Archive for March, 2010

The title of this post is the name I gave to the personal project I was working on this Spring Break. The shoot was scheduled for Friday and involved a total of 3 assistants (John, Perry, and Ron) and 3 models (Tanya Manifold, Torrie Clontz, and Aoni Ma). The shoot started at 2pm and ended at around 10pm. It was a long but fun day. The purpose of this project was to test the ability to push my gear to the absolute max. The goal was to make an image that would require more gear than I actually had. The final setup required that I made each one of my flashes act as if it were 3 separate flash guns. A challenge to say the least. For the shoot, I ended up using a 580ex and two 430ex. The shoot would be “easy” to pull off if I had another $5000 to $10000 worth of lighting equipment and other support. I’m a little crazy though so this was a nice challenge for me.

My assistant, Perry, drew up this diagram of the very first lighting setup I came up with: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/322709/Perry_Diagram.JPG You’ll notice how he drew his own face in the diagram and the nickname that I now have :p

Problems started almost immediately after we arrived on location. Pretty much everything that could go wrong, went wrong. Right off the bat, two of the models had to leave early. Originally, I had selected two locations for the shoot. The first location was the ideal but the second location gave me more control of the light. With that in mind, I made the decision to shoot at the second location first and if time allowed we would move to the first location. Before putting down the first light, I had problems finding the cables for the Pocket Wizards (PWs). Ended up spending about 5 to 8 mins searching for the stupid cable. After that, we hooked up the first light (a 580ex2), setup the laptop for tethered shooting, and started making some frames.

Proceeded to the next two “lights”. The word “lights” is in quotes because I was making the lone 580ex2 act as two separate lights. I wanted to try and simplify things by throwing in a 430ex instead of making the 580ex2 act as two lights. This meant triggering both flashes with one PW (I only have two because I’m poor). Hooked up the cables from the PW to the two flashes and gave it a test. *click* …. *click* … nothing. No blinding pops from the flashes. Checked the cables and connectors to make sure everything is plugged in tightly. Pushed the test button again *click* … *click* … *click* *CLICK* *CLICK* *CLICK* “GAH!!!” Unplugged all the cables and connectors and plugged them back in again. Turned the flashes off and on. Nothing. Turned out it was the cable connecting to the adapter that was causing the problem. That wasn’t the end of it though. While trying to plug in all the cables, the light stand fell over taking with it the flash and PW which would of been fine… except we lost the connector in the tall grass. Spent another 5 mins looking through the grass for the connector. Eventually found it and got everything hooked up properly again. The cable wasn’t long enough for the setup I wanted. Ended up throwing out the 430ex and using just the 580 acting as two lights. So much for simplicity. This all took about 30 to 45 mins and my three princesses waited patiently.

Finally got the location lit, time to light the models! I thought that would be the easiest part… hahahahahah! Oooooohhh boy was I wrong. I didn’t take into account of the light modifiers sucking the very life out of the flash guns. With the 580 and 430 at full power, I was still underexposing the models by almost a full stop (depending on where I had them positioned). As if the photo gods didn’t think that was bad enough for me, the wind decided to knock over the light stand with the 580. Killing my beloved Lastolite All-in-one umbrella, breaking its ribs and bending its arms. I grabbed the gaffer tape and performed emergency surgery on the poor thing. Luckily, I was able to save it and the show could go on. Not satisfied with what it had done, the wind decided to strike again. This time it took down my other light stand with the 430 and Westcott white satin umbrella (which was already damaged and repaired from a previous shoot), I caught it just as it was about to hit the ground. Unfortunately, the hot shoe adapter couldn’t handle the force and broke in half. Again gaffer tape was used to perform emergency surgery on the adapter.

Angered by my awesome surgery skills that saved my gear, the photo gods struck again. This time taking down my laptop and causing the camera to go trigger happy. Luckily the tank that is my Thinkpad weathered the attack without skipping a beat. I had to reset the camera and EOS Utility though. Not a big deal. Still not satisfied, the photo gods decided to attack my flash triggering system. I’m used to the triggering system failing so that didn’t phase me in the slightest.

Long story short, the rest of the shoot involved minor problems popping up like wild fires every few mins with my crew and I working frantically to put them out and continue on. Eventually, the on-location shoot had to be cut short. The two models that had to leave early were going to run late. We broke down and went off to grab some gourmet grub from this fancy food joint known as In-N-Out Burger :p

Our dinner.

After dinner, we moved to the studio to continue the shoot. Without going into much details, the shoot involved the use of a fog machine which didn’t work out quite how I expected. Not to mention we were all on the edge of food coma. With John being the only exception. He couldn’t eat with us because of Lent. Ended up calling it a day after a little over an hour of shooting. We still had a little energy to fool around and decided to take some goofy pics for our Facebook profiles

Overall, a great day. Didn’t get the image I had set out for. I always imagine an image in my mind that I could never quite get into print. It annoys the hell out of me but that’s fine. Its all part of the learning process and what makes photography so much fun. I set out to create an image with the limited equipment at my disposal. To others it was a crazy idea and that is partly true. With this experience under my belt, I now have the knowledge to pull this off next time. During the creation of this post, I told my assistants that I would spend the money I have saved up for more lighting gear in order to get this image right. I take that back now. This is a challenge and that’s what makes it fun. I will do this again when time allows. And I will do it with the limited equipment available during this shoot (although, I will definitely replace the broken gear with new equivalents). I know its possible to pull this off and that is exactly what will happen!

Expect behind the scenes, goofy pics, and the final images to be posted soon. Check back soon! And thanks again to everyone who helped. I couldn’t have pulled it off without your help.

Till next time…

John came over Friday evening and brought along his newly acquired Kenko extension tubes. Since the extension tubes are made for both EF-S and EF lenses, you can technically attach an EF-S lens to a EF only camera such as my 1Ds Mark II:

A Canon EF-S 55-250 IS attached to a Kenko extension tube attached to my 1Ds Mark II.

It’s not something you would ever use on a day to day basis. The extension tubes maintain AF and have no glass elements so image quality isn’t affected. However, you can’t really focus normally anymore. Why? They’re extension tubes… d’uh. If you don’t know what I mean, look up how extension tubes work.

I did take a picture with this setup:

Shot with the Canon 55-250 IS on my 1Ds Mark II.

Till next time…

Reflection of a CD. Taken on 2010-03-12 11.56.09 with MyTouch.

Now back to studying…

Had the chance to do a shoot with the lovely Jessica Jann. It was a fun shoot and Jessica was a pleasure to work with. And yes, she’s Janice Jann’s sister. I’ve been favoring impromptu shoots lately. Go in with no ideas and just let things flow. No assistants again and kept the lighting real simple. Unfortunately, I broke my Lastolite umbrella when it fell over from the wind… now both my umbrellas are broken -_-

Anyway, here’s the gallery: Jessica Jann

Had the pleasure of doing a shoot with Janice Jann as 1st Princess (Miss Chinatown LA 2010). The shoot was very impromptu and I didn’t have any assistance (I know, the insanity!). Kept the lighting setup as simple as possible. Didn’t have to do much, Janice would look good in any kind of lighting.

Janice Jann 03

Till next time…