Photo 13: 5-Minute Shoot with Tanya

Jerica and I met up with her friends at Eastwood.
I didn't have an entry yet for the week so I commissioned our pretty (and single) friend Tanya to model for me :D

I've had my share of flirting with security guards in the past, so I was almost certain that it would only be a matter of time before one approached us as we took some pictures. I was determined to make it into a quick 5-minute shoot because probably in 6-10mins, we'd be shooed away by security (they seem to have an agenda against DSLR users).

This was shot at F1.4 to blur out the background and a single speedlight was placed behind Tanya to serve as a kicker light.

Using external flashes, even just one, will do wonders for your pic. I highly encourage those with flashes to start using them off-cam.

For comparison, here's a pic of Tanya WITHOUT any flashes

It's an ok picture, but without the flash, Tanya doesn't stand out that much.

Well of course you need to learn some proper mixing too, since if you use too much, the pic also won't look as good

All these photos were shot with a D700 and an 85mm F1.4 prime lens. The SB900 at the back was triggered via CLS with my pop-up flash as the commander (Oh yeah!! Nikon CLS rocks!! :D).

Thanks Tanya for modelling! :D

Photo 12: Prenup Teaser

The tables have turned!

It's OUR prenuptial pictorial session and it's our turn in front of the camera!
It was awkward for me at first because I really prefer taking pictures rather than posing, but of course it still turned out to be a great experience :D

I know I wasn't supposed to be taking pictures but when it was Jerica's turn for her solo shots, I quickly grabbed my camera and I "borrowed" the light from the official photographers' continuous video light source.

This is just a teaser and I'll soon be releasing the official photos from JayJay Lucas :D
(Idol!!)

:D

Photo 11: Red Cross

A good friend asked me if I would be interested in helping out the Makati Branch of Red Cross. Of course why not?? I mean, a chance for me to help out a humanitarian organization with my photography?? I'd be happy to do it! :D

So last weekend I went to their office and took some pictures, which they will be using in their website, reports, and other multimedia stuff.

This is Rey Alicante, one of the rescuers of their branch. The rescuers are highly trained and they get to use some really cool stuff that I only usually see in Med-related TV shows :p

They wanted a shot of the equipment so they laid them all out, but I wanted to make it more personal so I asked Rey to pose in front of their gears. Although it was a bright day, the light was a little lacking in the room, so I used a couple of speedlights to evenly illuminate the place and Rey.

It was a really cool experience, meeting the people of Red Cross, the officers, the trainers, the volunteers, and everyone else (even the dog na masungit sa akin). It's given me more appreciation of the organization and of what they do. Ma'am Shirley hope you're reading this, thanks again for the hospitality :)

Photo 10: Drive Angry

Nope, I haven't seen the movie... I just thought that it'd be an applicable title to this week's submission. Hehe.

With just barely 2 months before our wedding, I've had less time to organize more elaborate photo shoots... so yeah, you'll have to settle for me as the subject again :p

This is actually a follow-up to last week's submission and is another light painting photo. This time, instead of using a flashlight, I used the lights from outside the car. I wanted a redo of the light painting pic because I feel that I over-complicated things and the same effect could have been done with a simpler set-up (thanks Jeri for pointing this out! :D).

This was just the camera on a tripod with the SB900 speedlight mounted on top. The camera was set on rear curtain, meaning that it'll trigger the flash as the shutter closed. I used a trigger to click the shutter wirelessly and that's it! :D

Here's a very crude drawing of how my set-up looked like

*Yes, all my drawings suck and there's a very good reason why I chose to be a photographer instead.

:D

Photo 9 Explained!

I've gotten a lot of questions asking how was I able to do the light painting... so here are the steps broken down and explained :)

Set-up.
Here are the things that you'll need:
- Camera on a tripod (doesn't have to be a DSLR, just as long as you can manually set the aperture and shutter speed settings; and yes the tripod is a necessity)
- External flash (can be a speedlight triggered off-cam or a studio strobe)
- Flashlight
- lots of imagination :D

Step 1: Prepare the aperture and shutter speed settings
- WITHOUT triggering the flash, click on the camera
- ideally, the shutter speed should be around 10-20 seconds long
- the resulting pic should be pitch black
- this is why the area should be very dimly lit

Step 2: Prepare the flash setting
- with the determined aperture setting, get the flash power output that will properly expose you in the picture

Step 3: Light Painting Time!
- after the prep work is complete, it's time to do the actual light painting!
- trigger the camera (remember that the shutter speed should be 10-20secs long)

Step 4: Draw!
- using your flashlight, draw whatever your imagination can think of
- the flashlight should be pointed at the camera
- you should finish your drawing before the shutter closes

Step 5: Pose & Trigger
- after you finish your drawing, and still before the shutter closes, do your pose
- then trigger the external flash

End Result
- final picture should be your posed shot with the "drawing" imposed in the foreground

That's it! Hope this helps and good luck with your light paintings :D