Tog-Talk

Ep.34 Natural Light vs Flash

• Kevin Ahronson • Season 1 • Episode 34

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Discover the secrets to mastering photography lighting as we host an engaging debate between Kevin Ahronson from Hampshire School of Photography and Kelly Perrin from the Big Ambition Company.

Struggling to choose between natural light and flash? Learn how Kevin transitioned from a natural light purist - to a flash enthusiast, after a remarkable encounter with a newspaper photographer. Kelly, however, champions the beauty of natural light, even in the most challenging settings like theatres and conference halls. Their debate offers insights that are invaluable whether you're a seasoned pro or just starting your photography journey.

This episode doesn't just stop at theory; we dive into practical tips for using both natural and artificial light in various scenarios. From capturing candid moments at weddings to balancing ambient and artificial light during the first dance, Kevin and Kelly reveal their personal experiences and hacks.

Enhance your photography with advanced techniques discussed in this episode. From adjusting white balance settings and using CTO gels to elevate your sunrise and sunset portrait shots... to mastering clamshell lighting for studio portraits, Kevin and Kelly provide a treasure trove of tips.

Learn how to avoid unflattering shadows, achieve beautiful, professional-looking photos by reflecting or diffusing light.  Don’t miss out on this comprehensive guide packed with valuable insights and inspiring stories to help you take your photography to new heights.

Photography Masterclass Program: A Part-time One Year Course

The Photography Masterclass at Hampshire School of Photography is an essential course for new photographers, offering a comprehensive, year-long program that builds strong foundations in both technical skills and creative vision. With 10 modules covering everything from camera mastery to composition, portrait, and landscape photography, it immerses students in a supportive learning environment.

Find out more: https://www.hampshirephotoschool.com/one-year-masterclass/

Got a Photography Question?

If you have a burning question about (virtually) anything to do with photography, click on this link. You can record your question onto your device (phone, laptop, etc) and if picked, I will play it during the show. https://www.tog-talk.com/voicemail/

Looking for courses

Want to find out about my live, in-person workshops, check out the Hampshire School of Photography website:

https://www.hampshirephotoschool.com

Hampshire Photography Network

A free Facebook group for amateur photographers who want to connect, collaborate and grow together.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1222685165227144

Contact me

You can contact me by leaving a message via this link: https://www.tog-talk.com/contact/






Kevin:

Hi, my name is Kevin Ahronson from Hampshire School of Photography and Tog-Talk to 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0,.

Kevin:

All engine running liftoff. We have a liftoff.

Kevin:

And welcome to this week's . My name is Kevin Ahronson from Hampshire School of Photography. I've been a photographer since right at the end of the 1960s, so over 50 years behind a camera, and I've been teaching photography since 2009. That makes me seriously old, and I've got with me today a personification of youth. Why don't you introduce yourself?

Kelly:

Kelly. Hello, I'm Kelly Perrin. I am the owner of the Big Ambition Company and we have our very own photography studio in Fleet Hampshire. I've been a photographer for 10 years roughly and I was student of Kevin's turned pro and I was student of Kevin's turned pro.

Kevin:

What a delight it is to have you on this, our third episode together. Tell me, kelly, what's the subject we're discussing today and how did we come about? How do we choose it? How do we pick it?

Kelly:

So we were having a discussion about things we could talk about on the podcast and I mentioned to you that you put a meme in the Facebook group Hampshire Photography Network. You popped a meme in there and I've seen this meme on a few different Facebook groups and it's Batman and Robin, few different Facebook groups and it's Batman and Robin and Robin is saying that he likes to shoot natural light and Batman slapping him and saying learn how to use flash, or vice versa. But it's basically the concept that if you don't use flash, it's because you don't know how. And I believe I said to you most of my work is with natural light or quite often no light at all, and I can use flash but I actually prefer not to.

Kevin:

So let's discuss. So this could be quite a heated discussion If we put this, if we put a question inside the Facebook group and if you're not a member of the Hampshire Photography Network, anybody can join. You don't have to be in Hampshire, but you do need to be an amateur. So we don't want pros in there or semi-pros, we want people who are quite new on their photography journey, because countlessly I've come across over the years whenever there's someone in a group who is really skillful and posts amazing pictures, it actually prevents other people from posting. They feel a bit intimidated. So if you are an amateur, look up on Facebook the Hampshire Photography Network and you've got to answer four or five questions or something like that to get in and then we'll let you in. Anyway, what was the question?

