The internet is awesome.

Nov 272008

So I’m a Chase Jarvis Fanboy.  It’s true- the guy is like my photographic idol, not just for his photography per-se, but for his business acumen, his industry savvy, and the way he has managed to really build himself into a “brand”.  I think he is really doing great things for the contemporary photography industry as a whole, and driving some really great initiatives…

But to the point…

I was perusing the strobist flickr group, as is my wont – and I came across this post wondering how Chase managed to balance his strobe/ambient in creating some of the “frozen action” shots in his latest video.  After a couple of replies, who replies but the man himself, explaining exactly how the effects were achieved!

Honestly, how cool is that?  Sure, it may seem like a little thing, but the fact that you can basically have an open ended conversation, ask a question, and have it answered directly by the likes of CJ is just super cool.  Just went I start to get disillusioned by the endless flamewars and disinformation spread on internet forums, something like that comes along and reminds me of how the web can really bring people together to socialize and share knowledge in a way that would have been impossible less than 20 years ago…

Of course it also just points to how cool Chase is to hang out on forums and answer folks questions :-)   I decided to make sure that when I am that high-profile I will never become haughty or aloof and always be available to help folks out.  That’s what makes our industry great.

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The nuts and bolts of off-camera flash

Nov 232008

Just to make it easier for reference, I’m collecting all 4 parts of this piece together into one post before they get lost in the black pit of the “blog archive”!

PART 1 – Intro/basics

PART 2 – Manual flash

PART 3 – TTL wireless

PART 4 – Syncing/sync speed

So there you have it!  all the nitty gritty of off camera flash in one convenient package for your bookmarking convenience :-)

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Buying knowledge…

Nov 202008

I’ve been a big fan of the “Strobist” flickr forum, been following it pretty much since David Hobby started up his little blog :-) It was always a great place to pick the brains of some great photographers about lighting concepts, techniques, and yes even gear (although the slogan used to be “*less* gear, *more* brain…” hmmm). Recently though, it seems the focus of the group has shifted from discussions on controlling speculars and bright field lighting to “hey I have an xti and a 430ex and I want to do strobist stuff (whatever *that* means) what should I buy?”

To opine on the topic in a more general fashion, I would like to propose the following answer to most any “what should I buy” question.

Buy Knowledge.

when I look back at the evolution of my own skills as a photographer I cannot think of *any* instance were a particular piece of gear made a quantifiable difference in the quality of my photos. I can, however, directly attribute each and every improvement in my photography to *learning* or *understanding* something new.

To that end, the money I have spent on photo classes/seminars or even just having out watching more experienced photographers work has been exponentially more beneficial to me than any piece of gear. Sure the whole “it’s not the camera it’s the photographer” is cliched, but just look through flickr at the amount of absolute crap coming out of cameras like the d3 or 1ds… Folks are dropping 10k on gear who would make exponentially better images with an xti and spending the other 9k on a semester of photography classes at uni.

The bottom line is if you have a camera, you can make a picture. if you have a light you can light it (whether it’s a 20 year old vivitar or a profoto 7b). But you have to *know what* you want to make and *know how* to light it first. Once you do that, you will *know* what gear you need. Believe me, spending a weekend at a seminar with a serious photographer will improve you images so far beyond buying a 1D or set of profotos, it’s amazing.  It may not be as sexy as the latest toy, but when it comes down to it you just have to ask yourself – is it the gadgets, or is it the images? (and don’t get me wrong, I’m as much of a gadget-head as the next guy!)

If you *think* you need more gear to make better images, you don’t – you need more knowledge.  If you *know* you need a specific piece of gear for a specific application, well then by all means go crazy :-)

end rant.

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Movie? Photography? Art?

Nov 132008

This is a semi-oldie but a goodie… for those who haven’t seen it:

A fascinating and surreal piece of art… Paintings on walls/public spaces photographed and stitched together into a stop motion piece that really plays with the whole concept of photography in and of itself.


MUTO a wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.

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New portfolios!

Nov 102008

Since I’ve been doing a *ton* of work recently, I decided it was about time to update my portfolio on f/1.0

Kinda streamlined things a bit, lots of new work in the “people” section.

Check it out here or click on the “portfolio” link on the right

I’ve also decided to separate a lot of my personal work/projects onto flickr, rather than cluttering up the portfolio per-se – check out MY FLICKR STREAM here, and look for more updates in the weeks to come…

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I love it when a shot comes together…

Nov 032008

Last week Shari DeAngelo and I got together with model extraordinaire Maureen Haley for a faux “bridal shoot” for some portfolio building. The shoot was great, and when we finished up on location we went back to my studio to recoup/start packing up… we were supposed to finish around 6:30, and it was almost 9pm at this point. Now I had this idea kicking around in my head for a while… The first floor landing of the exit stairs in my building has this great grungy look – crumbling brick, peeling paint – the whole 9 yards. I had this vision of just tons of light streaming out the cracked door, and a model peering around, maybe a little curious or a little scared at what might be on the other side… kind of an “Alice in Wonderland meets Poltergeist” kinda vibe.

Of course Maureen, being the champ she is, was up for it!  Luckily I had tried out a few lighting setups a while ago when I first had the idea, so I had a pretty good idea of how I wanted to light it – I need one big light for behind the door to make the light pouring out, then a 2nd snooted light to illuminate the face , and a 3rd for just a touch of foreground light (the cast shadows were an extra benefit).

We got everything set up and started shooting. Of course about 20 frames into the shot I realized I had flipped my camera into MF mode, and they were all out of focus (it was too dark to tell through the VF but I was wondering why my focus confirmation points weren’t lighting up). Luckily I realized early enough and was able to get a couple of good frames. Of course, about 3 frames after getting the shot the Vagabond powering the AB800 behind the door gave up the ghost!

Some processing in lightroom and the final result was just as I pictured it. Like I said, I love it when it all just comes together in the end :-) (link goes to larger image on flickr)

The Other Side...

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