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Lesson Info

Dance Floor Shooting

Group table shots big beautiful light works indoors that we got about fifteen minutes he said okay, so we want to save aboutthe last seven minutes to the s a little get going on some it slides we got here I'm thirty out of fifty okay, so this is what I kind of like to achieve this nice, beautiful light during the reception and some dyes your you have anybody do outdoor receptions when you do outdoor receptions it's very difficult to get great light because normally what typical photographers do is they bounced there, flash off the ceiling are awful wall to get that big light, but when you're outdoors you've got nothing to bounce it against we're going to bounce it against the moon and have it reflect back down there's just no way. So what I do is I just take a flash and I've put it on that umbrella stand here, right? And then I use this as my big light source and that's how I did these pictures here. So what I do is I take the bride and I take the table and I take half the people to pu...

t him on the other side so you got a table take half the people, put a mother side, put the bride and groom in there and then uh let's see, do I do the settings here? Yes put your eyes so at eight hundred. Put it at five. Six. Why five six? Because that way I can sure everybody's in focus. Okay. If I do a lower f stop, it'll be let less light in. I mean, it will be more sensitive to light, but everybody might not be in focus. So put it in five six to make sure everybody's and focus and then justice. Just your shutter speed to that background that you want. If there's a lot of ambient light in the room like it's light like this, this is a lot of light. Then you're going to have to raise your shutter speed because light's going to leak back into their sensor. Okay, so that just set it for that. Try it there and go from there. You're gonna get these beautiful table shots. Okay, outdoors. We talked about this before. Now you understand why I was at one sixth of a second? Because I was getting the background in and then taking that shot there with that. Okay, so I went over. Yes. And that shot you using it as a reflector rather than shooting through it right now. Do you choose? It was just because position if I turned it around the other way of being might, in my view oh, and so it would be she would have to hold it back like this more versus this way it's easier for her to hold does it affect the amount of light that it reflects really it's about the same you khun try it on dh it makes a subtle difference but mostly is for positioning that's the reason why I ok so and so this is how you do a cake shot, right? So what I do is I set two flashes on the side one flash with the gel in the background whatever it is so in this case I was trying to match the the theme of the wedding which was orange so I put orange gel on there to give it that orange feel to it and to sidelights and so I created very nice lighting and I put it on the table there now if you don't a lot of times if the table's not big enough what I recommend is actually not doing this method now because you could do it another method like this where I put it on to light stance uh like this and so I used the gel in the background to fire it and so how the set up was when this would see how far their part and I lit the cake like that it looked like that but now when I throw the couple in there I've got some nice light for them already I've got some backlight and I use a little front fill to fill them in on the front in this particular case here I didn't have any feel I don't think and I just using all back light and you get that cool look to it okay? So two flashes on the side you like your cake and then they're ready to cut it and everything you already set up with your lighting okay here's, how you do this is what we're going to get to know ok, so we're going to do this set up on the dance floor and this is my set up I do two flashes on the side pointing towards the dance floor in this case I have it at sixteenth power because there's a lot of ambient light in the room because usually when you shoot a reception it's going to be a lot darker than in here is that correct his assistance at the moon but let's see what I set these flashes that I know I'm probably not in camera right now but I am going to set it at sixteen power okay, so here again you get your assistant to do this and let's diss pretend this is the real thing you want to be my assistant stand in the middle of the dance floor there and I'm asking you is this pointing at you he's coming with just a touch of the other just like ok so there right in the middle of the dance floor then I've got my other one I put a yellow gel on that okay? I would like to use complementary colors a lot just if I want to give it that night that that kind of nightclub field this one I'm going to sit at that one's that sixteenth power I'm goingto prove this to quarter power because it's got a darker gel on it just going to make this a little bit brighter, ok? And I'm gonna put this over here and this one's gonna be a little bit more and then I asked my assistant is it about the same height or is it lower this probably lower much lower about now about that ok is in the middle I'm needs to spend a little bit towards me just a little bit. I'm going right there. Yeah, okay, turn it on. Yeah. Okay, so then I do some test shots I do take my transmitter and I fire it just to see that it's going off. Okay, good. Now what I do is I have another flash um what I used to do I used to have a flash on the camera yeah, thank you. I used to have a flash of my camera so I have got this backlight coming in this way and I need a little bit of fill light coming in this way, so I used to put a flashing my camera, but I'm getting old and the less stuff on my camera, I just like it. So I have said, you know what? Why don't I just make that off camera? So what you could do you could do to think some people don't even use any front light, and they just use all this backlight to come through and do it that way for me, it's safer because I'm having people face the camera and I'm doing cheese shots and stuff like that. I like a little bit of light this way, but when they're dancing, you know, you don't really need it a lot of times if you're not looking at the face and you're doing more silhouette shots and stuff like that that's really cool. So I'm going to set this flash over here, firing in the middle, okay? And I'm setting this at one sixteenth power just