If You Fall Off the Grid, Do You Still Exist?

Photomom

PXLated said:

Jeanne - Various LED flashlights for the outside lighting and a strobe for inside. Multiple exposures layered together in a photo editing app.

I know a couple of photographers who use those $2.99 multi LED lights you can get at Harbor Freight. Tuck them behind a convenient rock or tree.

Nomad

Photomom - I have them in various sizes and brightnesses. For buildings you need something with some lumens as you're shining from many yards away so you don't show up in the frame. Gotta stay outside the sight lines in most cases. They're all relatively cheap but my smallest one did cost $40. The strobe was a little spendy though and eats batteries for lunch.

Nomad

Some guys lite up monument valley - the camera was to the east a couple miles and the spotlights were three miles north. Took two 3-million cadlepower spots to do it. And of course two Navajo guides and waki talkies to coordinate. Beautiful photo that you couldn't have gotten any other way.
It's basically studio, movie set type lighting but done outdoors.

Ratkity

PXL, I was wondering how some of those shots were lit!

mash2

Curious why the light seems "tungsten" (2,000-2,700K Calvin).  The flash is about 5,000K and most LED's are in the 4-5,500K range.  Color set by taste?

BTW, checked and you can get a 18M candlepower rechargeable spot from walmart for under $75.  Go for it.

Nomad

mash2 - For most exterior lighting I'm just using raw LED with a straight dispursement filter so I don't get hotspots. The strobe has a yellow filter to give that warm incadesent look for interiors. The overall blue cast in some is from moonlight. Have played around with whitebalance changes but have never liked the result.
My base shot is usually done during the golden hour so grass/trees have that rich tone. Here's typical shot combining LED, Strobe, and Golden Hour lighting...

Nomad

Since this was a simple one, only six layers - Five exposures and Copyright - I made a composite of the individual shots...
1) Base - Dusk - General Fill
2) Interior - Back Wall
3) Window Frame #1 - Some spill on the ground
4) Window Frame #2 - Some spill on the ground
5) Ground in Front of Window and Door
6) Copyright



As mentioned, this was a simple one, just 5 exposures - Have had as many as 35/40 for buildings.

mash2

So the strobe is setting the "tungston" glow; get it. The LED shots seem to be low temperature as well (at least shot 5 seems to be very warm as well.  

Have you tried embedding a gray card somewhere in the scene to have reference color for all of them (or at least most of them since there doesn't seem anywhere where a gray card would be exposed in all the images.  i'll often lay a small gray card when I'm doing multiple images and then use that reference in working at getting a consistent color balance between images.... 

Nice images BTW.

Nomad

mash2 - I don't use a gray card on these as I'm really not trying to match true color - More conceptual than true. If need be (I usually don't) I can tweak some layeres in the photo editing software.
I just realized that in all but the initial base shot, I used the strobe with yellow filter, no LED. That's unusual. Did use LED on the door in the base shot to light up the explosives warning.

ChanW

Very interesting PXL. Thanks for explaining. They're fascinating renderings.

jkjenn

mash2 said:

Curious why the light seems "tungsten" (2,000-2,700K Calvin).  The flash is about 5,000K and most LED's are in the 4-5,500K range.  Color set by taste?

BTW, checked and you can get a 18M candlepower rechargeable spot from walmart for under $75.  Go for it.

Most guides for this kind of set set-up recommend around 3500k, but it does come down to taste. It will vary depending on the light you use, though. The Bronfman Xenon should be closer to 2900k.


I love my Cano 600EX speedlights for off camera flash. It seems like the batteries last forever, too.

Nomad

"comes down to taste" <- Yep. And intent. I'm creating a mood, an emotion, rather than recreating reality - Art vs documentation. :-)

Photomom

PXLated said:

"comes down to taste" <- Yep. And intent. I'm creating a mood, an emotion, rather than recreating reality - Art vs documentation. :-)

The difference between art and journalism!

Ratkity

Just for the record, my "tastes" very much like it all!!! Thanks for sharing PXL. 

KyBawpaw

I remember the "good" old days when we waited with our fingers crossed by the light table for the E-6 processor door to open. Shot it a dozen different ways knowing one would be the "Goldilocks" (just right). From E-6 and C-41 chemistry to digital pixels, photography progress has been awesome to witness. I started with a Sear's equipped darkroom with Tower brand accessories and a Testrite enlarger purchased with S&H Green Stamps (remember those?). Set it up in mom's walk in closet, Lol. I was about 15 years old then.

