• A bike company selling the idea of a frame that’s so light you won’t feel its weight
• A company specialising in sports health food and drink who wish to emphasize that it’s the athlete who succeeds, not the equipment.

Technically it wasn’t easy to produce so it’s a perfect subject for one of my anatomies.

The Cyclist

The shot of the cyclist was taken in a studio environment against a white backdrop. I used white rather than a green to eliminate any colour spill onto the subject. She was shot on a real cycle (secured on a home bicycle trainer) so as to ensure that she was in the correct anatomical position, and I shot her from lots of different angles to give me greater flexibility when creating the composite.

Examples of the studio shots

The problem with this approach is that the cycle covers up various parts of her body, so I then had her cycle her legs in the air and hold invisible handles so that I’d have the body parts that I would need to create the final image. These extra images were taken from the same position as when she was on the bike to ensure that the lighting was the identical.

The extracted cyclist. The bike covers up lots of the body.

Shots taken without the bike so that I've have body parts available during retouching

I don’t think the model really understood what my final aim was, so she may have felt a little silly complying with my bizarre requests!

For the lighting I relied upon my faithful ProFoto AcuteB strobes for the key light, and an SB900 for the rim light. The two were set off together using the new Nikon version of the PocketWizard FlexTL radio triggers.

Note that the decision to use a rim light was chosen to give greater three dimensional modeling to the image. This was done at the expense of a more flawless composition since there wouldn’t really be both a main light and a rim light in a natural environment (there’s only one Sun). In my image of the tennis player I was very careful about using one light since I wanted to create the most convincing image possible. In contrast, this image of an invisible bike is clearly impossible to start with and so I allowed myself a little more creative license. Nevertheless, to the untrained eye the rim light isn’t a noticeable giveaway…

The road

With the cyclist images in the bag I then hunted down roads that would be suitable. I knew what sort of thing I was looking for so used a number of scouting methods to find it: Google Earthing the local area, asking my entourage and just generally keeping an eye out when out and about. Eventually this road appealed to me.

As with the cyclist image I took the road from various angles so that I’d have an image that matched up with the angle of the cyclist image that I’d ultimately choose.

The backdrop

The backdrop of the road image lacked impact, so I decided to replace it. I tried quite a few candidates, from hills to mountains, but the green hills you see in the final result look best. It’s actually a snapshot that I took way back in 2004 while on holiday in Cyprus, just as I was getting involved in digital photography! The position of the sun produces a convincing look (to the untrained eye) whilst still adding some nice drama.

Putting it all together

Creating the composition took about a day and a half. The cyclist photo had to be chosen, extracted and then composited with various body parts to remove the bike. I originally had a false start in that the image I’d chosen looked great with the cyclist on the bike, however it looked very strange with the bike removed.

Once a better image had been chosen a suitable road image was used to match the angle of the cyclist, and she was blended into the image. The backdrop complete the composition, and the color toning finished off the image.

How can a proud father put photos of his children on his blog while still servicing the thirst for knowledge that his readership demands? I figured that this dilemma was justification enough to buy Nikon’s gorgeous new 85mm f/1.4G lens and put it through its paces.

Used wide open – which is what this lens is for – the 85mm produces beautiful dreamy images with sumptuously creamy bokeh. On a full frame body its the perfect focal length for a wide variety of portrait work, and after a few shots it instantly became my favourite lens.

I wish I could add something more useful for you, but what more can I say? There are lots of technical sites that demonstrate how incredibly sharp this lens is, and how perfect the corners are, how great the colour rendition is, and how well built it is; that’s all great stuff. What’s really important for me though is that only a super-wide 85mm can give this unique look, and that’s why I bought it.

Here then are a couple of family snapshots taken with my new toy. For the technicians, you’ll may like to know that the lighting is provided by an off-camera SB900 bounced off a wall and an on-camera SB700. Quick and simple, but effective.

Clovis and mum. Melty heart and melt-away background.

Big sister. Three and a half, going on ten.

Then in September last year I switched to Nikon. The reasons for this had nothing to do with flash, however as a result of the switch I’ve spent a lot of time familiarising myself with the Nikon system. I thought it might interest some of you to understand how the systems vary from the point of view of someone who has (now) used both extensively.

First off let me state that I personally find that both systems give me good results in terms of TTL flash exposure – neither are perfect, and with both systems the use of flash exposure compensation under various lighting conditions will be a necessity, but I don’t find one system better than the other in this regard. Rather, it’s the differences in usage that are actually fairly significant, and this is what I’ll be discussing.

Ambiant vs. Flash control

One of the biggest differences concerns how the two systems give you control over the ambient vs. the flash exposure.

The Canon system completely separates the two exposures, such that any changes made using the exposure compensation dial will only alter the shutter speed/aperture combination – the flash exposure is not altered. To change the flash exposure the user must use the Flash Exposure Compensation (FEC) setting.

Nikon have taken another approach. The camera’s exposure compensation dial affects the whole image, so any changes made will affect both the “background” ambient and the flash exposure simultaneously. The FEC setting, on the other hand, will only affect the flash.

Bumping up or down the background exposure relative to the flash exposure is something that I do all the time. With Canon, the separation of these controls makes this very easy. With the Nikon system such a manipulation would possibly require a change to the global exposure (ambient light and flash) followed by a further change to the flash exposure to put it back where it was before.

I say “possibly” because personally I work with the camera in manual mode 95% of the time. In this case one can therefore continue to control the ambient exposure by adjusting the shutter speed and aperture, and then use either the FEC or standard exposure compensation to adjust the flash.

My opinion is that Canon’s approach is to be preferred, it’s simpler and less fiddly.

Remote TTL

Both Canon and Nikon systems provide the ability to control groups of remote off-camera flashes, both using TTL for the flash exposure or by offering the ability to adjust the manual power of the flashes from the camera position. There are however major differences in how this is handled by each system.

The Canon system provides for 3 groups of flashes. In TTL mode Groups A and B are intended to light the main subject, and group C is independent. The flash exposure of the A/B groups is calculated such that together they correctly expose for the subject, however the A:B ratio can be easily changed by the user, and the FEC can be used to affect the exposure of the combined A/B group. In manual mode each group must be controlled independently. It’s not possible to combine TTL and manual modes.

Nikon have taken a more flexible approach to remote flash control. There are 3 remote groups + the master flash, and each can be placed into either TTL or manual. The FEC (for TTL mode) or the power level (for manual mode) can be adjusted separately for each group (or the master flash).

In my opinion the Nikon SB900 master is considerably easier to use than the Canon 580EX – the rear control screen has been very well designed in this regard. I also love the flexibility of the Nikon approach, and the independent control over each group.

Although Nikon’s flexible system would allow me to light independent subjects using different TTL groups, this would be an incredibly rare thing for me to do. Rather, the different TTL groups will typically be pointing at the same subject from different directions, and in this far more common scenario I like the ability to quickly change the ratio of the lights. Canon’s system makes this trivially simple, where’s Nikon’s makes this a little harder than necessary since each group will have to be changed individually.

Clearly Nikon themselves have realised this too since the A:B ratio mode is now available on the new mid-range SB700. Unfortunately the SB700 doesn’t allow for a combination of manual and TTL groups, so where it gains is flexibility in one area it loses in the other.

Assuming that the replacement for the SB900 keeps its existing flexibility whilst also providing the new ratio mode of the SB700, Nikon will win the remote TTL game hands down.

FEC

The two systems handle flash exposure compensation very differently, and for Nikon’s pro-body users it’s a bit of a kick in the teeth.

Canon offers a FEC control on both the camera body and their external on-camera flash units. Any changes that you make using the external flash unit will override the camera’s own setting. When using multiple off camera flashes separated into difference groups, the FEC will affect the A and B groups simultaneously.

Nikon’s approach is to offer an independent FEC control for each remote group (and another for the master flash) that can be controlled via the master flash unit. The on-body FEC has a cumulative effect with the FEC values that have been set on the master flash.  This allows you to control the FEC of all the groups simultaneously via the camera body, and to adjust individual groups using the master flash unit. Note that it’s not possible to change the FEC globally for all groups using the master flash unit itself.

As a side effect of this approach, the Nikon system also benefits from a greater range of FEC. The flash offers ±3ev of compensation and the camera body offers -3ev to +1ev – since they are added together this in gives a theoretical range of -6ev to +4ev. With the camera in manual mode the global exposure compensation is also added to the mix, giving a total range of -11ev to +9ev. Obviously this can’t be achieved in practice.

If this were the situation for all Nikon bodies then Nikon’s approach would be the better one to my mind, however they’ve thrown a huge spanner into the works for pro-body users. Specifically, since there’s no on-camera flash on D3-series bodies, Nikon didn’t see fit to provide users with any on-camera flash exposure compensation. As a result of this decision, when working with the camera in a semi-automatic mode remote flash work becomes rather more complicated:

• It is not possible to adjust the flash compensation for ALL the remote flash groups simultaneously – each group has to be adjusted one at a time.

