Boot Camp II: First Assignment

UPDATE: DEADLINE REMINDER -- This assignment is due at the end of the day, your local time, on June 23rd.
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There is an old saying: The cobbler's kids have no shoes.

The translation of which, for us, is that many photographers do not have a recent headshot of themselves.

Your first assignment will allow you to rectify that situation, and perhaps lend a helping hand to someone who may recently have been affected by current economic situation.

Done correctly, this assignment will yield both a model for you, and a photographer for your own headshot.
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The first Boot Camp II assignment is set against the backdrop of a national unemployment level in the U.S. that is hovering at 9.4%. Which is to say that you almost certainly know someone who is out of work. And many other areas (including localized pockets in the U.S.) have even higher unemployment rates.

So, rather than photographing your hand-painted Dungeons and Dragons figurines in your late-night living room studio yet again, we are going to put you to some good use for a change. People who recently have lost their jobs are likely working overtime on social networking, resumés, etc. And a nice headshot can be a very helpful thing for them.

To be clear, you can choose anyone you want to photograph, and any person will be a valid subject for the assignment. But if you are going to be making a headshot anyway, why not point that effort somewhere it can do some good? And as a bonus, you'll have someone you can swap places with so they can take a nice headshot of you. (Just show them how to grab focus on your nearest eye, recompose and shoot.)

If you are a total newb and don't know where to start, might I recommend the L101 Corner Headshot tutorial? You can almost certainly do better than that, but it will get you off on the right foot.

Coincidentally (not really) we also just finished up a three part series on some different ways to approach the lighting on a headshot. (Here, here and here.) You don't need a lot of gear to do this one -- every shot in this post was done with either one or two flashes. (And no, I am not going to walk you through all of them. It's time for you to do some thinking.)


Make it Appropriate

If you are shooting an out-of-work accountant, do something that is fitting to his or her skill set. Unless, of course, they are using their job loss as an excuse to launch a career in stand-up comedy or something. You would not shoot an actress the same way you would photograph a CFO.

Work to make a portrait that will fit your subject. This is also good practice for creating photos that work within the boundaries of a publication and/or assignment. And far from being a hindrance, you'll find that these kinds of restrictions tend to help you by narrowing down your choices.

A really good headshot will work well either as a small mugshot or as lead art in a double truck. Don't dismiss a headshot just because the subject matter is about the size of a football. Some photographers build entire careers out of tight portraiture.

Of course you will be paying attention to the light. But once you work that out, don't forget to make a photo. Work with your subject to get an expression, a moment, a little extra intensity, a look, some levity -- something.


Adjust to Your Skill Level

Headshots are everywhere. One might serve as booking mugs at your local police station, another might be next month's cover of WIRED magazine. The beauty of this first assignment is that the difficulty level can be adjusted to the photographer.

At the very least, as a newb you'd be looking for a clean, elegant professional-quality headshot. But if you are more advanced, you can pretty much go anywhere with it.

You know where your comfort zone is. Make sure you get the bases covered. But if that is easy stuff for you, try to stretch a little. Headshots are easy to get into and offer endless opportunity for creative growth.


How to Submit Your Assignment

I am serious about the "shoot both ways" aspect. To complete this assignment, you will need to turn in two photos -- the one you shot of them and the one they shot of you. Ideally, you'll combine them in Photoshop or some other imaging program. Just cut and paste them side-by-side.

If you do not have the software to do something like that, put both photos into Flickr, turn in only your photo of the other person, and link to the corresponding photo of you in the caption. (Alternately, you can upload them at the same time so they are right next to each other in your stream if you do not know how to create an html link in the photo's caption.)

Don't go all vampire on us -- you'll need to have both photos to fulfill the assignment. Please do not submit just half of the job.

And for the introverts, this is the only assignment in which you will be required to photograph another actual human being. Screw up your courage and ask someone if you can photograph them for a school assignment.

If they say, "Hell, no!" and beat you up just for asking (after all we are talking about an irrational fear here, right?) then just ask someone else. Maybe someone a little smaller (and not very fit...)

Your assignment is due by the end of the day (your local time) on June 23rd. Don't be late.


How to Tag it

First, upload your assignment to Flickr. Then join the Strobist Group, if you are not already a member. Submit your photo to the group using the "add to group" button just above your photo. Do not wait until the last minute to do this. Flickr apparently has a waiting period before you can submit to groups.

Oh, and since you are adding it to the Flickr Strobist Pool, tell us a little bit about your lighting in the caption. That way, you'll be of help to someone else.

