Using Flash Creatively—No. 4

 

I must admit two things right from the start:  (1) this is a rip-off of a Joe McNally idea; and, (2) Joe did it better.  You can see Joe’s photo on page 234 of his book “The Hot Shoe Diaries.”  Joe, if you read this, I hope that by me giving you credit for the idea and promotion of your book is sufficient payment for me ripping off your idea.

Why is Joe’s better?  First, he picked a better time of day (night) and a better location to shoot the photo.  Both added to creating a real “Greepy-Guy-in-the-Alley Shot.”  The lighting of Joe’s heron was to make her look “normal” while I wanted to tie the two elements of the shot together—heron and ax murder—by the introduction of a Steve King novel and eerie green light coming from the novel.

My photograph was taken at about 3:30 PM (before we went to day-light-saving time) so there was a lot of ambient light even in the shade of the building.  The ambient light reduced the greepy effect of the shadow.  It also reduced the effect of the light coming from the book.

I also made a mistake of where I placed my camera.  I purposely selected a Steven King book that had a scary cover, but then, I placed my camera on the side that would not show the scary cover.  Very rookie mistake.

Final score:  Joe 10, Larry 5.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D4 on a tripod, 24-70mm f/2.8 at 44mm, ISO 100, f/8 at 1/180^th of a second on a tripod with a Nikon SB 800 with a green gel in Emili’s book and an Elinchrom Quadra with a green gel at 5.4 power setting and pointed at Ax Murder to create shadow on wall.

Post Processing:

Lightroom 4—applied Nikon Vivid preset during import, set white and black points, added vibrance and clarity and adjusted white balance.