• Accessing the flash compensation on the flash is slower and more awkward than access via the camera body.

• D3-series users don’t benefit from the extended FEC range.

Note that there is a partial workaround for these issues, and that’s to place the camera into manual mode. In this situation the standard exposure compensation will continue to affect the flash exposure as explained above.

That said, the primary situation in which one uses TTL flash rather than manual flash is one in which the lighting conditions are changing – and in many of these situations the semi-automatic modes may also be useful for handling changes to the ambient exposure.

Rear curtain sync

There is one final detail that’s worthy of note: Nikon support rear curtain sync with their off camera flashes, whereas Canon don’t.

Conclusion

It’s hard to really say if one system is better than the other, but here are my personal conclusions after using both systems:

• The Nikon system is considerably more flexible in terms of remote flash control, and that’s a very good thing.
• The Nikon system is also far more user friendly.
• Canon’s ratio control of remote flashes provides for quicker control over the common case scenario. I hope that Nikon add this to their top-of-the range flash quickly.
• In semi-automatic camera modes, Canon’s separation of ambient and flash exposure is preferable. In manual mode there’s no difference, but I still find it clunky to adjust the flash exposure using the global exposure compensation.
• The lack of FEC on Nikon’s D3-series bodies is a significant oversight. Canon’s pro-bodies have on-body FEC.
• Nikon’s rear-curtain sync for remote flashes is a nice advantage.

Prior to switching to Nikon from Canon I compared the lens line-ups of the two systems to make sure that I wasn’t shooting myself in the foot.

I couldn’t find a decent comparison, so I thought it might benefit some of you if I were to post one here. The comparison is based on the current lens line-ups of the two companies. In cases where both a new version of a lens and the old version are still listed I’ve only included the new version.

I’ve tried to match lenses in each system to their nearest equivalent. The prices are from B&H at the time of writing, and are really there as a point of comparison.

All add my personal observations on the line ups at the end.

Note that users of the RSS feed may find the table easier to look at directly on the site…

Canon have the most complete lens line-up, however in reality most photographer’s won’t notice this since both companies address the needs of most photographers. Here though are the most important advantages that I notice:

• Canon’s range of primes is more up to date, with many more lenses using USM/SW motors than the Nikon equivalents.
• Canon offer more options for the popular 70-200mm range, including all the permutations of f/2.8, f/4, stabilized or not. Nikon only offer a stabilized f/2.8 which may be too heavy for some uses.
• Canon offer an f/4 version of their 400mm lens which is significantly cheaper than the f/2.8 version from either company.
• If you’re a macro shooter, only Canon offer a true macro lens with the MP-E 65mm.
• Canon now have a fisheye zoom.
• Nikon are more expensive, and this is especially true for the super telephoto lenses.

Nikon does have a couple of tricks up its sleeve though:

• The 14-24mm. Need I say more?
• They have a better range of DX (EF-S) format lenses, no doubt as a result of the amount of time that they took to enter the full frame market.

I don’t think that my reasons for switching will apply to many other photographers, but I’ll explain my choice for those that are interested.

My decision to change system was a very hard one. Canon offer many compelling reasons to stay with them:

• Canon Inc.’s immense size gives them a research and development capacity that dwarfs Nikon’s. It allowed them rule the autofocus domain for years and to be first to market with full frame and high-definition video. This has given Canon shooters real advantages over their Nikon competitors.
• Canon’s system is, as a whole, better value than Nikon’s – equivalent lenses are often substantially less expensive.
• Canon also offers a larger range of lenses, including a series of f/4 L lenses that have proved extremely popular with those that need to reduce the weight of their gear. They have a better range of primes, and the latest 8-15mm fisheye zoom shows that they’re still innovating, whereas Nikon are still playing catchup in terms of the range of lenses on offer (but not in terms of quality).
• Most 3rd party developers release products for Canon first. The ControlTL PocketWizards spring forth as an immediate – and important – example.

Nikon, on the other hand, doesn’t have any big advantages like these. To remain competitive they’ve had to play with our hearts; they make great bodies, and they haven’t reserved high end features such as state-of-the-art autofocus and weatherproofing for their pro bodies. Nikon’s reputed for their ability to listen to photographer’s needs, and I believe that’s what’s kept them firmly in the game.

Nevertheless, now that Nikon have caught up in sensor technology it does finally seem that Canon is finally having to compete in these other aspects too. The Canon 7D is well built and feature packed (although they still haven’t put in pro level AF….).

So, given the fact that we have the most equal playing field that we’ve seen for years, why would I want to switch now?

My problem is that Canon have separated their professional users into two categories, providing a body for each of them:

• The 1D meets the needs of sports shooters and photojournalists to due its high frame rates and 1.3 crop ratio. The 1.3 crop is a great compromise, adding more reach whilst leaving enough space on the sensor for better quality pixels than on an APS-C sensor.
• The 1Ds is a great studio and landscape camera. Canon are clearly doing their best to take some of the medium format market, adding as many pixels as they can to the full frame sensor. Speed is therefore not the objective of this camera, and the frame rate is half that of the 1Ds.

The separation is an intelligent one, and I believe it benefits most of Canon’s professional users. Unfortunately it doesn’t benefit my work. I need a full frame performance camera. I want full frame for the image quality, the shallower depth of field and most importantly the wide angle lenses. I need performance because my subjects move – often very fast. In other words I need either a full frame 1D or a fast 1Ds, and I don’t think either of those are on the table just yet because the current dual line up makes sense.

I’ve been making do with the 5D Mk II because there’s no where else for me to go in the Canon line-up. The 1D isn’t an option for me at all due to the crop factor, and the 1Ds would be an extremely expensive investment considering the frame rate would still be limiting me on some shoots. A fast EF-S body with appropriate wide angle lenses could have been a begrudged compromise, but even that isn’t an option since Canon haven’t put their 1D autofocus onto any EF-S cameras.

It’s principally this problematic that’s forced me into this position. Nikon has a full-frame body designed for performance – the D3s – whereas Canon doesn’t. It probably seems like an insignificant problem to most photographers, and it may seem wildly excessive to change systems, but a glance at my portfolio shows that I use a lot of wide angles, and shoot a lot of movement. I want to get the best images possible for the work that I do and the limitations of my 5D Mk II are having a direct impact on my ability to capture images. I have to change it now – either I compromise in my choice of 1D body, or I move to the system that’s best adapted to my needs.

I don’t like compromising my work…

Update: I’ve removed most of this post since I’ve found a dealer who’ll give me a very good price on all my Canon gear.

Chase produces very high end – and high budget – photography, and this shows with the gear that the team are using. For example, the two field drives are G-Tech 256GB SSDs, and at $1200 each they’re worth significantly more that the MacBook Pro itself!

Chase knows this though, and he makes a very important statement at the end of the video when he says “everything I say here is scalable, and you need to design your backup solutions for your needs”. Storage and Backup are vital, but the workflow can be scaled up or down based on requirements and budget. There’s no single “right” solution for that’ll work for everyone, but there’ll certainly be a solution that’s right for you.

I thought it might be interesting to describe – with far less grace and without the cool little graphic doodles – the workflow that I use. I hope it’ll prove interesting for other photographers who have comparable budgets to myself. I’ll compare my workflow to Chase’s so that you can see how the key ideas are the same, even if the gear isn’t.

In the field – Key concept: backup multiple copies immediately

In the field Chase ingests his photos into Aperture using a fast firewire compact flash reader and has them copied onto two daisy-chained SSDs. The images are therefore backed up onto each SSD and (I assume) the hard drive of the computer – three copies in total. Since SSDs have no moving parts they are an ideal storage solution when travelling.

I ingest my images using Lightroom (obviously!) and have them backed up to an external 2.5″ rugged hard drive. Once that’s done I then stick my compact flash card into a NextoDi backup device. This little gadget copies the photos off the card extremely quickly and performs a hardware verification of the data. The end result is that I also have three backups.

Chase’s SSDs look fantastic, but my rugged hard drive is much cheaper. It’s also very small and light; for my work size and space are of paramount importance, especially when trying to fit everything into a rucksack. Although there’s more risk of mechanical failure with a traditional harddrive that with an SSD it’s still slight and with 3 backups I’m secure. That said, SSDs will be cheap enough to make them a no-brainer in a few years time.

Why a NextoDi rather than a second exernal hard drive on my MacBook Pro? Well, if the MacBook Pro breaks down, crashes, smashes, bursts into flames or simply runs out of power I can continue to backup my work. In fact I think that this feature is so important that I’ll undoubtedly invest in a second NextoDi in order to ensure that I can continue to back up 2 copies if the laptop fails – never be afraid to evolve your workflow.

