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This web article was first posted in April ‘06 on the DWF, as a tongue-in-cheek reaction - or sarcastic response then, if you will - against the numerous articles and seminars where we photographers are urged to just look for the light.

What triggered me to write this article in the first place, was that there seems to be a trend where use of flash is disdained in favour of only using available light.
As if it is always that simple.

(This article was also published in the Sept ‘06 issue of Rangefinder magazine.)

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Finding the light …

I’ve been so inspired recently by the various photographers at seminars and magazine articles, telling everyone to just look for the light and to find the light.

So many photographers just use available light, and make the rest of us who aren’t blessed with perfect light like they have in la-la-land, feel so inadequate. It is our failing as photographers if we can’t find the light and use it properly.

I felt I had to rise up to this and push myself as a photographer, and just look for the light.  It is there to be found!  Inspired like that, I approached this very colourful Hindu ceremony (April 2006), with a fresh mindset …

The temple itself is beautiful and imposing from the outside, in a blocky New Jersey kinda way.

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The late afternoon light was incredibly harsh, and I knew I had to do something here so that my portraits wouldn’t look like the few candids I had to shoot outside in the sun. So for the portraits, I moved the bride (and others) into the open shade between the pillars in the front. The strong vertical lines behind them helped to make the simple portraits more striking.

Speaking of striking - isn’t she an incredibly beautiful bride?

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Well, I was happy at this point. I was able to get lovely portraits using the light and the setting … but walking inside of the room where the guests were going to dance, my heart sank.

The ceiling was high, with only fluorescent lights, which meant the light was top-heavy and dim.

Light levels were low - 1/60th @ f2.8 @ 1600 iso.
Hmmm .. just not enough to stop action. And the client wouldn’t be too happy with hundreds of impressionistic colour smears for photographs.

But .. I just had to look for the light.
Nevermind that this is a dimly-lit New Jersey room, and not a brightly lit la-la-land venue.

This would be MY failing for not looking for the light,
and finding the light,
and finally .. getting to USE the light.

I scoured the place … and .. sure enough .. there it was .. light!

But .. was it available light?
I looked around .. and sure .. no one else was using it.
It was available! I could use the light!
I saw it and found it, and now I could use it!

And boy! Am I impressed! Just look at the light! Look at the colours pop!
People were dancing around me, and I could stop the action if I chose to, and have faces recognisable. The bride would be able to recognize herself and her friends and family.

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So, a genuine thank you to everyone here who inspired me so to rise above my own inadequacies as a photographer, and just frikkin LOOK for the light.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Neil van Niekerk

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technical info:

The additional strobes that I put up in the corners of the room, were Quantum T2 strobes. They were powered by Quantum 2×2 batteries, and triggered by Quantum 4i radio slaves. The stands are Red-Wing stands. These strobes were run in manual mode, and at 2/3rd stops down from full output, to ensure consistency in exposures in faster sequences of shots.

I also used an on-camera flash which was turned around and slightly bent backwards, with a Stofen with the top cut open. This meant that most of the light from my on-camera strobe was thrown upwards and slightly back .. but because of the Stofen, enough light spilled forward, to ensure there were no raccoon eyes, and that the lighting was as even as I could make it under the circumstances.

Exposure info .. all shots at 1/125th, and 800 iso.
The aperture varied between f4 and f5.0
I diallied the flash exposure compensation down in certain areas of the room.
The on-camera flash exposure was varied from +0.3 to -1.0 EV.
The on-camera strobe was in TTL mode.

A constant debate that I see online is whether a specific piece of equipment is justifiable.  And whether it is justifiable in terms of a business decision.  The discussion typically centers around something like the eternal, “What will the 85mm f1.2 give me that the 85mm f1.8 won’t? And is it worth $1000 more?”

But I feel that in phrasing the question like that, the real effects that equipment choice have on our style are disregarded. I firmly believe that:

Style should always be evolving, borne from our choices and not from our limitations.

And those limitations are quite often our equipment choice.  Indeed, f1.2 vs f1.8

So does it bring more business?  That I can’t say - but I do know that using the very very best equipment does affect how I shoot, and does affect my results.  It also directly affects my confidence during a shoot - and therefore during client meetings. I know I can pull it off,  no matter what is thrown at me during a shoot. I have the skills and the equipment.

So let me back that up with an image from a wedding this past Saturday:

… taken with the Canon 1D mk3 and the Canon 35mm f1.4

Yes, I could’ve gotten that moment with the mk2N and the 24-105mm f4 .. but it would’ve looked vastly different.

Using the fast optic and a camera that has a very usable high iso, I was able to change the way I use flash from before. I am now able to snoot my flashgun with black material and very carefully choose where I bounce my flash from. (I also gelled my flash for a Tungsten WB.)  With the mk3 I’m now able to integrate the way I use flash more subtly with the available light than ever before.

And in these choices, I was able to bring out an image that looks different than it would’ve with other equipment. I like this result much more than what I would’ve been able to get with equipment of lesser spec.

