Category: Photography
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Equipment for photographing in a pizzeria
Packing the right gear is for me the last stage of a process where I try and understand the least I can use to get the look that I want. In the pizzeria I wanted to achieve a good backlight effect. I had tried, without success, with a smaller and sturdier beauty dish, but eventually…
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The best lighting for pizza
Pizza is food so, traditionally, benefits from (moderate) backlighting. Pizza is also large and flat: a large(r) and flat light source was my choice. The Elinchrom Rotalux 90x110cm softbox, placed about 30cm above the pizza, slightly angled, was large enough that I could use its “tail” like some sort of moderate backlight. A small reflector…
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Warm, soft light for food, with one light source
I would not call a 90x110cm Elinchrom softbox “portable”, however I set for myself the limit of one light source or when I want to shoot food outside of my studio, and albeit I tried and get the results that I wanted with a beauty-dish reflector (smaller and sturdier), I decided I would not settle…
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Morning light for food
How I re-created in studio some natural-looking morning light for food photography.
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Strobes in continuos-light mode for shallow-focus effect
Studio strobes can be used in continuos light mode with their modelling lamp, which obviously give a lower light output than the flashes. Besides videos, this mode can be used in combination of large lens apertures in order to have a shallow focus. Unfortunately, it usually happens (but it depends on the strobe model) that…
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Attaching a smartphone to a bicycle
This is how I attached my iPhone to the handlebar of my bike, using equipment normally found in photographic studios (not specifically designed for bicycles). The… contraption is made of three elements: one Manfrotto Superclamp one Manfrotto spigot one smartphone clamp (Shoulderpod S1, without the handle), with a 1/4″ threaded attachment for tripods I managed…
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The “inverse square law” has nothing to do with photography
Why has the «inverse square law» has nothing to do with photography? Actually, it has everything to do indeed, but it is often (always?) misquoted. The inverse square law is a law of physics that tells, basically, that the intensity of light decreases in proportion of the distance, squared, between a point-like light source and…
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Studio light scheme for portraits with fog
Fog (“smoke”) is unreliable because dosing it is difficult. You may find your perfect f-stops and light power settings, but the variability introduced by a fog machine will force you to try and try again. Of course, fog must be lit, or it won’t show up in photography. I’m presenting here a lighting scheme that…
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Four light sources (and one reflector) for portraits that pop
I am taking advantage of the new large gridded softbbox and I have slightly complicated the light scheme that I have described here. The simple yet effective modifications are: Added a flashgun, placed on the floor, between the subject and the backdrop, pointing at the latter, aiming high. This was trigged by a simple photocell…
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How to light a muscular man
How to light a muscular man, in order to emphasise his muscle? For this purpose I kind of like the following scheme: I used Elinchrom material, as usual: three D-Lite RX 2 units equipped with: one beauty dish, with the white diffuser cloth that I stole from the Rotaluxes; two 90×110 Rotaluxes equipped with their…
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Asymmetrical three-lights setup for Medium Shots
Most of the times, I like symmetrical lighting without rim. Recently I wanted to experiment with an asymmetrical lighting with rim for a medium shot portrait. This scheme seems to work well with the rim switched off too.