Also worthy of note is that my external hard drive is partitioned, and a SuperDuper’d copy of the MacBook pro has been placed on one of the partitions. If the Macbook Pro’s hard drive fails I can boot from this and continue to work.

Base Camp – Key concept: back up your work in progress

Back at base camp Chase copies his field drive to a G-Tech 2TB G-Safe. A lovely piece of kit. With one copy procedure he gets two backups (thanks to the RAID setup), each of which shares a room with a different person on the team.

I think that different photographers will have different needs when it comes to making backups at base camp. Personally I use fields drives that are big enough to hold the data for the entire shoot, so I don’t need to make any further copies. Once again the idea is to travel light. For very big shoots I can certainly understand Chase’s approach however.

If working with an assistant then separating the drives is definitely worthwhile – the biggest risk being an opportunist thief.

The Studio – Key concept: backup, backup, backup.

In an environment such as Chase’s, where there’s an entire team of people working at the studio, a central server is an absolutely requirement. But many photographers, including myself, work alone from either a home studio or a small office – in this case we can limit our expenditure whilst still protecting our work.

I use a powerful Mac Pro with a 30″ NEC Spectraview as my central workstation. A fast computer is essential when working with the large files such as those generated by a 5D Mk II. In terms of data storage, it’s set up in a particular way:

• Data is stored internally on 3 “enterprise level” 2TB hard drives in a striped RAID (very fast data transfer, but if one fails everything’s lost). I don’t physically separate RAW files from “Live work” but I do work non-destructively, so the RAWs never get modified.
• The boot drive is an SSD and doesn’t contain any photographic data, but it does contain most other things (accounts, emails, etc).
• A 4th internal hard drive (actually the machine’s original boot drive) is used as a Time Machine back for the boot drive. Time Machine’s great.

The 3 2TB hard drives form a single data partition, and every night this partition is SuperDuper’d to a partition on an external Drobo while I’m tucked up in bed. The same is true of the boot drive.

Note than when I get back to the studio after a shoot the images from one of the field drives are copied to the Mac Pro, but the field drives aren’t emptied until this data had been backed up over night. Typically, they aren’t emptied until the next shoot, just as an extra safeguard.

For those that are interested in maximising the performance of their Mac for photography I highly recommend reading the Mac Performance Guide by Lloyd Chambers. Chamber’s explains how he configures his data drive on a Mac Pro, and also the reasons behind the the stripped RAID that I’ve adopted.

At this stage I have my data backed up twice – once internally and once on the Drobo. This does not suffice. As Chase also states an off-site backup is an absolute necessity. You must protect your data from fire, theft, flooding or any of the other unpleasant things that might happen to you. I keep my data backed up on an external hard drive at a friends house, and I keep his at my studio.

So I’ll leave you with my last words of wisdom – “3 backups, one off site. No less.”

1. Chase – how did you do those cool little graphic animations?

Carrying camera gear into nature’s more wild expanses is always problematic. It’s heavy, it’s big and it needs to be carried with a certain amount of equipment needed for the trip itself – extra clothing, food, first aid kits, etc.  The problems can often be mitigated to a large extent when working with assistants that can help share the load, but even this plan can fail since more assistants often means that there’s more opportunity to carry even more gear!

The ugly reality of the situation is that there are very few good carrying options on the market today. Lowepro have the biggest range of rucksacks but personally I’ve never found them to be comfortable with heavy loads – they’re camera bags first and back packs second. To make matters worse most of them don’t leave any room for non-camera related essentials.

It was therefore very intrigued when I came across a fairly new company called F-Stop Gear that makes a couple of camera back packs specifically designed for the outdoor photographer: the day-sized Tilopa and the expedition sized Satori.

Both packs are based on the same premise – they are extremely good back packs in their own right, and they are specifically designed to hold an “Internal Camera Unit” – or ICU – to carry the camera. F-Stop gear provides two ICUs – a large model and an extra large model. Both packs will hold either ICU, but obviously the extra large one leaves less space for other equipment. The Tilopa is supplied with the large ICU and the Saturi with the extra large.

I spent a long time trying to decide which of the two packs to buy, but in the end I went with the Tilopa. It’s big enough for a day’s commercial shoot on the hills, but not so big that I’d be tempted to overfill it and risk carrying a silly amount of weight.

My main concern was whether or not the large ICU would be big enough for a typical trip, however my fears were lain to rest this week when I packed the sack for it’s first call of duty. In the ICU I had:

• 1 Canon 5DMkII with battery grip
• 1 Canon 70-200 f/2.8 IS L
• 1 Canon 24-70 f/2.8 L
• 1 Canon 16-35 f/2.8 L
• 1 Sigma 15mm fisheye
• Lens hoods for all the above
• A pocket wizard Flex transceiver/transmitter kit
• 1 Canon 430EX Mk II
• 1 Nextodi (to back up memory cards)
• 1 Manfrotto Mini tripod

Outside of the ICU I had room for:

• Lunch
• A Gortex jacket
• A fleece jacket
• Hat and gloves
• Map/compass
• Walki-Talkies
• iPhone
• Leatherman
• First aid kit
• Waterbottle (in side pocket)

Needless to say, there’s plenty of room in this sack!  But space isn’t everything, and the Tilopa just kept on delivering the goodies.  Here are the things that I just love about this pack:

• First and foremost the Tipola is a great back pack in it’s own right.  There’s an internal metal structure to place most of the weight of the sack onto the hips, and the hip belt is adequately padded and very comfortable to wear.  The above gear weighed 12kg (26lb) and I was fine carrying it.
• Most camera packs offer easy access to gear, but with the Tilopa (and Satori) access to the gear is from the back of the pack.  This means that it’s the front of the sack that gets put onto the wet/muddy ground – the back stays clean.   Access to the top is also designed around this concept.
• Opening the back access is easy thanks to a nice rounded zip that avoids sharp corners.
• The pack’s flat bottom means that is can be stood upright.
• The shoulder straps are perfectly shaped for maximum comfort.
• There are pockets galore.
• The 3 colours in the range are great choices.  The black makes this pack a great choice as a camera back pack for street use.  The red is ideal for the mountain where high visibility is important and the foliage green will appeal to wildlife photographers.
• The pocket on the hip belt fits an iPhone very nicely:)

All considered this is the best and most comfortable back pack that I’ve used.   I was also pleased to discover that their customer service was both speedy and competent.

F-stop gear offers free worldwide delivery, however I wanted to avoid the complications of import duty to France so I bought the sack from their German distributor.  My only complaint is that this was a fairly complex and frustrating event – they don’t even take credit cards!  Still, once the transaction was made the bag was delivered promptly.

Many photographic workshops are aimed at newcomers who seek basic guidance and support, covering entry-level subjects such as exposure, composition “rules” and simple post-processing techniques. My objective is different — to address the needs of intermediate and advanced shooters who wish to push themselves further and overcome any hurdles that are preventing their progression.

With this in mind I have chosen not to offer a rigid menu of predefined workshops. Instead, I will discuss your requirements with you in advance so that each workshop will be a unique experience designed to meet the specific needs of its participants. Nothing is fixed — the dates, course content, duration and even the location are all open to discussion (and guidance).

You can browse the list subject areas that I’m currently proposing on my workshops site. If you have other needs then please feel free to contact me.

To get the ball rolling I’ve decided to offer a 20% discount on the first five bookings for 2010.

I thought it might be interesting for some of you if I explain how this image of a tennis player diving for the ball was created, starting with the concept and working through to the the post-production.

Concept

Once the initial idea for the photo had been conceived (and having the idea is often the biggest challenge) the first step was to determine exactly how to achieve the result.  In this case I clearly couldn’t ask a model to dive onto a real tennis court (that’d hurt I would think…), so the only option left open to me was to produce a composite image.

As with all commercial-style shoots it’s important to pre-visualise the final image since this will guide the choice of location, the model, the clothing, etc. In the case of a composite image this pre-visualisation becomes absolutely critical; if the result is to be successful each of the individual images needs to be taken under similar conditions.  If the perspective of each subject isn’t consistent, the depth of field doesn’t match or the lighting is too different then the final result won’t be convincing.  It’s not feasible to undertake a project of this nature without having a good idea of what the final image will look like.

Planning

I knew that I wanted to use a wide angle lens with the tennis player close to the camera for a more dramatic perspective, and this implied a number of important considerations:

• I would need a very wide chroma key (“green screen”) backdrop.
• I would therefore need a fairly large studio.
• The perspective distortion would be strong, so it would be very important that the photo of the tennis court be taken at the same focal length as the photo of the player so that I could place the player at the correct distance into the image.

