PocketWizard cables

In a previous post I mentioned that I was having problems with some low cost radio slaves I had gotten in an effort to avoid forking out significant bucks for the industry benchmark PocketWizard brand radio slaves. That effort failed miserably, and I was forced to concede that I needed the more expensive units. I happily received two PocketWizard Plus II Tranceivers for Christmas. I still need at least two more, but that’s neither here nor there as far as this post is concerned.

 

The PocketWizards come with a cable that goes from the unit (using a 1/8″ mini-phone plug) to a flash via a PC plug. This is perfect for most modern small flashes such as the Nikon SB800 or most of its predecessors (Canon would be the same). However, you need to buy additional cables to use the PW’s with any varying connections on most larger studio flashes or even small flashes like the Vivitar 285 HV’s which have non-PC connections. In the case of the Vivitars which use a unique proprietary plug for such things you have to buy the MV1 cable which, in Canada, costs $36 + tax (and shipping if you order online) and is a special order item in most camera shops which takes a lot longer. The same is true if you have studio flashes that use a 1/4″ plug. In that case you’d need the PocketWizard MP1 cable which costs about the same as the Vivitar cable. I found this exorbitant…but then I find most things hugely overpriced when it comes to photography equipment. This is why I always search for alternative products than the usual benchmark equipment sold at most dedicated photography stores.

 

I was talking with friend and fellow photographer Rob Faubert of Holeriders Adventure Sports Photography yesterday and was telling him all this. It’s always interesting talking to Mr. Faubert about gear because he’s the MacGyver of photography. I once saw him make a pc-sync cable out of a straw, some grass, two toothpicks and a stick of bubblegum…I kid, I kid. Anyway, he suggested it would be very simple to make this cable myself. I was a little dubious because I’m not exactly Mike Holmes or Bob Villa with my hands…in fact, I could accurately be dubbed the anti-MacGyver, but resolved to give it a shot anyway.

 

So, off I went to The Source (formerly Radio Shack) to see if I could pull this off. They had all the requisite parts which I happily grabbed. But, on the way to the cash I walked past the audio cable isle and noticed that they had a shielded audio cable with the exact connections I needed (1/8″ and 1/4″ plugs). It was 1.8 m (6 ft) long, 10k gold plugs, etc… and cost only $10! That was even less than all the parts I was about to buy. I bought that instead, making sure I could bring it back if my experiment didn’t work.

 

Long story short, got the cables home, plugged it into one of my studio flashes and voila. It worked perfectly. Score one for the good guys!

 

Unfortunately, this won’t work as easily for the Vivitar flashes (which I also use) since the plug needed is proprietary…I think. I’ll need to do more research on those particular plugs. I may be forced to pay full price and wait a long time for that cable.

 

Oh well, you can’t win ‘em all.

Digital Cameras – The Environmental Savior

The war between digital and film is, thankfully, all but over. No one who really sits down and goes over stats and is truly honest with themselves should ever conclude that digital isn’t, at the very least, equal to film now. If you still stubbornly say film is superior, well, I guess you’re entitled to your opinion…it’s wrong, but you’re entitled to it. In fact, I can’t see where film even compares to digital. My one caveat is large format film. It’s still in a league of its own in terms of quality.

 

But, the point of this isn’t to stir up film users into a defensive frenzy.  I normally wouldn’t care one way or another what format anyone picked. It’s a free country, and some are just set in their ways, which is fine by me.

 

However, I do in fact care what format people choose. Not only does digital have a future technologically, but it has a future environmentally. And that is the real point I’m trying to make.

 

A few years after I started in photography, I took a darkroom course so I could develop my own black and white shots. I was shocked when, at the end of the class, the teacher just dumped all the chemicals down the drain. Not only that, during the class he was putting his hands in the chemicals to show that they were harmless. I never really got over that, and it was only a few months later that I took the opportunity to switch to digital. He had opened my eyes to something that I simply hadn’t considered before. And that is that the Stop Bath, the Fixer, and the Developer are not harmless chemicals, especially if you do a lot of your own developing. Without proper disposal, which is expensive and really not very effective in the end, it contributes to our already overwhelming environmental and health problems. Being a very proud tree-hugger, I didn’t want that on my conscience.

 

I was going to go through each chemical that makes up the three solutions needed to develop film, but the list is too long and I don’t want to bore you. Instead I’ve just compiled a list of what each phase of the developing process can do:

 

Stop Bath:
Your typical odorless Stop Bath isn’t too bad actually. Only one of its constituent chemicals, called Bromocresol Purple, may cause irritation to skin, eyes and respiratory system – pretty low key stuff, really.