So the choice between the 50mm f1.4 and the 50mm f1.2  appears incremental when seen on paper.   (It’s a huge $1000 jump though.)  Similarly, the difference between the mk2N image quality, and the 5D image quality is incremental. And again, the difference in image quality between the 5D and the mk3 image quality is incremental.

Now add all those small increments up … and you will find the equipment now allows you to achieve results you weren’t able to before.

I know for a fact, and I can see it in the past three weekends that I have been using the Canon 1D mk3, that this camera is changing the way I shoot, and changing the way I use light. Incremental changes, but they are proving to have a profound impact.

The question remains however - does it bring more business? I don’t know if there is a direct correlation. In a sense the question becomes a trivial one for me … because right now, I am doing work I absolutely love, at a level I would never have dreamed of a few years ago. And if using the very best equipment adds to that enjoyment - well, I only have this one life to live.  It would be a sad waste in a way to have frittered it away in worries about f1.2 vs f1.8 and omygawd, it’s so much money!  Just give me the f1.2 already and let me see how much I can push myself in this endeavour.

This leads me to another point.  Right now, with an arsenal of f1.2 and f1.4 optics (and all the f2.8 zooms) at my side, the only limitations in my photography are my own.  I certainly can not blame my equipment … (ok ok .. aside from the error 99’s and backfocusing and the usual litany of Canon hiccups) … seriously, I can not blame my equipment and say that, “If only I had *that* lens, I could’ve pulled the shots out of the hat.”

Right now, my limitations are my own. And that is a challenging boundary to be at.

How is that for a business decision?

I want to explain a bit more about how I use fill-flash, by using a specific example - and compare the results with and without fill-flash.

The image above is of clients of mine (Erik & Carla) whose engagement shoot took place in Vegas earlier this year.  This part of the shoot took place outside The Venetian. I bounced the flash into that open ceiling of the Venetian, and half behind me into the walls. And anyone who has been there, knows how large a space it is … but enough light bounces back from the walls and ceiling to lift the shadows and reduce the contrast.

The image as shown above, had some post-processing done to it.
Specifically, I ran the Prettyizer and Rusty Cage actions by the Boutwells.
(Highly recommended, btw)

But here on the left is the image as it comes out of Canon’s DPP (which follows the camera settings for image quality), with only a minor WB correction done to it, and exposure pulled down -0.3 stops in raw processing.
On the right is an image taken shortly after where I tripped the shutter before the flash had enough time to recycle. ie, no flash. Exposure at 0EV, and the same WB correction as the left-hand image.

And just to show what the flash does to the detail in the faces.
(And yes, they did give me permission to use the image here.)

For me, the difference is huge. The left hand image is flattering, there is detail, but the mood is retained. And it certainly does NOT look like flash.

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And NO, I did not modify the flash. A flash modifier would’ve thrown too much light forward and made it look like flash was used. Which quite often is ugly. (If only I could convince the world that using a flash modiefier is more often a bad idea than a good one.)

Re my specific settings … the shutter speed was 1/250th - maximum flash sync speed for this camera.

And this setting was chosen deliberately. There is something very sweet happening at max flash sync speed - and too many photographers aren’t aware of it. I touch on some of it in this blog posting - but if it doesn’t quite make sense why, let me elaborate:

Let’s say your background that is brightly light is at 1/60th @ f11 .. and you’re trying to push enough light from your strobe to light your subject which is in ’shade’. Now your strobe would have a really hard time trying to push out f11 if you’re bouncing it off the ceiling or wall in a large room.

BUT .. that same exposure setting, also translates to ..
1/125th @ f8 … and now your flash has a slightly better chance.
1/250th @ f5.6 … and now we’re getting into the realm of bouncable flash.

We could extend this to 1/500th @ f4 … but we’d have to go into high-speed sync mode.  And as soon as you do that, you lose more than half your flash’s range. 

You can double check this by watching what your strobe’s range indicator does as soon as you go 1/3rd stop over your max sync speed. For this, you would need to take your flash out of bounce position.
(5D users have a slightly different experience here wrt when high-speed flash sync kicks in.)

btw … I am explaining this as if your camera has a max sync speed of 1/250th. Of course it differs for different cameras, but the same thought process remains.

So we’re looking at 1/250th (or whatever your max flash sync speed is), offering us the widest possible aperture, at the most range / output we can get from our strobe. Less than max sync speed, and we’re making our strobe work harder than it probably needs to because we are using a smaller f-stop. (We’re still thinking in terms of balancing flash with a very bright background, or in bright conditions.)

For me, 1/25oth therefore becomes an easy default when working outdoors.
I have max efficiency from my strobe (in case I need it), and at the slightly higher shutter speed, I have less chance of camera shake or subject movement to register.

And in the instance where in bright conditions (or against a bright background), we’re settling on max sync speed giving us the widest aperture we can use for the most range from our strobe, but this also has the implication that ..
 - our batteries lasting longer, and
 - our flashgun recycles faster, and this in turn
 - we have more consistent exposures when shooting faster.