Who Should Buy It?

Someone looking for a nice set of strobes (and all the other gear like stands and soft boxes) at a good value.

the Cost

$900 for the kit, $350/head

the Good

Great quality for the value, fits with other Elinchrom accessories

the Bad

Could always use more power (these have 400 w/s per unit). Missing some of the bells and whistles of the higher end units.

Welcome to the third installment in the Studio Strobes and Setup for Beginners series. Check out the intro here or the Choosing Your Strobes segment here.

My choice of studio strobes that provide a great balance of features and cost are the Elinchrom D-Lite 4’s.

The kit comes with 2 identical, 400 w/s studio strobe heads, with stands, 2 softboxes, cases and cords. The kit includes everything you need to begin your studio lighting setup.

After several months of use, the units work consistently, providing good color and durable use. The units are very easy to set up and use and are one of the best additions to my lighting setup.

The Specs

Each flash head has a power output of 400 w/s, replaceable flash tubes, power variability (ranging 5 stops), modeling light and an optical slave (one can see when the other fires and fires at the same time). They synch at 5V (that is the amount of voltage that runs along the synch cord from your camera to the flash – you can use wireless triggers as well, which is the topic for another installment in this Studio Strobes and Setup for Beginners series), which makes it safe to use with any digital camera.

The soft boxes that come with the kit work best for 1-2 person portraits (they aren’t huge – 1 is 21" and the other is 25.5").

The Good

Good value. You can purchase the entire kit for about the same price as a single professional-quality strobe head. I also really liked the decent range of features and the fact that all the other great Elinchrom accessories worked on the strobe heads. For example, I also purchased the Elinchrom Midi-Octa Bank soft box and it worked perfectly.

The Bad

Not too much to complain about, really. The biggest downside is the power. At 400 w/s, the strobes put out about 1/3 of the power of the high-end versions (400 w/s is still lots of light – the bigger ones will give you about 2 stops of light, though).

The Verdict

Looking for a nice combination of features/power and cost? The versatility, compatibility with other Elinchrom products and the ease of use make these a great studio strobe. You’ll probably also want to purchase some large soft boxes as the two that come in the kit are best for 1-2 person portraits.

One of the cornerstones to studios and the focus for today’s post is choosing studio lighting. It’s time to decide what lights should be used. We’ll consider several options. Other aspects, like light modifiers, backgrounds, etc. will be examined in future posts in this series.

How to Decide

When deciding what type of studio lighting you should use, you’ll want to consider several questions:

• How much $$ can I spend?
• How much light output do I need?
• How flexible do I want my choice to be?
• How hot can the lights be?

Some Options

You’ll have several different options, depending on how you answered the questions above.

Continuous lights provide always on light, allowing you to see exactly how the light will fall as you set it up. Lots of options here. Tungsten are popular and can produce a decent amount of light (still less than pro-level strobes though) but get VERY hot. That was a deal breaker for me – I do a fair number of children portraits and the heat thing was a problem.

You can also do fluorescent continous lights, which run MUCH cooler, but you lose quite a bit of light output. If you’re interested in continuous light, check out a great description of popular continuous lights by Scott Kelby here (picture shown above).

If needed, this can be the cheapest way. As long as you get the same type of lights you can often get away with cheaper workshop-type lights from a place like Home Depot. Just make sure that you don’t mix different bulb types – like some fluorescent and some tungsten – each often outputs a different light color cast and you don’t want a little of both.

Entry level strobes are a great way to get into the strobe world at a reasonable price. They provide a reasonable amount of light output and some decent features (like adjusting the output, modeling lights, etc) without breaking the bank. They also run much cooler than continous lights. I chose an entry level strobe – see that section below.

Professional level strobes provide high light output, lots of flexible features (like remote controlled settings and more). The catch? The cost. 1 professional level strobe can run you $1000+. That’s without stands, soft boxes, etc. (see a picture of a strobe to the right).

