Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Technique Tuesday - On Camera Flash Used As An Off Camera Light Source - How To Tweak The Color

I've just developed this technique over the last several months. I love bouncing my on-camera flash off a wall or any other surface. I want those photons coming in from a decent direction to give me that beautiful direction of light I want on my images.

There are many times, though, when the surface the light is bounced from is not perfectly neutral thereby color shifting the light just a bit. Sure, it a fairly easy Photoshop fix, but I wanted to get it closer or correct in the camera. Watch the short video below to see how I solved my problem. Enjoy, -David

6 comments:

  1. ok, so I'm pretty much a newbie, and I'm not so much questioning a mentor as much as trying to blend what I'm learning from everywhere. McNally (in The Moment It Clicks) seems to be a big fan of gels - could you have also used a gel on your quantum to warm the light and saved the step in photoshop?

    thank you for all the work you put into these posts. us newbies appreciate it.

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  2. Actually, I've done that too. The Photoshop step is quick and gives better control. I'll cover the geled lighting technique in a future tutorial.
    Thank, David

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  3. Excellent tutorial, I only have 1 question. Do you do a custom WB and then set the red/magenta? I normally do a custom WB and I am not familiar with the other thing as much I just know my camera has this adjustment.

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  4. Hi Rene,
    Yes, 1st CWB then shift it in your Color Shift menu setting - CWB picks up shift - just remember to delete setting next time you CWB. I assume Nikon has it too. --David

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  5. Thanks a lot for posting this tutorial. It was very useful !

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  6. Good info, slightly different take on solving the problem - thank you for the info.

    One slight nit - looking at the before & after shots, they are two different photos! The before shows bride's right shoulder forward, arms and head position slightly different, and overall image frame is slightly different. The camera position & zoom is also inconsistant between the before & after shots...

    I'm sure you would get the same result, but it's not exactly a before & after if it's not the same image!

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