The fact is, these plastic devices that you attach to the end of your flash are not softening the light coming out of your flash.

Light itself is neither hard or soft. It’s photons flying through the air in a straight line. The only way to create softer shadows is to make the apparent size of the light source in relation to your subject larger. This can be done, for example with soft boxes and umbrellas placed near your subject. Another method, if you are indoors, is by bouncing the light up into the ceiling or into a wall, which will bounce back much larger light source than the small size of your on-camera flash.

You can also use these plastic flash diffusers to aid in softening the light indoors. What these attachments do, is send the light spraying out in all directions, which in turn, bounce off everything, causing light to fall upon your subject from many directions to produce the look of softer light.

Now, are you heading outside to shoot with on-camera flash? The first thing you should do is take your plastic diffuser off (if it’s attached), and shove it in your pocket, camera bag, or wherever else you feel like shoving it.

Contrary to popular belief, a piece of translucent plastic that scatters light in all directions without nearby surfaces to reflect the scattered light back into the scene, will not soften the light. A diffuser outdoors — a large majority of the time — simply wastes light, reduces range, slows recycle times and eats batteries.

The light that will hit your subject will be the light that starts at your flash and heads straight at your subject. All the other light spreading out in all other directions will not have anything to bounce back from and will just go to waste. If you think that bouncing off the clouds is worth a try, fahgettaboutit, that’s a lesson in futility.

Outdoors, use your on-camera flash as fill, and shoot direct. Your mileage may vary, but by setting your flash to ETTL mode with a FEC of -1 1/3 to -2, should yield some very nice results.

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The Fallston gym, like most in Harford County, has very little room, and no balcony at the end of court which prevents getting our lights high and pointed parallel to the sidelines. We had to place the lights on the sides, which create too much crosslighting and harsh shadows.

When using strobes/flashes, ideally you want to over power the ambient light by 3 to 4 stops so that when you are shooting at your camera’s sync speed (typically 1/250 sec), the quick burst of light from the strobes is what freezes the action and not the shutter speed. I tried bouncing my 580EXs off the back wall to create a large light source, but my flashes, even on full power, could only muster about 2 stops over ambient. In a darker lit gym, this method would probably work, but Fallston’s ambient lighting is better than average.

I had to stick with direct light from the corners of the gym. I placed my flashes on my 7-foot light stands and set them each to 1/8 power, 28mm zoom and aimed them towards the top of the key.

Here are some samples from the night.

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I’m bored.  What to do? I know, take some pictures of the Christmas ornaments on the tree we recently put up.

These shots were taken on a tripod with my 135 f/2.0 lens. ISO 200 and a tungsten WB. The average shutter speed was about a third of a second.

Then I grabbed the nutcracker on the end table, and set him in front of the tree, put a 1/2 CTO gel on my flash and manually fired the flash at the his face while the shutter was open.

Ok, that little project is over, what can I get into now … ?

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This is the continuation from Part 1 of the wrestling team poster project done using a green screen. In part one, I explained how I used a green screen to put together a team picture.

The next stage was to provide some sample background images to be selected for the final poster.  I submitted for review, ten different images, from pastures to buildings, for potential candidates for the final poster. Coach Watson and his staff settled on the stormy clouds version. In addition, he let me know that one of the original wrestlers has transferred to another school and would need to be removed. With the removal of that wrestler, I then rearranged the other guys to balance it out.

Coach Watson wondered if I could add a bolt of lighting to the sky. I played around with Photoshop after Googling for help inspiration and technique from others. I personally like the poster without the lightning, but the coaches loved it, and wanted it included.

The final step was to add the text, and get the final OK.  Once approved, it was time to send the final image to the lab to print the posters.

This was a fun learning experience, and would gladly accept another project that could utilize the green screen.

In fact, I am going to start utilizing this technique for doing T&I (team and individual). No more ugly bleachers or gym stages in the backgrounds. Another benefit is that there is no need for everyone to wait around for the entire team to show up — I’m sure the parents will appreciate that aspect.

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If you are a sports photographer and frequently shoot high school night games of football, soccer, or lacrosse, you have probably experienced poor lighting.  Some of the newer fields have decent lighting, but a majority of the ones I visit are marginal at best.

Prior to Bel Air High School being remodeled, if I shot a game without flash on the old football field, I would usually come away disappointed with my results.  The light reading on that field was ISO 3200 f/2.8 1/250 on the best lit areas of the field. The team wears dark blue uniforms and shots from the endzone and sideline would be horrible, unless you shot at 1/60.

If you shoot at night with a flash sitting on-camera, you will end up with a majority of your subjects with red eye or ghost (white) eye.  Pupils are dilated and the light from your flash is so close to the lens axis that red eye is unavoidable in that situation.   To use flash without getting red eye, the flash needs to be distanced from the lens axis.  One way would be to put the flash up high above your camera.  Well, in doing that, you being nimble and having the ability to move up and down the sidelines quickly is probably hindered.  What I do is put my flash below my camera. This allows me to move up/down the sidelines pretty much the same way I would without flash. The flash below keeps the weight low to the ground and doesn’t affect my shooting ability.