A Mixture: Depending on your budget and needs, you may choose a combination of these. For example, you might choose strobes when you need higher light output and flexibility for outdoor portrait sessions. You might have another continuous light setup using fluorescent bulbs for indoor product shoots (when you don’t need as much light output and it helps to see exactly where the light is falling as you setup the lights).

My Choice: Elinchrom D-Lites

Choosing which strobes I wanted was one of the hardest things I’ve had to do in a while. I visited online retailers (like B&H Photo), searched on Google, read discussion boards and more. None provided a clear choice and why, especially in the entry-level ish price range. I knew Scott Kelby used Elinchroms, but his particular models are pro level and cost pro $$.

Then, one day, the Strobist ran a contest and was giving away Elinchrom D-lites (entry level models) as a prize. He gave them a general thumbs up. With that recommendation and the fact that Scott Kelby uses Elinchroms, I was sold.

I purchased them a few days later – my full review on them as my choice will be posted in the next installment of this series.

Studio Strobe Terminology

Flash Tube: The fancy ‘light bulb’ that creates the actual flash.

Modeling Light: Light bulb that sits near the Flash Tube. It can be turned on/off as needed and is used to get a feel for where the light will fall (it isn’t nearly as strong as the Flash Tube, but can show where shadows, etc. may end up). It also helps provide light prior to the full flash so that your camera’s autofocus has enough light to work.

Watt/Seconds: The power output of a light source. Every time you double your Watt/Seconds (from 400-800, for example), you get one stop of light. Luckily, both strobes and always-on light sources are measured in Watt/Seconds, allowing for easier comparison.

Continuous Lights: Lights that are always on. The bulbs are typically tungsten, but are more frequently fluorescent.

Monolight: The strobe plugs directly into the wall like any other electrical device.

About six months ago, I decided to step into the land of the home studio, which for me, included strobes. At the time, I did some research to try and find the best equipment, setups and general knowledge about using strobes. I found varying amounts of information, but still struggled getting a fairly comprehensive view.

That’s what this series intends to help with. I’d like to share the information, resources and experience I’ve gathered and worked with. I may not have the 20+ years plus experience, but I hope to help others just starting out with a guide on how to proceed with Studio Strobes.

This series will last several days (I’ll post most of the series back to back) and will include the following topics:

• Choosing your strobes. Which strobes did I choose? Why? My review of the options I selected.
• How to trigger your setup.
• How to effectively use the strobes for different lighting effects.
• Backgrounds. What are some options and what are the advantages/disadvantages of each.
• Challenges of the in-home studio.
• Various resources for studio lighting.

Check back tomorrow for the first installment – Choosing Your Strobes.

Who Should Buy It?

Anyone who owns and uses a camera

the Cost

$24.95 – 54.95, depending on the model

the Good

Nice construction, great price, extremely flexible tripod solution

the Bad

Nothing bad here!

A few weeks ago, I reviewed a tripod by Gitzo, which is regarded as one of the premiere tripod manufacturers around. While I love my Gitzo, the Gorillapod tops its rating!

If you haven’t already seen the Gorillapod, it is a compact tripod (coming in at about a foot tall). Unlike other tripods, it has flexible, gripping legs, allowing you to put your camera almost anywhere. It comes in three sizes, depending on the size/weight of your camera.

I bought mine primarily for my new G9 point and shoot. The smallest version is meant for point and shoot cameras, but because the G9 is a little larger than others, I decided to get the medium version, which is meant for light SLRs. You can also purchase a heavy-duty version meant for SLRs with zoom lenses. Check out the site for full information.

The Good

Simply put, this thing rocks. It is small enough to fit in a backpack, but is still very solid. Knowing that the legs were flexible made me a little hesitant to put my expensive camera on it. But, after seeing it in person, any concern was removed. It easily holds my camera in any position, allowing me to set it on uneven surfaces, or when needed, wrap it around something like a car mirror or tree limb.

See the picture at the right of my Gorillapod in action at a recent family outing (click on it for a larger version). We wanted to take a family self-portrait and set the Gorillapod on the windshield of our van. It worked like a champ.

