Lessons
Chapter 1 Introduction
01:26 2Why Just One On-Camera Flash
04:22 35 Reasons to Use Flash
10:37 4Common Flash Myths
06:51 5What Makes Flash Challenging?
04:56 6Chapter 2 Introduction
01:36 7Flash-Strobe vs. Ambient-Constant Light
08:19 8Flash vs. Ambient Light Exposure
03:07Flash vs. Ambient Demo
06:42 10Flash and Ambient Balancing for Natural Effect
07:11 11Flash and Ambient Balancing for Dramatic Effect
04:19 12Flash and Ambient Balancing for Creative Effect
07:10 13Understanding Flash Duration
08:37 14Chapter 3 Introduction
01:34 155 Common Key Light Patterns
08:38 165 Common Key Light Patterns w/ Diffusion & Fill
07:42 175 Common Secondary Light Patterns
08:28 183 Primary Subject Patterns
05:27 19Light Qualities
09:56 20The Inverse Square Law
07:50 21Inverse Square Law in Practice
08:21 22Corrective White Balance
10:02 23Creative White Balance
05:47 24Chapter 4 Introduction
01:58 25On Board vs. Hot Shoe Flash
05:57 26Full Feature vs. Manual Flashes
08:59 27TTL vs. Manual Control
08:12 28TTL vs. Manual Recycle Times
04:43 29Flash Power & Zoom
09:18 30HHS vs. ND Filters
12:29 31FCS vs. RCS
07:11 32Chapter 5 Introduction
01:38 334 Tips When You Must Use Direct Flash
06:00 34Bare Bulbing Done Right
11:42 35Grid Snoot + Direct Flash
06:43 36Mini Beauty + Direct Flash
06:08 37Ring + Direct Flash
07:52 38Understanding Modifiers
09:24 39Direct Flash + Shutter Flash
09:07 40Chapter 6 Introduction
01:55 41Ambient vs. Direct Flash vs. Bounce Flash
14:27 42Silver Bounce
14:27 43More Light Silver
11:02 44Soft White Bounce
15:41 45Overhead Bounce
11:39 46Overhead Bounce + Fill
09:42 47Event Bounce
12:42 48Chapter 7 Introduction
01:38 49Natural vs. Dramatic Light
17:43 50Filling and Refining Existing Light
08:44 51Coloring Light for Corrective Effect
13:33 52Coloring Light for Creative Effect
10:27 53Chapter 8 Introduction
00:43 54Case Study 1 - Dramatic Sunset
09:45 55Case Study 2 - Desert Sunset
10:04 56Case Study 3 - Sinister Headshot
09:40 57Case Study 4 - Family Portrait
08:21 58Case Study 5 - Athlete Portraits
11:19 59Case Study 6 - Working Angles
07:22 60Case Study 7 - Drag + Composite
08:09 61Case Study 8 - Less is More
07:16 62The Good Karma Jar
01:41 63Favorite Feature Flashes
05:52 64Favorite Manual Flashes
21:35 65Favorite On Camera Flash Modifiers
21:21Lesson Info
Grid Snoot + Direct Flash
All right, let's, start to modify our direct flash and starting with a grid or a snoot. Either way, both he's going to do very similar things now for this shot because we're not having a throw. The flash long distances were only working, like, say, ten to fifteen feet away from our subject. Grid is totally fine. But it's not going to do something very similar. Now, what is this effect going to do? Well, in the last video, I briefly mentioned that you can use your zoom that kind of control, whether you want the light to go pin lit on the scene and kind of have a little bit of yet around the edges versus whether you want to shoot a little wider and have kind of even edge to edge light inside the frame, we shot even edge to edge light inside the frame. But if I want that been yet, look, another thing that I could do to take that zoom kind of a step further if I was in the one o five. And still I want more of that kind of pin lit. Look, I want maura that vignette mohr, that extreme kind of...