Kelly:

Natural versus artificial light is our subject.

Kevin:

So what I was getting at is that if we were to post this inside the group, or indeed any group where there's a large number of photographers, you will end up with quite a heated debate. This is quite a divisive subject. Do I use natural light or do I use flash? Because there are lots of people the majority, I would say who don't use Flash. They don't know how to use Flash, and I don't want to use Flash and I have every empathy, every sympathy with them. Do you know why?

Kelly:

Why.

Kevin:

Well, you have to probably go back to about, actually, about 2009, which is about the same time as I was teaching, started teaching. Actually, it was about 2009, which is about the same time as I started teaching, and I was working for a charity and that particular charity were embarking on a large building project. Now, while I was working there, I was also shooting a lot of weddings, exclusively shooting with natural light, on the basis that flash doesn't look very flattering and if you're trying to capture people candidly which is what I was doing if a flash is going off during the reception or you wouldn't use it in the church but during reception it kind of puts people off and they get quite, yeah, aggressive, stop, keep firing that flash. So I was an exponent a passionate exponent of shooting with natural light. So all my lenses were very expensive lenses because I had to work in low light. I had a full frame camera Back then. It would have probably been a Canon 5D Mark II. I don't think the Mark III was out then, I can't remember. So I had a Mark II and a Mark III and I've still got a Mark IV, and even the very thought of using flash was a complete. It depressed me because, having shot with flash both in the studio and on camera back in the days of film, I knew how unattractive flash can sometimes be Very harsh shadows, very unattractive indeed. So I was completely anti-flash and very pro-natural light. I was an exponent of natural light. Does that sound good? It does. One likes to be an exponent, anyway.

Kevin:

So I'm working with this charity and they invite the local newspaper to come and photograph what they were doing, and it meant going up onto the roof of our building. I had to take him up on the roof and he was photographing from up there, beautiful sunny day. And we got to a point where I'm climbing across the rooftops and he said stay there. And where I was when he said stay there, I was climbing over a roof, apex, with one leg on one side of the roof and one leg on the other. He said this is like a great picture for the paper, really. Yeah, ok, so he's a newspaper reporter and it's bright sunshine and he's shooting with flash. And I'm thinking what, why does he even do that? And I can hear him talking about making some adjustments to the back and he's saying, yeah, I'll just drop the power down on that about two thirds, and I said what you can adjust the power of your flash. So he very briefly gave me a simple lesson on how to make the flash brighter or darker than it normally wants to go, and I didn't realize that you could do that with flash. Within a month I had spent two grand on a system flash system with I think it was, four flashes and a transmitter from Canon might have been just over two grand because I fell in love with the idea of being able to control light. And then I bought studio lights and then from that point on, it's one of those situations you say the rest is history. And I fell in love with photographing with flash because finally I could control light.

Kevin:

What that guy was doing on the rooftops was using fill-in flash Under bright sun. If you take a photograph of someone from almost any angle unless the sun's right behind them, you get part of their face lit by the sun and part of it in shade and it's a harsh, high contrasting shadow with sharp, hard edges and it's sometimes, if not nearly always, a very unattractive image because you've got these highlights and bright spots on one side and shadows on the other. You can't see too much detail in the shadow, and sometimes the highlights are so bright you can't see the details there. And so what he was trying to do was fire a little bit of flash into the image which doesn't affect the highlights very much but does dilute some of the darkness in the shadows. And he did that on this particular occasion by underexposing the flash by two-thirds of a stop. He reduced the power of the flash by two-thirds of a stop.

Kevin:

Those who shoot in aperture or shutter priority know, on a camera you've got something called exposure compensation, where you can compensate for the camera getting exposure wrong by over or under exposing by just turning a dial. And I didn't realize you can do that with flash as well. So on the flash it's called FEC, flash exposure compensation. This was absolutely liberating for me, so. So I had no idea, and once I figured out how you could use it, I had so much control of my shots. So not only could I control the exposure on my camera through the exposure compensation because I rarely shot in manual but I could also control the brightness of my flash to be brighter or darker than it would normally shoot. So that gave me an enormous amount of control. So that's when I started shooting with flash properly.

