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Shoot: Snoots and Gels

Lesson 13 from: Speedlight Photography Basics

Mike Fulton

Shoot: Snoots and Gels

Lesson 13 from: Speedlight Photography Basics

Mike Fulton

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Lesson Info

13. Shoot: Snoots and Gels

Lesson Info

Shoot: Snoots and Gels

Let's kind of just do some really quick testing and I'll show you some of the different the ways the things look with him without so you can kind of make up your own mind and so let me get this little prepared we're gonna have macy come up here in a second we're going to optical we're not going to do any linus I mean all out of sight we're not gonna do any radio poppers at this point I can make sure you seat that correctly or it's not gonna work so those are the foundation items that I use I can't really think of anything else that I've used over the last ten years probably besides these companies and the and the two the two lou request has been my foundation for my entire business for the most part and they're one of the first ones to come out and and then recently I'm really, really, really like in the magma it'sjust the magnet one it's really nice and bits and pieces of the other ones for sure uh and then like so the denny's easy soft blocks when um when I need it in certain circums...

tances all right again creative live peeps put my flash on slave I'll get mine going here in a second this is not going to be creative photos this is going to be more of a scientific photos so please don't judge on the quality all right, macy, come on out, please. All right, so I'm going to set this flash to master and it's gonna be on channel one and I'm gonna actually set it to where it's on ly transmitting what we talked about yesterday because I want the on ly light to be this light here coming coming out since I'm doing optical, we know it's enslave because it's blinking at me we'll turn this to her. I'm gonna pull it out a little little bit. Make sure what you can also do when you get ready for this. Guys is just kind of give us it give it a test if I turn on my camera because I'm a professional yep. Uh, so this is bare bulb just straight. We're actually almost flat light because I just want you to see the difference. Perfect. Can we switch over? I'm sorry. There we go. Thank you. That is straight. Bare bulb bear flash my settings as you can see simple one twenty fifth, three, five turned down. Now we're going to put this bounce on from lim quest to put the band on. Sorry. I feel like I haven't ever taught this course before, so when I go into a wedding, this is one of the things that I just keep on I literally just had this on all my flashes about extra bands and that's literally what I do so I don't have to do exactly what I just didn't have to stop lower. It will be about the same height a little bit. There we go. Do you shoot it? I s fifty a lot in here, it's just gotten adjusted, so I usually try to keep it right around one hundred two hundred. But again, as I mentioned yesterday, don't remember but has gotten so good, that is kind of the lost thought process. And I know that's not probably the professional thing to say, but it's the honest thing to say that I will put it on sixteen hundred with I'm in a dark church and I'll realise as the sunset that I shot the rest of the outdoor pictures on sixteen hundred and your wonder, am I having a hard you know, because I just didn't comprehend why was having such a hard time with my light that because I had it on sixteen hundred like an idiot, right? So, yeah, yes, I don't think we've talked before about white balance settings. Yeah, way real briefly, but I'm glad you brought it up is a general, since this is flash. If you want to use an automatic white balance setting a use flash, I mean that's logical if you want to do the kelvin, what I always do is anywhere between fifty, two hundred fifty, eight hundred generally what I try to do again, I want to try to be on all the time, but if I'm especially shooting down what we are, we have a lot of hispanics, and again, we talked about the yellow scan. If I'm going to be off, I want to be awful cold side, just a tad. So, depending on what I'm photographing that's, when I really will go into the calvin, maybe and make it a little colder, my images and this is something to kind of get tricky, that I want people to be aware, because it doesn't matter your candid, and I kind of seen it across the board don't trust your lcd on the back of your camera, trust whatever's in your with what's in your computer when you put your image is in there because some of these lcds are absolutely horrible, they'll be extremely warm or extremely cold and that's, not how the actual image represents when you, you capture it, because I remember in the old days, I bought it when the forty b was brand new from canada bought one, and it was everybody look like there were vampires they were just pure blue white and I mean I was sitting in a warm kelvin and it was just horrible and then you put in the computer and everybody the first images look norman the last ones looked like noble loompas because they were so brown and warm so don't trust the bacterial cd and just find a happy medium in what I do is do some tests figure out what is a good good actual white balance for each venue that you shoot because when I shoot sports again I mentioned yesterday bob levy he's the one who told me I have a white balance for every of sports stadium that I shoot and I've never even comprehend that the way the light's fall off the green chairs of the blue chairs just like jails like we talked about pain in your room it works the same way in the spa kevin you and it got me thinking that I needed to have a white balance for every venue that I photograph in and so all my main venues I have notes and I know exactly what kelvin I need to shoot it in that room using custom yeah outside like today when we go outside I'll probably just use flash it'll be on flash, which right now on automatic but generally I'm own flash outside if I'm in my studio I usually use anywhere between like seven, two hundred fifty eight hundred or or flash I want flashes a little colder and that's that's why I kind of tend to like the flash more than anything all right notice no hot spots on her face I don't know if you could go back to the one before but you'll see some hot spots in the t zone right here all that that's that's all you really really need from basic defusing is just taking away that hot spot that direct bam on their face and the work now you gotta remember she has makeup on too you get a guy at a wedding event it's not gonna have any makeup that t zone is really going to shine t zone across the forehead down the nose it's really going to shine so something like this tremendously helps and I know that doesn't seem like a lot but it's huge when it comes to just simple basic flash photography and that is about as easy as it gets that's why I like this product so much all right so let's go to another one oh, you get a question yes sir. I'm sorry would you turn the flash up more vertical and take another shot? I can'tjust too so the effective that angle so you won the flash higher and virgil, I want you to turn the angle of the bounce flash okay up this way yes, okay good bye here and then you want me to raise the flash up the power or just the same divert power just say okay actually I think I raised too much because I raised it up when you set up so it's gonna be brighter but not bad still no riel huge hot spot on her face so the effect of I have found the effect of making that angle change can be huge absolutely right and that's why you have when we talked about the little the little meeting that you can see on their absolutely huge and so you need to realize even like we talked about when you drop it down a little bit of raising it will make a huge difference you can get away with it more here because it is bouncing and spread it out more this is much more effective than the little white card bounce it comes in your flash quite honestly I know it's there and I'll use it if that's the only thing I have but the reality is I never really use it I mean it's a nice concept I have and it's a great backup but I think it's good that it's in the flash but to me this is this is my go to my go to guy plain and simple because again it's just simplistic it's just there's nothing there's no riel thought process to it so now let's use what we have the loom request on we'll go ahead and do the soft blocks with him without well take a shot again without then I'll just pointed right at her perfect makes you're doing great nice big shadow in the background nice bright t zone and you could see it just doesn't look it's soft just there's something weird to it because you know her skin is almost flawless it's very nice and it doesn't look nice on the image with that direct harsh flash not changing it that good you happy with that art I'm messing with you man yeah much softer and you notice the white balance it's a nice even tone across her face it I know it's just not huge differences but even look at the shadow behind her you can see the huge harsh line direct and even the shadow is softer that is light diffusion that's simple, simple basic light