Lighting workshops for photographers: off camera flash workshops

It was only yesterday when Amy was in the studio for her first shoot in front of the camera and today she got a baptism of fire in her efforts to be a part time model when I called her up and asked her to be the model at my lighting workshop for photographers in Doncaster! Due to a mix-up, my intended model couldn’t make the shoot and so I had to ring round quickly to get a substitute at short notice. It made perfect sense to ask Amy to stand in as she was buzzing from the shoot yesterday and was looking to gain some experience so she jumped at the chance.

I was booked to give a one light workshop to Axholme Camera Club over on the Doncaster/Lincolnshire borders. We had Axholme church booked for the shoot and I was to show the delegates how to create some professional looking portraits using a single off camera flash. I kept the techniques simple so that the photographers could go away from the workshop and create beautiful portraits with just a single flash and a reflector, the sort of equipment that most photographers already own. By getting the flash in close and using the shutter to drop the ambient light, I was able to demonstrate how to get a dark background without any distractions. After the event, I gave a demo to a couple of photographers on how to create some dynamic and dramatic movie poster styled images using a single flash to overpower the sun. It was a bright sunny day and I made the shots at 1pm, just about the worst time for photography as the sun is high and harsh. However, by placing the sun behind the model and then under exposing the ambient light by a couple of stops, I was then able to use the very powerful Profoto B1 to light the model.