Kelly:

I love it. That's such a great story and, as you were talking, I remember so clearly in 2017, that lesson on flash outside, and I remember at the time thinking it's such a beautiful, sunny day, why on earth are we going outside to use flash? And it made so much sense in that lesson with you. And that story has just brought that lesson back, which is great. So, no, there obviously is massive benefits to using artificial light, but what I want to know to using artificial light, but what I want to know when do you enjoy not using artificial light? So when would you?

Kevin:

I mean, obviously there's the golden hour but when are you likely not to have a flash with you? When am I likely not to have a flash with me? To be frank, most of the time. Um, one of the disadvantages as a flash is you have more gear to carry around with you, and if I'm shooting a paid gig then I will have flash in the car. I have a box which has got all these sponge inserts where you cut out holes, and I've got four flashes in there and I've got my transmitter.

Kevin:

So if you don't know what I'm talking about here, guys, the simplest way of using a little battery-powered flash, which are also called speed lights that's the kind of generic name speed lights. In America they call everything strobes, so a flash over there is a strobe, whether it's a studio strobe or a battery powered strobe. So if you hear strobe on the internet, it's just the american way of saying flash. So if I'm using a speed light, which is a battery powered strobe or a battery powered flash, um, I can either put it on the camera, in which case I've got one flash sat on the camera, or I can take it off the camera in what's called, strangely enough, off-camera flash and remotely trigger it, and for that you need a transmitter or a trigger to sit on the top of your camera and you can control your flashes all your flashes from that controller sat on the top of your camera and you can control your flashes all your flashes from that controller set on the top of your camera.

Kevin:

It goes in the flash shoe, the same place as a flash would, and you can have 15, 20, you can have 100 flashes. They're all controlled from your transmitter, otherwise known as a flash controller. I have this box with four flashes in and a controller. I've got additional flashes as well which are all synced into the same controller so I can take even more flashes with me if I need. So if I've got a party or a wedding or reception or a corporate bash somewhere, then I'll take flashes with me in my box and I know that I've instantly got four flashes if I need them, plus the system for triggering them.

Kevin:

And of course you need lighting stands as well to put them on. If I'm out just for the day, I don't take the flash with me. I rely on natural light and I love natural light. I was thinking just recently, kelly, in the way I think we all do from time to time what is my favourite type of photography? Because I was going to put a post in the Facebook group which said if you could only pick one type of photography for the rest of your life, for the rest of your life, what would it be? And if I could pick just one type of photography that I could only shoot and nothing else, it would be out on the street, one camera, one lens, one focal length, no zoom, because I know I could find so many things to photograph that would satisfy me aesthetically.

Kevin:

And when I'm using natural light, I am in my greatest element, because that's how I started. As a 14-year-old, with my first camera, I'd walk around the streets of Brighton, which is where I grew up, and I would just find things to photograph based on what I saw was light, creating amazing images. So I'm using natural light to form the kind of images that I really like, and it could be buildings or it could be people, could be a bit of landscape, but it's looking for the light and the shadow and how they contrast with each other, how they play against each other and if you've got some kind of repeating patterns going on or reflections and textures, all these things interact with the highlights and the shadows. Ultimately, that's light and that's what I really enjoy doing. However, that's what I really enjoy doing, however, knowing that if the situation demands some help, likewise, I can turn to artificial light to sex up the shot, if you get my meaning.

Kelly:

What about you? Well, the type of photography that I do, I just can't have a flash because I'm often behind the scenes in theatres or I'm walking around a conference hall and lots of people are, you know, are talking and concentrating. So I'm often asked not to have a flash with me and I prefer that. We've spoken before about what I like about photography and I love getting those candid shots of people, and you can't do that if you've got a flash with you because everybody becomes aware that there's a photographer in the room. I'm happy to go around without a box of flash equipment. To be honest, I do like flash and now that I've got the studio, I'm using it a lot more and I'm probably similar to you.