Unfortunately I didn’t have access to a green screen as wide as I needed, so I had to improvise.  I ordered a 1.2m x 15m roll of “Fadeless Art Paper”¹ so that I could stick it up on the wall using masking tape.  I didn’t expect this to be ideal (and I was right!) however I was prepared to spend a little more time in post-production to work around any problems.

Other than the backdrop issue there were many other things to think about – even a small scale shoot like this one needs careful planning.  Here’s an non-exhaustive list of the things that I needed to consider or remember to bring along:

• The date and time: the studio, the model and myself all needed to be available at the same time.
• The camera equipment: which lenses and strobes would I need to bring along? I have a very long equipment check list that I use when planning a shoot.
• The model’s comfort: food and drink (I made a quiche), access to toilets, a place to change, etc.  Also, in this case, a mattress to land on!
• Setting up: It’s the simple things that are easy to forget – masking tape, scissors and a step ladder for  putting up the backdrop for example.

The “Dive” Shoot

The "dive"

I planned to give myself an hour of set-up time before the talent arrived, however I was lucky enough to find a great model who wanted to be involved in the whole process.   She arrived early to help me unpack the car and prepare the equipment.  Without her help putting the backdrop in place would have been a horrendous experience – thanks Selma!

I’d bought 2 mattresses and a thick double duvet to use as a landing pad.  I positioned these at the angle that I wished to take the photo and moved them as far away from the “green screen” as I could.  The combination of a wide angle lens, a very wide subject (model horizontally out-stretched with a tennis racket) and close shooting distance meant that I couldn’t get as much separation as I’d have liked, so the green would inevitably “spill” onto the model and increase the post-processing time.  The main light also cast a shadow on the backdrop (although that isn’t too hard to handle later).

The lighting setup was fairly classic.  I used two monobloc flashes to light the backdrop as evenly as possible.  The main light was a Profoto AcuteB with the “New Zoom Reflector”, placed just left of camera and just high enough to put a catch light in the model’s eyes.  I planned to use another AcuteB as a fill light but it wasn’t necessary in the end (the white walls did that for me).  Rather than let it go unused I was able to use both power packs together for the main light (a dual tube Acute “Twin” head) allowing me to reduce the flash duration to better freeze the model in mid-air.  Finally, a Canon 580EX with a C.T.O. gel used as a kicker gave a slight separation.  All the flashes were set off simultaneously using PocketWizard radios.

After an hour’s set-up time we were ready to shoot.  Once again I was lucky to have been blessed with a great and enthusiastic model.  She took a 10 minute jog to get the sweat going a little, and then proceeded to take 70 (yes, seventy.) dives onto the landing pad.

My 5D MKII was tethered to my Macbook Pro, and the images were bought into Lightroom² so that she could see her body position and facial expressions.  This sort of direct feed back really helps to get the talent involved in the shoot, helping them to help you.

At the end of the shoot I took an image of a tennis ball under exactly the same lighting conditions.  This would facilitate the composition later on.

The “Tennis Court” Shoot

The tennis court

The choice of court would have an huge effect on the final image.  Since I wanted a slightly gritty/hard feel to the image I found a court that would suit that look.

The light falling onto the court was very flat – not at all like the hard light falling on the model – but that actually gave me more opportunity to control the image in post-production, and for the look I was after the flat light was more appropriate.  Had I wished for more lighting consistency it would have been crucial that the light was coming from the same direction as the light on the model (and that would have cast my shadow on the ground, complicating things a little).

The only major shooting considerations were therefore the focal length and aperture (which needed to be the same as that used in the studio), the focal point and the angle of view.

Post Production

I personally use Lightroom to catalogue and rate my images, so the very first step was to bring the images into my main catalogue. Once this was done I selected the images that would be used in the composite.

To choose my selects I use an iterative process.  On the first run through I give one star to all the images that have any possibility of being selected (in this case filtering out the ones where there model has already landed or where she wasn’t placed correctly in front of the green screen, etc).

I then filter for only these images and go through again to find the 2-star images – this is possible now that I have a familiarity with all the images in the collection.

In the third iteration I find the best images from the collection and I also check for critical focus.  If necessary a fourth iteration will leave me with just a few images to select from.  For this shoot the body position and facial expression were the two most important criteria.

Once I had my “dive” shot selected I bought it into Photoshop to remove the green screen (and the green spill).  This is a critical step, a badly cut out image will destroy the final effect.  Delivering a well-executed composite image requires a fair amount of post-processing experience and familiarity with your editing application (Photoshop in my case).

The tennis court also received some retouching to remove the fussy background. I wanted a clean image in which there weren’t lots of details fighting for the user’s attention.

The resulting composition is achieved using a fair number of layers in Photoshop.  Good use of layers ensures that the composition is created non-destructively so that it can be tweaked until it’s right.  The three principal images (court, talent and ball) are included as smart objects so that they can be transformed and retouched many times without compromising the image quality.

Here’s a look at the resulting layers palette to give you a feel for the work involved. Bear in mind that some of the work isn’t visible here since it’s inside the smart objects (the green-screen masking, for example).

Note that it’s best to read from the bottom up.

Attention to detail is essential if the composite is to look real to the casual observer. Things such as the subtle colouration of the ball and t-shirt from reflection of the ground help to ensure that the result is as seamless as possible.

Over to you…

I hope that this has been a useful insight into a shoot of this type.   There are many things to consider and to control, but this is what makes photography so interesting!

If you’re interested in learning more about photo realistic composition then you may be interested in the workshop that I’m going to to start offering for 2010.

If you have any questions then please feel free to leave a comment so that others may benefit.

1. This was harder than it should have been since I couldn’t find such a thing in France so I had to order from the UK.
2. Tethered shooting is possible using a combination of EOS Utility and Lightroom

However, I’ll fully admit that my DSLR isn’t always appropriate; I find that I hardly ever get my ‘big’ camera out for casual just-for-the-fun-of-it shooting.  I miss that. I’ve just come back from a week’s break to Florence and the size and weight of the 5D MkII with two 2.8 lenses was just too much – it was a bane around my neck, literally….

But I could use a small compact for the fun stuff, right?  Well, no.  The problem is that I get absolutely no pleasure from shooting with today’s compact cameras for several reasons:

• Their minuscule sensors give near infinite depth-of-field, and if I can’t play with selective focus then much of the pleasure of taking photos is gone.
• Their ergonomics and slow reaction times are frustrating.
• The resulting images are poor – for years the camera manufacturers have been playing the marketing game with the megapixel count, and as they’ve struggled to cram far too many pixels¹ onto those tiny sensors the results have been tragically poor quality images and appalling low light performance.

I thought that my hopes had been answered in 2006 when Sigma revealed the DP1 – the  first compact with a big sensor, but the camera wasn’t really up to the job.  Two years later, with the DP2, they hadn’t learnt much from their mistakes².

So, I’ve been waiting a long time for a compact digital camera with a wide aperture and corresponding large sensor (for reducing the depth of field) that offers high image quality, good low light performance and decent reactivity.

I’d nearly lost all hope, but now it seems that that day is finally dawning.  By the end of the year they’ll be quite a few “serious” compacts that make a concerted effort to meet these needs.  Here’s a quick run down.

Leica M9

It seemed impossible – a rangefinder style compact with full-frame 35mm sensor and interchangeable lenses!  The M9 looks like a dream camera (and so it should be at $7000!).  Leica seems to be making a concerted effort to come back from the M8 disaster with their heads held high, and for this they should be commended.

For me personally the M9 is well out of my budget for a ‘fun’ camera, and the full-frame renders it just a little too big.  I can certainly understand the appeal for many other photographers however – a traveller’s panacea.

Leica X1

Leica seem to have read my mind concerning the price and size or the M9.  The X1 offers a smaller APS-C sized sensor (still bigger than all the other competitors) and a much reduced price tag (albeit still with the Leica tax).  Unfortunately it has a fixed mount 35mm prime lens, rendering it less flexible than it could have been.

Olympus E-P1

Olympus tried to steal our hearts this year with their E-P1 and it’s gorgeous retro styling.  I’m a sucker for good design and if my heart ruled my head I’d buy this camera for the looks alone.

Based on the Micro four-thirds format the sensor has just a quarter of the surface area of the Leica’s 35mm sensor.  Nevertheless, this is still much bigger than those found in other compacts and offers very respectable selective focus possibilities.  The smaller sensor size also helps to keep the body more compact and the price down, which is a fair trade off.

The lenses are interchangeable, so lots of creative possibilities are opened up.³

Is there a catch?  Yes – the unusably slow auto-focus.  If I can’t use it to take photos of my fast moving two-year-old daughter then there’s no point.  Even for that beautiful styling – sniff…

Pansonic Lumix DMC-GF1

And so I save my personal choice for last.  Panasonic’s DMC-GF1 has sports a compact body, a four-thirds sensor, a good selection  of lens choices, fast auto-focus (nearly as fast as a consumer DSLR) and unremarkable-but-still-nice-styling.