I setup my monopod with an L-bracket attached with a hose clamp (purchase at any hardware store) about 15″-18″ below the camera. I mount my 580EX upside down with the camera still able to talk to the flash with an off-shoe cord.  I shoot football with my Sigma 120-300 f/2.8 DG at ISO 1600; f/3.5; 1/250 with the flash on E-TTL -2/3.   In doing this, the ghost-eyes are eliminated completely, and red-eye will only be seen in a small percentage of shots.   What the flash does is pops the color and lights up inside the helmet to see eyes and faces –  for that’s what the mom’s really want to see!  The downside to having the flash below the camera is that it creates some funky shadows, for the light is coming from below, but it really lights up underneath the helmet and will produce many more good images than without flash.

My setup isn’t pretty, but it works.  You too can create this setup for little money.

#1: Hose clamp and L-bracket placed onto monopod. Tape to protect the monopod.  I suggest using gaffers tape — I used blue duct tape, DOH!  Washers used because the thin bracket causes the bolt to bottom out before getting tight.

#2: Canon 580EX flash attached upside down.

#3: What the players see. (My father’s arm typically isn’t attached though)

#4: Side view of setup.

Another alternative to the hose clamp and L-bracket is to attach a super-clamp to your monopod and use a lightstand bracket to attach your flash to the superclamp. The super-clamp method will add more weight to your monopod. If that isn’t an issue for you, that method is very simple to setup.

Below are some samples of what this setup can do.

With the knowledge he has given to the photographic community with regards to small flashes, David is now expanding his Strobist site to discuss the use of other lighting equipment — mainly studio strobes.

As David wrote in his post Birthdays, Heresies and Watt-Seconds:

I don’t care if they are using speedlights, Profotos or magnesium powder. Light is light. And we may as well be learning from the folks who are working at the highest levels.

Year three of Strobist should be filled with more interesting reading and learning.

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How many times have you been outside taking pictures only to find all your subjects faces dark and the background beautifully exposed? Sure, you could adjust your exposure to expose the faces better, but now you’ll have a background that is blown out. A better solution is fill-flash.

Below is an example of a shot I took without flash and another taken just a few seconds later using flash.

I set my camera exposure manually to the scene (bright sun on a deck at 3:00p in the afternoon). This turned out to be f/11; ISO 100 at 1/250s. Because I was going to use flash, I did not want to set my shutter speed any faster than my camera’s sync-speed of 1/250. Another alternative would be to set your camera to shutter priority (Tv in Canon) and set it to 1/250 of a second. I prefer manual settings, for I don’t want the the camera being fooled by the scene.

My daughter was in her pool where the sunlight was coming from camera right, casting a shadow across her face. The shot on the left looks like a snapshot taken by anyone with a P&S. Just by using my flash, and setting it in ETTL mode (Canon) with a Flash Exposure Correction (FEC) of -1 2/3, that same shot brings out much more detail in her face without that harsh flash look. The sun still overpowers the flash, creating it’s normal shadows. I may have even been better off using at FEC of -2 or even less (in negative territory here), but now, the picture has a much better look and feel to it.

Imagine if the sun was coming from behind her. That first image would really show a dark face, which would be completely in the shadow. So, next time you are out in the sun taking pictures of family and friends, don’t be afraid to experiment with a bit of fill flash.

The headshots were all taken at her home (where her mother makes some delicious lemonade) in the family room / living room area. The home had a beautiful wood floor, and it made a great background as I shot from high above.

I think Valeria had a great time — once she got over a bit of nervousness in the beginning — and I hope I was able to help her land a great role in the future.

Lighting Information:

Clamshell lighting with two 43″ umbrella’s and 580EXs.

Top umbrella – 1/8 power
Bottom umbrella – 1/32 power

Hairlight from snooted 285HV at 1/16 power

Happy Memorial Day to everyone. Today is a day to honor those who have fought and served our country and to grieve those who died while serving.

Memorial Day also signals the unofficial beginning of summer and what do kids want to do in the summer … SWIM! The weather in Bel Air today is fabulous — bright sunshine and 84 degrees.

While the kids were playing, I also was playing with my camera. I thought I try my hand at shooting with my right hand while holding a flash in my left. The downside to bright sunshine is the harsh shadows that accompany it. To bring out some definition in the shadows, a bit of fill flash does wonders.

The photo above — of my daughter Keely, the ham — used my technique of underexposing the camera 2/3 of a stop to cut down on the hot spots, and pop a bit of flash from the shadow side at 1/32 power.

The flash is not for inside use only. It can really come in handy outdoors as well. Give it a try, you may like the results.