Namibia – Portraits

Note: Please click on theses images to view them full-size… they go a bit fuzzy when reduced down.

On my trip to Namibia there were three genres that I wanted to photograph;

1. Ruinscapes (Kolmanskop etc.)
2. Landscapes (Deadvlei, Wolverdens etc.)
3. Portraits

I was particularly excited at the prospect of spending five days living with and photographing the Himba tribes of NorthWest Namibia.  While I had seen plenty of natural light photography, I really wanted to try to make different types of portraits of these photogenic people.

Inspired by the incredible personal work of Joey Lawrence, I packed my trusty Paul Buff Einstein light and my two favorite modifiers (Paul Buff 64″ Silver PLM and Westcott Apollo softbox) and decided to really try and make some stylistic environmental portraits using off camera flash techniques.

I had a ball making these images and I’m pretty happy with the way they turned out.  The beauty of the Einstein is that it throws out plenty of light and I can easily overpower the sun.  When I combine it with the ultra-efficient Parabolic Light Modifier (PLM), then I can easily get well over f64 of light out of the light setup which allows you to do some interesting environmental portraits during bright daylight.

Here's our rig in action. Jimmy (our translator) is holding the monopod.

Sometimes we used the sock over the PLM, and other times we shot with the straight silver bounce.   Most of the time we had our light on a light stand, but occasionally we put it on a monopod (as in the photo above).  While this is a 240v light, I use the Paul Buff mini vagabond to provide 240v on location… It’s incredibly small and light.

I also used my neutral density filter with some of the shots to open up my aperture and reduce the depth of field…. again to create more of a stylistic image.   I hope you enjoy the images.

Even Christian Could Nail Focus With this!

Hey check this out… this is very interesting.  A camera that doesn’t rely on focus.  Doesn’t sound like a scam, sounds like the real deal.  If this is the case, it’s one of the biggest leaps forward in photography in a long time.

http://mashable.com/2011/06/22/lytro/

Brent

Off Camera Flash Workshop For Perth?

Hey there Sand Gropers

I’m going to be visiting Perth for a few days of business in early June and was contemplating putting on a 1 day workshop for bringing models into your landscapes and shooting with Off Camera Flash.

I’ve been running this workshop over here now for about 8 months and it is very popular.  So if you would like to attend this workshop, just drop me an email at brentbat@gmail.com and express your interest.  If there is enough interest I will make it happen.

Not sure whether you guys just shoot “scapes” over there or what.  More information about the workshop can be found here.

This one is for Wacom Tablet Users – 3 Great Tips!

If you have been to any of my workshops, then you know that I utterly encourage the use of pressure-sensitive tablets like the Wacoms for post processing.   If your not using one, chances are you haven’t been shown how to use them properly.

I thought I was reasonably decent with the tablet, but a few days ago I watched a Kelby training movie by Corey Barker on “Using the Wacom Tablet With Photoshop”.  Boy did I learn some very cool tricks.  Here’s just a few tricks that will turbo-charge your tablet-driven post production effectiveness.

Tip 1 – This was my favorite tip.  Program the button on the pen to adjust brush size and hardness.

If you are like me, you probably left the button on the pen to the default of launching the brushes menu.  It used to piss me off everytime I bumped it, and I never changed my brush sizes via the menu, always with the bracket keys (or touchstrip).    However Corey showed me a way better way of adjusting your brush size and hardness in Photoshop (works in CS4 and CS5).

Try this out…..

Open Photoshop and open any document.

Select the brush tool,  now hold down the <Cntrl>+<Option> keys down on your Mac (if you have a PC, list it on eBay and go and buy yourself a Mac now)

While you holding down <Cntrl>+<Option>  move your pen (or mouse) left and right….. This adjusts your brush size!

Cool eh?  Now move it up and down…. this adjusts your brush hardness…. Is that not WAY COOL!!!!

Now, here’s what you want to do.  Program that annoying little button on your pen to be <Cntrl>+<Option>, and then you can adjust your brush properties by clicking it, and dragging your mouse around.

To program this on your Pen do the following.

a) Open up the Wacom tablet driver  from your System Preferences.

b) Make sure that your tablet is selected in the first row,  Your pen is selected in the tool row, and Photoshop is selected in the Application row

c) Select the pen button to bring up the programming for the pen

d) I adjust the bottom part of the pen button and disable the top part of the button.  Select “Modifier” for the bottom part of the pen button

e) select <Cntrl>  <Option> and <Click> Check boxes

Thats it, give it a try.

Tip 2 – Make the Eraser Useful

I never use the eraser (because I’m typically painting on layer masks with white and black brushes),  so I never used it, but Corey showed me a great tip to make this useful.  I am often toggling between Photoshop and Lightroom,  so what I did was to program the eraser to be a toggle straight back into Lightroom (would also work for Bridge etc.).  To do this click on the Eraser button  and select “Open Run” from the menu choices and then browse to your Lightroom (or Bridge) application.

Tip 3 – Program up your Express Keys and your Touch strips.

I’ve been programming up my touch strips (left zooms in and out,  right cycles through blend modes), and also my Express keys (lots of goodies on there that I use regularly like Space Bar, B for brush, X to toggle Black and White, Option key, etc.   Don’t be lazy, use them thoughtfully.

Not using a Wacom tablet?

You don’t know what you are missing.  Seriously, I can not process images properly with just the mouse anymore,  it DRAMATICALLY speeds up your effeciency and effectiveness in post production.  The tablet is not a substitute for the mouse (I still use the mouse), but the secret lies in unlocking the pressure sensitivity along with Layer Masks.

Enjoy

Brent