diffusion which is why I wanted her so close the backdrop I wanted you to see that shadow because if it's diffusing it there you pull her away and there's no shadow your lighter properly everything else it's going to help it's going to help soften that life on their face just a little all right we're gonna go through the mag mod now I actually take this off so bear with me every question's why I'm doing this nothing I love that we do mike why don't you do it and ask sorry we cleared it out yeah so this's from photo wanderer what difference is there with snoops that have a white interior compared to a black it's a great question um perp example and I know it's kind of off topic but it worked perfect I have a brand new photo booth that I designed it's an inflatable photo booth direction really cool you willow push it into the photo booth enclosure you blow it up plug it in it blows up like a bouncy house but you walk in on the outside is all white and have led lights on the inside of it and I haven't a wife I hooked up and I can control the wifi of the melodies from a wifi my iphone or have a little speaker that controls from the beat of music well the first one I got had black walls on the inside because I thought it would be great I don't want to see the leads come through and it's a constant light photo booth it was like a cave when you walked in I had to put so much light in there to light it up because those dark wall just absorbed it the next one I gotta put white walls and that one little light inside just bouncing all around and it was beautiful light on the inside of the same thing with the snoot on the white light we're gonna have a lot more like it's not gonna be absorbed its goingto little produce more light because that whiteness I know it sounds a little funny but you'd want the white or the silver just like a reflector you have white silver gold I don't you gold everywhere I live because again we have a lot of hispanics that have yellow stan and I don't want to add that yellow just like we talked about whether your silver white add more the white color if whatever you're bouncing light into is going to affect that amount of light for sure great thank you let me get this set up on wireless change the chantel sorry all right so this is the new six hundred and I'm gonna use it as a slave to the five eighty two make sure that it's working first yes sir there's no diffusion yeah, I know we're going to use a blank first and then I'm gonna put the diffuser on so I want to make sure this is working yep firing it's always good to do that so you don't look like an idiot in front of people I see the thousands that are watching me which I probably have already made myself look like an idiot so I shouldn't worry about that straight flash no diffusion and I don't remember taking that photo so sorry so straight flash now we're gonna put on on this day they're simple so this will soften the light up some just a little honey comb soften it up and I want you to see this is more like a snoot see what it does still a lot of no it's a lot of like this is like a snoot this is not this is this is tightening down the line. This is not a soft box. This is like that snoop product that we showed you so this is this is once new disco it's gonna really you see how you don't see anything on the edges that's what this product does now the neat thing about this because I can add another we're like a spotlight absolutely we can definitely do it, which is what it does. So now I'm gonna do the same thing and I want I'm not gonna just any power and this should be really bright and really defined I didn't just anything so now you literally have almost like a spotlight effect right owner with those two and you can keep stacking them and stack it with zach tickets tighter and tighter and tighter so that's what that that does and then you can actually we wanted to if I know where I put everything sorry we can actually add jail if I remember I don't even see where it is appear well, I am a professional we'll just leave the jail that's on there but this is what this is what I like about this so that's a great snoot you know, at a jail if you want again just going to snap on and you can keep stacking on this I hope it's going to show up the way I wanted to you know, it's horrible this is not what you want to do in real life but it shows you how strong there's the oompa loompa but that shows the effect how easy it is now how would you want to use this and realize very simple? Can I have that other stand please? Perfect. Thank you. I'm gonna put the blue and I'm gonna put a neutral density filter in here so it's gonna take out some of the light, get creative all you want for just a little bit but this own slave again so now our five, eighty two's control in six hundred and another five, eighty two. And so when I found when we have brides or clients with dark hair like macy, I love love love gel in her with a cold light just can't let this way turn this way a little bit trying to change this way perfect it's a little bribe sorry, I need to lower this flash but you'll see this light over here it doesn't look real blue but it's not that real white and it's not golden it just brings out all that light over here and that's what I like this is how I used this product all the time I love the titan that band down of light and then put gel on it and really be able to give me just what the light the jail light where I want it and then you can just use the light out front like we've been doing so there's two now I can lower this life or I could move this light out here we'll take the same shot now the problem with this is what I wanted I was hoping was going to show I want to show you I pulled this light back what did it do it just spread this light everywhere so that's what I'm saying when you're outside some people we talked about earlier I put a soft box on this and I'm way out here it's not doing anything the soft box is going to help when I'm up here because by me spreading its light way back here you see see how much this light spread well that's this for me pulling it back that's where you don't need anything that's why I could shoot bear above all day long outside if I choose to because the distance to my subject is diffusing my life naturally don't make sense we thank you we covered a lot. I didn't get to show you all the examples, but this is the foundation. I showed you my limit quest. And I showed you the magma, which of the two main companies that I use all the time. And then in the cloudy days I use the soft box, um, the road, I think, is going to have some great promise with me. And again, I just started using it recently because I'm an idiot because it's been around for a while. Um but this is my favorite product. A little soft box from there by father favorite product. I like I like the jails of this because its so easy and those cones just tighten it down so quick and again, it's, indestructible. And then I like the bounce that I first showed you from lim quest the most. Because I think it's just the most simple and no brainer that anyone has it. It just takes that just that hot spot away. And if you're in a hot air like me assumes you walk outside the t zone, just start shining. And so that was a one way that I could actually get it not looking like flash, you have any questions? Do you have one from the internet party, william, answer great. Brenda k asks so when you pull out the diffuser panel on your flash zoom function is disabled, what happens when you add one of the diffusers? Do we need to set the zoom to a certain way? You won't be able to when you pull that diffuser out that's a that's a very thoughtful great question by the way, when you pull this the future out right there again it's going to go to fourteen millimetres so if I had this flash on it's going to go really, really wide you won't be able to really adjust anything, so if you can put it diffuser on it, it will diffuse but that's one reason why I don't like using this guy I don't again, I don't like I don't like it to be in control I want to be able to guess that's a guy I mean I want to be was that zoom toe what I want and so to me I'd rather just leave that in and pop on a little omni bounce that we talked about at the very beginning, a little stuffing or one of those little soft boxes and it would be defuse it for me, but you can if you want you can actually zoom in fourteen is what you wanted you want light diffusion fourteen is the widest light diffusion you're going to get built into this guy but just remember, you're not getting any more power out of that life, it just spreading it more, so you will get exactly what we just did. Here. You're gonna have a hard time controlling where that light put. And so if you're going to do a wide angle, fourteen that's, how I would suggest, using some type of diffuser more to control that light, where you want to put it. Otherwise, it just goes everywhere. The other thing is that I had the experience of not, um, not getting those on flights diffusers fully back into the slot, that show ball work, right when you, when you talk about sliding this in no, no, no, I'm talking about those little, oh, yeah, this. Yeah, it calls us just problems if you don't think it's town, but it may not be over exactly.