Kelly:

If, if I could only do one type of photography, yeah, it would just be outside. Because, again, when I was given my first camera as a Christmas present, the first thing I did was I went straight in the garden and I just took pictures of flowers and blades of grass and the dogs and you know anything that I liked. The look of that looked pretty, I feel like. For you, you enjoy the contrast, whereas I'm a bit more of a soft. I kind of like the softer photos. So I wouldn't necessarily look for harsh light differences in my image.

Kevin:

I don't know whether that makes a difference or the thing is, because photography is such a big subject, there's room for everybody to do what they want in their own way, and if there's one irritation I have about photography, it's photographers who are dogmatic, who are dogmatic, who their way is the right way and anyone who challenges that is in the wrong. Because I grew up photographing the way I've just described, it's easy for me, for instance, to see a picture and visualise it in real time as if it's actually a me. For instance, to see a picture and visualise it in real time as if it's actually a black and white image, because I shot in black and white for decades, and I mainly shot in black and white for decades because it was much easier to process and print black and white than it was to print colour. In fact, I'd never printed colour and I shot a lot of transparencies during the 70s and the 80s and the 90s, but I never processed any colour. I couldn't be bothered. It was too much of a fad. But black and white was relatively straightforward.

Kevin:

So what it meant was that I developed a skill of being able to see in black and white. I could spot an image that would work brilliant in black and white by searching around, just looking around and looking for areas of intense brightness and and darkness and the contrast between the two. So any area where there's a lot of highlights, a lot of specular highlights, a lot of deep shadows. I could see that in a black and white preview of my brain. As black and white I knew exactly what it was going to look like. You can put me anywhere and I'll find a shot that will work, because I have that ability of and our eyes trade over decades to just spot shots based on the play of light, and for me personally, it's the light that is the most powerful element of an image if you're going to suck someone's attention into that image. So it's interesting that you're talking about your own professional aspect of photography of working in low light, because for weddings I shot in low light for a very long time, refusing to go over to flash.

Kevin:

But with weddings and the weddings is a good example, probably by the second decade of this millennia I began to think again Because I was always disappointed with those shots you get towards the end of the day at the wedding reception, particularly the first dance, where all the lights go down, and you're shooting at around about 3200 ISO maybe 6.4 on cameras in those days where the sensors just weren't capable of shooting decent pictures at those high what was then? High ISO levels, and not only were the images very grainy but the cameras weren't able to focus in that low light and you'd shoot dozens and dozens and dozens of images and nothing was in focus and eventually I can't remember what the moment was, what the catalyst was, but at one point I decided to bring some flash in during the first dance for a wedding and it worked so well. From that point on, all my wedding first dance images were shot with flash. So how did I do that?

Kevin:

I had off-camera flash. I had at least two flashes up high on stands, pointing at the ceilings of the buildings, bouncing off the ceilings so they come back down and they would illuminate the bride and groom from behind, left and the right. So you get a rim light on the left and the rim light on the right, and then I'd use it what little ambient light there was to get the face of the couple, which was relatively, compared with the highlights, quite low, and those shots were spectacular. They looked amazing and from that point on I stayed with flash.

Kelly:

Now you can't shoot flash on your jobs no, I can't, usually because the the sort of jobs I'm doing um are being filmed as well. Yeah, so if I'm at a conference and the conference might be being live streamed, they don't want flash going off. It messes with their lighting that they've set up. Um, certainly, when I'm in theatre, you, you can't use a flash, but I guess, because I don't use flash very often, I would opt not to take it and save my kind of artificial lighting for when I'm in the studio.

Kevin:

Okay, I remember also. I remember shooting a wedding at the Aviator Hotel in Farnborough and after the initial ceremony everybody went upstairs and I walked into the bar. Oh my word, the light was amazing. The sun was shining through the windows, very low, warm. It was end of day and it just looked sensational. And as everybody came into the room and sat at their tables all that light's a bit glaring quick put the blinds down. It was awful.

Kevin:

So I had to resort to flash on camera bouncing off the ceiling, and the way I did it is I used a 135mm lens so I could shoot some distance and allow quite a big gap between me and the person I was photographing.

