Posts Tagged ‘Speedlight flash’ (Page 2)

Flash gels are thin pieces of colored plastic that you can place over your flashgun, studio strobe, or any other artificial light source to modify the color of the light. (Actually they don't always have to be colored - we'll look at some neutral flash gels at the end of the article).

The reason they are known as gels is because they were originally made from gelatin. Plastic is a lot more long lasting, cheaper, and easier to use, so you're unlikely to find any flash gels still made from actual gelatin today. In this article we'll look at how you can use flash gels for balancing flash with ambient light, creative use of gels for colored lighting effects, how they can be used for reducing the light power, and creating softer lighting.

When considering setting up a home studio for photography, whether it be for portrait, product, or food photography, the most important decision is typically regarding the lighting. Should you go for continuous lighting or strobes? And if going for strobes, should you go for speedlight flashguns or studio strobes?

I've covered the differences between continuous lighting and flash in the article LED Light panel vs. Flash. So in today's article I want to look at the choice between speedlight flashguns and studio strobes. We'll look at the benefits and disadvantages of each system, to help you make the decision as to which will work best for your purposes.

Canon 600EX-RT Speedlite Flash and Elinchrom D-Lite RX 4 Studio Strobe

Low key photographs are those that are overall quite dark, often with just a small patch of light picking out the subject. Basically, it's the opposite of a high key image.

Whereas a brightly lit high key image appears bright and airy, a low key image appears dark and moody. The lack of light can be used to give a sense of foreboding or fear, or just to create a dramatic image. In this article we'll look at some tips to help you create low key images.

Highlighting a small part of a photo with flash can be used to help draw the viewer's attention to that part of the image. When this technique is combined with an overall lack of light over the rest of the image, this can create a very dramatic photo, with the highlighted area really standing out.

However, with a standard speedlight flash this technique can be difficult to achieve as the light from the flash spreads out too much, covering most of the frame. You can reduce the coverage of the flash by moving it closer to the subject, but depending on how small an area you want highlighted, this could result in the flash having to be so close that it appears in the frame.

A cheap and simple solution to this problem is a grid. A grid attaches in front of your flash, and creates a narrow, focused beam of light. This allows you to have your flash positioned further away from your subject, while highlighting just a small area with the flash. In this article we'll look particularly at how to create your own DIY grid for your speedlight flash, and how different variations affect the light.

In this article we'll look at four different lighting setups you can use to create beautiful portraits. These techniques all involve using multiple off-camera light sources. For a couple of the techniques you may be able to get away with just using natural light and a reflector, but really these setups work best if you are using controllable light sources such as speedlights or studio lights.

Rear or second curtain sync flash is a flash mode available on many (though not all) cameras. It is designed for use when you want to combine a slow shutter speed with flash. Unlike the standard flash mode, rear curtain sync flash will fire the flash at the end of the exposure, rather than the start.

In this article we'll take a in-detail look at rear curtain sync flash, looking at how the resulting image differs to standard flash, and why and when you might want to use this flash mode.

Most DSLR and mirrorless cameras have a hotshoe on top into which you can connect a speedlight flash gun. But why would you want to use a bulky speedlight flash on your camera if the camera already includes a built-in flash?

When thinking about new purchases to help capture better photos most people will probably think of filters or a new lens if they own an interchangeable lens camera. But a speedlight flash can have a great impact on your photography, and should not be overlooked.

In this article we'll look at why you would want to use a speedlight flash, what advantages it has over the pop-up flash built into most cameras, and what the disadvantages are as well.