The Bad

After several weeks of use, I can’t find a single downside. Over time, I’m a little curious to see if the hinges will loosen up to much and become less effective – I haven’t heard anything about that from other reviewers, though. I expect that I’ll continue enjoying this great product for a while!

The Interesting

Joby (Gorillapod’s manufacturer) does a few interesting things. First, they seem to be a very environmentally friendly company. While I’m not as green as I probably should be, I do appreciate a company’s solid effort. And, they’ve turned it into a price savings for you. When at their web site, you can actually order any one of the products for about $3 less if you choose to not have it packaged (thereby saving packaging waste).

Also, they provide a Flash clip for the SLR versions that slides into the clip area and holds a portable flash like the Nikon SB-800 or Canon 580 EX II.

The Verdict

Do you own a camera? Then you should also own a Gorillapod. It’s low cost, low profile and high versatility make this an amazing purchase.

Who Should Buy It?

Someone who wants a solid set of portable tripod legs at a reasonable price (comparatively).

the Cost

$350

the Good

Solid Gitzo construction; G-Locks; great travel or hiking weight/height

the Bad

Still a bit pricey; a little shorter than I’d prefer.

Gitzo is the premium name in tripod names. The Weekend Basalt tripod legs follow in that excellent tradition of quality and solid construction.

Made of Basalt (cooled lava), these tripod legs are light, yet fairly rigid (the quality is higher than aluminum but lower than their carbon fiber series). The set weights in at under 2 pounds, folds down to 22 inches and extends up to about 55 inches.

The Good

I purchased the set primarily for hiking landscapes and travel and they’ve performed wonderfully. Their construction is excellent and they handling them is a pleasure. They are small/light enough to easily place on a camera bag and fit well under an airplane seat or in an overhead compartment. Due to their lighter weight, in windier conditions, I had to put a weight (my camera bag) on the hook under the main post to anchor everything down.

One of my favorite features, though, are the patented G-Locks. They allow you to twist the lock, extend the leg and tighten the lock, without any unecessary leg rotation. The result is an incredibly fast set up and take down. When moving around for landscape shots, this is even handier.

The Bad

The only two downsides to this nice rig, forcing me to only give 3.5 stars, is the price and height. The set folds up small and as a result, the maximum height tops out at 55 inches. In some cases, I was wanting to stretch things a little further to increase comfort when standing behind the tripod or when trying to get a particular shot.

Also, at $350 for the legs only, they can be a bit pricey (the carbon fiber series is even more at $500+). You do get what you pay for, though. These legs will last a lifetime.

The Verdict

If you can spend the money and need a solid set of travel tripod legs at a good price, these will suit you well. The build quality, G-Locks, weight and general durability make them an excellent choice.

I’ve wanted a new point and shoot for a while now. I really like my Canon 40D, but I need something that I can bring with me when carrying around a full setup isn’t realistic (hiking, traveling with the family, etc.).

The Canon G9 is appealing to me for a number of reasons, including its ability to take pictures in RAW mode, shoot video, use off camera flash (you’ll notice it has a hot shoe on top), its manual settings and more. I’ve seen several very positive reactions to it, including the Strobist and David Tejada. I wasn’t fully convinced, though, until David Hobby (the Strobist) recently posted a video he took in Dubai while at a shoot in the desert (you can check out the video here). The video and audio quality really impressed me and finally pushed me to go out and get one for myself.

I just opened it up today, so I haven’t had much of a chance to really put it through its paces yet, but I figured I’d post my intial thoughts. A more complete review will follow in the coming weeks.

• Solid Build Quality: The camera feels great in the hand. It has a solid feel and good balance.
• Tons of Great Features: I’m already loving the high amount of control it gives over settings. The ability to easily set a wide range of ISO settings, go into full manual, etc. doesn’t come in many cameras this size.
• Other Cool Benefits: A few other things that jump out at me quickly – the live view on the large LCD (3″) shows a live histogram, along with other critical information. Also, it adds the feature of auto-rotating your images when playing them back. Doing so allows you to turn your camera to view the LCD in portrait mode and any photos taken in portrait mode are rotated, providing maximum viewing. This is something I’ve seen on other point and shoots and really like.

