Class Introduction: How to Shoot with your First Flash
Lesson 1 from: FAST CLASS: How to Shoot with your First FlashMike Hagen
Class Introduction: How to Shoot with your First Flash
Lesson 1 from: FAST CLASS: How to Shoot with your First FlashMike Hagen
Lesson Info
1. Class Introduction: How to Shoot with your First Flash
Lessons
Class Introduction: How to Shoot with your First Flash
05:59 2Defining Flash Photography
09:08 3Camera Setup: Metering
03:48 4Camera Setup: Exposure Mode
04:27 5Camera Setup: Flash Synchronization
06:26 6Camera Setup: Shutter Speed
04:46 7Camera Setup: Aperture
06:31 8Camera Setup: White Balance
09:20Lesson Info
Class Introduction: How to Shoot with your First Flash
Hey, Creativelive audience. Welcome to those in the studio. I'm happy to be here today when it was Mike Hagen, and I love flash photography, and I know that Ah, a lot of you are here today to learn flash photography. Flash photography can be hard. It can be scary, can be daunting. But I'm here to tell you it's not that bad. It's not super hard. It's not. Something is something that everyone here can learn. And so today you know, today's class is all about learning the nitty gritty. There's a lot of buttons and knobs and menus and I esos and white balances and all that good stuff today. So today is really a hands on class, and I'm going to teach the class in a way that is it kind of independent of cameras. You know, I'm a Nikon shooter, but I fully will recognize there's a lot of canon shooters out there and Fuji and Olympus, And so I want to teach the class today in a way that will help everybody learn their flash. So I will be talking about things like T T l and things like manual man...
ual flash control. I mean talking about nice, expensive flashes. I'm gonna be talking about inexpensive flashes that you can buy from Amazon for, like, 30 bucks. And I'm gonna show how all of that can be integrated together to create beautiful photographs. So you know, whether you're ah, maybe you're someone who's wanting to get better with your flash. Maybe your ah, photographing your kids and you just want to document their life. Maybe you're a grand parent and you've got grandkids grown up and you want to take great photos of them. Or maybe your ah, professional available light photographer. And you know who you are. You know, I hear people say, Hey, I'm in available light portrait photographer. Well, what that is, really is that's code word for I'm kind of afraid of my flash. And I don't always get consistent results. And so I want to show you if you're inspiring pro or if you just want to take your photography in the next level, I want to show you how to use that flash so it can be so get reliable, good, high quality imagery wherever you are. You know, back to that fear thing. Ah, lot of us are fearful of Flash. And we bought the flash when we bought the camera. And if we took a couple of pictures and one photo came out, like, really bright, and then the next photo came out really dark, and you're like, Ooh! And then and then it didn't look that good, right? And so maybe this shine off the forehead and you showed those it didn't look all that great. And you're like, Oh, I'm just not really good at this. You put your flash away and then you didn't take it out for a long time. Uh, and so you're a little bit afraid of it this week, actually, a couple days ago is down in San Diego and I was leaving. Ah, I was running a conference at a photo festival and I was talking to one of the guys and he came up to me. He said, Hey, you know, I'm a grandfather. Ah, he was about I'm going to guess 65 or seven years old, he said. I'm photographing in the next week a big family re union, and he said, This is really important to our family. My aunt or I forget exactly who it was. But one of his relatives asked him to do a big portrait session with all of its family said, You know, there's people there who are well into their nineties, and quite literally, this is the last time I'm gonna able to photograph these people. And then we've got all these babies and we got nieces and nephews and he says, is the words right of his mouth. I am terrified. I'm gonna screw it up. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I have to document my family, says I'm terrified. I'm gonna screw it up. And so he hands me. His flashy says, Help me, Help me set this up in a way that I won't screw up this important life moments. So I recognize that photography for us is a lot more than then buttons and knobs and pixels. There's an emotional attachment, and there's a reason why we do this. And so today I want to help you solve the flash photography issue. So to that end, let me talk through what we're gonna what we're gonna cover in the class. Um oh, First of all, I just want to say, you know, What I was doing with Kim while Kim was talking is I was back here is kind of prepping for the class, and I was shooting off camera flash with the cable and we would just did that to kind of piqued the interest of those watching. We just want to show kind of where we're headed later in the day. So So this morning is all about getting started. The first segment we spent about an hour, hour and 1/2 somewhere around there, literally going thru menus and I, ISOS and flash settings and buttons. And I'm gonna show close ups of the flash and then I'll translate that to canon speak and all the other cameras and flashes out there. Hot shoe, an on camera flash. You have all heard this. People tell you you can't take a great photo of flashes on the camera. It's just impossible. Don't even try it. Don't go there. And although I subscribe to that, sometimes I want to show you that you can take great for great photos with your flash on your camera. But I must show you how how not to do it, how to do it in a way that makes your subject look good. Not like a deer in headlights. All right, we're gonna talk about off camera flash. This is where your your production values gonna really increase. And although you can't shoot on camera, I'm going to really be pushing you towards the off camera flash photography. It's not as hard as at 1st may seem. And I'm sure you all kinds of really cool gear to do that. Something some very simple ways to do off camera flash all the way up to the very complicated way. And hopefully I'll simplify it. Also, you can just kind of pick your technology that you want to use. I'm gonna grab Uh, let me just pull this up here. I'm gonna show you guys how to use soft boxes and Octa boxes and umbrellas and big old light stands. But while still using your little Nikon or Canon speed light, it's amazing. You can use this three foot, you know, soft box, and it will look nice. Look, look like you're using the big old studio strokes. There's some limitations to that. I'll talk through those, but really, this afternoon in the fourth segment, that's where way really get very creative.
Class Materials
Bonus Materials with Purchase
Ratings and Reviews
a Creativelive Student
Great fast-class! Mike Hagen got straight to the point and made it super easy to understand!
user-182390
Great course very informative and so easy to understand.
Craig
The class covers exactly what you would expect. Very good basic information about how to set-up and operate a flash on any camera. Mike was extremely personable and communicated very well.