 

Fixer:
This stuff is a little nastier than the Stop Bath phase because it contains a larger list of chemicals. Again, almost all of them cause skin, eye and respiratory irritation and one of them is a registered pesticide and also contributes to indoor air pollution. Overall it is possible for Fixer to cause death even in small doses to people that have a pre-existing respiratory ailment like asthma. Inhalation can also cause delayed pulmonary edema which is an abnormal build up of fluid in the lungs, that leads to swelling. It also contains a chemical, Sodium Bisulfite, that is a known mutagen (causes genetic changes). Whether or not it poses a cancer or reproductive hazard needs further study. That’s comforting, isn’t it?

 

Developer:
It’s the last phase of development, and it’s also the most potentially harmful. As with the fixer, it can also cause skin, eye and respiratory system irritation. One of the chemicals involved is a registered pesticide that is also used in consumer products, building materials or furnishings. This particular chemical also contributes to indoor air pollution. On top of this, however, the developer also contains one known carcinogen, DTPA Na5 (Diethylenetriaminepentaacetic Acid, Pentasodium Salt ), and another, Hydroquinone, that is suspected of being one.

 

Other than the threat of cancer, DTPA Na5 also causes burns to any area that it contacts. It is considered a severe irritant if inhaled and can cause severe pneumonitis which is a condition that causes the inflammation of lung tissue. Chronic inflammation of lung tissue can lead to irreversible scarring (pulmonary fibrosis). It can also be absorbed through the skin and can cause varied systemic problems that may not manifest themselves for days after exposure.

 

Hydroquinone is listed as a suspected carcinogen and also a cardiovascular, blood, gastrointestinal, liver, reproductive, respiratory, immuno, and skin toxicant.

 

Other chemicals like Ascorbic acid are linked to gouty arthritis in susceptible people.

 

This brings me to Eastman Kodak based out of Rochester, New York – makers of fine photographic products since the late 1800’s. Eastman Kodak is one of the top 25 largest companies in the U.S., but rarely does anyone hear about their horrific lack of anything resembling ethics or morality when it comes to the environment or even protecting the people that live in the vicinity of their production plants and incinerators. In the mid to late 1990’s they were acknowledged as one of the top polluters in a country that tops all the lists of world polluters. I won’t go into details here, but if you wish to read a detailed and utterly despicable accounting of Eastman Kodak’s environmental track record you can read A Tarnished Image: The Eastman Kodak Performance Scorecard.

 

All I can say is I’m glad digital came along and made film unprofitable for the manufacturers of that medium. Environmental issues are slowly being heard these days, but the word ‘environment’ still elicits exasperation and dismissal from most. All I can say is ignorance and apathy, bad on their own, are greater than the sum of their parts when combined. No one wants to admit that we’re decimating our planet at a staggering rate, so we just ignore it and hope the problem goes away. This attitude is manifestly confusing for me, especially when you acknowledge that the world’s population seems to have turned into health and safety zealots, especially when it comes to protecting our children.  You can’t give your kid a ball the size of cantaloupe for fear they might somehow choke on it, but we’ll obliviously allow companies to blatantly and unapologetically poison the water, air and earth that we rely on to live all for the sake of financial expediency. And, please, don’t label me an alarmist. I was an environmental lab technician once upon a time. I know all these things to be truths.

 

The whole argument that fixing the environment will cost many jobs and cripple the economy is a blatant lie. Jobs will certainly shift, of that there is no doubt, but they will not disappear. Even if this wasn’t the case and jobs would disappear it would still be necessary. I mean, we’re destroying everything that sustains our life on this planet. Most of the diseases that are spinning out of control these days can be directly linked to the desecration of our environment. What’s the point of making all that profit at the expense of the environment if we’re not around to spend it? This is such a fundamental case of common sense I can’t believe that it has to be explained.

 

Here are some links that may be of interest:

• saveourclimate.ca

• climatecrisis.net

Alternative lighting

Well, the holidays are blessedly over, and not a moment too soon, I say! Despite my vows to the contrary, I almost killed myself in an orgy of over-consumption; turkey, gravy, potatoes, apple pie, Toblerone, wine, beer…all fell before my gastric Kung Fu! I secretly, however, wept at my utter lack of self control…or perhaps that was just gravy leaking out of my tear ducts. This over-indulgence combined with my willful two-week absence from the gym (a filthy word during the holidays, I might add), had me popping Pepto Bismal tablets like Pez in a futile effort to combat my heart burn. Actually, heart burn sounds desirable compared to what I experienced. My heart felt something akin to a flaming canned ham. Yesterday was the first day back to the gym and though it had only been two weeks it felt like I had never worked out a day in my life. Yes, it was painful, but chanting “that which does not kill me can only make me stronger” seemed to get me through the worst of it. Thank you Frederick Nietzsche.