If you need technical help on the Flickr stuff, try this thread. Please read the thread before asking any questions, lest someone reply that "your father smelled of elderberry" (or words to that effect.)

(UPDATE: They have already started in with the general craziness, so you can skip to the more relevant stuff by jumping to this point if you like.)

After you have submitted your assignment, tag it with the following term:

SBC2ASSIGN1

If you are successful, your photos should appear in this search within a few minutes. Please, only submit one entry. For most people this will be two photos, side-by-side, combined into one. As we are hoping to create an inclusive slideshow, please do not tag photos which are not appropriate to this assignment with the SBC2ASSIGN1 tag.

For the same reason, please do not turn in any photos which are NSFW. As we noted yesterday, breaking these rules will get (at least) your photo removed from the Strobist pool, and thus, this assignment. Thanks much.

Please note that your photo must be tagged correctly and in the Strobist group pool to show up in the search.

If you want to ask questions, or otherwise discuss this assignment, you can do so in this thread.

And you can check out some of the other bloggers following along, here.


And the Winner Is ...

One winner will be chosen from qualified entries. That person will receive the following, shipped anywhere:


• One Speedlight Pro Kit (more info)

• One Strobist Lighting Seminar 8-DVD boxed set (more info)

• One set of Strobist Trade Secret Cards (more info)


Winners Never Cheat; Cheaters Never Win

Since there is prize booty involved, we have to keep it fair. I do not wanna see your previously shot headshots popping up as entries. To some extent, the fact that you will also be including a headshot of yourself in similar light will help to keep the bad guys honest. But just to make it even harder to game the system, the following photo will be required from the winning entrant before any prizes are sent anywhere:

Winners will be required to submit, on request, a shot of their subject, taken in the same shoot, holding up one finger. This is for authenticity verification reasons only. So, don't forget to shoot a frame of that while doing your assignment. Just in case you win.

(And let's keep it to the index finger, please...)

Shooting Movie Moving Posters

Via Rob at the always excellent A Photo Editor, a very cool vid from photographer Alexx Henry on how they are now bringing movie posters to life.

My first thought: Minority Report.

If you are going to start putting these displays out in public, go ahead and outfit them with motion detectors and retinal scanners and be done with it.

Way cool -- and there is even some info on lighting in the video, too.
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More Alexx Henry: Portfolio | Blog

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Boot Camp II: Introduction

Welcome to Boot Camp II, a series of assignments designed to help the newbs to get off their collective butt and actually go shoot something.

If you are more experienced, you are more than welcome to participate. But understand that, at least at first, we'll be dialing the degree of difficulty back a little.

Details, and a couple of items of interest, inside.
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What to Expect

This summer, you will receive four assignments. Each assignment will have a specific subject matter and scale, and will be designed to introduce you to four different areas of photography.

Our theme this summer is the worldwide economic meltdown, so everyone please sell all of their stocks to buy gold and ammo if they haven't already.

Long-time readers will already know that we don't take world economic crises (or much of anything else) too seriously. In fact, we would rather tickle a credit crunch under the chin -- or maybe sneak up behind it and deliver a wedgie -- than cower in fear what might happen in the future if we spend enough time worrying about it.

After all, what can we really do about it? Nothing, right?

Well, maybe not. We can always do something. Even if it is small, it is still something. So each assignment will contain a way in which it can be used to do something good in the face of certain, worldwide economic doom.

It might be the assignment itself. It might be a variant in which you can choose to participate. But the point is that this need not be pointless busywork. You can accomplish something good with each of these shoots if you want to.


Okay, Let's Make This Interesting

Each assignment will also come with an associated prize pack. We have some nifty things lined up that certainly will be of interest to anyone who reads this site.

Shortly after the deadline for each shoot I will choose a single winner, based on quality, lighting, appropriateness to the assignment, the alignment of the stars, what I had for breakfast that morning, etc. Conveniently, with a judging panel of one, each decision will be unanimous.

The winner will receive the prize pack, with free shipping to anywhere in the world. The contents will be labeled as a gift, which it is, so hopefully that might even get you out of duties if your country so imposes.


How to Participate

The assignments will be submitted through Flickr. By now, you should have already created a Flickr account if you did not already have one. If your country's government is so worried you will see a boobie (or a guy standing in front of a row of tanks) that they block Flickr, there are workarounds.

Download Firefox and install the Access Flickr! 1.11 add-on and it will usually get you in.