It’ll be available very soon, and I’ll be trying before I buy, but this does seem the winner to me.

More to come?

Will there be any others by the end of the year?  Who knows…  It’s an exciting time.

1. Do consumers need typically need upwards of 12MPixels to print family snapshots?  I made beautiful A3 prints with my 6MPixel 300D.  It’s utter madness
2. I have to wonder what they were thinking.  They clearly saw that there was a market for a big sensor compact, but it didn’t occur to them that the market consisted of serious photographers who would want a fast camera.  Sluggish performance is one of the major issues I have with consumer compacts.
3. Which is to say, my wife’ll be happy with a zoom (she won’t care about the aperture), and I’ll be happy with a wide aperture prime….

The obvious solution, and one that many location photographers use, is to Geoencode the photos.

Luckily many cameras have integrated GPS nowadays, it’s become a cheap consumer level component that’s easy to include in even the smallest compact camera.  Unluckily, Canon have taken their standard approach of sucking the will to live from its DSLR users, refusing to take the GPS module from their tinsy-winsy compacts and put it in their high-end and very expensive digital SLRs¹.  The only option the offer is to buy a very expensive vertical grip that has a socket to plug in a commercial GPS logger. Utter madness.

So, today I decided to try automating this process using Jeffrey Friedl’s geoencoding plug-in for Lightroom (he always gets the best plugin ideas, the fiend), an iPhone, and the Trails application.

The process was a pleasure.  The Trails application has a surperb user interface – you start recording a new trail and stick the iPhone in your pocket.  The application ensures that the iPhone doesn’t turn off, and even shuts down the screen automatically.  At any moment you can stop and start recording on the same route, which is very useful if you’re driving around and shooting intermittently since it’ll really save on the battery life.

Once the scouting’s over recoving the tracklog it simple – Trails will email to you.  How cunning’s that?

To geoencode the photos they first need to be imported into Lightroom.  Once this is done the images should be selected, and then Jeffrey’s plug-in should be invoked.  The plug-in can then be used to open the tracklog file², and by correlating the time and date information from both the tracklog and the photos the GPS coordinates for each photo can be estimated with a high degree of accuracy³.

Easy peasy.

1. A built in intervalometer is another example – easy to include in software, but then they couldn’t sell a remote shutter for €100
2. For the plug-in to open the tracklog I had to remove the .xml suffix that Trails generated
3. the caveat here is that the camera and the iPhone should have their time and date synchronised

Having had a good look at his book, I felt that I just had to blog about it. This really is a great Lightroom book; not only is it comphensive, it’s extremely clear and easy to read. Nathaniel has obviously thought long and hard about his presentation, and the result is simply excellent – the best I’ve seen. And the final cheery on the cake is that Nathaniel has separated the chapters with some wonderful colour images to inspire you to get out there and shoot…

I’d highly recommend this book to anyone wishing to learn more about Lightroom. And no, I’m not just saying that because he gave me a free copy!

To this end, over the course of the last few weeks I’ve been doing a lot of research into the various options that are on the market. Unfortunately I couldn’t find any resources on-line that grouped all facts together to help make the decision easier, so I’m sharing the fruits of my labour in the hope that it’ll serve other photographers.

Updates

I shall continue to update this post retrospectively to fix any errors or to add new information that I deem pertinant.

History

28 May 2009: Added importance of minimim flash duration to the discussion.
26 May 2009: Added flash duration for Acute Twin head, and discuss the use of two AcuteBs as a great starting setup.

The Contenders

There are battery powered flash systems available from all the major flash manufacturers, including Profoto, Elinchrom, Hensel, Bowens, Bron, White Lightning and Alien Bees. However, since Paul Buff’s White Lightning and Alien Bee systems are not readily available in Europe I eliminated them from my research. I also eliminated Bron since they’re far too expensive. That left Profoto, Hensel, Bowens and Elinchrom.

Criteria

In the comparison that follows I’ve compared the specifications of the various options available.

When considering a flash system some of the most important factors, price aside, are the power, flash duration, recycle time and the weight of the system, so I’m going to take a quick detour to discuss these points. The one thing that I don’t talk much about in this article is price – each photographer will have their own budget to consider.

Power

How much power should a portable flash have? This is a key question to answer when choosing a system because it’s going to have a direct consequence on the weight, and therefore the portability of the battery pack.

Questions to ask include:

Will you be shooting at the brightest time of day?
Will you need to overpower the ambient light, or are you just wishing to supply fill?
Will you be using a softbox or a reflector? Softboxes will require more light.
Will you be shooting in confined spaces or with wide apertures; will you need to turn the power right down?

To overpower sunlight using a softbox at 2pm in the afternoon on a bright day, you’ll need power, and you should definitely be looking at a system offering 1000Ws or higher. Most people consider 600Ws to be borderline for overpowering the ambient light, but depending on your shooting style this may not be an issue, in which case the 600Ws units are more portable and less expensive.

A good alternative would be to invest in a 600Ws system that offers a bi-tube flash head. When you need 1200Ws (or a shorter flash duration) you can put two packs together. When you don’t, you have more flexibility in the placement of the packs, and the ability to travel with half the weight when only one light’s needed.

Having lots of power isn’t necessarily a good thing however. Often the more powerful flashes don’t have a power range that allows them to be fired a very low power. The Bowens Explorer 1500 is such an example – it offers 1500Ws, but can’t be fired at less than 31Ws. When working with wide apertures or in circumstances where the light can’t be moved further back, the minimum power level can quickly become a real problem. I often stumble into this when using my 600Ws Bowens Geminis in the studio – their 6 stop range is limiting on the lower end. The problem can of course be address using ND filters, but it’s a pain.

Flash duration

If you need to freeze action then a short flash duration is absolutely essential. The manufacturers typically quote the ‘t0.5′ value for the flash duration, which is the total time that the flash output is above 50% of its maximum for a given power level. To equate the flash output to an equivalent shutter speed (for freezing action) we really need the t0.1 value (the total time that the flash output is above 10% of its maximum), and we can fairly reliably calculate this by multiplying the t0.5 value by 3.

For example, a t0.5 flash duration of 1/3000s is approximately equivalent to using a shutter speed of 1/1000s as far as freezing action is concerned.

The duration of the flash is dependant on the power level chosen. It is generally quoted that, in the case of portable strobes such as these, the shortest flash duration is achieved at the lowest power level, and the longest at the higher power level. This being the case, overpowering the sun (high power requirement) and stopping action (low power requirement) may be mutually exclusive.

During my research however, it’s become clear that not all the power packs behave in accordance with this rule. In effect, as the various capacitors are switched in and out to achieve the desired power level, this has an effect on the flash duration that’s difficult to predict. For example, the Bowens Explorer 1500 has its shortest duration at 1000Ws, and the Hensel Porty 12 at 300Ws. Also of note is that on asymmetric packs the shortest flash duration will normally come from the lower powered output.

Unfortunately this level of detail isn’t readily available. I’d be happy to add flash duration curves to this article if my readers can provide the raw data.

Recycle time

This is simply the time that it takes for the strobe to recharge ready for the next shot. Clearly, it’ll take longer to recharge when shooting at full power than it will at low power.

If your shooting style is fairly slow then this will probably have little bearing on your final decision, however if you’re shooting action it can be the most important criteria when choosing a pack.

Weight

The weight of the pack may well be very important for you. If you working alone and moving about a lot then a low weight system will have a huge advantage. A small flash pack that you can put into a backpack is a lovely thing to have.

On the other hand, if you’re doing large commercial shoots and have assistants and transportation at hand then the advantages of the larger packs will probably outweigh the weight disadvantage.

For this reason, many photographers may eventually choose to go both ways and buy different pack for different uses, and this foresight may well influence the buying process:

• Does the manufacturer offer both heavy and lightweight systems?
• Are both these systems appropriate for you?
• Are the modifiers compatible with both systems?
• Are the heads compatible with both systems? Is that important to you?

Facts and Figures

I shall start with a direct comparison of the fact and figures since they’re easy to compare. They don’t tell the whole story however, so I will follow with a more subjective comparison afterwards.

To make this comparison fairer, I’ve divided the various product lines into two groups – those of less than 1000Ws, and those of 1000Ws or more. If we don’t do this then many of the figures become meaningless; for example the Hensel Porty 6′s stunning 1s recycle time is very impressive when compared to the Elinchrom Ranger’s 3 seconds – but of course it only has to reach half the power…

Packs offering 1000Ws and higher

Packs offering less than 1000Ws

Other considerations

If there were one flash system that stood out as the clear leader then that would certainly make the buying decision a lot easier. Unfortunately this isn’t the case. Each product range has its advantages and disadvantages, and there’s always a compromise to be made.