I guess this means that we have to turn our brains back on and descend back into our comfortable (or not) routines. The near suicidal forays to the malls are mercifully done, and all the frenetic Boxing Day deal hunters have been assuaged for another year and are languidly smoking a metaphorical cigarette about now, mulling over their most recent consumer conquest.

So, what does all this have to do with photography, you might be asking? Umm, nothing actually. I just sometimes get overcome by these urges to type something.

Actually, this posting will cover something that eludes many of us in our scramble to get all the gear we feel we need to accomplish our photographic goals. And that is sometimes we just need some stuff lying around the house to get the job done. In this case, I’m referring to lighting. Sure, by all means, go buy some new flashes. In my opinion you can never have too many portable flashes. Buying used helps keep costs down. However, some friends of our asked if I wanted a chess set of theirs that had a broken piece. They thought it might have some photographic potential. I eagerly accepted. While I almost immediately knew how I’d arrange the shot, I was a little baffled how I was going to light it to get the effect I had in my mind. No matter what I did with flashes and various light modifiers, it just didn’t turn out like I wanted it to. Then I asked myself, why do I need to use flashes? It’s not like the subject was mobile. There was no action to stop, so I could use as long an exposure as I wanted. So, setting up my tripod, I set about experimenting with a long exposure combined with light-painting with a small flash light. Nope. Still not what I was going for. Then I noticed a couple of tea lights (small candles) sitting on the counter. Then I remembered that I had already lit a similar picture using candles a year or so ago that worked out pretty well. So, I lit two of them up and used a long 30″ exposure at f/16 with my Nikkor 105mm f/2.8 Micro lens and it generated the look I was going for. Here is a diagram of this uber-simple set up:

Here is the final photo:

Notes:
-The room was pretty dark when I took this. Just be aware of any ambient light sources that might complicate things.
-I sharpened the shot a bit in Photoshop as well as removed some inadvertant dog hair that my Golden Retriever contributed to the shot. I swear Goldens are the best dogs in the world, but, my god, the hair!!! You pretty much forgo the priviledge of owning any black clothing when you own a Golden Retreiver. But, they’re worth it.

Special thanks go out to my godson, Cael Vallentyne, without whom the shattered subject matter wouldn’t be possible. Good job Bam-Bam…

Wilson out.

Radio slave woes

I’m the kind of photographer that is always looking for ways to save money by either building stuff myself or buying cheaper, non-brandname materials when it seems safe to do so. I do as much research before taking that plunge as possible though. Despite my best efforts, I sometimes fail in this regard. A good example is when I tried to save money on radio slaves for my flashes.

When initially researching radio slaves I quickly determined that Pocket Wizard was the best name. Unfortunately they’re also exhorbitantly priced. They do have the reputation of being exceedingly reliable and very easy on battery power, but I thought I’d give a lower priced unit a chance. I bought a generic radio slave off of eBay for a very small amount. It was a four channel version that claimed to be effective up to 100 feet (30 meters) and have a sync speed of up to 1/1000. For use with a small flash you needed to use the 1/8″ jack adapter and insert into a hotshoe socket adapter that had to be purchased seperately.

 

The units seemed to work well initially and I felt vindicated in my coup over high-priced, brandname bullying. Alas, my victory was short lived. I used the remotes at a wedding a few weeks later. They soon let me down. I missed a few potentially great shots because of flash misfire. It wasn’t due to slow flash recycling as I suspected. I even changed the batteries on the flash just in case. I was also noticing that I was seeing the shutter in some of pictures even though I was only at a speed of about 1/80.

After the wedding I did some more experimenting and found that the receiver seemed to eat up AA batteries almost as fast as the flash did, which accounted for sometimes seeing the shutter in the pictures. However, I can not figure out why it only fired sporadically (about 70% of the time it would fire). I can only speculate that the hotshoe is to blame because the receiver always got the signal from the transmitter. Regardless, the units are not reliable in a professional sense. For amateur usage where the odd misfire doesn’t really matter that much, they are still a good value though, at least in my opinion. But when photographing people, where you need split second timing, you just can’t afford to use these units.