where the light's hitting, where the shadows are, I would add a grid. For these pretty girl shots, I think we're using the fellow grids, although if you're using a magnet and whatever you've got, you're going to get virtually the same thing, okay? Rumor that the tighter the weave on the grid so this is a quarter grid, the tighter the weave on the grid, the mohr light is going to come a lot to disperse and the tighter did I say the tighter the tighter, the weak, the more funneled it's going to be and in the wider the weave, the more it's going to kind of dispersed. So this is a one quarter this is a one eighth grade. You can kind of see the difference between these. All right? So just trying out these air really inexpensive guys and again, if you're getting gels, grids, all that kind of stuff, all the light modifiers, I just recommend going the magma kit because it's very elegant of a design, it worked extremely well, and it gives you everything on one so you can see the difference between these two shots. Look, the bearable shot we have edge to edge, kind of even lighting look at the grid shot where we have a lot of drama and a lot of punch to it because we've left certain areas of the frame basically blacked out, so we're highlighting her face in this particular shot so grids and snoops are going to control the lice bill, and this is important remember not only for on camera usage when we're just doing direct flash or balance flash, because we can control where that light's going with the bounce it's also important when you're doing off camera flash, which we're going to get to in lighting to one so let's, go ahead and show you our actual gear list and camera set up. Now remember, in all these different gear lists, we give you several different items budget versions, favorite virgins and so forth you don't need the entire list, watch the video and see exactly what we're using and decide from there don't go in, just buy everything because you'll have duplicates of a lot of stuff. We're just trying to give you different options. So for these, I think we used the bellow and all we would do is with the, uh, with the brackets still attached, I'm just gonna apply this grid right over the flash, and so this is how it would be applied. Okay, so I just have the velcro along the sides of this, and this is the camera set up for these shots remember, I still want to keep the flash coming from above the cameras, I still want to use the bracket. So brackett still needs to be in place that's tip number one tip number two tighter the grid we already talked about that the tighter the spread of light number three is if you do need to go throw it long distances or you want to have more pinned accuracy you can use a snoot but we didn't bother because we don't really need to in this shot number four is we can place the light exactly on what we want a feature for each shot so what I would be doing is basically as I'm shooting with my portrait aspect ratio, I kind of just have one hand up at the top and all I'm doing is I'm adjusting where my life is kind of hitting in each shot okay, so you can kind of adjust and play around and you get different effects with each one so let me just show you our camera settings and what kind of effect that we're talking about so in this top shot basically I have pinned her head all way through to her shirt okay, so we have kind of a feature on her on her face that her expression and we also get her shirt but on some of the other shots I've pinned certain things differently particularly if you look at the one right below it I threw the light up even higher now what this does is it brings folks it's strictly her expression we get just kind of this for a celebrity headshot this would be absolutely perfect that's all we really care about the clothing and everything else plays a really kind of backside role to her and her face and her expression so it hasn't absolutely fantastic for them. I love that look. This is again kind of mohr kind of towards the think this is more towards the clothing, actually with a little bit of the face in the oven yet and again, this is more appropriate for, say, a fashion catalogue or fashion type look book where you want to bring more attention to the clothes versus the model wearing the clothes. So, depending on what we pin, we can adjust and draw the viewer's attention into the most important area of that image I like this looks so much. I thought I had a really edgy vibe, so I had her look in the camera give me a kind of stare and put the camera a little bit. We have this kind of foreground shot with her, her finger in the front and then her look in the back. I thought it looked really cool too, so again we can see all the vignette ing effects toward the back we can see it around the edges depending on what we pin, it has a fantastic look for the camera setting for all these, it remained virtually the same, so we're still on our eighty five mill where one, two hundred of a second after two so two hundred and we're using that flash cable some shooting tl via that velo e t t l cable again with these types of shots direct flash because I'm moving in and out so much with this type of a shot there's not really a point to using manual because my t t l is gonna do a perfect job of getting the exposure because they're very simple type of shot there's, nothing crazy about the composition, there's, nothing crazy about the types of modifier that we're using, so the camera can give me consistent results with tl, and if it can give you consistency, then by all means, use it. If you want to use manual in practice, by all means, use that too, but for these pretty good shots, we just left it in teo, the processing again is very simple, very light. Once again, we're just brightening up. We're making me a little bit on the warm side. We're leaving the highlights and the contrast and so forth instead of later, you do the same thing if you don't want taking the photo shop, you might fix some of the harder edges, like if your model is getting a little sweaty, or, if there's a little oil on her skin, it will appear because this is a very speculative light. Remember, so those are things that you might want to retouch any skin re touches and so forth you would do in a photo shop. But this just has a little bit of tiny basic, like impressing that's it for this video. Hopefully, you kind of dig the results in the differences between just unbearable versus a gritted bearable. But how much more dramatic this khun? Get your images with the same direct flash it's, with a tiny bit of modification.
Class Materials
Bonus Materials with Purchase
Ratings and Reviews
Sid
The best class for understanding light and lighting there is bar none. Pye is an excellent teacher and the quality of the material provides for a rich and very informative experience. Pye breaks down the fundamentals in easy to digest packets and then elaborates as needed. If there is one class that you watch this is it! Worth purchasing and saving for future use. I would also HIGHLY recommend downloading the saving the PDF of slides that accompany the videos. Again, and can't say it enough, this is THE BEST video to lighting on Creative Live. A must watch for the novice and the expert.
Petra
Great course, I highly recommend it if you want to become a more confident flash user. Pye is a wonderful instructor and just such a nice guy, it's a pleasure to listen to him
Simon Metselaar
This is the best thing that happened to me since I've been into photography. What a lifesaver. Unfortunately I already payed for some courses that are not Pye, but Pye just nails it. Amazing, and kind of a life hack. Thanks again :)