Today's guest blog is by Tony Urban, a photographer based in Western Pennsylvania. Tony specializes in High School Senior Portraiture. Please follow Tony on Twitter.

At least twice a week someone who has just learned that I'm a photographer responds to that information by telling me that their uncle/coworker/neighbor/dog walker/classmate/etc. is a photographer too. So how is a working, professional portrait artist with a legitimate business supposed to compete with all of the new shooters who are, quite often, working for free just because they “really like to take pictures”? There are several options, but one of them is to stop “taking” pictures and to start “making” portraits.

The word photography, as most know, is based on the Greek words “photos” (meaning light) and “graphe” (meaning drawing) – drawing with light. Despite that, many senior photographers ignore lighting when it comes to creating their images and as a result, they produce a style that can easily be reproduced by anyone with a “fancy camera”. With the proliferation of natural light photographers, it's more important then ever to have a stye that will set your work apart.

I'm a full time senior portrait photographer and over the past 2 years I've transitioned from being a “natural light” shooter to a photographer who drags around lights on every senior photo shoot. It doesn't matter if we're hiking into the forest or wading into the lake – if I'm making the portrait, I'm lighting it too. We might be shooting in “God's Studio”, but we're using my light to create the image.

On one hand, my business has almost doubled from the time I changed from natural light to controlling the light.

I've spent way too much money on lighting equipment over the past few years. Small flashes, studio strobes, Pocket Wizards, Radio Poppers, light stands, boom arms, sand bags, power packs, etc. Sometimes I carry my gear, others I use a modified golf cart. I use translucent umbrellas, soft boxes, octoboxes and beauty dishes all outside while shooting on location. Not only does this gear take the portraits to a level that is unattainable by the guy who just bought a D5000 and opened up his business, but it gives my clients more of a “model” experience and makes them more excited about the shoot.

Is lighting a big deal to my senior portrait clients? On one hand, my business has almost doubled from the time I changed from natural light to controlling the light. On the other, not a single client has ever looked at their photos and said, “Wow, that's some beautiful lighting!” To the average client, I suspect good light is appreciated on a subconscious level. It makes them enjoy and appreciate the photos more, even if they aren't sure why.

If you're a professional photographer you really should understand the basics of studio lighting and taking the knowledge and using it outdoors isn't as intimidating as it first appears. Basically, you just have to compensate for the sun/ambient light (a light meter comes in handy with this) and, you have to deal with wind, rain and whatever else Mother Nature decides to toss your way.

The Strobist website is a fantastic resource and you'll find exhaustive amounts of information there about lighting. I haven't even begun to read a fraction of what is discussed there because I usually prefer to learn by doing rather than studying, but it should still be the first stop for any photographer looking to take their lights into the great outdoors.

There's no magic bullet when it comes to lighting outside. Sometimes I use Nikon Speedlights and Radio Poppers. Sometimes I use White Lightning strobes and Pocket Wizards. Both have their pros and cons. Speedlights are lightweight and easily portable but might be lacking in power depending on what you want to do with them. Strobes have tons of power but can be bulky and you need to use portable power packs to run the lights.

Maybe even more important than the lights themselves is what you use to sculpt the light. I prefer Beauty Dishes as they typically give you the most “bang for your buck” in terms of power. I always use them with the diffusion sock on though to soft the light produced. I, personally, love soft light and find it flattering for most senior portrait clients. It's important that you don't get too caught up in “lighting” the portrait to remember all of the other technical areas which need to excel – the pose, the composition, the subject's expression, etc. You can create the most stunningly lit photo possible but your client isn't going to buy it if the pose makes them look chubby or if their smile is a little goofy. Portrait photography is about making your client look amazing and the lighting is just one part of that.

The best light you can use is simple – it's the one that gets the job done. Play with your lights, experiment, see what works best for you and your style of photography. Once you've mastered using one light outdoors, move on to 2 lights – or 3 or 4 – or go crazy like Joe McNally and use so many that you lose count. But when you're working with your seniors, remember that your goal is to make them look great. Use your lights to give them unique portraits that all of the weekend warriors wouldn't even try to create. Your lights can be another tool to take your work to the next level and to help your portrait business stand out amongst a rising sea of “shooters”.