As a result I will be biting that bitter bullet and purchasing some Pocket Wizard units. I hate it when I lose!

Photographers – Climb That Ladder (or, “Dig That Hole” depending on your circumstances)

I was in a camera store the other day when I overheard a guy in his early twenties asking the salesperson about SLR cameras. Just the usual stuff like how much are they? Why are they better than point-and-shoots? Which brand is better? etc…

It got me thinking back to my own experience when I was at the counter asking the clerk the same basic questions. Back then it was my girlfriend (now my wife) who was interested in photography. I recall her asking me for an SLR camera, too which I vividly remember responding, “what the hell do you want that for?”. So, off I went to a local camera store to find out more about them so I could make an informed decision. Long story short I got her a Nikon that she never really got to use because it never left my hands. And thus my journey began.

It made me realize that for every person who picks up a camera with any interest at all, invisible, but well defined lines magically spring up in front of them. These lines, like yard lines on a football field, demarcate interest levels and dedication to the art form of photography. Note that those lines also define how much money they’re willing to spend or have spent. As with so many specialized activities, photography is an enormously expensive craft, especially if a few of the aforementioned invisible lines are well behind them.

The groups, in my experience, break down as follows:

1/ There is the I don’t really want a camera but I better get one so I can take incriminating photos of my buddies for coercive purposes later group. These folks just want something, anything, that will record an image. Usually a cheap point-and-shoot or a cell phone with a camera built in will do nicely.

2/ The I still want to take embarrassing photos of friends, but I want a little more quality so I can blow them up to poster size group. This usually equates to a higher end point-and-shoot

3/ The Photography is waaay cool, but what the hell is an f-stop crowd. These people cross a rather large invisible and fiscal line here and purchase an entry level SLR camera. The person may or may not realize what they have gotten themselves into depending on the nature of the salesperson. I won’t get into the various types of sales people at this point in time. Suffice it to say that a few are awesome and very forthright, but most are…do I really need to finish this train of thought? Didn’t think so. Even if the salesperson is great and warns you about the cost of various doodads you might want later, your first thought will most likely be, “Nah! I’ll never need that!”…the inevitable happens in the next level.

4/ The I’ve just bought that insanely expensive doodad and my spouse doesn’t know yet. What the hell have I done! crowd. There is a quiet desperation to these people. They know that they’re fully committed now, not unlike going “all-in” with nothing but a pair of 2′s in poker…in both cases they’re not likely to survive the night. Unless the person has a good chunk of disposable income to blow, the realization soon comes that they have to try and make some money at this “hobby”. It’d be funny to watch these folks squirm if I hadn’t already lived through and blown past this level quite a while ago.

5/ The Zealot group. A varied group of people, some are hardened pros that sometimes make a lot of money, but most often make okay-at-best money and do it for love of the craft. Others are perpetual amateurs with too much money that are in no danger of going anywhere with photography other than the store to buy the latest and greatest gadget that will transform them instantly into pros…these are rare though, much to the chagrin of sales staff the world over. Yet others are skilled and gradually working their way — because they miraculously won with those pair of 2′s at the last level (aka not getting killed by their spouse) — towards the hardened pro status they’ve dreamed about.

Anyway, that’s my take on it. Taking that plunge into photography isn’t for the faint of heart, that’s for sure. I think the key to success is having more passion than brains

Dramatic lighting set up

Well, it’s been a while since I’ve posted…I’ve been crazy busy lately. So, with that excuse out of the way, here’s a set up for a dramatic lighting shot.

I had an idea to shoot a picture that had a neo-ninja feel to it. I wanted it to be anachronistic in that the subject is in a dark suit and tie like a modern professional “solver of problems” you would see in the movies, but he’s carrying a samurai sword, which, in itself, speaks of his overwhelming confidence in his abilities. No guns needed with this guy. For the shot I enlisted a friend who runs a local Taekwon-do school…and, while he’s obviously not a professional “solver of problems” in the sense I meant it, I certainly wouldn’t want to get on his bad side — I’ve seen him do things that I didn’t think were physiologically possible, you see….very impressive/scary.

First of all, I’d like to point out that lighting is my achilles heel, so to speak. In my early learning of photography I inexplicably ignored learning about flash since I primarily shot wildlife and nature shots where natural light was pretty much all I needed. Well, now I’m playing catch up. The funny thing is that now that I’ve made an effort to educate myself on studio and small flash setups, I’m becoming completely fascinated with it. I truly admire the masters of lighting, cause it’s not easy to do right…at least I don’t find it so.

