Could you please help me with studio lights?

[cusvenus]

I am a newbie in photography and trying to learn taking photos with umbrella reflectors. When I shoot the subject with two umbrella lights (lights bounced with umbrella refectors - White color with silver reflection inside). I always getting 1/2 picture with good light and the other exact half is completely dark. I tried to take picture both vertical and horizontal both times i got the same result. Am I missing anything?

Equipment Used:

Nikon D7000
Nikon 50mm f1.8
Two 400 W/s lights
While (silver inside) reflector umbrella.

Please shed some light and help me in this. Thanks a lot.

 

[philsphoto]

You need to lower your shutter speed to the camera's flash sync speed. Likely 1/200 or maybe 1/250.

 

[tirediron]

I think Phil's nailed it. Remember too, that depending on the type of trigger you are using, it could be lowered even further. Your camera's sync speed is (IIRC) 1/250, but it could easily be as low as 1/180 with some triggers. Since you say one half the frame is black, I'm guessing you're using a shutter-speed just about double that which you should be. Check your EXIF data.

 

[Village Idiot]

Wrong section. Discussion forum is for non technical matters. There's a lighting forum.

 

[Destin]

Wrong section. Discussion forum is for non technical matters. There's a lighting forum.

I'm sick of people, especially those that are not mods, correcting people on what section they post in. Get off your high freakin horse, answer the question, and let the mods take care of it. I DONT EVEN LOOK at what section a thread is in when I open it. I just read it, and answer it if I've got useful input. Ya'll really need to relax a little bit, its getting absolutely out of hand. The mods will take care of it if they see an issue.

To the OP, the above answers are correct. Lower your shutter speed.

 

[gsgary]

Wrong section. Discussion forum is for non technical matters. There's a lighting forum.

I'm sick of people, especially those that are not mods, correcting people on what section they post in. Get off your high freakin horse, answer the question, and let the mods take care of it. I DONT EVEN LOOK at what section a thread is in when I open it. I just read it, and answer it if I've got useful input. Ya'll really need to relax a little bit, its getting absolutely out of hand. The mods will take care of it if they see an issue.

To the OP, the above answers are correct. Lower your shutter speed.

I don't answer stupid questions by people who cannot be bothered to read their manual properly

 

[Overread]

*thread moved to lighting subsection*

1) I've said it before and I'll say it again - use the report function not backseat moderating when you see a thread in the wrong place.

2) Gary watch it with the attitude!

 

[Village Idiot]

Wrong section. Discussion forum is for non technical matters. There's a lighting forum.

I'm sick of people, especially those that are not mods, correcting people on what section they post in. Get off your high freakin horse, answer the question, and let the mods take care of it. I DONT EVEN LOOK at what section a thread is in when I open it. I just read it, and answer it if I've got useful input. Ya'll really need to relax a little bit, its getting absolutely out of hand. The mods will take care of it if they see an issue.

To the OP, the above answers are correct. Lower your shutter speed.

Hi! I'd like to bake a cake. Can you tell me what ingredients I need to buy for this cake?

 

[dots]

An eighth should be plenty.

 

[Village Idiot]

An eighth should be plenty.

Unless they're shooting at a low enough aperture that it allows ambient into the exposure.

 

[CCericola]

Hi Cusvenus,

I had the same problem when I started using strobes in college. (they didn't teach strobe lighting in any of the classes but they had the equipment in the lab to play with)
I was shooting a friend doing dance moves. We usually used the school's mamiya rb67's but I wanted to use my new 35mm Nikon F100. I set the light so I was shooting at 1/500 at f8. Well I developed the film and BAM half the frames were pitch black. I was so confused. So I took the film to my professor and she knew exactly what was wrong. The cameras we were using could only sync up to 1/250. So off we went to take more pictures.

So chalk it up to experience and take a quick look at the manual to find out the sync speed.

 

[cusvenus]

Thanks a lot for everyone helping me.....I admit I posted in wrong section and I will be careful from here on......

Special Thanks to people who helped me without minding my ignorance.

 

[cusvenus]

By the way I forgot to mention. I am using Pocket Wizard Plus II trigger.

 

[tirediron]

You'll probably only be able to get 1/200 sync w/ PW +2

 

[gsgary]

*thread moved to lighting subsection*

1) I've said it before and I'll say it again - use the report function not backseat moderating when you see a thread in the wrong place.

2) Gary watch it with the attitude!

What attitude, they should read the bloody manual before asking basic questions