Do you agree with Tony that lighting can be the biggest differentiator? Tell us how you distinguish your work from others? And if you enjoyed this post, please “Share The Knowledge” by clicking on one or more of the social media buttons you see below! Thank you.

This week, we'll have two blog posts from my friends from “down under.” Can you tell I've always wanted to use that expression? In all seriousness, though, this first one up is a guest post by David Robertson, a Canberra Wedding Photographer. Follow him on Twitter.

As photographers we’re fed this basic message that a bigger lens = better photos. Don’t get me wrong, I love shooting with good quality equipment but as soon as you replace a passion for knowledge with a passion for equipment you’ll find yourself frustrated when your photos aren’t improving and will get burnt out. As a young photographer I bought the gear that I had lusted after and spent thousands of dollars without even realizing that I can make some amazing photos when equipped with the right knowledge and understanding of light.

Lighting in photography is one of the most overlooked aspects by today’s photographers and even the ‘professional’ photographers. Amateurs and professionals alike are completely oblivious to the effects of light of the human body and how different lighting can reveal or hide things, tell a story and bring your subject to life. Through this article I’ll go over some very simple and basic natural lighting techniques that I use for 90% of the work I do.

Many photographers over chop their images to try to make up for their lack of ability to understand light. We’ve all seen those ‘professional’ wedding photos that really just make you cringe and die a little inside. The aim of my work is to provide a very exclusive and high end photography experience, not just great images and being able to utilize the available light to the best measures is absolutely essential to that.

Amateurs and professionals alike are completely oblivious to the effects of light of the human body and how different lighting can reveal or hide things, tell a story and bring your subject to life.

There are a few different factors to consider when you’re lighting for portraits; size, diffusion (hard or soft), color and angle. Before I take a single photograph I analyze the scene and choose one of the below based on the factors above.

Hard light – shoot into the sun with the subject in front of you. This prevents squinting, gives a great wrap around light and if exposed correctly can give you amazing results. If possible try avoid shooting with midday sun. I always get a few wedding clients every season boasting about how they’ve planned to have the ceremony at midday and how good the light is then. Truth is that it’s very hard to avoid making people look likes pandas when the sun is at its apex.

Soft Light – The easiest light to work with, there is usually no squinting of the eyes (important) and it gives really nice warm, soft skin tones. The clouds act as a massive softbox; it’s my preferred light to shoot with. Shoot with the subject facing the light source (sun behind clouds) to get the most of all the color in the eyes, catchlights from light source (sun) and the best skin tones.

Sounds too easy? Well, it kinda is really :)

I encourage you to buy a small mannequin or get a willing model and study the effects of light on the person in a room with a nice big window. Rotate around the model as you’re shooting and very carefully observe with your eyes all the subtle differences that occur when you change the angle of the light and position of yourself and the subject. You’ll soon find yourself being able to get familiar with the effects of light and in no time you’ll be a light connoisseur.

If I had known all the things I do now when I first started I could have saved myself a lot of stuffing around, I hope it helps you :)

Do you have a preference for hard or soft light? Sound off below and let us know. Tell us also why you like one over the other. What challenges do you face when photographing in different types of light.

JVS just me this video that I had to share with you. It gives you a glimpse of what to expect at his workshop. If you are coming to his Boston workshop, please let me know in the comments. Only a few spots remain.

If you are interested in joining us in Boston, use this link to register. Please enter “PICSESHU” in the “Enter Promo Code” box during step one of three on their shopping cart. The cart will automatically apply a $50 discount for the first 10 people to register.

Check out these links to learn more about JVS' Lighting Workshops and Wedding Photography:

Off-Camera Flash
1 Day Speedlites Workshop
JVS Wedding Photography

This is a guest post by Justin Van Leeuwen, an Ottawa-based portrait and wedding photographer trying to find his way through the sea of part time photo mommy-bloggers and seasoned, grumpy, veterans of the wedding profession. As a father of two photogenic sons, he loves spending his time with a camera in one hand and a beer in the other. In his spare timework week he labors for a local charity making sure they raise lots of money but was once fired from Best Buy for giving his supervisor the “double-middle” – which he does not regret.