Anyway, I fiddled around one morning trying to figure out how I wanted to light the following picture to match the vision I had in my head. I used my wife as a model wearing one of my suit jackets, sunglasses, and a broom handle for a sword…I’d love to post those pictures, but my wife, knowing me all too well, explained (as one would to a small child) that while a broom handle isn’t a samurai sword it’ll still leave a mark, which I’d find out first hand if I didn’t delete those pictures immediately. Apparently she doesn’t feel my instincts for self-preservation are fully developed. She sometimes demonstrates feats of great wisdom, my wife. I say sometimes only because she actually married me, which shows she isn’t consistently wise.

I’ve included a diagram, since I believe the saying “a picture is worth a thousand words”…especially if those words are a poorly written, disjointed explaination of what I was trying to do, as is often the case with me.

So the main light, the Vivitar, is about four feet to the right side of the subject, eye level, and slightly behind his shoulder (about 110 degrees to the plane of the camera). It is set to 1/4 power. This lit the side of his face, arm (although the black coat absorbed most of the light), his hand and the sword.

The kicker light, the SB-800, was fitted with a homemade 6″ snoot made of poster board and wrapped twice in black hockey tape (to make sure it was fairly light tight on the sides), set to f/11 at 1/8 power, and was zoomed out to it’s max setting of 105mm. It was also on a stand set at about 5 or 6 feet high so that it could be tilted downward at a rough 45 degree angle. This light was aimed at the sword so that it would add highlights along it’s length.

Note: Some post production work in Photoshop was done to the final image. For example, the raw shot out of the camera showed a slight hint of the other side of the sunglasses which I didn’t want. I wanted him to look like he was about to disappear into the shadow. So, I did some light Burning to that part of the photo just to clean it up. I also sharpened it a little, and did some warming of the skin tone. Oh, and I Dodged the white in the collar a bit, too.

I have no ego, so please feel free to comment or send me some ideas on how I could have improved the shot.

Quick and easy sharpening or de-hazing technique

But, first a couple of quick caveats:

Caveat #1
Like anything, this tool shouldn’t be used in all scenarios, just as you wouldn’t use a hammer to fix your computer…no matter how much you really, really want to sometimes. But, a real example would be when sharpening a close up portrait shot of a woman. Special consideration is needed here because sharpening can accentuate the pores in the skin or any imperfections. Women tend to be more discerning when it comes to photos, especially when they are the subject. And, trust me, if you’re in the business of portrait photography, you want to keep your female clients very happy because it’s usually them that drag their boyfriends or husbands in (usually kicking and screaming) to get portraits done. But, I digress (I do that a lot). I’ll at some point cover how to subtly sharpen portraits of women.

Caveat #2
You should never, EVER work on the original image file. Make a copy and work on it. The reasons for doing this should be obvious. I’ll freely admit that I’m guilty of doing this sometimes by accident. Do as I say, not as I do!

All right, here’s what you have to do:

Many pictures, especially those taken while not on a tripod, need a very slight sharpening or what I call de-hazing. Even if you can’t readily see it upon initial inspection, just follow these instructions and you may be surprised to notice that your photo did indeed need a little something.

Step 1
Open a photograph in Photoshop. Hit ctrl + J (cmd + J for Macs) twice to create two duplicate layers of the background (I never work on the original background layer because I like to quickly look back on the original when I’m done to see the differences).

Step 2
With the top layer selected, go under Filter>>Other>>High Pass on the top menu.

Step 3
When the High Pass dialogue box opens I usually select a radius between 1.0 – 3.0 pixels. Remember, you’re going for subtle sharpening. When accentuating any photo the general rule to follow is less is more. In this instance I selected 2.0, but it was more so that you would be able to more easily see the difference in the end. I would normally have used 1.0 if really editing this photo.

Step 4
In the layers view, still with the top layer selected, simply select Overlay from the option box.

And there you have it. Notice the pattern on the helmet to really see the difference (No, that’s not moire. The helmet had that pattern on it).

Of course there are about as many sharpening techniques as there are photographers, and many have their uses in different scenarios. I don’t usually use this technique in people shots despite my example above. I usually use this technique for nature or wildlife type shots. It just seems to work well in those scenarios.

Credit where credit is due:
I was introduced to this technique years ago by a graphic designer/photographer buddy of mine, Scott Doubt.