Well, I’m signing off for now but will be keeping this handy little camera within arm’s length for a while. I’ll post more findings, some test photos and a more official review as soon as I can.

In simpler terms, workflow can be described by answering three questions. What do I do? What order do I do it in? What tools do I use to do it?

So, for a theme this week, I’ll describe my workflow. Today will describe my photo workflow from the 50,000 foot view. It will describe what I do and the order I do it in. Then, additional posts this week will provide more detail into particular steps or tools.

My Workflow – An Overview

We’ll take a look at this from the perspective of an actual shoot. I’ll set each as time stamps, reflecting roughly the amount of time each stage takes. This is an average and spaced out over an hour for the sake of breaking out the time – some shoots will go faster and some will take longer.

Minute 0 : Start setting up for the shoot. Get camera ready. Canon 40D, with lens – almost always the 24-70 2.8L or 70-200 2.8L. Make sure I have enough memory cards. Make sure the lens is clean. Make sure the settings are where I need them. Check white balance, ISO, F-stop and Shutter Speed. Make sure the time setting is correct (the photos’ time stamps need to be accurate if I want to easily synch with any GPS data) Check the battery.

Minute 5 : Set up other gear. This depends largely on the type of shoot. If shooting landscape, make sure tripod and shutter release are set up. Turn on the GPS and set to take automatic readings every 5 minutes. Attach any needed filters. If a portrait session, set up any flashes, reflectors, etc. Possibly connect camera directly to laptop to shoot tethered.

Minute 10 : Begin shooting. This is one of the steps that has the most potential for variety. If it is a shoot for kids – it needs to be over quickly (a good number of our shoots for kids take 20 minutes or so – sometimes stretching to a few of the 20 minute sessions if other poses or outfits are needed). If it’s a landscape, I might be there for 3 or 4 hours waiting for various lighting. Make sure to continue changing settings as appropriate when the shot changes significantly. Switch filters, memory cards and batteries as the need arises.

Minute 30 : Pack it all up. Head back to the digital lab (either my office, or in the field, a laptop and a restaurant or the hotel).

Minute 35 : Insert cards into CompactFlash card readers. Adobe Lightroom (my tool of choice for importing, sorting and doing basic image editing – more on this later in the week) detects the cards and opens up an import dialog. I choose to copy the pictures from the card to my hard drive into particular folders. I also enable the setting to convert the Canon camera raw files to .dng. Repeat for all cards with pictures on them.

Minute 37 : Begin reviewing and sorting the pictures. One of the great things about Lightroom is that I can begin sorting/editing while other pictures from the card(s) are still importing.

I always go through two stages when reviewing pictures. The first is a basic pass, marking bad photos for deletion from my hard drive. Shots that were extremely out of focus, shot in the wrong direction, etc. I then permanently delete those photos. I know that some prefer to keep them all, but I like to keep more hard drive space usage as lean as possible. Also, some like to backup the photos automatically to another hard drive at this stage. I typically wait until later in the process (this hasn’t bitten me yet – I’m half waiting for the day that my hard drive crashes right after I import and clear off my memory card… the other half is hoping it’ll never happen).

I then do another, more thorough pass, marking my photos with ratings from 1-5. I don’t often use all 5. Usually just 3’s for the okay shots and 5’s for the best. All the rest are left at 0. If I had a very large or diverse set of photos, I might use more.

If I shot landscapes or travel photos and captured the GPS locations of the photos, I attach those GPS coordinates to the photos. I do so using GPicSync. You can read more about that at a previous post here.

Minute 42 : Create a collection (collections are ways to organize photos into different areas outside the standard folder structure) for this shoot. Create sub-collections called Good and Best and Use. Display only photos with 3’s and put them in the Good collection. Display 5’s and put them in the best collection.

Minute 45 : Begin editing photos, focusing on those in the Best collection. 80% of editing happens in lightroom – adjusting white balance if needed, tonal adjustments, playing with B&W, etc. Lightroom has a great Synch function that allows transferring the adjustments from one photo very quickly to a large number of other photos.

