Lighting Query

mugwumpjism

Good Morning All,

I am currently shooting some portraits of people in their cars at night but have some problems. Firstly I have no studio lights so have tried a CFL daylight bulb around 6400K and 125 watts (Equivalent to 450 watts), I have this inside the car and as you can imagine it is very bright on a longer exposure and throws shadows everywhere, it is nicer with a blue sheet of plastic but there are still shadows. I was thinking of a remote flash in front of the subject and the bulb in the back of the car? I want to create a stark portrait of people in their cars but have clear features defined with little shadow and some of the background (but not as important). Any ideas?
Plus any ideas where to get a cheap light meter, long synch cable for cannon 20D (3 meters) and coloured flash filters (or just coloured plastic to use over the flash, would enlarger filters do?)

Sorry for the long post

Fajitas!

If I were you, I'd be combining long exposures, with multiple flashes, and shorter ones with single flashes, getting 5 or 6 shots together for each photo.

/Will explain better when not hungover...

pete4130

You can always just shoot in a brighter lit area and stop down to cut out the bright lights and effectively underexpose the shadow areas and keep the highlighted areas. Being a confined space it can be hard to shoot.
You could improvise and create something to "snoot" the light (direct a focused beam to the face or area you want lit up) and use diffusers to have softer lighting around the car to balance it out a little.
Places like multistorey car parks usualyl have suffucient lighting to use if you were to use a tripod for the shots.

mugwumpjism

Thanks,
I think I might light the back and use a flash in the front to light my subject and reduce shadow and place a reflective surface on the ceiling of the car to avoid under eye shadow? Now I have a new problem in that I need to get an off camera set up for my 20D 420ex, anyone I talked to only have the 3 foot canon set and I need at least 9 foot distance any ideas of where or what to get?

digitalage

go wireless these are cheap off ebay,

http://www.gadgetinfinity.com/product.php?productid=16766&cat=0&page=


heres a link to the ebay site Ic got mine from they work a treat alot cheaper than PW.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Wireless-Flash-Trigger-V2s-for-Canon-580EX-430EX-420EX_W0QQitemZ170176794478QQihZ007QQcategoryZ64354QQtcZphotoQQcmdZViewItem

pete4130

Depends on budget. I use Pocket Wizard radio transmitters/receivers for off camera flash work. Other than that just long PC sync cables. the flash won't have to be TTL as you can adjust the output/aperture/ISO settings if the shots are over or underexposed until you get it right (unless you have a light meter but I haven't used my light meter for flash photography since I went digital. I rely on the LCD and histograms, not perfect but works).

mugwumpjism

Well my budget is tight as I have just forked out for a new tripod and am fairly broke but need to shoot off camera. What type of cable do I need and where do I get one that is long enough and is there a danger of shorting out my camera?. I kinda need the gear for next week so long waiting times on e bay are not an option. I'd like to go wireless too will both the mentioned units work with a 20D 420ex and where can I get them in Dublin?

Thanks for all the advice

pete4130

Best thing to do is bring your kit somewhere and show them what you have and see if they have the correct cables. I remember years ago I wanted to use flash off camera on my pentax 35mm slr. It didn't have a PC socket to plug the cable into the camera, so the easiest solution was to buy a hotshoe adapter that had the necessary socket.
Radio transmitters aren't cheap I'm afraid. You can get "slave" cells for your flashes. These sense when a flash fires and instantly fires the flash they are attached to. They are limited if there is alot of ambient light (which shouldnt affect your set up) and a line of sight is necessary unless you can succesfuly bounce one flash to set off another.
If your really stuck with a budget would you consider using regular lamps, and not worry about trying to get flashes to fire when you shoot? Once you use similar lamps with similar colour temps your white balancing shouldn't be too hard to deal with.

EDIT: look here for some more advice.... http://strobist.blogspot.com/

digitalage

You could try this techique on youtube but it would have to be really dark or personally with the limited gear you have I would shoot the subect sitting in the car at sunset with back of car facing the sunset to give background light, then get the subject to trigger the flash with one hand below dashboard so the flash is out of the shot. Aslo your limited with the canon 420ex flash unit as it has no manual flash control. Good luck!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtMQtAz250c

mugwumpjism

I ended up getting a hotshoe and a 5m cable from conns cameras only set me back €26 and will do for what I need at the moment, it means that the flash will be manual but I can alter the aperture to compensate I am thinking of having the subject outside the car and light with the flash and the other light inside the car in a dark enough setting, will post some results. Thanks again

mervifwdc

If money is tight, and given what your doing, start looking for cheap 2nd hand nikon sb24/26/28 flash units. The can operate in slave mode, and fire when they see another flash fire. No wires, no nuthin.

If you get enough of them, you can operate a number of lights firing low enough to not cause as bad a shaddow as 1 strong light.

Merv.