I’ll preface this article to say that I’m new to the world of wedding photography, lighting, and portraiture in general. I have no classic schooling and have just studied, sought inspiration, and worked my butt off to the point that I’m at; and at this point, there’s a lot of room for improvement. I think, though, that I can help a lot of you out who are interested in a similar style of photography but just haven’t taken that plunge.

The Elinchrom Quadra System

This blog post will be about the Elinchrom Quadra system that I recently used at a wedding. The first question a lot of people ask me is why I got Quadra’s?  There are a million different light options out there and all I can say was that this was the right choice for me. You’ll have to do your own research when it comes to using lights more powerful than a speedlight.

In my own research I found blogs like www.strobist.com, www.zarias.com, & www.joemcnally.com invaluable – as I do every day.

Why not just use speedlights?

I can tell you, quite simply, it comes down to power. A Nikon or Canon or “other” speedlight just can’t come close to the quantity of light that a more powerful strobe like the Quadra’s can produce. If photography is all about ratio’s and f/stops of light that increase by doubling numbers then you’d need to double up your speedlights pretty fast to get the same power output that a Quadra system will offer you. If you’re thinking a good flash is $500 – how many of those flashes are you going to need to bungee together to just get one pop the equivalent of the Quadra’s? 4 … maybe 8? Right there you’ve paid for the bigger set with cash left over; so the decision is easily made to grab a good portable Elinchrom System.

Another thing I like about the Elinchrom lights is that it IS a system, a system that pre-exists with snooths, and grids, and softboxes that have been refined and perfected over the years. And with a few adapters I have access to every light modifier Elinchrom makes.

But, at this point I’m working on a very limited budget, I can’t very well afford every piece out there, and with limited (read: no) rental options available to me, it’s buy and try. Luckily there’s help if you know where to look: I put a Tweet out to the pro’s and asked, if they could have just one light mod for the Elinchrom system, which would it be?  Overwhelming response was the Deep Throat Octa (sexy no?).  The deep throat is great because it’s big, produces a wonderful quality of light close up, and can be easily used backed up to throw a strong (still pleasing) harsher and powerful light in the direction of your subjects.

That’s what I was working with going into this wedding: 1 Elinchrom Ranger Quadra set, 1 Deep Throat Octa, a light stand, a broken budget (don’t tell my wife!), an assistant, and a really windy day.

Lighting The Wedding Day

I’m determined to use quality lighting at my clients weddings. I think it brings a dimension that is not as easily replicated (as in you need the gear and know how to use it) and will help set me apart from other weekend warriors.

Pictured: me adjusting my blackrapid R-strap, with the Ranger Quadra & Deep Throat Octa (outer diffuser removed) on an Avenger C-stand. Photo by David Hicks.

As you can see in the above image, aside from me needing to lose some weight, I’ve removed the outer diffuser of the softbox. The reason for this was that the material does absorb about a stop of light, and since the day was quite sunny (though we weren’t shooting in full sun) I wanted the latitude to change my exposure on the pack and use less power. Using less power per flash would mean a faster recycle time and more “pops” on this formal portraiture shoot.

Setting all this up was dead-simple, the heaviest component being the C-stand (and you want a really good heavy stand when you spend this kind of cash credit on lights). It was sandbagged but, with a giant wind-sail like the Quadra attached it didn’t matter, it was a very windy day and we required someone to hold the stand at all times.

Pictured: The groom & his boys. Photo by Justin Van Leeuwen

I love the contrasty look that you can get by under-exposing the background of a daytime scene – it makes the blues of the sky so much richer, like how I remember them, or how I want to remember them.  It also serves to separate the foreground the lit elements (the wedding party), from the ambient light of the day: this really makes your subjects “pop” out of the image.