Kevin:

And that enabled me to shoot at a moderately shallow angle, bouncing off the ceiling, which meant as the light came down off the ceiling, it wasn't coming down too steep, it was coming in at a low angle, which meant as the light came down off the ceiling, it wasn't coming down too steep, it was coming in at a low angle which filled all the eye sockets.

Kevin:

Otherwise, if you're too close to someone, the light goes up, comes down and you get something called raccoon eyes. You get a nasty shadow in the eye sockets. But I was a long way away, shooting on a 135, it was an F2 lens. I was shooting it wide open with flash, and I was getting amazing shots, and the revelation that I experienced was no one gave a fig about the flash going off, and I thought hang on a second. I've been working under the premise for years that this would upset everybody, but it didn't, so from that point on, I converted to using flash at a wedding. It wouldn't work where you are, though, because your requirements are very specific. Now you're using a Canon 5D Mark IV.

Kelly:

Mark III.

Kevin:

Mark III Okay, and you're shooting at f 1.8 on a 50 mil lens most of the time uh 1.4 1.4. Okay, okay, what isos are you having to shoot at?

Kelly:

um, well, usually uh, 32, 32, yeah, if I can. If I need to go up, then I will. Yeah, but I try not to do, do you?

Kevin:

do any post-processing to reduce that?

Kelly:

I do, I do, and also I wait for moments of natural light or artificial light sometimes, and if I can grab shots when there's a little bit of light, somebody's maybe looked at their phone so they light up their own face of light. Somebody's maybe looked at their phone so they light up their own face, um, or maybe if we're backstage and there are lights on stage and they're kind of moving around, um, and it might hit somebody's face behind the scenes, then I'll use, I'll use things like that, um, so I you know I work with what I've got. What I would like to talk to you about, though, is you are very pro artificial light. From this conversation, everything comes back to how you work around using so that you can use flash, um using so that you can use flash. So my question for you is for people listening who don't use flash for whatever reason what modifiers and things can you use with artificial light to enhance your photos?

Kevin:

oh, there's a big question. The biggest problem that most photographers experience when they first buy a flash is they stick it on their camera, they point it at the person they're photographing and they wonder why the picture is unflattering. And the simple answer is it's a very small point of light or point source. It's often called a point source of light which creates harsh shadows like the sun does when you photograph someone on an overcast day. Very flattering, because there's no single point of light that the light's coming from. It's everywhere in the sky, so you end up with a very diffused light. It's a bit like having a light bulb and putting a sheet in front of it before it hits the subject. The cloud is a sheet diffusing the light from the sun. So if you're photographing anybody unless you are looking for that particular high contrast, almost aggressive style of lighting, which generally we're not, although some men lean themselves to be it works quite well. If you're trying to call a macho, masculine man, look, look a lot of those adverts at christmas time you get from those french perfume companies. They're all shot like you know, the guys with the chiseled jaw and heavy dark shadows very masculine, but for the most of the time you know, when you're photographing the kids and your female partner, wife, whatever they are and even your husband, for most of the time you actually don't want that harsh look. You want a soft look. So with a single flash on your camera, pointing it at them is going to get you the worst possible shot. You have to bounce it, and either you bounce it off the ceiling or you bounce it off the wall. And in terms of modifiers you don't need anything else. You just need a nice light coloured wall, preferably a white one, where you can bounce the light off. And the reason it's better to bounce than it is to have a point source is that as the light leaves your camera, it spreads out, it goes out as an a-hawk, it's like a cone of light. So it's small at its original source and it gets wider and wider as it leaves the flash. By the time it hits the wall or the ceiling, it might be three, four, five, six feet in diameter, and then, when it leaves that reflected surface, the wall or the ceiling, it widens up even even more so by the time it hits your subject. It's an enormous source of light, a bit like the clouds in the sky, and you envelop someone in a broad, wide beam of light which is very flattering. It's soft and it's lovely and it's sumptuous and it's just so nice. So never, ever, ever, ever, ever, point your flash to it. You have someone. Unless you're going for a specific special effect, you bounce. Now what happens if you've got nowhere to bounce? So I'm going to go back to the aviator, because there was a good example there At that wedding.

