Two simple examples of off-camera flash (with diagrams!)

Nikon D700 + 24-70 f/2.8 | 1/320 sec at f/7.1 | ISO 200

I took the opportunity of having my long-time friend Antoine visiting me to try a few off-camera lighting set-ups.

This is the diagram for the above picture:

I am using a SB-900 as the key light, and I attached a Lightsphere Collapsible to it, with the dome on. The flash is on a light stand, about 2.5 meters up.

For the wall behind, I used a SB-800, with no particular diffuser, on a tripod about 50cm above the ground.

I should have tried the same set-up without the Lightsphere but it’s really hard to fit on the SB-900 and I didn’t want to keep putting it on and off!

Both flashes are triggered by infra-red, by the little pop-up flash on the D700. It acts as a commander only and does not light the picture. I can change the flashes levels directly on the D700, which is quite handy.

Second set-up, using the sun

Nikon D700 + 70-200 f/2.8 | 1/250 sec at f/7.1 | ISO 200

In this one, I wanted to use the sun as a rim light, and balance the flash accordingly:

As well as lighting Antoine’s right side, the sun also lights up the grass which I think looks quite nice. The overall feel of the picture is that the light is quite ‘hard’ though, and I had trouble making everything look a bit softer.

As a comparison, here is another one taken when the sun was hiding:

Nikon D700 + 70-200 f/2.8 | 1/250 sec at f/7.1 | ISO 200

No more rim light but the feel is much softer and his pose is great.

Next time I will try to have more people in the picture and maybe have a play with coloured gels… Any questions or comments please feel free to post in the comments below!

This entry was posted on Saturday, April 17th, 2010 at 12:48 and is filed under All, Photoblog, Tutorials and tagged with collapsible, flash, key light, lightsphere, off-camera, rim light, sb-800, sb-900, strobist, sun. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.