Pictured: The bride. Photo by Justin Van Leeuwen

There are some tricks here and I’ll run you through them.  Most people know by now – thanks to visionary teachers like David Hobby, Joe McNally, Syl Arena, and many others – that the ambient exposure is your “available” light and your flash can come in as a key light to add some ‘pop.’ The means to control how much pop is there is pretty simple – your shutter speed will control your ambient light (so 1/60th will let more ambient/available light in, and 1/250th less) while your aperture will control how much flash gets in (so f/2.8 will be brighter than f/8 assuming your flash power stays consistent). And the combination of these two that you choose will all be according to your tastes. Some like to keep the flash and ambient levels balanced to create a more natural look, while others, like me, like to pop it up.

Most digital SLR’s are limited in their ability to sync the flash with the shutter speed. 1/250th is pretty typical, though a lot of 5D users are more in the 1/160th range and others fall in-between. For your model be sure to RTFM. The reason for this is that your shutter doesn’t move fast enough to capture the full power of your flash – leaving a black, or dark, area having only exposed for the ambient light. But there are a few ways to cheat this and even use it to your advantage.

One way, when you’re shooting manual (which I always do for my lit portraits when not using a TTL flash system) is to just crank that shutter speed up anyways. 1/250th? HA – I LAUGH AT YOU! It’s called cheating the sync and, when done right, it looks like a strong vignette on your image.  When done wrong you have a horrible black bar across the frame. The thing to know is that whatever shutter speed you choose, will still expose the ambient, it’s the flash that won’t get captured in the region (the bottom of the frame).  So you can use it like I did here to still expose, but create a natural vignette highlighting the area of the subjects I wanted to focus on.

Pictured Bride & Bridesmaid the heavy vignette at the bottom is due to cheating the sync to 1/400th of a second, thus the flash exposure was never recorded at that lower portion of the frame. Photo by Justin Van Leeuwen

Others can manipulate this technique by turning their camera’s upside-down and letting that vignette hit only the sky – which is usually brighter anyways – or compose in a way that they’ll crop later.  Shooting on a now ancient 1DMKII, I didn’t have the MP to spare to crop down.

Another way to cheat the sync, and this I love, is to use a different kind of camera.  Point and shoots aren’t SLR’s right? So they’re not bound by the same “rule” of a max shutter speed because there’s no shutter – just a sensor. Sadly, i find, the cameras are still limited in their firmware to a number that is much lower than they’re capable of – if you’re using a TTL system a camera like the G11 is still limited to 1/250th or so. A camera like the G11 (or the Panasonic LX3 which I’ve also used) has a hot-shoe which allows me to put a remote trigger in it (like the Elinchrom skyport that triggers the Quadra flashes: very similar to a Pocket Wizard). The G11 was able to reach the shutter speeds I needed for the day (1/400th), to darken the sky, without the burden of worrying about a shutter vignette. In fact, I could have gone with an even FASTER shutter speed, effectively turning day to night if I really wanted to. To sweeten the deal, the G11 is 10MP (2MP more than the 1DMKII) or if you had a G10 that’s 15MP to put to use.

The groomsmen were shot at 1/1000th of a second. Two other images (above) were also shot with the G11.

Once I’ve figured out my ambient and ideal working aperture the rest of the shoot goes like any other, lock in your settings and keep the distance of light to subject consistent… except when the clouds cover the sun and you’re effectively starting from scratch because your ambient just went down a hole…

Lighting the Group

One thing a single speedlight can’t do very well is light a large group… heck, even a medium group it’d be struggling with if they were spread out.

Pictured: The Bridal Party. Photo by Justin Van Leeuwen

Another advantage to removing the outer diffuser panel of the Octa was that it also gave the light a bit more spread – not only would it carry farther, it would spread wider – allowing me to light the group who, otherwise, would have been in shade, unevenly lit and definitely not standing out.

Tearing Down

Packing up the Quadra is as easy as it is setting it up, except you’re no longer balancing exposures, you’re racing off to the ceremony that starts in 30 minutes.

For posterity, here’s a shot of the bride with the flash off, and the next on.

After the ceremony we were able to put the Quadra to use again in larger groups for the family formals.

The bride’s family.  Photo by Justin Van Leeuwen

Finally, I also added a “Photobooth” as an add-on benefit for your clients and a great point of sale for your business.  But I found that I need a good amount of clean, wrapping light to do it right – also to get a small enough aperture to capture depth in case someone does something crazy.