Nomad

KyBawpaw - The wait and the expense. I had the full color darkroom back in the days also. Mine was in the fruit celler :-)
Can't really say I miss any of it. The only trouble with digital is (since it's so cheap) you can shoot so many shots that you have to be ruthless in editing/ditching or you'll need a roomful of hard drives :-)

Photomom

I'll take Lightroom, thanks. 

Ratkity

As a microbiologist, I did a copious amount of B&W photography in grad school for the electron microscopes (Transmission and Scanning) and it just spilled over into photography on a macro scale. I was lucky that I had access to an enlarger and constant fresh chemicals. At the time, we didn't shoot color (but the micro photo lab was set up for it so I could shoot electrophoresis gels). I can't say I miss the smells though. Might have spent too much time in there some nights and those closets had no ventilation! I wonder how much dain bramage I suffered

Nomad

I generally don't use the term "light painting" to describe the technique I use as there's just a lot of weird junk out there in that category. It's more "studio lighting" outdoors. But here's light painting in the studio and this vid shows (on a small scale) what I'm doing outdoors on a larger scale...
https://fstoppers.com/bts/behind-scenes-beverage-photography-shoot-using-light-painting-techniques-126890

jkjenn

PXLated said:

I generally don't use the term "light painting" to describe the technique I use as there's just a lot of weird junk out there in that category. It's more "studio lighting" outdoors. But here's light painting in the studio and this vid shows (on a small scale) what I'm doing outdoors on a larger scale...
https://fstoppers.com/bts/behind-scenes-beverage-photography-shoot-using-light-painting-techniques-126890

You mean we won't see you setting steel wool on fire and spinning it?

Photomom

A group of us did that just the other night!

Ratkity

OMG Photomom! Cool! *thumbs up*

Photomom

The guy doing the spinning did sustain some burns on his arms, but he didn't set his clothes on fire. This time. Fortunately we were a few feet from Lake Ontario. 

Ratkity

Isn't Lake Ontario always a wee cold no matter what time of year?? LOL. Stop, drop and roll!  

Ratkity

"Burns and Hypothermia at the same time? Uh, well, doc... I know I had to be pulled from the Lake and thanks for getting the blood flow back to my fingers, toes and brain. See, uh, we were doing something we've done a 100x before [translation 1x] without any problems, Really!!"  *patient facial expression of wide-eyed innocence*

*Doc solemnly asks if patient knows the name of the current US President, how many fingers the doc is holding up, as well as other sanity-confirming questions and actions. Shakes head and walks away as the patient yells after departing doc, "Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time!"*

Nomad

Jenn - I've actually had a couple locations where spinning steel wool might have made for a dramatic background behind a structure but was afraid I'd catch something on fire. Could just see the headlines - Idiot photographer catches 10,000 acres of native prairrie grass on fire. :-)

Photomom

 We did have to move further out toward the lake when someone noticed that sparks were landing on the roof of the building behind us.

Ratkity

*Meanwhile, in the waiting room...... excited geeky photographers are have given up trying to use the overloaded hospital wi-fi and are now using a personal hotspot to upload the entire humiliating episode to YouTube*

*While waiting for their friend to be discharged and the video to finish uploading, they overhear the nurses refer to friend with burns and hypothermia as "Sparky the Snowman". New nickname for friend has been established. They are sure this story will go viral.*

jkjenn

Sort of reminds me of perhaps my favorite TV commercial of all time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9B8S6YhVlzc


I was shooting on Boulder Mountain in Utah one fall and had backed up on the slope that led from the meadow up to the road. What I didn't realize that was under the grass it was not solid ground, but loose, dry asphalt. The ground starting giving way under my feet and I instinctively held my heavy camera and heaviest lens above my head with one hand to protect it and fell into a baseball sliding position. It was a glorious save, lol. My leg was a cut up bloody mess, but the gear was all in tact. A man leading a photo workshop ran over and said that was the most impressive equipment save he had ever seen, lol;

PXLated said:

Jenn - I've actually had a couple locations where spinning steel wool might have made for a dramatic background behind a structure but was afraid I'd catch something on fire. Could just see the headlines - Idiot photographer catches 10,000 acres of native prairrie grass on fire. :-)

I genuinely appreciate your restraint. What some have done on with fire, or in general forgone the "leave no trace" mentality, in wilderness or national parks, boils my blood, like the guy who set the fires under Delicate Arch for a photo or when Dean Potter wore grooves into the top of the arch for a video shoot of him climbing it.

Nomad

About the only thing I leave behind is three dimples in the ground from the tripod otherwise you wouldn't know I'd been there :-)