Kevin:

I was on the top floor and the crowd from the reception were mingling around everywhere and there were some on the top floor and a couple came up to me and said would I take their picture? And I looked around, the walls were black, looked at the ceiling, the ceiling was black. Where the hell do I? I can't point this flash at them. It would be a dreadful photograph. I've got a reputation. I had nothing. Suddenly this I'm going to use a word here which is not politically correct and I don't care this fat bloke walked by. He's a big guy, and I said hang on, a guy, take your jacket off. I got him to stand with his back towards me and because he was so big, I was able to bounce the flash of the back of his shirt onto the couple I was photographing and I got the shot I want.

Kelly:

You're laughing. So if you don't have a reflector, just find a fat bloke.

Kevin:

Yeah, not a fat lady, because they don't exist. No, obviously Voluptuous, not fat yeah, so, um, yes, the other option is to have a portable reflector with you, which is a usually a circular thing which comes in a smaller form, and you unzip it and it pops up into a larger diameter and you can bounce a light off of that and then it reflects back onto the subject.

Kelly:

And, of course, bringing it back to artificial light. That's what you can do with the sun as well. It is, so you can also use the sunlight to your advantage with reflectors and things like that and also diffusers.

Kevin:

So because I just want to root for the artificial light, I'm gonna put you on the spot, then just explain the difference between a diffuser and a reflector so a diffuser will spread your your light more evenly, whereas a reflector you can use to bounce the light around.

Kelly:

Yeah, so if?

Kevin:

you're working outside those two items, which often come in the same thing. You buy something called a five-in-one it's a generic term and it's like a circular dish. It comes in a little bag. You undo the zip and as you open it the whole thing pops up to be a lot bigger and there's a zip running around the outside of that. But leave the zip on for a second, because as you look at it, there's got this big circular thing which could be anything from well. They do small ones, maybe from like 18 inches, and you can go up to things which may be six foot across, all in different sizes, dead cheap from amazon, absolutely pennies.

Kevin:

And one side would be white, which you can use a reflector. One side would be white, which you can use as a reflector. One side could be black, which absorbs light, so you can take away light from the things you don't want to be too bright. Take the zip off and reverse it and you've got a silver reflector and a gold reflector. Silver reflects more light, but it's more harsh. Gold is great for end of daylight. If you're photographing someone on a sunset or a sunrise, you can bounce a gold light onto their face. It just looks fabulous. And then if you take that off completely, that reversible thing, just remove it, so you put it to one side.

Kevin:

What you're left with in the middle of this circular thing is a diffusion screen, which is a transparent screen which is a bit like the clouds, again on an overcast day.

Kevin:

You could hold that over somebody on a bright, sunny day and the sun would be diffused through that screen. That person would still be as bright as ever, but they wouldn't have those harsh shadows. So if you're photographing someone on a bright, sunny day and you know it's midday and the sun's up high and the shadows are just horrible, ask an assistant to hold the diffusion screen above the model's head, or you put it on a stand and you get great shots of them without all those horrible shadows. On the other hand, with flash you could fire a flash through it and it diffuses the light from. The flash creates a very large source of light. The diameter of your diffuser screen whether you've got a two foot, three foot, four foot, six foot, whatever makes a huge source of light and again you get a lovely soft, diffused light hitting that person. So both reflectors and diffusers work with artificial light and natural light.

Kelly:

Lovely. And another question for you, just because, given our audience and I try to think back to when I was beginning my photography journey explain what the golden hour is.

Kevin:

There's two of them one in the morning, one in the evening. It's that time when the sun's really low in the sky and it's having to shine through a lot more atmosphere to get to you, because it's dropped down and it's close to the horizon. When it's above you, it's only got that small distance between you and it only about 93 million miles, you know but because it has to shine through more atmosphere when the sun's low, you end up with this lovely warm light which is so attractive because as the sun is going through more atmosphere, more particles in the atmosphere, the light gets diffused so the shadows are softer. It's a bit like having a diffusion screen fitted to the sun, but with an orange, warm tinge to it. It is just the best time to photograph people, with no exceptions, and also, if you're, to landscape photography marvellous.