Wedding revelers don’t fit my 10’ seamless (which wasn’t seamless after this shot)

Full disclosure: Admittedly, I was inspired by “The Image is Found” Nate & Jacyln Kaiser who rock the Crazybooth like nobody’s business – actually they rock it like THEIR business. And you can buy their secret sauce recipe for how to do it right (which I don’t – YET) here.

What did I need?

An awesome assistant and second shooter.  Dave saved my ass that day; he held my lights up in some serious wind, and shot a bunch of photos that I would not have been able to when he wasn’t a living land-sail.  I’d argue a good 2nd shooter is always a valuable resource to have at a wedding for both you and your clients – they can also be someone to hold your lights – even better!

Pictured: David Hicks. Photo by Justin Van Leeuwen

Just to be clear, I did not use the Quadra, or any sort of strobes for many other parts of the wedding.  They were just a tool that I utilized to give my client a bit of a “studio” experience while producing images that, I hope, will set me apart from some of my competition.  The capital outlay wasn’t much more than some of those “L” Lenses I look at (and own), plus it gave us some images that were must haves for the wedding album, and even 12×18 print orders.

I still have a long way to go before I get what I’m really aiming for – these images aren’t perfect – and I can pick them apart.  I also welcome you to – seriously – let me know what you think, how they could have been improved, a light in the rear for separation? Shallower dof (you’d need ND filters for that) Just no comments on the subjects okay? They all look awesome.

If you have questions about this or anything else, I also welcome them.  You can reach me on twitter @justinvl or by email at justin.vanleeuwen AT gmail DOT com When I’m not taking care of my two kids and taking pictures of them, you can sometimes find me on my photography blog.

I think it was Zack Arias who lit a fire in me to think about off-camera lighting for my wedding and portrait photography. Since taking his workshop in Boston a few years back, I have been to a number of other workshops. I'll be happy to post a short list of those in a future blog post.

The one lighting workshop that always eluded me, however, was Joseph Victor Stefanchik's 1 Day Speedlites Workshop in Dallas. For a few years JVS, as he is called, only had these workshops in Texas. Now he and his lovely wife Anne are now taking these workshops on the road.

The one in Boston will be on August 26th. It will be held at LensProToGo‘s amazing warehouse space in Concord, Massachusetts. Learn more about these workshops.

JVS and Anne publish a blog called Off Camera Flash. You may want to bookmark it as it is one of my go-to-blogs for inspiration. Check out the images posted there and at his wedding website.

The word – “excited” – is a bit of an understatement. I spoke with JVS about this workshop and he promises me that he will elevate my ability to craft images with light and depth. The cost of the workshop is $500. It's a long, intensive day where you can expect to start using one-light and then two-lights and by the end of the course, three-lights. Class size will be small – no more than 15 people. The bonus is a PDF that JVS and Anne custom-design from the workshop that you attended with images, lighting diagrams and a list of equipment used for each example. This dedication to their craft and to their students alone convinced me that these guys are the real deal.

If you are interested in this Boston workshop by JVS & Anne, use this link to register. Please enter “PICSESHU” in the “Enter Promo Code” box during step one of three on their shopping cart. The cart will automatically apply a $50 discount for the first 10 people to register.

Yes, we are all inundated with requests to attend photography workshops all the time. Which ones are going to hit the mark … for you?

No easy answer to that one. However, here are the steps I usually take when I am considering a photography or lighting workshop of any kind:

1) I outline my immediate needs to grow as a photographer
2) Research the forums to see what is being said about a workshop I want to attend
3) Ask my peers if they have attended the workshop you are considering
4) Get a sense of who the instructor(s) are and what their goals for the workshop will be
5) Look for a way of following up after the workshop

Full disclosure: If I get 10 people to register using the link above, my registration fee will be complimentary. So, yes there is vested interest in plugging this workshop, but people who know me even remotely will tell you that I promote products and/or services that are only of a very high standard.

I hope you will join me in Boston on August 26th. We have much to learn … together!