Tag: brolly

What equipment do I need to photograph weddings?

 Gavin   Tips
What equipment do you need to photograph weddings?

 

What equipment do I need to photograph weddings?

Photographing weddings is easy. Don’t be put off by the illusion of stress on the wedding day because it’s just that, an illusion. The secret is having a plan and having the right equipment to do the job. In this post, we’re going to talk about equipment. (If you’d like to talk about planning the day to make it stress-free, leave a comment and let me know).

OK, so what do you need?

This list is what I believe to be the absolute minimum. Can you do it with less? Of course you can, Continue reading What equipment do I need to photograph weddings? »

Greenwich…

 Gavin   Fashion, Low Light, Photoshoot, Strobist, Techniques
image
Tumi, sunset over Greenwich

A couple of weeks ago I was fortunate enough to receive an email from Tumi, a student at the London College of Fashion asking if we could work together on a photoshoot. I’m very glad she did too.

We threw a few ideas around and settled on an autumnal theme, with the aim of catching the golden light around dusk.

On the evening of the shoot we were very lucky with the weather, thhe sky offering up those sunset. To get the shot I placed Tumi on the beach, underemployed the sky by a stop out two and lit her with a 580exII firing into my shoot through brolly. I really struggled with the PocketWizards that evening. The Mini simply wouldn’t trigger the flash so I had to rely on the a second Flex instead. Even that wasn’t perfect but it was much more reliable than the Mini. I have to say though that this was the one and only time I’d had a problem of this nature. My only guess being interference from the boats on the Thames.

Another Shot in the Dark…

 Gavin   Black and White, Fashion, Low Light, Strobist, Techniques
Night life
Night life

I don’t often quote the parameters for my images but I will in this case: ISO6400, 0.5s@f11, handheld. That’s probably about the limit of what I can reasonably achieve wiht the 5DmkII. Nevertheless the image was very noisey and won’t reproduce at much over 12″x8″

So, what was I thinking when I set this shot up? Continue reading Another Shot in the Dark… »

A Shot in the Dark…

 Gavin   Fashion, Low Light, Strobist, Techniques
A Shot in the Dark
A Shot in the Dark

I love working in low light conditions but the shoot I did a few days ago over at Greenwich really stretched me and my equipment to the limit. This wasn’t just low light, for the most part we had no light. If that wasn’t challenging enough, add the beautiful Dilsa wearing a black dress and black hat and you guessed it we have a serious issue to contend with.

Continue reading A Shot in the Dark… »

How to fix a broken brolly

 Gavin   Equipment, Strobist, Tips

I’m sure I’m not alone in having a gust o fwind blow over a light stand and snap a brolly pole. No, I thought not. I think it’s a natural part of the learning process, the lesson being taught is that of adding ballast (aka camera bag) to the stand to prevent it.

But, what of the brolly? Is it now confined to the bin? Absolutely not.

When this happened to me the other day, I thought “bother, now what am I going to do?” I needed it for a model shoot the following day, and there was no time to go out and replace it.

Continue reading How to fix a broken brolly »