Aside from the compromises that can be seen from the above tables (power vs weight vs performance) there are other things to consider too. Here I’ll look at each system and add my own subjective viewpoint.

Bowens

The Bowens Explorer 1500 battery pack offers excellent value for money, and may well be the best compromise for a number of people. The Bowens system itself is very extensive and their innovative “Wafer” softboxes are considered by many to be the best of any brand.

Pros

• Very short flash duration (1/5700 at 1000Ws)
• Very reasonably priced
• Highest power output available (1500Ws)
• Full asymmetry – both heads can be controlled independently.
• A total of 4 heads may be attached – 2 QuadX’s and 2 Gemini Esprit monoblocs

Cons

• Noisy fan
• Slow recycle time
• A friend of mine who uses this system tells me that RF noise it emits interferes with (US) Pocket Wizard reliability. Need to use Pulsars instead.
• No lightweight portable system alternative (TravelPak requires Gemini monoblocs)
• No option to remotely control the power levels
• Minimum power level is high (31ws), which may be annoying when working at wide apertures

Elinchrom

Elinchrom offers what is arguably the best overall system in terms of interoperability. The Rangers offer good performance with a much lower weight penalty than either Profoto or Bowens and at a reasonable price. The Quadra’s compliment the Rangers very nicely when portability is essential, and the Ranger heads can be used on the Quadra. Furthermore, the Elinchrom modifiers are plentiful and very well regarded.

That all said, most users appear to strongly dislike the mounting system, describing it as fiddly and error prone. There are plenty of stories of softboxes falling off because they weren’t attached properly! Also, the Elinchrom range stops short – when the Rangers don’t have the recycle time that you need, there’s no top-end product to turn to.

Pros

• Excellent all-round system
• Good choice of modifiers
• Reasonably short flash duration
• Light weight
• Skyport system allows for remote power adjustments
• Battery change is quick and efficient – very well thought out
• Weather resistant thanks to sealed push button interface

Cons

• Build quality often considered lower than the alternative – may be a little more fragile
• Slow recycle times
• Very fiddly mounting system
• Digital interface less convivial than analogue knobs (personal opinion)
• No very high-end portable offerings

Hensel

The new Hensel Porty stands apart from its peers due to its Lithium battery technology. Using Lithium rather than Sealed Lead Acid gives the Porty some major advantages in weight and recharge times.

If portability is the most important feature for your shooting style then the Hensel will be a great tool. The Porty 6 out performs the competition easily. However, if you’ll eventually need more performance then there are no options in the range that’ll match the Profoto B2, so this could be limiting.

Pros

• Very low weight
• Very quick recharge time
• Very fast recycle times
• Excellent flash duration for the Porty 6
• Hensel radio system allows for remote power adjustments
• Weather resistant thanks to sealed push button interface

Cons

• Mediocre flash duration for the Porty 12 – especially when looking at the other advantages. A real shame that they couldn’t do better here.
• Digital interface less convivial than analogue knobs (personal opinion)
• Uninspiring range of modifiers
• Less common, so harder to find accessories etc.
• Spare batteries are very expensive

Profoto

When reading forums and talking with other professionals Profoto stands out as the brand of choice. Profoto products are expensive compared to the other brands, but they’re renowned for their build, reliability and superb light quality.

All is not rosy however. As a complete system I feel that Profoto is somewhat behind its peers. The AcuteB offers great portability, but the autonomy is poor and the recycle times and flash durations are very poor compared to the Hensel Porty 6. They’re also limited to just one head, and that head isn’t comptable with the other products such as the B2 or 7b, so if budget is tight it’s going to be hard to build up a system gradually. Finally, none of the battery packs are currently compatible with Profoto’s “Air”‘ system for remote power adjustment.

Do they have any redeeming features? Yes, of course. In terms of raw performance the B2 is the absolute best in class with the fastest recycling time and the shortest flash duration, although the price one pays for this is the weight. Moreover, they have what is undeniably the best mounting system. It’s quick and easy to use, and it allows for the reflectors to be “zoomed”. By moving a reflector back and forth the spread and quality of the light changes, giving the creative professional a wealth of possibilities that simply don’t exist with the other brands. It’s possible to change the fall-off of light in a way that would be very difficult in any other way.

All this is very infuriating. With Profoto you get both the best of what’s on offer (performance, build, superb mount) and the worst (price, system limitations, no remote power control) in one package, and you have to pay the highest premium for it.

If budget isn’t an issue then all things considered, Profoto is an excellent choice because it’s the system that has the most room for expansion (e.g. when you need more speed, there’s a pack that offers it). If you have the means to buy into both head systems then the system disadvange goes away. However if budget is an issue then think carefully before investing.

A single B2 is a great place to start, but the 7b represents awful value for money, offering very mediocre flash durations and recycle times.

Another excellent starting point would be to buy 2 AcuteBs, one with the bi-tube (Twin) head. This set up offers a great deal of flexibility – the two heads are totally independant for complete control and less cable routing problems. When portability is paramount one pack is very light to carry about. When more power, quicker recycling times or shorter flash durations are needed then the two packs can be used to drive the Twin head.

Pros

• B2 offers best in class performance
• Very high build quality
• Easy to rent
• Best mounting system by far (can aslo accept adapted Elinchrom modifiers)
• Excellent range of modifiers

Cons

• Expensive
• B2/7b packs are very, very heavy
• No radio system for remote power adjustments
• Not at all weather resistant – care needs to be taken.
• The AcuteB is poorly spec’d compared to competition equivalents
• B2 is best in class, but also heaviest
• Acute and Pro heads aren’t interchangable

Conclusion

All the systems that I’ve looked at have their own advantages and disadvantages. There’s no one brand that stands out as the obvious choice, and each photographer will have his or her own specific needs. It’s an unfortunate reality that it’s very unlikely that any of the systems available today will meet all of them. For example, I’d ideally like a small, light weight, 1200Ws pack that offers a very short flash duration and an extremely fast recycle time. In practice I can have all of those things, but not in the same package.

Given the sums of money involved I feel that it’s very important to take time to examine the various offerings and to make an informed decision based on your own requirements. Many forum discussion include comments along the lines that the light quality is essentially the same from all of them, and that all the systems will do a great job. Such commentry may be true for the person stating his or her opinion, but don’t be so blindly led. You may be very happy with your Elinchrom Ranger until the day that the 3s recycle time drives you mad and there’s no better option to upgrade to. You may love your Profoto until you realise that you need another light and you can’t afford it. Hensel offer a great package – but can you get parts easily where you live?

My advice is simple: consider not just what you want to do with the flash now, but also what you’ll do with it in the future. Look at the whole system, be very aware of the compromises that you have to accept, then decide.

• Canon 5D MkII
• Canon 30D (backup body)
• EF 16-35mm
• EF 24-70mm
• EF 70-200m
• Macbook Pro (15″)
• All the various chargers, cables, card readers, etc.

That’s a fairly compact amount of kit, but it’s worth a bomb.  The absolute last thing that I want to do is check-in any of this equipment as luggage. Doing so would mean risking loss, theft or breakage, any of which would not only be extremely upsetting in its own right, but it would stop me from participating actively during the week.

So imagine if you will my chagrin when I read the carry on baggage rights with Turkish Airlines:

8kg? That’s just ridiculous.

I grabbed my lightest backpack, and I can effectively stuff in the Macbook Pro, the 5D and 2 lenses before I reach the limit.  What’s a man to do?  Stick the other lens and body in my coat pockets seems to be the only possible solution to the problem.

I’d love to hear how other solve this issue….

Neil Van Niekerk has just written a very interesting comparison between Canon and Nikon flash systems.  Neil’s a very experienced TTL flash user, and uses both Nikon and Canon extensively, so there’s really no better person to discuss the subject.

His conclusion is that for on camera TTL (including bounced flash) the systems are just different.  That’s all.

We often hear that Nikon’s flash system is better than Canon’s and being the curious fellow that I am I’ve tried many times in the past to get to the bottom of this question by searching the net.  Until now I’ve never seen a decent comparison – probably due to the fact that there are so few people who are intimately acquainted with both systems.

I personally use Canon’s ETTL-II flash extensively, and I’ve never had an issue with it. It’s always worked extremely well for me. Clearly understanding the system is key to getting good results in either case.

However, I was very interested to note Niel’s thoughts concerning the better ease of use of Nikon’s off-camera TTL, so I took a peek at the SB-900 manual…

Here’s my own feature comparison based purely on reading the Nikon manual, my own experience with Canon, and the things that are important to my own use of flash.

