What type of lighting/flash used to create this?

[jack666]

Particularly interested in knowing how the interior shots were taken (lighting specifically) - I have a shoot coming up this weekend (one of my first!) and the apartment is going to be darker than the others I've shot at recently where I used natural light and reflectors, so I get the feeling I am 100% going to need lighting/flashes/not sure - help!

Men Cats David Williams

Any advice greatly appreciated - I have a very small budget!

 

[Derrel]

See this look? mattpam-1.jpg and also this look? Men_Cats-7.jpg

That is what one,single studio type flash looks like when bounced off of a ceiling. See how "hot" the light is at the top of the frame, and then how rapidly the white-white on the walls drops in intensity? That's what it looks like if you fire a studio flash, or other very powerful flash, at the ceiling in a smallish room. If the light is pretty close to the ceiling, it can give that very rapid fall-off, which I think looks substandard.

The rest of the shots look like a medium-sized umbrella is set up and is creating the majority of the light. Something like a 43-inch umbrella would work.

Bounced flash, fired off of a wall, or a ceiling, or a corner of a ceiling, or the wall/ceiling juncture, can be used to pretty good effect with a little practice. In the shots with windows in the background, the shutter needs to be set to give the right degree of brightness to the windows and the outdoor lighting. The FLASH exposure is determined by the power of the flash burst, and the ISO setting used; the shutter does not "make" the flash exposure; the shutter only "makes" the exposure for things that the flash does not hit or reach.

Indoors, using bounce flash, it might be helpful to use an ISO of 400,or 500, or even 640, maybe even 800 ISO if the flash you have is not all that powerful. If the flash is being bounced off of the ceiling or wall, it can be left in the hotshoe, and the flash head zoomed to a pretty telephoto length, and then aimed so that the flash will get a good bounce off of the interior, so as to light the scene in a nice way.

 

[jack666]

Thank you SO much for your reply - I get it now! I am ok with imperfections in photos, that's the look I'm going for, so I guess I can bounce it off the ceiling.

My next question would be - is this flash powerful enough - I am using a Nikon D610

Amazon.com Altura Photo Flash Kit for NIKON DSLR D7100 D7000 D5300 D5200 D5100 D5000 D3300 D3200 D3100 - Includes Altura Photo I-TTL Auto-Focus Dedicated Speedlite Flash Wireless Camera Flash Trigger and Camera Remote Control Function Cable-M Cord for Remote Control Protective Pouch Hard Flash Diffuser MagicFiber Microfiber Camera Photo

Really appreciate the help!

 

[Derrel]

If you boost the ISO level a bit, yes, that flash will be adequate. There is a difference between a 150- to 400 Watt-second studio-type flash, and a single, Made in China type speedlight with less power than say a Nikon SB-910; the "look" of a studio flash is often more-diffused, meaning more spread-out light that softens and lessens shadows through a LOT o light being spread around the entire room. A single speedlight might not tend to "flood" the room to the same degree as a monolight that has a lot of power AND a wide beam-spread.

But, the D610 has really good Higher ISO capabilities, so you can elevate the ISO a bit, which is effect serves to make the flash effectively more-powerful. Do NOT fall into the trap of using ISO 100 or 200 with bounce flash if you want the same kind of look that guy's images have. Bounce flash reallllly often benefits from starting at ISO 4900, 500, or 640, and you might even need to go to ISO 1250 or 1600--a lot depends on the size of the room and the height of the ceiling.