Kelly:

I was just going to say not just people, because a couple of my During Covid I did quite a lot of landscape photography just so I could go and be on my own, to be honest, and have some time away from the family, and that golden hour was just. I've got some really beautiful images of Fleet Bond, where it just is. I mean, it's stunning anyway, but you know, rich blue sky, even though it was sort of seven o'clock in the evening, and again at Virginia Waters. You know we're so lucky around here with the places we can go and get landscape. You don't have to be up in the Lake District to get beautiful shots, which is nice.

Kevin:

I'm just thinking because these are subjects I often teach about on my masterclass, and masterclass is a one-year class, a one-year course teaching the basics of photography, from the very foundational building blocks to some quite high levels of uh, imagery, photographing people or landscapes. There's a lot of compositional, creative elements to the course as well, but this thing about shooting at sunrise and sunset there's some interesting things here, and one of them is we're talking about light now, and without flash, if you photograph a sunset, the sunset could be absolutely beautiful. You know, you just occasionally come across one where the clouds in the sky are perfect, the sun's hitting them at the right angle, there's highlights, there's warm shadows, the scenery. You just happen to be in a really good place. You take a picture and it looks. It just doesn't look the same, does it?

Kevin:

So, on the other hand, you want to photograph, say, you're doing a romantic engagement shoot. You know you've got a couple getting married and they say, oh, come and take a picture of us and you go out somewhere, romantic and the sun's low and you've got this lovely warm glow in them, but they want the sun behind them in the shot. Well, if you put the sun behind them and correctly exposed for a really good sun, they go quite dark, almost silhouette. So you have to use other lighting to illuminate them. So you fire a flash, go on. You were going to say something, weren't you?

Kelly:

I was. I was just for the non-flash users, or correct me if I'm wrong. You could take two photos and expose them differently and then layer them after you could, you, could, you could.

Kevin:

Which some might say is a very creative way of getting the perfect shot.

Kelly:

A lot of work, I know, but I'm a designer. I quite enjoy the post-processing just as much as taking the photo, and you know I do as well.

Kevin:

Yeah, I'm talking in my late night FM voice, okay. So first of all, if you're shooting in natural light on the sunset and forget people in the shot at the moment but our cameras are designed to work most of the time in something what's called auto white balance you might see on your camera is the three initials awb, and the purposes of that are to try and make whites look white regardless of the shooting condition. So if you're moving indoors, where maybe you've got a nice orange glow for the lights in there, and you go outside and maybe it's early evening but a bit too, I don't know yes, it'll look kind of bluish in comparison. The camera adjusts reasonably well to give you a white that looks white under any circumstances. But if you photograph a sunset, the camera's going to look at that, thinking gosh, that's a bit red. So what it does? It adds some blue electronically into the image to try and balance out that red, so that it's a bit red. So what it does? It adds some blue electronically into the image to try and balance out that red so that it's not so red. So you end up with a picture where the sunset doesn't look as good. How did he get around. That I'm going to tell you in a second.

Kevin:

Hi everyone, it's Kevin Ahronson and I want to tell you about some exciting changes I've made to the Photography Masterclass, my in-person course that's been helping photographers grow since 2019. Yep, this is an in-person course in a classroom, with me face-to-face. This is not online. As we approach our 10th intake in January, I've made some significant changes to celebrate this milestone. This masterclass goes beyond just technical skills. It's about learning to see the world as a photographer. I've shifted the focus to give even more attention to creativity, with three entire modules dedicated to developing your photographer's eye. I retained the more popular modules on shooting landscapes, photographing people, and there's a new one on black and white photography. This Masterclass is more than just a course. It's a creative one-year journey you'll share with other passionate photographers, growing together and forming lasting connections along the way. Need more information? Visit GoHSPcom, click on courses and select masterclass. I'll also provide a link in the show notes below. Welcome back, okay.

Kevin:

So now I'm going to tell you the secret how to really pimp up your sunsets and your sunrises, because the camera in auto white balance is trying to make whites always look white. It'll take the powerful oranges and reds out of your sunset and almost kind of desaturate them On your camera. There could be a setting on your auto white balance which says either cloud or shade, and some cameras have both. When you select those, as opposed to water white balance, you're adding orange back into the shot and you're replacing the orange that's been taken out by the auto white balance and what happens is your sunsets now just look amazing because the blues have not been imposed upon the shot. The orange has been imposed back into the shot and now it looks incredible. And if you want to, you can actually go in and you can customise just how orange the images are. You can really pimp up the orange so that the sunset looks spectacular.