Mind you, this is only a suggestion from your shining, world-class democracy that values intellectual freedom so long as you do not stand near a train station brandishing a camera. If your government might track you down and lop off your goodies for doing the Flickr end-around, that's on you.


Fraud Squad: Two Important Notes

From experience, I have learned that when there are prizes involved, people will try to game the system.

We do so want to make sure you are not tempted to enter your various, pre-existing portfolio pictures as assignments. So each assignment will also a little security code that the winner will be required to provide before any prizes are coughed up. More on that later.

Second, the biggest benefit from these group assignments is in seeing how people from around the world handle the exact same assignment you just shot. To that end, I would like to put up an all-in slideshow of the entries up on the main site, just as we did with the water drops.

To do that, we have to rely on people tagging their assignment photos -- and only their assignment photos -- accurately. The tags will be designed so that photos could not "accidentally" get swept into the slideshow.

Since the photos also will have to be dropped into the Strobist pool to qualify (more on that later) there is some recourse available. Tagged photos not appropriate to the assignment will be removed from the pool, thus removing them from the slideshow and from prize consideration.

And depending on how badly the bounds are breached, the photographer may themselves be removed from the Strobist group -- or permanently banned. The idea is to be inclusive with the slideshow. So please do not take advantage of the tagging structure just to be an ass.

This kind of thing would be at the expense of all who entered honorably. And we can only promise that you will be given a fair trial, immediately followed by a fine hanging.


Follow Along at Home

Are you a blogger? If so, you are encouraged to follow along in public. After all, why crash and burn in obscurity when you can do so in front of the whole world?

If you want to participate in a meta-tagged way, it's very simple to do so. Just link into the appropriate assignment page in your posts, and include the intact phrase "Strobist Boot Camp II" (no quotes necessary). Then, your post should come up in a Google blog search which will be linked from each and every Boot Camp II post.

That linked search (results are last-in, first-out) should be good for a few drunken visitors stumbling in over the course of the Boot Camp and long after. What the heck. It's not as if you were swimming in fantastic post ideas for the whole summer, right?

That's all for now. The first assignment drops in tomorrow.

Hands-on With the Speedlight Pro Kit

We blurbed these when they came out a ways back, but I just got a chance to play with them last month in Paso Robles.

Inside, more on the Speedlight Pro Kit, a video showing just how specialized the internet has become, and what's in it for you.
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Combining aspects of both the Lumiquest and Honl stuff, the Speedlight Pro Kit hits a lot of high points.

For about $125.00, you get a combo that allows you to make a double-paneled diffusor, a large grid, a large bare reflector, two snoots and two grids. They share parts from each other, but can be used together to create four different mods at once, as shown in this example.

I got a chance to play with them last month, and they are well (and uniquely) designed. In fact, I liked them enough to immediately start tweaking them.

For starters, you'll definitely want to use a StoFen-type diffuser (either yours or theirs, sold separately) along with the big reflector or big grid. You want to spread that light out to make use of the full size of the source. Otherwise, what's the point?

Additionally, my immediate thought was to mod the big grid with a thin sheet of tissue paper on the back side, to provide diffusion right behind the grid. This effectively gets the light soft(ish) and gridded at the same time. This would make a big difference for close in gridded portraits. Without the tissue, the light would be hard and gridded. You could split the difference with a StoFen (or similar small diffuser) and the internal light from the reflector.

The grids themselves are spartan, if strong. They are hand-cut-and-stacked Coroplast (corrugated plastic) with rectangular channels. These channels are what determines the aspect ratio of the beam, so expect a soft rectangle shape to the beam. (If you want a pure circular beam, go with straws for channels.)

Overall, they are well-made, and very versatile. The only potential problem we saw was possible light leakage around the (double) diffusor. This is a super easy fix, with a little tab of gaffer's tape. Nothing to be concerned about at all.


There's Niche, and There's Niche ...

How specialized is the internet?

Specialized enough to where you can now watch a walk-thru video of a kit of third-party modifiers designed only for speedlights -- and homegrown from Malaysia.

I am so glad to be alive in 2009.

Herewith, everything you need to know about the Speedlight Pro Kit, complete with a soundtrack of genuine, authentic Malaysian bluegrass music.



And why am I telling you about these today? Because the Speedlight Pro Kit is part of the prize pack from the first assignment from Boot Camp II.

Which starts tomorrow.
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Available here:

:: Speedlight Pro Kit (USA retailer) ::
:: Speedlight Pro Kit :: (HQ -- Malaysia and UK retailers)
:: Behind-the-Scenes Shoot Video ::
:: Don Giannatti Review ::

Variations on a Two-Light Theme, Pt. 3

Finishing up our quick series on two-light headshot ideas, we finally come around to something a little more mainstream looking. Today, two different spins on umbrella key used with on-axis fill.

