Stop Munking Around - With Color

I just calibrated my laptop, desktop, printer and projector - all in about 20 mins – with my new ColorMunki Photo. The device is show here hanging on my laptop's monitor.

If you are serious about color (or wonder why the heck your inkjet prints don't match the image on your monitor, or why projected images look yucky) check out this totally cool calibration device.

When you are on the site, don't miss the Training Videos.

So here is the question: How many of you have calibrated your monitor and printer? Now, now, now. Don't be shy or bashful. It's okay if you have not calibrated your digital darkroom gear. I was there at one time :-)

Let me know, I sure am interested.

Rick

Canon Speedlites and Ambient Metering Systems

A photographer sent me a tech question (via the Photofocus podcast I do with Scott Bourne) about the ambient metering systems in Canon cameras when a Canon Speedlite is used.

For the answer, I turned to my pal Rudy Winston at Canon USA. Thanks Rudy! You da man!

Here goes . . .

Assuming that a photographer is using a Canon EOS Speedlite: With most of our cameras, the camera CHANGES ITS METHOD OF AMBIENT LIGHT METERING as soon as it detects a flash ready light.

Regardless of whether you're set for Evaluative, Center-weighted, Partial, or Spot metering, it instantly shifts to a full-area system – but it's NOT pure Evaluative or Center-weighted. Rather, it gives essentially even coverage throughout the frame, to assess the overall ambient brightness in the scene.

Normal Evaluative metering would tend to try to compensate for things like back-lighting, but, instead, this modified "ambient metering when a flash is being used" system tries to make sure the overall scene brightness is coped with – presuming that any foreground shadows on back-lit subjects will be filled-in with flash.

NOT ALL Canon EOS BODIES work this way – there are a select few, like some of the Rebels that WILL preserve the user's choice of ambient metering pattern when the flash is active and in use.

When photographers ask about this, rather than fuss about which camera model they have, and whether it's one of the few that lets the user preserve his or her ambient metering choice, I tell them to expect the ambient metering mode to function in the form that I mentioned above.

Thanks again, Rudy.

The pictures in this post, which I took of my son, Marco, show the effectiveness of daylight fill-in flash photography. Mo’ on that to come. . . if anyone is interested. Lemme know.

Write a Caption

This one is just for fun! Post a funny caption.

Where is this man doing? What is his job?

The first correct answer wins an autographed copy of Rick Sammon's (who else) Digital Photography Secrets.

Good luck.

Rick

Speedlite Set-Up

Hey All

MajorJD on Twitter had a question about using Canon Speedlites with the Canon ST-E2 wireless controller. Hope this helps... no matter what kind of flash you use.

Here are two behind-the-scenes photos: one showing a basic set-up (top) and one showing a reflector in the bottom of the frame (bottom left), and the end-result image (bottom right).

Basically, we bounced two Speedlites that were mounted on Bogen stands into Westcott reflectors that were held by Westcott stands/brackets. We used one more Speedlite as a hair light. All Speedlites were fired by the ST-E2. The reflector, held by an assistant, filled in some of the shadow area below the model's chin.

If you use a set-up like this, experiment the flash output of each Speedlite. One Speedlite should be set on full power (main light). Reduce the flash output of the other Speedlites - espeically the hair light.

If you have a reflector/diffuser kit, you can also use a similar set-up and fire the Speedlites through the diffusers. You can also mount Speedlites inside some softboxes (Westcott offers a few.).

We will be doing stuff like this on some - some - of my workshops.

If you would like to see more Quick Tips about lighting, let me know.

Happy Shooting,
Rick