Photography Tips – Invest in Lighting

Here’s one of the best photography tips I can give you…..Invest in lighting. I know it’s expensive, I know it can be confusing when you start out with it, but trust me…..there is an entirely new world out there for you when you have lights and learn how to use them effectively.

There is only so much you can do with available light before everything you shoot starts to look the same. Sometimes, it’s nice to just mix it up.

It seems like the latest posts on this blog have been about shooting our kids once they’re older….it wasn’t intentional, but it seems to be what I’m mostly doing this last month. If your kids are still little…..enjoy them…..it won’t be long before they are heading off to college and you’ll be wondering where on Earth the time went.

I’ve spent the last couple of days shooting my oldest son for a potential job he’s up for in the sports media department at the University he attends. He’s in the Graphic Design major and this would be a dream job for him.

He played soccer this past summer with a bunch of buddies and one of them runs the department and mentioned that if he had a bunch of good work, he’d be able to get him in. That was all Blaine needed to hear and he was busy creating “mock” ads and needing great photographs for them.

I used to shoot him like there was no tomorrow when he was a little guy and it was almost like going back in time working with him again. We did a whole bunch of soccer images with his layouts in mind. It was so much fun to be shooting him again.

I was really happy with the lighting setup I used so I shot my 17 year old in his lacrosse gear as well. He doesn’t really like having his picture taken, but was a great sport and actually had a good time, even if he won’t admit it. He loves the finished images he’s seen so far.

I also grabbed the 6 year old next door and dressed him up in his lacrosse garb as well. What a blast!

These shots were done in the middle of the day, at f-16 and 1/250th of a second. I overpowered the sunlight with my strobes. I set up a paper background and shot my subjects against that knowing that I was going to “strip” them out of the image and put them into a different scene that I had previously shot.

I also went down to Cougar Stadium the other night after their season opener and shot the stadium lights to strip into the images as well.

I know this isn’t the typical stuff you’d shoot with your kids and for many if not most of you it’s overkill, but it was fun and it was a great opportunity for me to do something cool with my kids.

Not all of these images are finished yet, some are still works in progress. The main thing is for you to be able to spend quality time with your kids and then as a bonus have something to remember it by with the pictures.

These images are a lot more advanced than the vast majority of the images I’ve taken of these 2 over the last 2 decades. I just wanted to give Blaine the best chance I could to impress these guys and get this job. My fingers are crossed.

Owning a couple of strobes can greatly enlarge what you have going on in your photographic “wheelhouse”. They are nothing more than tools you can use however you choose. Maybe you’ll use them so subtly most people won’t even notice they’re there. Maybe you’ll push them to the extreme and create images that are way out there.

Perhaps strobes are too much for you, but you want to do a little something more than just point and shoot….look at getting some good reflectors to help you manipulate the light and better your images.

The point is that lighting is just one more part of the process of learning your craft.

Go out and play…..have some fun!!

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