Kevin:

So I never, ever, shoot sunrise or sunset in auto white balance ever. I never do it and I haven't done it for years. I always shoot to cloud or shade and sometimes I dial up because colour temperature is measured in degrees Kelvin. I pimp it up to 10,000 degrees Kelvin and it just goes off the scale. So that's what I do for sunrise and sunset.

Kevin:

Now let's go back to the other question, because that was for natural light Photographing that couple with the sun behind them as the sun goes down. If you can photograph someone like that with an off-camera flash in a small brolly or a softbox which is a large box, it's basically shooting the flash into a diffusion screen which kind of softens the light. If you shoot with flash, the light coming from the flash is very, very blue compared with the light that's coming from the sun. So whilst you can get a good exposure, for that couple standing against the sun, it looks weird Because you're correctly exposing for the sun in the background. You may even be shooting in cloudy or shade to increase the orange effect of the sun and the clouds and so on, but the flash is throwing a blue light effectively from the camera's perspective. We may not see it as humans, but the camera sees it as a blue light and it just doesn't look right. Any idea how you solve that?

Kelly:

No, you tell us have.

Kevin:

I got to tell you yes, okay, you stick an orange gel on the flash. Okay, it's normally called CTO, color, temperature orange, and what that does? Cto will throw an orange light onto the cup of your photographing which balances out nicely with the sun. Now CTO comes in full CTO or half CTO or quarter CTO, and you can vary the combination so that it matches the sun and a lot of flashes. When you buy them, they come with a little kit with little gels, coloured gels, which you can choose from. If not again, it's pennies, probably less than a tenner on Amazon you can get a set and you just stick them on the front of your flash and you experiment to find what combination of CTOs gives you the right colour. So it's all about colour adjustment. There we go.

Kelly:

I'm learning. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Still learning. Kevin, I'm going to have to go and find a couple on a sunset now and have a little go at this.

Kevin:

Jo, I think we've covered quite a bit today.

Kelly:

We have. I do just have one last question for you. Hit me, babe. So, as you know, I have a studio in Fleet that is available for photographers to hire out if they want to practice. So my question for you what would be your go-to lighting setup in a studio if you were doing portraits?

Kevin:

my go-to. If there was sufficient space, I would use a clam shelf as a go-to. Clam chair was a soft box hitting the person from above. So it's a big, broad spread of light hitting them from above and complemented with another one coming from underneath, so like a clam, you know, which has comes together with the top and bottom impossible to demonstrate on an audio show, but a light source above, a light source below, because the one from above always casts a little bit of shadow, albeit soft, and the clamshell bottom half kind of takes away some of that. It's very flattering, for ladies and for children it's wonderful. And then possibly some lights from behind to give a bit of a rim around the hair maybe. But it depends on the background. If you have a white background you need lights to illuminate the white background. But the clamshell I absolutely love and I have done for years. It's my absolute favourite because it is so flattering.

Kelly:

Excellent, thank you.

Kevin:

Not at all. Okay, well, it's been a good sesh Been a good sesh it has. Thank you for coming again. I'm kind of hoping that this new now know you coming to the studio as opposed to you recording it from home remotely is going to be far more successful.

Kevin:

I mean, on my headphones it sounds great yeah, I think it flows nicer as well it's nice to be able to see the person you're talking to rather than looking at a screen. Yeah, yeah, okay, in that case, shall we say our usual it's goodbye from me and it's goodbye from me. Well, that about wraps up another episode of Photographers in Conversation. Before we go, I want to remind you that we'd love to hear from you. Got a burning question, a burning photography question. Click on the link in the show notes below and it'll take you to a button on a website. Press that button and record your question straight into your phone or your laptop's microphone. If your question is selected, it'll get played live on air and we'll answer it. Thanks so much for listening and for your continued support. Don't forget to hit the subscribe button and give this episode a like if you enjoyed it. I'll see you next time and don't forget, take your camera with you everywhere.

People on this episode

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Kelly Perrin

Co-host
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Kelly Perrin

Co-host
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Kelly Perrin

Co-host