Initial impressions

I certainly like the way that the SB-900 presents the information to the photographer, and I also like the way that the system allows the photographer to have total control over each flash group independently (for example, placing one group in TTL and another in manual). It seems easy to understand, and certainly slightly easier to grasp for someone new to off-camera TTL flash than Canon’s user interface.

Full TTL

In a full TTL situation the two systems are very different.  With Nikon you control the flash exposure compensation of each flash group independently whereas with Canon you control the overall flash exposure and then the ratio between the A/B groups. Nikon’s approach is easy to understand.  If Canon has an advantage here it’s that its very quick to change the ratio (and thus the output of two groups at once) with the simple turn of a dial – and this is something that I do all the time.  It seems to me that the Nikon flash system would require me to alter each group in turn to achieve the same thing which may be less efficient.

In practice however I assume that both systems simply require the photographer to adapt.  Like for Niel’s conclusions regarding on-camera TTL, I think that the systems are simply different – not really better or worse. In this case they’re so different that I can imagine that frequently switching between them would require an uncomfortable amount of mental gymnastics. However for those of us that use one system all the time I don’t think that there’s really an advantage to either approach. They both have their advantages and disadvantages, and they’re both so advanced as to excel in the right hands.

Mixed TTL/Manual

Where Nikon’s approach shines is in its flexibility. The ability to mix manual flash groups with TTL groups at will is extremely nice.

The most common usage scenario for this would be to use manual flash to light a stationary background object, and TTL for the moving subject.  With Canon the nearest we can get is to use group C for the background. This group fires under ETTL independently of the A:B ratio, however since it’s ETTL it may change slightly between shots.

Nikon wins here.

Full Manual

The final scenario is that of full manual flash control of all groups via the master, and in this respect the two systems offer the same level of control, so there’s no winner.

Other differences

There are a couple of other small things that swing in Nikon’s favour.   The most obvious one is the ability to use the pop-up flash as a commander.  The second one is that the on-camera flash is in a group of its own (under Canon’s system it belongs to group A) thus there are four groups rather than just three; nevertheless I’m not sure how useful that is in practise.

Conclusion

Nikon’s flash system is perhaps a little more flexible for advanced users, however both systems are so well refined that the difference shouldn’t be blown out of proportion.

As for the all important flash exposure calculation, I’ve never had any issues with Canon – and I note that Neil didn’t bring up and issues either….

• It either had to fit in my car, or be quickly and easily collapsable, so that I could take it on location.
• It needed to be relatively big – 1 meter wide plexiglass.
• It needed to hold reasonably heavy objects
• It needed to be in stock somewhere!

I couldn’t find any table that met all these requirements.  My research was leading me to choose between the Manfrotto 320 (too small), the Manfrotto 220 (too big) or the Elinchrom Multi-Table (too expensive).  Since the 220 and the Multi-Table were too big for the car once assembled, the time that’s needed to take them apart and put them back together would probably prove to be annoying.  This was all irrelevant in any case because I couldn’t find any French suppliers that had either of these two tables in stock.

The Multi-Table is made from Aluminium profiling, so it seemed reasonable that I could design my own made to measure table, and that’s exactly what I ended up doing.

I used the Elinchrom table as a basis (although I felt that one articulation was sufficient), using thick 8mm transparent Plexiglass for strength which supports a 2mm white Plexiglass sheet for the surface/background.  I bought the white Plexiglass from the local DIY store – the 1m x 2m size was absolutely perfect.

I designed the table using Google’s excellent SketchUp, and passed it to a local company that specialises in Aluminium profiling.  They then supplied me with everything cut to length and I just had to put it together.

The result is a table that fits perfectly in the car without having to take it apart (it’s just light enough to be lifted in by one person), and it fit’s comfortably in my garage studio (which suffers from a low ceiling). Thus, for me, it’s the perfect still life table, and it cost me about half that of the Elinchrom.  I could probably have saved money using wood, but aluminium profiling has several advantages:

• It’s light.
• It’s modular and there are lots of accessories available.  For example, I may add a rack and pinion system to allow for easier height adjustment.
• It’s can be easily reconfigured to meet different needs.  I’ll probably add a second transparent shelf soon, so the ability to move parts about without adding holes is appreciated.
• It’s very sturdy.

Here are a few more details…

With the back folded down it’s just off the ground so it can be moved easily:

The Citroën Berlingo may not be the most stylish car money can buy, but it’s incredibly practical. We wouldn’t be without it now….

In the car the front edge of the Plexiglass is held up using the shelf above the driver:

I’ll post some photos once I’ve used it properly…

Well, PocketWizard haven’t been sitting on their laurels either.  Oh no – they’ve done everything possible to make me lust sinfully over yet another piece of gear.

The new controlTL system is just insanely brilliant.  Whereas RadioPopper transmits the flash sequence  verbatim over the air and then repeats it back to the slave flash, PocketWizard have chosen to interpret the TLL communication between the camera and the flash and then send it directly themselves.

The PocketWizard solution carries many advantages, but Rob Galbraith tells the story well so I won’t bother reiterating it.

That all said, I’m in the same sad place as I with the RadioPoppers – there’s no date annouced for the European version…

I’m one of those people who struggles with camera straps.   I just can’t get comfortable with them.  The weight of the camera around my neck is bad enough, but what  frustrates me more is that it’s impossible to move – at all – without actually holding the camera. If I dare lean forwards the camera will invariably swing out into a hard obstacle, and if try walking it’ll swing about in what I can only assume is a desperate attempt for independence.

So, I have to hold the camera.  What’s the strap for?  Standing still.

I could accept all that if the problem stopped there, but it doesn’t.  Once the camera gets put up to my eye the strap flaps about, gets tangled and generally does its darnedest to stop me getting the shot.  When using a tripod the strap reaches its peak of head-banging potential, being both in the way and totally useless at the same time.

I’ve tried a number of solutions.  The Op/Tech straps certainly make the camera feel lighter, and they can be removed easily.  But there in lies the rub, because I’m scared by those little plastic clips that require only the tiniest squeeze to set my camera free.  Moreover, once removed the camera’s left with two flappy straps that while less irritating than a complete strap are still irritating enough to drive me to distraction.

I’ve also tried removing the neck strap in favour of a hand strap.  I quite like the hand strap when walking about, but it loses it charm when you have a vertical grip attached to the camera.

I discovered the Rapid-R strap a while ago, and it seemed to come all too close to perfection.  By all accounts it would be comfortable, easily and completely detachable, wouldn’t flap when held to the eye, and by design would hold the camera closer to the body when bending over.  For me though the weak point was the Fasten-R – the big hook that you have to screw into the tripod hole.

I use a vertical grip with a Really Right Stuff L-bracket, however I don’t have giant hands. I can comfortably hold the grip with the L-bracket in place but there’s no way I could support having that chunky hook burrowing into the palm of my hand.  It seemed that the Rapid-R would be great without the vertical grip, but fairly useless with one…

However, by strange happenstance the Really Right Stuff L-bracket has a strange loopy bit at the front.  I would expect the bracket to hug the camera as closely as possible but for some reason that isn’t the case.  At first I found it incredulous that they would do such a thing – it can only make the camera more awkward for some people to hold – but now I’ve come to rather appreciate the oddity because it’s allowed me to attach a Rapid-R strap to the bracket itself…

I protected my bracket from scratches by covering it in masking tape and then proceeded to thread a chunky split-ring around the otherwise pointless loopy bit.  Now, the bracket is quite thick, so by the time I finished the split-ring was distorted and looked more like a spring.  Not one to be deterred from such things, I taped the ring in black electrician’s tape, which serves to hold the ring in it’s original form, prevent scratches from the ring against the bracket and look cooler than silver would (opinions may vary).

I don’t yet have enough experience with the system to be categorical, however the result of all this mucking about seems to be a stunning success story, fixing all my strap conundrums in one fell swoop.

Well, I received it today. It arrived safely in one piece, well packaged.

LensAligns is an innovative product, and as we’ve become accustomed to with Michael it’s been subjected to great deal of attention to detail. Once you have one in your hand the instructional videos on Michael’s web site are clear and easy to understand. Previously I’d been confused by the suggestion to place the LensAlign on a tripod (as opposed to a flat surface), but it soon becomes obvious that this allows you to very quicky align it parallel to the camera by looking through the back of the device towards the camera itself. When the LensAlign is on a tripod it can be positioned at any required angle; when placed on a flat surface it would become more awkward to achieve the required alignment, involving nudging the camera in all directions to get it just right. Personally I only have one proper tripod (on which I’d placed the camera), but I placed the LensAlign on a Manfrotto mini table-top tripod that I keep on by bag for emergencies, and this setup worked very well.

