct umbrellas depended on ceiling height. Something to consider next event that isn’t critical where you can try. You can start with a shoot through umbrella on an adapter with a speedlight on a monopod. For receptions go for just direct speedlight. You can have an assistant who knows flash and sets the power, or set it at about quarter power and figure out the distance you need, telling your assistant to always remain that far from what you shoot at a 90 degree angle. Optionally, you can also use a TTL capable commander and see what it can do. It often works nicely. Just from experience, Nikon’s TTL worked better than Canon’s when off camera in the past, but I’m sure this has changed so nobody take that to be a certain thing — just my opinion and was largely the reason I chose Nikon when originally going for my camera.

[Jones]

As many photographers say — just because you shoot it, doesn’t mean you gotta post it.

The lighting seems mostly nice. If there were some way you get the flash off camera, that would obviously be ideal. A great majority of some of these shots seem like they are very out of focus, and facebook does not you whatsoever.

I’m still a student in high school and haven’t been shooting decades by any means, but critical focus was always the first thing taught to me under professional photgraphers.

[Jones]

In this case, the flash was there to completely drown out the ambient. I only set up one because long story short my other was out on loan. 😛

Without any flash, meter is at about 1/320, ISO 6400 at F/2.8

I haven’t tried extensively, but 1/250 on the d4 is about Max with radio triggers.

[Jones]

I was triggering with a radio in this instance.

There was one fairly strong light near the baseline about 12 feet high, shooting into the ceiling (a bounce was the only way the AD would allow me to try it) which is my only fear with speedlights that trying to bounce them will not be a favorable outcome. I didn’t know about CLS not triggering from any flash, so I’ll have to look at that. If I want to do TTL that may be the case, but I do know that SU-4 mode is an optical slave that will be triggered by anything.

You’ve given me good things to look at (and desire to go buy SB-910’s, in any case! :-))

[Jones]

I did consider using speedlights, but I don’t have enough triggers to pull it off, and I didn’t want them to be accidentally slaved by a parent (they always seem to flash during free throws).

I have considered Nikon’s SD-9 before, as I’ve heard good things about it. I will have to take a look again.

Since I was only using one light, I opted for a large monolight instead of any sort of speedlights, but I could probably do something similar, but the lights would just have to augment the existing light instead of overpowering it like I did here.

Oddly enough, I was going to reduce the power and bump the ISO to get better recycle, but turns out that the lower power I go on my monolight, the longer the flash duration gets. If I go too far, the motion will start to show. I opted to keep it at full power for fastest duration, which worked well.

On a side note, I do love the D4 — Noise is rarely an issue even at higher ISOs for most of what I end up doing. 😀

Thanks for all of the advice. 😀

[Jones]

Thanks for your comments- definitely helpful:)

 

I shoot with a Nikon D4, so the continuous drive is definitely very helpful; unfortunately, when I am using a strobe I am limited to about 1 frame every two and a half seconds. Still trying to get some of the timing improved on my part.

[Jones]

http://www.loribrownphotography.com/Lori-Brown-Photography/i-bj5n65Q

 

Were their eyes really this big? I don’t mean it in a bad way… but I’m aware that people sometimes use liquify to make the eyes a tad bigger (usually in commercial photography) but I can’t help but ask if that was perhaps something that went wrong and it was taken too far?

[Jones]

Yeah, something weird with the skin softening.

When you post to facebook, size to 2048 pixels on the long edge and with a JPG quality of 100 (LR), 12 (Photoshop), basically as high as you can get it. Do not compress it. When you upload them, that should make them look much, much better on Facebook (though not quite as good as somewhere like Flickr)

[Jones]

The Nikkor DC is truly a dream — great lens. It’s definitely a specialty lens though.

[Jones]

I… I have no words, joehomeowner.

Very sorry to hear that you are dealing with actual real-life problems because of fauxtographers!

[Jones]

For those with the YongNuo flash units, what do you think of them? A YN 560 III for $95 is certainly more attractive than an SB-910 for $550.

Are they pretty reliable? Also, this is a bit far out there question, but I know they have a stroboscopic “repeater” mode. Can that be triggered wirelessly somehow?

I’ve been looking to do a project similar to Joe McNally’s stroboscopic dancers, but don’t quite have the resources he does to pull it off. Any one have any ideas on how to trigger … 6-ish of them wirelessly in that repeater mode? Without affecting the exposure by a huge slaving flash? 😀

[Jones]

Nice — respect! I dare not touch landscapes. I’ve had lots of experiences with varying strobes, both good and bad — I’d be happy to share, if you want. Shoot me an e-mail at a2molinephotography@gmail.com with what sorts of stuff you’re looking for, or at least if you want to hear the stories I’ve got. 😛

[Jones]

That’s definitely an awesome kit there! Wish I could afford those 910’s like that. Went to a Joe McNally seminar, and saw the absolutely bonkers stuff that he does just with little flash and TTL, and makes me want to just fork over my life savings and get addicted to TTL. Awesome stuff. Need to find a cheap (manual) flash that is still pretty reliable that won’t set me back a nice $600!

[Jones]

Nice, CC. I got to play with a friend’s 5D MK II and MK III the other day — both great cameras, and I enjoyed using them.

[Jones]

I’m not a landscape photographer by any means — throw the most beautiful scene in the world in front of me, and I guarantee I can make it look lame.

 

I am, however, a portrait photographer, so I’ll comment where it makes sense.

 

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3712/10331911675_91da3d7bec_o.jpg

Her teeth look like they are glowing. What happened there? Maybe I am mistaken?  It looks like you tried to retouch her teeth without knowing exactly how and just made them brighter, instead of the yellow going away. I could be wrong and that’s how they look, though.

 

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7336/10332202475_49292bc004_o.jpg could be okay, but she doesn’t look very happy, but that’s fine if you’re going for that kind of mood. She has no catchlights, which don’t help the picture. The shot is quite grainy, but doesn’t bother me too much. Was this shot with a wider angle lens? She looks slightly distorted, but I could be tricking myself into seeing something that isn’t there. It’s not a terrible shot, but it’s definitely not one that belongs with your ‘best’

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5534/10331916474_1d92154624_o.jpg

Yikes, what happened with her clothes? That hurts my eyes. If that’s how it came out of the camera, I would tone it down a bit. It’s distracting from the point of the picture — her, assuming it’s a portrait. If it’s a fashion shot, there are better ways to display that jacket. Again, no catchlight. Not an awful shot, but again, kind of “meh” and I wouldn’t put it with your best.

[Author]

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