More, inside.
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For the first two, we used a gridded flash and a gobo'd SB-III, respectively. Today we are going for a little more of a classic look, then putting a twist into it.

Steven, above, was lit entirely by flash -- no ambient contribution in the exposure. The key was an SB-800 in a shoot-thru umbrella, positioned right over the top of the camera. You can see the setup shot here:


(Setup shots courtesy Syl Arena / Paso Robles Workshops. Click on any pic for bigger.)

We used a white wall as a background, but dropped the wall to dark grey by moving everything away from the background to underexpose it. (All about the relative distance.)

We could have easily gone to black by moving further away. The point is that you can get any tone you want by depriving the wall of light -- or adding light to it.

Since we did not need to use the second light for the backdrop, that left us free to use it as fill. Our second light was an SB-800 in an Orbis ring flash adapter.

This two-light combo now gives us complete control over subject key, fill and background levels. The fill, obviously, being determined by the power level on the ring flash.

We can place the umbrella wherever we want, to shape Steven's face however we want. We don't have to worry about the shadows so much, because we are erasing them to whatever extent we want with on-axis fill.

And because we have control over the fill level, we can ease that key over into a more dramatic position. Just by moving the key around a little, we can give this same setup a little more attitude.


Enter, "Tokyo" Bill. (We had an extra Bill in the class, and we had to tell them apart somehow.)

With Bill, we can really rack that key light around to far camera left and work that Obi-Wan thing with his hoodie. Bill was damn-near ready to whip out a light sabre before we finished.

(That, of course, would not have fit into our two-light limit. But it would have looked friggin' cool.)

We can move the key around to sculpt his face and work the edge of his hood because we are not at all worried about the fill light in the deep, dark recesses under there at camera right. This is where on-axis fill shines, as it can worm its way into just about anything.

If you can see it from the lens axis, you can light it. As much or as little as you want. Here's the setup:



When using two lights like this, I find it very simple to think in terms of, "one for shape, and one for detail." You control the form with the key, and control the depth of the form with the fill.

That fill can be an off-axis strobe, or an Orbis (or Ray Flash, or ABR-800) or it can be ambient. All have advantages and disadvantages.

But working that shape-vs. detail balance can allow you to get many different looks with just a couple of speedlights.

First, Riaz, then Brett, now Steven and Bill. So Just a few quick and dirty, all-flash two-light headshot looks that you can whip out anywhere the ambient is controllable.

Which you may find very useful, starting next week.

Speedlinks: June 3, 2009

Just a quick batch of four this time, fresh off the grill:
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• Lumiquest SB-VI? Lumiquest SB-33? Nope, just two Lumiquest SB-IIIs, used over and under, by McNally in Charleston. (You have to scroll down -- I like this look.)

• Not able to find Honl stuff at retail stores in Spain, WIRED's Charlie Sorrel rolls his own. (I still like my DIY'd speedstrap better, Charlie.)

• It's official. They don't need us anymore. This photo wasn't retouched at all. It wasn't even lit. Because it's not a photo.

• And finally:

"Lord Vader, we believe our sensors have located the headquarters of The Resistance."

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Dean Collins on Lighting Hotel Rooms

Regular readers of this site will know that I am a huge fanboy of Dean Collins, who was probably the best lighting instructor their ever was.

And today, we have some new (old) Collins videos today -- on lighting hotel rooms -- inside.
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I came across three YouTube clips from one of his "back in the day" lectures at the Brooks Institute. These are not of anything that is available to purchase, and they have been sitting around on YouTube for quite a while. But they do give you an idea of what he was about.

If you like his stuff, there is some excellent stuff available commercially. There are three different DVD sets here, and all are highly recommended. The "Best Of" set is the best, IMO. I cannot recommend that one enough.

But the "Live at Brooks" DVD is also quite good, too. I just re-watched it this weekend. I was just gonna watch a few minutes to refresh, then he had me for the whole hour-and-a-half plus.

(RSS and Email readers, click on the post title to pull up all three vids in order.)


Part One




Part Two




Part Three



As you can see, Dean's hotel room shots are a little more involved than mine are. But even though I am using speedlights, all of the principles are the same.

More information, including two more video clips:

:: Dean Collins at Software Cinema ::
:: Dean Collins at ExpoImaging ::