The weather was frightful

Actually it was pretty cool. During last nights thunderstorm/tornado warning I took a few lighting shots.

 

 

 

 

 

The new toys have arrived

As you can see by the photo below the new toys have arrived. I hope I will have time to play with them before Halloween.

I found one set of AAA batteries for one of the remote receivers. I may have to steal to more from some TV remotes and such.

Also I need to re-read the Lighting 101 articles again. It has been a few months since I last read it. Hopefully it will give me some ideas that I can use to photograph my Hallowen display.

 

 

Taking the plung

I have been thinking about doing this for a few months. I was not sure it was a direction I wanted to go. But I had recently done some computer work for a friend, so I had some extra money. A couple of days ago I ordered some off camera lighting. I have been doing exclusively natural lighting and enjoying it. But there have been many situations where I could not get a shot because the lighting was wrong.

Also I have been collecting items I wanted to do some still life photography with but needed better control of the light. The equipment will arrive on Tuesday the 28th. Today is the Sunday before. Just in time to take pictures of my Halloween display.

Only one problem. A day after the ordering the equipment, I realized I did not order any stands for the lighting and I used up all my extra money. So for now I will have to make due with placing the flash's on the ground or near by objects.

Here is what I have ordered:

Two Neewer TT560 Flash Speedlite for Canon Nikon

Neewer Wireless Remote FM Radio Flash Speedlite Trigger w/ 2.5mm PC 2 Receiver

Panasonic eneloop AA 2100 Cycle Ni-MH Pre-Charged Rechargeable Batteries

 

While thinking about going this direction with by photography I have been reading articles about lighting. The best I have found is "Lighting 101" by Stobist". It is a series of blog posts about lighting equipment and techniques. You can even download a pdf version of all the posts compiled. The blog is a great place to start.

 

Oops!

While gathering the links for this article I noticed that the receivers for the wireless remotes do not include the two AAA batteries per remote! So I guess I will need to do more ordering. Batteries, battery charger, and light stand. And eventually some light umbrella's.

 

PS: I am on vacation this week, so hope to posting some of my backlog of photo I have been taking or the past several weeks. Sorry about the not posting thing.

 

New lighting for my still life photography

I made some small LED spotlights for Halloween. I made white , warm white, green and blue spotlights. When photographic in the dark the colors look normal. The whites look white and the green and blue look correct too. I did not test the warm white. I will try it next.

My LED spot lights are not powerful enough for anything other than low light photography currently. I will try creating an array of LED's to see how many are need for other lighting needs. But these small spotlights are cheap and easy to make.