Class Materials

bonus material with purchase

TriCoasts Wireless Flash Challenges
Speedlight Basics 1
Speedlight Basics 2
Fill-in Canon Speedlight Diagram
Fill-In Nikon Speedlight Diagram
Syllabus and Resources

Ratings and Reviews

cmc
 

Someone should tell this nice guy, Mike that he should restrain his comments and do his homework and structure the course and sticks to it. Of 100s of pictures he took not even one was inspiring or great shot. Yes, he did say that "I am not going to make good image", why not I ask? I do believe he is not only a nice individual but knows the tech side, not sure if he can make artistic images.

Barbara 756d43
 

I am in the midst of watching this class through the videos I purchased and am very impressed by how in depth the information is. VERY happy with this purchase. I like Mike’s ability to make concepts easy to understand and also that he shows you by example what he means. As a direct result of watching this class, while visiting family yesterday I found myself looking at my grandson’s face as light was shining on him through a window and thinking to myself, “Oh, that is short lighting and when he turns his face it becomes broad lighting.” Thanks, Mike. Can’t wait to see what other gems of understanding I have in store for me in the rest of the class videos.

user-457531
 

Excellent course, especially when I learnt something within the first 5 mins of watching it. I have found Creative Live courses to be very thorough in detail and equally practical in application. 10 out of 10 Creative Live support has also been 💯 % helpful Thanks guys..

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