A Day Of Learning!

Tuesday morning I shot portraits of a woman who volunteers at a school answering phones for a story about volunteers, of course. I only had one Speedlite, I'm still down one strobe and I am still putting together the items for my lighting kit. I used an off-camera cord to do fun things with the light. Its a woman and a phone, I tried to be creative. I will order a softbox for the flash sometime soon hopefully. (Its in my shopping cart on bhphotovideo.com)









Next time, I need to hold the flash directly above the subject so there isn't a black triangle by the nose.

Then, John David spewed forth knowledge in the studio. Michelle's daughter "volunteered" to be the guinea pig. I learned to make a picture using a single light, then we built on that light to add a secondary light, a hair light and a background light.




The little "tail" in the bottom right of the above picture is the power cord for the background light. I need to hide it better next time.





Then me and JD went to the BayBears game but it was storming. JD grabbed a camera and some short glass and went into the stadium to make pictures of the empty stadium with lightning overhead. He clamped the camera down with a sweet variable friction arm thing (also in my shopping cart on bhphotovideo.com) and then he used a remote to motor off a hundred or so shots trying to catch the lightning. A few of the shots worked out, there was visible lighting streaking down from the sky. I learned from this that even though the game is canceled, there are still pictures to be made.

Here is his picture with the lightning and rainbow captured.
This is why he makes the big bucks:

"Lightning strikes though the sky between a rainbow above Hank Aaron Stadium as evening showers rolled across the Gulf Coast Tuesday July 7, 2009 in Mobile, Ala. The contest between the Mobile BayBears and Chattanooga Lookouts has been postponed because of rain at Hank Aaron Stadium. It’s the first rainout for the BayBears this season at home. (Press-Register/John David Mercer)"

On the way back to the office we went by a bayfront landing to make pictures of the amazing sky.





JD showed me a handy trick to shooting reflections in small puddles. 10 minutes before I shot the following picture JD had already made one in the same puddle that was better but I learned new things from it.

Here is my picture:


And here is his picture:

"Mobile Skyline after evening showers rolled across the Gulf Coast Tuesday July 7, 2009 in Mobile, Ala. (Press-Register/John David Mercer)"