to fill it in. I'm making this a little bit brighter than normal because for camera and for you to see it's gonna show a little bit better and then I do a test shot, okay? Okay, I do test shots, so come on out assistant and I stand him right there for her and I just see what it's like if they were going to dance. All right, we'll wait. I got my white balance that, uh, something we're crazy. Ridiculous. I gotta change it over to, um I can change it if flash where's my flash at so I said to the little flash icon and see if I can get it I can't see your son. Let me try, son. Okay, I'm gonna try saying it it, son, because this is emma set one, two, three oh, shoot! I got two and a half seconds, okay? That's not gonna work. Okay, let me change my shutter. Dak down too. Uh, I like putting it at one twenty five. Let's put it at a one twenty five and my f stop. I usually like to do it at a low low um shutter speed, but because in hee I'm low f stop, but because there's so much ambient light I have to make a black box to simulate the reception right reception would not be this bright. You would never have a reception this bright, but I have to simulate it, so I'm making it darker. I would normally shoot a two point eight some point times two point oh, but because I need to make it a little bit darker and more contrast I'm going to try doing this at five point six o r and see what it looks like okay but I normally would shoot at two point eight but in here I'm going to try to make it darker but we'll see oops it's not going off now that's not good okay one two three okay this go off now did alright something's going on here all right let me get it toe let me get it tio preview take the preview off so I can see exactly what I'm shooting okay let's say a year um for some reason that's not going off not sure why, but we'll figure it out this is really world situation here, folks. It is the name of live television yeah that's right uh okay, maybe this is a slave mode there some good obviously lizzy let's go about here live I got to set it it uh maybe it's because this thing is encased in turning on it's going this is going off. Okay? It's going off okay great. Great for telling me I thought it wasn't going off. Yeah it's probably too high, so uh just it little bit lower house that shooting over said let's say well, sometimes I kind of like that but because I just want to use the edge of the flash sometimes it's a little bit softer but let's try right here right because that that's weird way and that's okay what what's going on there can you guys bump that up one can somebody come over there and just bump that up like two stops to lights and then try it on then we'll see because this going off it is going off noon in f six right fire oh yeah get a job thank you oh man that's why you have assistance I usually have it at eight hundred no wonder why eyes assistant gets stay the big bucks now okay that's a little bit better now it's too much light okay got it that's it some like I am putting a lot of juice on this dude it shouldn't be like that okay so ana I want so that's wait stay out there buddy ivan got it right so I want that that see how it's not dark enough now right and so I might have to go up tio may I'm trying to make a dark box and it doesn't help it that's also white back there too so it's bouncing back and making it more white so this is not the ideal situation but what I'm trying to demonstrate like okay so let's try to make it darker this is great all right here we go it's darker now that f ate okay so it's getting kind of a night field lt's loading right? So that's kind of like what we want and then I'm gonna fill this in and I pointed that up because it was way too much but I'm going point it straight down at him and now we should get what we kind of want finally it was the I s o eight hundred oh my gosh. Okay, great. Ok, now it's starting to fill in ah little bit mohr and so I do this all before the first dance takes about five minutes if you have a good assistant to tell you what s so to put it at um and then okay, so you get this kind of uh I feel you can create more contrast in light room but I think that's kind of the field that is at right so the that's how you get that light coming back through I'm wondering if I actually can you step back some um I'm wondering if we opened up that light back there more did you actually turn it back up where she left it? You ok? So wait keep that one there let's turn it up one can you turn that one up over there to and so I'm just wanting and like my taste is a little bit more light in this particular situation let's just take that purple jail off because it's not a nighttime situation so I'm not getting that contrast of light so I just wanted brighter to create that contrast did you could you pick up it up? They're just leave it there let's stay there and I'm going to take what I'm trying to do is create more of a contrast light now, okay let's just go with that, okay? And it gives you an idea of what it is and if it was a lot darker it would look awesome but now it's kind of that's a lot hotter over there. Okay, so let's do that alright? So want you guys come in and here, right? And I'm going to show you what I do before we kind of came on kind of a lot of everybody find a dance partner or whatever okay and so what I'm doing is now let's just pretend like you guys are okay now just find just like pretend that you're dancing we're just gonna talk through this. Okay? So what I do I'm on wide and I'm shooting these people right? And I'm getting them to look at the motion and I'm not looking through the camera I'm just pointing and shooting at this particular point right what's that I'm at f ate now, but I normally wouldn't be enough sometimes I like to get this backlight in behind them this way even if I right on and here's me give you something, maybe something look here, uh, itself and I'm walking around and I'm doing that type of thing, okay, so you guys ready to do it for real way music, way need tohave, jim, you're turned out, you're going to be scott robert right now, because I need to dance, too, right? Isn't that. Do you want me to dance it? Okay, so we'll practice a little bit, no fear it's already set up for you. Go for it, jim, okay, and you just look through here, I got it and keep it on wide and just walk around and start shooting. You could come up, watch up with a cord. I mean, you could come on. I got you. I got I've been watching the class like, yeah, right, okay, I'm ready. And, um, is the music ready to go? Wait, wait, wait yourself.