EuRTSX

Um, modeling asap. =)

srika

my glasses never looked so good!

waTSX

^^ Yes, one on one modeling assignment is needed immediately. Just show her the 5d and you'll be in She's a stunner. Looks like a natural in front of the camera.

srika

it may be in the works! totally what I thought, she's pretty much the most photogenic person I've ever had the pleasure of shooting.

Crazy Bimmer

great pics

srika

danny25

find a studio you can rent and get her in it quick!

srika

^^ I'll try, lol. Stupid but I kinda lost her email address - I put it into my Treo - with a few beers in my system - and today I went to retrieve it and I have no idea where it went. I kind of pieced together the e-mail though, just from memory, and I think I remember it... will have to see.

Cedric Gervais @ Spybar

http://www.delobbo.com/gallery2/v/12...ervais_spybar/

srika

Localized @ Vision

http://www.delobbo.com/gallery2/v/12...alized_vision/

this pic is pretty sweet in higher-res

fdl

srika, not sure if this has been asked, but what ISO do you usually shoot at in the club.

Dan Martin

Looks good srika! I haven't checked this thread in a while, but you've come a long way.

srika

no it hasnt been asked - I'm still experimenting so I don't know what the "best" setting is but for these I have been mainly at 500-640. So far, I find that gives me the best balance between keepers and low noise. I tried 3200 for fun once and the pics were (not suprisingly) damn noisy. I talk once in a while with a guy who used to do club pics in Chicago a few years back (with a 1D) and was pretty good - and he said he always shot at 100. So I would like to try that at some point too.

Speaking of which, the keeper ratio on this camera is great - by comparison, some nights I would be under 15% with the D70. Kind of sad and kind of embarrassing - the bulk of the issue being inacurrate AF. I mean seriously there were a couple of nights where I shot almost 1500 pics and ~250 came out, out of which maybe ~100-150 were worth posting. Pretty ridiculous. On the contrary, I shot ~300 pics Saturday night and 193 of them were keepers. It's now becoming a question of having to weed em down. The key is the AF, which I read performs about the same as the 20D and 30D. Canon ftw.

srika

oh the other thing, I really need to get a 2.8 lens.. that'll be the next step.

Dan Martin

I think the next thing you should play with is adding some gels to your flash. Instead of the daylight balanced flash, you could add some different colors to closer match the lighting in the club. You could add an orange gel to give a little more warmth, or a blue one to cool things down. Not that there's anything wrong with the flash photos you've posted so far, but it would at least be something creative that you could experiment with.

fdl

Must have been using a very fast lens.

Dan Martin

He was probably using a flash.

fdl

Wouldn't the use of flash in that environment expose the subject or foreground, but then completely black out the background? This is the problem I have with using the flash, period.

synth19

I got on this thread kinda late... great pics and congrats on the sweeeet gig!!!!

srika

he had 2.8 and a flash

Dan Martin

If you use an auto mode, you'll usually get that. The trick is to use manual mode and control the exposure yourself.

Flash photography is a little different than available light photography. Here's an easy way to think of your exposure controls when shooting with the flash:
Aperture controls the depth of field.
Shutter speed and ISO control the ambient brightness.
Flash power controls the exposure of your subject.

Flashes freeze motion, so you can use a longer shutter speed and still have a sharp shot.

srika

, if you point the flash directly at the subject without using any diffuser. But, a flash is an absolute must - especially at a place like Spybar - most of the time I am shooting in darkness. That club doesn't have a lot of lights. So you put a diffuser on the flash (Stofen, Gary Fong, etc) and point the flash off to an angle (usually straight up, a little to the right, whatever works).

srika

hey Dan do you think that's whats going on here? this is the same place I shoot at a lot (Spybar) but the pics have a totally different look to em - I have been trying to figure it out.

http://www.sksphotography.com/galler...ham/index.html

srika

oh also - this is an absolute must - set 2nd curtain flash mode (on Nikon its called "SLOW" and "REAR"). When you do this, the flash will fire 2 times for each shot - the first is a pre-flash - then the main flash fires - the shutter is opened and closed as the light of the main flash is receding - that's what lets the background and ambient light into the picture and at the same time lights up the subjects. If you don't do this, the backgrounds will be very dark, if not black. This is actually more important than having the diffuser. Even if you don't have a diffuser you can still setup for bounce flash and just turn down the power. I usually have the flash power at about -1 to -1 2/3.

