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Lighting for digital Dave Montizambert - The Pie Plate Illusionist - part 4 of 1 2 3 4

by Dave Montizambert Published 01/12/2009

My reason for lighting the background with a long tungsten exposure was not just to get a funky backdrop white balance, it also allowed me to capture some blur movement in the shot as well. It works like this: the camera shutter opens triggering a burst of light from the studio strobes, freezing Cheyanne wherever these lights strike her; the shutter continues to stay open burning in the background for a half second. If Cheyanne is moving as in Image 8, she will be frozen by the strobes but will blur at her edges where the background exposure eats into her form. The LR12 Lightrein lights have a very powerful, 650watt modeling lamp, I use them for shooting video (can use all of my still photography soft boxes too for video) and love them for shooting portraits since they make viewing the subject lighting easy. Most studio strobes do not have such strong modeling lamps, 250watt is more common. With a less strong modeling lamp, use longer shutter speeds and if this gives too much movement, then have your subject move less or more slowly.

Playing with movement using this 'pop and drag' technique is hit and miss and was a little scary back in the days of film since you couldn't view your results before striking the set and kissing the talent good-bye, but with digital all that has changed, instant preview lets you stay on top of it and makes you more likely to experiment. It definitely takes much of the stress out of winging it.

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1st Published 01/12/2009
last update 09/12/2022 14:57:58

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