Flash Digital Photography Studio

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digital SLR photography?

In a home environment, when taking a portrait using reading lights, how to achieve "studio like" turn out for portraints & still life? What equipments are essential to bring out proper lighting? Is it necessary to buy metering device, flash, transmitter, reflectors, etc?

Your best bet is to buy a cheap off camera flash and look at cheap wireless triggers. You can get a Yongnuo flash which is manually adjustable by power levels off eBay for about £40. A set of triggers, like RF-602's (1 transmitter + 1 receiver) will cost around £35. Buy a 5-in-1 reflector (£8) and you're good to go.
Whilst the continuous lighting solutions offered by others might be a tad cheaper, they're a pain to white balance and you'll quickly find out their limitations & end up with flash, particularly if you want to do a lot of this type of work. If you want to do location portraits for example, the hotshoe flash is the way to go for portability (batteries only, & lightweight).
You don't need to buy a light meter either at this stage.

I suggest you read Lighting 101 at the Strobist site (see right hand pane);

http://strobist.blogspot.com/

LOTS of information there on off camera lighting (principally hotshoe flashes)

New Beginner Photography Lighting Workshop - Learn Flash Photography NOW


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Flash Digital Photography Studio

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Flash! Digital Photography? Other portrait studios?

I've been trying to find a great (mostly inexpensive) portrait studio in the Kansas City area. I have always loved going to JCPenny Portrait, but the past few times it has not been a very good experience when I take my infant niece (I take her once a month until she is a year).

To the point---I like the photos on Flash! Digital Photography, but does anyone know the prices to this place Is it expensive? Price ranges?

Any other portrait studios I should check out?

The problem with department store studios is that they have one setup for everyone and everything. That's what makes them inexpensive. Normally they have someone who is not a photographer or doesn't want to be one run the equipment...it's setup to be pretty much idiot proof.

You could try some of these....

1) Goto a college or photogrpahy school...see if you can find a student who wants to make a little extra money on the side.

2) Work out an arrangement with a pro studio to take your series of pictures...they may cut you a deal, they may not...but it never hurt to ask.

3) Church groups...it sounds weird...but the church I go to is always looking for volunteers to do things like this for needy families and such. You might be able to find a photographer willing to donate time to help you out.

Hope this helps.

Digital Photography 1 on 1: Episode 20: On Location Flash: Adorama Photography TV


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Flash Digital Photography

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Is histogram used when taking flash photography?

When you are going to use your flash does the histogram offer any help? I can see how it does in non flash photography situations but it's not clear to me its effectiveness with flash. Sorry, novice digital photographer

Histograms are very difficult to use under any conditions.

It is much more useful when you are processing images using a program like Photoshop or Lightroom

To see how crazy a histogram can get, shoot one high key and one low key photo and see if you can get any really good information you can use during your shoot. Probably not.

If the image looks good on your LCD (with it set to zero gain), the image file will 999 times out of 1000 shots will be perfectly fine.

Digital Photography Lesson - Flash 3 of 4


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Flash Digital Photography

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What's the best compact digital camera for low light photography without flash?

I'm looking for a compact digital camera, it will be used indoors for doing surveys in factories. Often it won't be possible to use a flash due to the presence of highly reflective stainless steel structures and plant. So I'm looking for the best performance camera in low light without a flash, plus it has to slip easily into a coat pocket. Any other features are not so important, except battery life. Any specific recommendations based on personal experience would be great. Otherwise is there a particular digital camera specification that tells me about its low light performance, so I can directly compare models? Thanks

I gather your three main criteria are low light sensitivity, small pocketable size and long battery life.

You will need a camera that you can manually adjust the light sensitivity to a higher ISO rating. I recommend a camera with an ISO of 800 or greater. The reason being, at higher ISO setting you may take a picture at a faster shutter speed, which translates to less blurry images. Beware though that the higher you set the ISO, the pictures will appear far grainier (the technical term is "noise"). Some cameras may have less noise at higher ISO ratings so try to make some comparison shots at the store using the same ISO speeds.

There are a few slim cameras in the market like Casio Exilim and Sony CyberShot. I have a Panasonic DMC FX01 which is a slim camera but the max ISO sensitivity is mere 400. Another camera I have is the Samsung NV11 which is slightly wider and bulkier than the first but is light sensitive up to ISO 1600. Both have incredible battery life but I can't recommend either one based on your needs. Take a look at Casio Exilim EX S10: it is small and light with ISO settings from 50-1600.

Digital Photography 1 on 1: Episode 57: Rear Curtain Sync: Adorama Photography TV


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