Aligning my lenses was a very quick process. I connected my camera to my Mac so that I could see the images at full size immediately, and this made it all the more efficient.

The results themselves were interesting. My prime lenses were all pretty much spot on; they were all back focusing a tiny bit but I’m really splitting hairs. However, all my zooms were front focusing significantly. Once adjusted they achieved critical focus each and every time.

LensAlign is definitely a worthwhile investment. It’s a shame to have a great camera and expensive lenses and then not take the time to ensure that those eyes are critically sharp when you need them to be….

His concern is that the 5D’s 21 mega pixels would generally be far more than he ever needs, leading to inflated file sizes and slower post processing. His interest is therefore in the SRaw1 format, in which the camera generates 10 mega pixel Raw files via some form of interpolation. He asked me to take an outdoor photo once in each format so that he could examine the Raw files himself. I’m happy to oblige.

First things first – I apologise for the terrible photo. It’s bloody freezing outside so I just found some detail in my garden, took a snapshot and ran back inside.

The photo is taken on a tripod using Canon’s 135mm f/2 and the settings are identical for each shot – 1/60 sec at f/3.2, ISO 100. I manually focused using the great 10x live view feature to ensure critical focus. Here’s the basic shot.

If you’re interested I’ve placed the original Raw and SRaw1 images online so that you can play with them in your preferred post processing software.

Here are two crops of the same area in each format.  The 21 mega pixels clearly have more detail, but this is to be expected.  Note that I’ve applied a very slight capture sharpening to the images using Lightroom. I thought that my readers would be more interested in what they will end up with rather than crops of the unadulterated Raw which will always be a little soft due to the anti-aliasing filter.

100% crop of full Raw image.

100% crop of smaller SRaw1 image.

I thought that it would be interesting to know if more detail can be extracted by reducing the size of the Raw file in post processing rather than asking the camera to do it.  Here’s the same crop from the full Raw image reduced to the size of the SRaw1 image – I think it speaks for itself:

100% crop of full Raw image reduced to the size of the SRaw image by Lightroom 2.

My conclusion is that the 21 mega pixels definitely bring something worthwhile to the table.  The SRaw1 format has its uses but post-processing speed shouldn’t be one of them.  It’s better to take the image in Raw and then downside to a smaller size as the first step in the process.

I hope this helps some of you.

]]> http://www.timothyarmes.com/blog/2009/01/canon-5d-mkii-raw-vs-sraw1/feed/ 17 http://www.timothyarmes.com/blog/2008/12/two-ways-to-improve-family-snapshots/ http://www.timothyarmes.com/blog/2008/12/two-ways-to-improve-family-snapshots/#comments Sun, 14 Dec 2008 20:27:38 +0000 Timothy Armes http://www.timothyarmes.com/blog/?p=140 Recently a friend of mine asked me how I took my family snapshots ‘to the next level’. He has a DSLR and a good eye for composition but he couldn’t get the look he was after. So we went through the images that he liked and there were two things in common – I thought I’d share them here (with help from a small person).

1. Use a wide aperture

I love the look that shallow depth of field gives, and to that end I have a collection of wide primes. Most of the photos that my friend picked out were taken with a wide aperture to separate the subject from the background and to give that indescribable dreamy look that comes with it.

This image was taken with my 135mm at f/2.

My suggestion to him was to buy a 50mm f/1.8 prime lens and to use it lots. Both Canon and Nikon versions of this lens are great because:

I use flash a lot, and the ability to control my remote flashes from my camera is very important. The latest annoucement from the RadioPopper team now has me on the edge of my seat.

Background info

Both Canon and Nikon flash systems have the wonderful ability of allowing the photographer to control up to three groups of remote flashes directly from the master flash on the camera. When working in ETTL mode (for automatic flash control) the systems both work the same way:

1. The photographer presses the shutter button.
2. The camera fires each group in turn in order to measure the baseline flash exposure of each group independantly.
3. The camera calculates the appropriate power output of each group based on the photographer’s choice of settings and the baseline flash exposure just measured.
4. The camera sends each group the actual power level to fire at.
5. The shutter is released and the camera tells all the flashes to fire.

How does the camera communicate with the off-camera flashes? It uses flash! The master flash on the camera sends a coded sequence of very fast flashes that the receiving flashes can understand. All this happens so fast that all we see is one single flash at the moment we press the shutter release.

The technology also offers a major advantage to manual flash shooters in that the power level of each group can be controlled directly from the master flash so there’s no need to keep walking back and forwards to get the flash levels sorted.

The Problem

The technology is very impressive but it has a major disadvantage – the remote flashes have to be able to “see” the main flash, otherwise they can’t receive the coded signals that are sent by the controller. If you want to hide a flash round a corner, for example, you need to find another way of firing it; using radio is the obvious solution.

Radio?

The ability to fire flashes using radio isn’t new, there are many systems on the market at every price point imaginable. The world leader in the professional circuit is PocketWizard, known for their extreme reliability and long firing range. However these systems are only able to fire manual flashes. When they detect the flash signal they tell all the receivers to fire the remote flashes, but they aren’t able to send the coded sequences necessary for controlling the Canon and Nikon flash systems.

Another major drawback to this approach is that these triggers can’t be used to fire a Canon or Nikon flash in high speed mode when the photographer needs to fire above the maximum sync speed.

The Solution

In 2007 my dream of radio controlling my Canon flashes saw a glimmer of light. The RadioPopper was announced. An ingenious system that would attach to a master flash unit and watch for flashes. It was then capable of sending the coded sequence via radio to the receiver units that would literally replay the flashes to the slave flash. The project was very ambitious, but it would ultimately prove to work incredible well – it can even fire remote flashes in high speed mode.

Choosing between PocketWizards and RadioPoppers was not an obvious choice. RadioPoppers would fire my Canon flashes in ETTL mode which would be fantastic, however PocketWizards could be used to fire my Studio strobes and they had a much longer range. Ultimately though I decided that RadioPoppers would be the right choice for me.

The great news for me at the time is was that the first units were to be available in the US at the beginning of 2008 and they would then ship to Europe just three months later! I put my plan to equipe myself with PocketWizards on hold¹ and prepared for the wait.

The Great Depression

Unfortunately things were not to be. The first RadioPoppers available in the states were several months late, and the European version has never seen the light of day due to a technical design issue that has apparently resulted in a neverending round of paperwork.

The Saving Grace (I hope)

However, all is not lost. The latest news from RadioPopper has given me a new glint of hope. The team has learnt a lot from their first design and has now announced a redesigned system with some great new features. The firing range has been expanded to over 500m, the units are smaller and better designed, there are 16 channels to choose from and the transmitter can now also fire both manual flashes and ETTL flashes at the same time (in the same picture). This means that I can now easily use my Canon flashes alongside my Bowens in the studio. With this version the choice between PocketWizard and RadioPopper is obvious – RadioPopper wins hands down for my use.

And the best news of all is that the new version should be available in Europe within just 6 weeks of the US release.

I’m waiting with baited breath. It’s been a very long wait, but it looks like it’ll have been worth it.

1. Actually I bought two so that I could fire my camera remotely

I put the battery on charge as soon as I got home and then later on, once the little one was in bed, I sat down to play with my new toy.

I turned it on and then I started working my way through the manual to see what was new. Auto ISO seemed interesting¹, so I switched to aperture priority with Auto ISO and then metered different parts of my living room at different zoom setting. The camera cunningly chose a hand-holdable shutter speed and then increased the ISO appropriately – very nice. I thought I’d take a photo:

Me: Click.
Brand spanking new 5D Mk II: “Err 30 – shooting is not possible”.

What? What’s that? Shooting. Is. Not. Possible.

Panic. Yes, panicking was definitly possible even if shooting wasn’t.

I turned the camera off and on again. Same thing. I took the battery out and then put it back in again. Same thing. I tried different lenses – to no avail. I shot without the compact flash card to make sure that that wasn’t the cause – it wasn’t. I then searched the Internet for “Err 30″ – I couldn’t be the only one surely? It seems that I was.

The Canon USA web site mentions Error 30 (along with 10, 20 and 40) without explaining what it actually means, and simply says to contact Canon. Great help.

Canon France was closed at this time so my wife convinced me to call the USA tech support (I get free calls to the USA, so it wasn’t just a fit of indulgence). To their credit the support was excellent; they were willing to help me despite my European origins and a very helpful and sympathic tech support man walked me through a number of steps to try to reset the camera but in the end it all made no difference.

The camera was, as I had feared, dead.

On Saturday I took it back to my (now shocked) dealer and he’ll send it back to Canon. He assures me that the next 5D Mk II to walk through the shop entrance will be mine, but they’re few and far between so I could be in for a bit of a wait…

Has anyone else seen this problem yet?

1. except in manual mode, which I use most of the time…