Fire For Effect

[daq7]

Shooting directly into the sun? Well nobody ever accused me of being too bright. I try to block it with my head and use the big cloud diffuser for a nice back light.

Fire for effect is an artillery term. After you call in a few spotting rounds to make sure everything is falling more or less where you wish it to, you call in fire for effect, and they begin lobbing in the nasty crap...

[daq7]

I probably have a couple more coming from this shoot.

[daq7]

If I understand ETTL correctly the system would have exposed this for the flash in front as the key light which is what keeps it from completely swamping my face in the second shot even though the flash is like two inches from my face. The tech in these things is pretty amazing.

[daq7]

I apologize for all the self-portraits. I can only expect you guys to put up with so much ugliness. I think I may be building enough confidence to hire some models, but that is a whole level of planning that frightens me. Plus shooting with another person will make me totally nervous even if I am paying them. I hope I can get there, because I have wanted to do that for years.

[GB1]

I think the concept's sound and that shooting into the light worked just fine here. I really like the first one's idea but I think it needs a more diffused light on his face as it is burned out there. Otherwise it's all there... Perhaps you can fix the bright spot in PP? I hope so.

The bottom one works too IMO. I like the daring composition but feel that it may go a little too far - I'd crop some of the left off. Wonderful sky, and exposure on him (you).

G

[daq7]

Jimmy Hendrix Mix. Or as Trent Reznor would say "Withah Teethah.."

[daq7]

Yeah, I can fix the hot spots in the glasses with photoshop easy if I decide to do it. It will be nice when I get a hotshoe cord and another light pole so I can pull the flash off the camera. It will help improve shots like this a lot. Although someone more clever could probably deal with it as it is.

[n8]

nice nin reference. are these all single shot hdrs?

[daq7]

Counsel. They are sort of HDRs. They all consist of four layers. Three of them are normal exposures two stops apart taken from a raw file. The fourth later is a tone mapped layer consisting of all three of the other layers. Then I blend them in photoshop. Sometimes the tone mapped layer has very little input.

[gahspidy]

That last one is really good, Daq. The lighting and dynamic inyourface composition is effective. Does not look like on camera flash at all really.Whats amazing about the 580EXll is that they cover an incredible range of output. Going down to as low as 1/128 output lets you get very close and precise with the flash, especially if the ambient light is already bright.
Your self portraits are fun, and never tiring.

[Shebang]

The last one is the best - fire in your eyes for effect! I love the sort of 3D effect you captured and the clarity is phenomenal

[daq7]

Thanks guys. I appreciate it. These are weak though. Not happy at all...

[Shebang]

I'd be thrilled if I were getting shots as good as this - but I understand that perfectionism thing.