Lessons
Class Introduction
09:19 2Language and Properties Of Light
07:59 3Position Of Light
04:43 4Terminology
03:10 5Science Of Light
16:47 6Dynamic Range
05:49 7Golden Hour
00:47 8Reflectors
01:22TTL Metering
10:47 10Studio Equipment
07:46 11Softbox vs. Umbrellas
02:17 12Intro To Flash Photography
12:41 13Color Balance
02:29 14Dragging the Shutter and High Speed Sync
05:22 15Light Metering
07:53 16Studio Strobe Science
05:30 17Three Light Setup
05:40 18Low of Reflection
03:18 19Understanding Histograms Part 1
04:42Lesson Info
Studio Equipment
first, let's start by talking about soft boxes and how they work and we'll talk about a couple of different kinds of soft boxes. Remember, we have, um, working with light. We're working with the direction of light and so doesn't matter which modifier you have. You can move that around to change the direction. But they were also talking about effective size and the shape. Remember yesterday when we shined that light on the wall here and we dialed it in and out? You can see how the shape of the light actually affected the speculate highlights and how the shadows and everything were affected. And that's why there are different shapes and sizes of almost every modifier available. So we're gonna talk about which ones do what. So this guy right here, this is Humira Soft box, this soft box, by the way. So it's a Shamir Softworks and the difference between this soft box and this soft box so they're very similar in size to take a very similar in size. The difference is this soft box here is mad...
e to work with a hot light, and so this light gets very, very hot oven hot. So hundreds of degrees. And, um, you can't use a normal soft box on there because it would melt or catch on fire. Burn your studio down. That's not good. And so this is made for high heat. And actually, you can't even close the back on this when you're using it with this, because it won't stand that kind of heat. So this is a high heat soft box, and it's other than that. It's very similar. All soft boxes have walls to them, and then they also have this front diffusion panel, and this one only has a single diffusion panel, and most soft boxes actually have more than one diffusion panel. So we're gonna go in and look at that. The other thing that you'll notice on this and even on this guy right here is the Velcro that holds these panels on. So if I open this up, you'll see that there's a diffusion panel inside, and then there's a diffusion panel on the outside. These could be removed, so if you want something that's a little softer, you can put in both panels. If you want to make that harder, you can take this panel out and that will give you a little less diffused light. And then the other thing I notice is this Velcro that holds this on. You know why that is? It's a very, very wide panel. And so what you can do with many, many soft boxes. Once you get this on there, there's enough room in there to actually Velcro in a grid. So what that allows you to do? And here we have a soft box with a grid. And I think this is a 20 same exact soft box. This is the same exact soft box, but this has the grid that's velcroed in. And so what this will do is this will restrict the light. And so you have very nice, soft, diffused light, but it's directional, and this is going to have very nice, soft, diffuse light, but much less directional. So with the soft wax like this, you have a lot of options. You can have both diffusion panels into have very diffused light. That's gonna help you with the speculum highlights. To soften those out, you can take a panel out to get a little bit harder light. Then you can put in a grid. So you have soft and directional light. So we're gonna start shining these on the background so you can see that. But that's how soft boxes work. And these soft boxes are common not only for the small ones, but let's get this four by six. Out here. Let's say you're working with the full length shot you want. Nice, soft light. Here we go. Here's another soft box. This is actually my go to soft box. Yep. And maybe you hold this right here next to me so I don't have to hide behind this giant sandbox. This guy right here is a soft box that I use probably in 80% of all of my photos. All right, so we have those two things. The other thing I want to show you is the difference on this studio Strobe. Compared to do we have a d one where that d one go. Um, just pull out any of this. The other difference with a speed light and a studio ST like this. Most studio strobes, the light actually comes out. And so this guy right here has a globe on it. And so when you put it in a soft box. That light isn't just gonna go forward. It's gonna go in 300. It's gonna come out all the way. It's gonna fill that soft box corner to corner very, very evenly and consistently as opposed to this guy. This is also Pro Photo Head and see how that doesn't have something that comes out. And so this has a really wide angle of coverage. Thank you, Like angle of, you know, angle of coverage. Eso the light does come out pretty radically, but you still don't get the same. Even consistent light is if you had something that actually retreated into this off. All right, so what I want to do, we also have some other modifiers. And these are considered hard light reflectors because what they dio is, instead of diffusing the light, they create really hard speculator light. And this guy right here you can see that this the sizes air changing and the larger the size of the light, the softer that light is so you can have very directional hard, a little bit softer than this light on. And so the larger these things go, the softer the light is and you can even go to something that is very large like this, and this is considered. It's called a beauty dish. I think the technical name for this is soft light reflector, but every calls it a beauty dish. You see, that's even larger. And so what you're getting there is your getting this very directional soft light that can wrap around your subject, and it is not quite as large as the soft box you can see. It's about half that size, but this will give you this look, that is pretty amazing. So we'll be shooting with this today and tomorrow we'll start looking at this. This also has a very broadly just sort of goes everywhere because of this white, and so what you can do is you can take this guy. This is a very common thing. You could throw a grid on the front of this, and that will give you a very restricted light, so we'll keep it from spilling in places that you don't want it to spell. So you can see with all these different light modifiers, you're able to choose the shape of light that you want. Then you can also choose how directional, how controlled that light issue can really dialling exactly where you want the like to fall and how you want it to appear when it falls. And so grids give you ah, lot of different options and can give me that little bag right there. Yeah, it's going the whole bag. Give it a whole bag. Thank you. This is something that actually works with this reflector, and it's the same kind of thing. So this is going to give us a very directional light. But if you want to restrict that, you can put the little grids on the front of this. And so again we can We can confine how that light is coming out, and these I use for things like highlights on the cheeks. And so if you have this with no grid on its shining into the camera, you can put a grid on it, and all the sudden you basically blocked the light from hitting your linds. But it still hits the subject where you want it, or you can put a little pool of light, maybe a corner of a room or on a chair on a lamp. You can really dial in where the light goes and these grids come in different degrees. So we got five degrees, 10 degrees, 20 degrees, and so you can choose how that light is is being shaped, which is really cool. And last but not least, we have here Ye olde umbrella and this umbrella. The question is, why would you use a soft box instead of an umbrella? The umbrella. And we're going to show you this on this background here, if you just need soft light really fast and feel like Mary Poppins. But you just need soft light very, very fast. This is to go to modifier. It's gonna give you very soft, diffuse light. It's gonna be nice and round it's going, Teoh, wrap around your subject. It'll look great and it takes 10 seconds at most to set this thing up, and they're very affordable and they pack easily. You can throw in a bag and carrying on a flight, and so umbrellas are something that every photographer should have. No matter if you're shooting with speed lights or studio strobes. They were great
Class Materials
Bonus Materials with Purchase