Another thing, while we are talking about exposure - most of the 5D reviews said the LCD isn't bright enough at its default setting, and so they usually increase its brightness a few notches. So I did this after getting mine. It didn't occur to me until this past weekend that this is a BAD THING to do! They LOOKED ok in the LCD after taking em - when in reality, they were underexposed and required PP. This may be obvious but I didn't know. Leave any LCD at the default brightness level - at least on a DSLR - I know some of the P&S's have auto-adjusting LCD's so those wouldn't be applicable.

Dan Martin

Diffusers are great, but only angle your flash if you're intending to bounce it off something. Otherwise, you're just wasting flash power.

Dan Martin

The few I looked at looks like he just bounced the flash. I didn't see anything that looked like it had a gel on the flash.

srika

thx dawg

Dan Martin

Second curtain or rear curtain flash mode lets you "drag the shutter" meaning the shutter will open to and start capturing ambient light, then the flash will fire just before the shutter closes. This freezes motion at the end of the frame and looks more natural. If you leave the flash in first curtain mode, then the flash will fire first and the shutter will remain open for the duration of the shot.

First curtain -- motion trails come out of the subject
Second curtain -- motion trails go into the subject

srika

yes, I do intend to bounce. I'm getting 400-500 flashes off one set of batteries - that is right in line - if not more - than what its rated at. I think cutting back on the power has something to do with it.

srika

odd. why do those pics have such a "warm" lighting look to em..

srika

hah thanks for the more technical analysis. lol.

Dan Martin

If the ceiling or wall you're bouncing off is anything but white, it will reflect some of the color when the flash hits it. You can tell there's no gel being used if you look at the hotter areas of the pic because they are white.

srika

yeah I see what you mean. I need to talk to her sometime and ask her what her secret is.

srika

Real World Denver promo event @ Crobar - I don't watch it but I did happen to catch one show a few weeks ago so I recognized the cast. Was cool to meet some of them.
http://www.delobbo.com/gallery2/v/12...denver_crobar/

pretty mad house party last night - I didn't intend to take any pix but it somehow came about.. this was after 3:30am - and pretty much everyone (inc myself) was lol
http://www.delobbo.com/gallery2/v/12..._holidayparty/

srika

I liked this shot from Spybar Friday night: They shoot napkins out of some machine a couple of times per night.

f/5.7 24mm 1/3s ISO 500 first-curtain flash


with a little filter action:


rest of the pix here:
http://www.delobbo.com/gallery2/v/12...lomojo_spybar/

Markus Schulz @ Vision:
http://www.delobbo.com/gallery2/v/12...schulz_vision/

wndrlst

I love the color version. That is awesome!

MeehowsBRZ

Srika, do you ever hit up Chicagolands #1 young adult, youth non-alcohol serving dance club Zero Gravity in Naperville. I hear its pretty sweet, I bet you could take some nice shots there.

srika

all the time, dawg.

srika

a few of my fav's from the weekend.

Timo Maas @ Crobar 12/29/06





Danny Howells @ Vision 12/30/06

einsatz

^ I'd hit it.
And do messy things to that beautiful face.

I think that second pic could make a cool flyer background with a few modifications.

srika

hahaah foool.. here's a few more in case you missed em from the New Year's thread.. yes Mizouse before you say anything lol the 2nd Tara pic is blurry, it was just how it came out..

full gallery here

Efrem Ramirez from Napoleon Dynamite, right after midnight






BT








there were about 4500 ppl here.. spread about 3 floors. wish I coulda taken a panorama shot of this, this is about 1/4 of the main floor, center. You can see more of it in the full gallery, page 2. there is also one (full) boob slip in the main gallery, but I'm not gonna tell you where it is. :P


AND in case you haven't seen it already, here is the most-watched Youtube video of 2006, from this event - 743,000+ views in 3 days. I am seen for a (very) short second at 0:38, holding my camera. :P