I then bring the photos that need some additional work over to Photoshop. It is best for adjustments that apply to just part of the photo, advanced cloning or masking, etc.

Minute 55 : Output photos. Use Lightrooms output modules (Slideshow, Print and Web) as needed. Print my own on my Canon
Canon PIXMA Pro9000. When larger prints are needed, export as .jpgs or .tiff for printing at an online vendor (I like MPix). Or, if needed In some cases, post up to my blog, e-mail, post in Flickr, etc.

Minute 59 : Back up photos to an external hard drive. Also, back up the Lightroom files once a week.

Minute 60 : Sit back and enjoy the photos. Begin planning the next shoot.

So I just went to B&H Photo (my favorite camera gear vendor) to pick up a few things to reward myself for passing the ACE and to get ready for my trip to Photoshop World in just a week and a half (more on that next week).

I started looking for an additonal CompactFlash card and decided to try one of the Lexar Professional cards – all the pros seem to use them. I typically use SanDisk’s Extreme series, but hey, I like to mix it up sometimes.

I found the 4GB version of the card and saw that it had a $35 mail-in rebate valid in March and April 2008. That dropped the price from $100 to $65. But wait, there’s more! After adding it to my cart dropped the immediate price down to $70, making it $35 after the rebate. So, I decided to get 2! I love B&H Photo – what a great present to myself for passing the test. Click here for the direct link to the card.

My brother’s birthday is this week (Happy Birthday Bro!) and I’ve been thinking about a good gift to get him. He’s a great photographer in many areas, including portrait and architecture. Some of his best work, though, is in landscape (the photo at the top of the post is his – you can click it for a larger view). I’d like to get him something for that in particular.

As I’ve given it thought, the following are the top 5 things I considered getting him and 5 great tools for the landscape photographer (in fact, a lot of these would be great for any photographer). Mmmmm… gear.

Hoodman HoudeLoupe

At around $70 this is one of the most cost effective gifts. It allows the outdoor photographer to more effectively see his camera’s LCD screen in the bright sun. I have one of these and love it.

You can check it out at Hoodman’s site here.

Gitzo Traveler Tripod

A good tripod is the cornerstone of landscape photography. If you’ve read my previous posts, you’ll know that I LOVE Gitzo tripods. Their build quality, great locks and overall cool look make them the best in the industry. The Traveler version is perfect when carrying it out in the field. It folds up to a ridiculously short 14″ and weighs in at only 2.2 lbs (for our metric readers, that is 35.5 cm and 1 kg). This one can get a bit pricey, though, with a price of $640 on B&H Photo. If you’re going this far, you might as well get their titanium version (it’s only $2,500).

Hmmm… maybe I’ll give my brother my Gitzo tripod and get this one for myself…

Check out the Gitzo site here for more.

Epson P-3000

When shooting in the field there never seems to be enough memory cards and the LCDs are never large enough. The P-3000 by Epson aims to help both problems. When a card is full you can plug the card into this small device and download the pictures onto its 40 GB drive. You can then view them on a crisp, bright 4″ display. It accepts a wide variety of card types and can view most popular camera raw files.

It comes in at around $400 and can be found on Epson’s web site (which has a few nice mail in rebates for a few months, knocking the price down to $300).

Garmin eTrex Legend HCx

I love geotagging my photos. If you haven’t tried it, you should. In brief, GeoTagging is a method that allows you to capture the location you took the photo at and store it in the photo’s metadata. You can then display the photo on a map using Flickr, Google, etc.

The Garmin eTrex is a small, handheld GPS unit that allows you to capture the location that you later synch up to your photos.

GeoTagging brings landscape (and travel) photography to a whole new level.

You can check out Garmin’s GPS units at their site. The eTrex Legend (which I have) is around $230. Make sure to get the HCx version. It has the better sensor, which allows you to get readings when under tree cover, in valleys, etc.

If you’d like to learn more about GeoTagging, you can check out some of my previous posts on the subject here, here, here, and here.

Photoshop CS3

Panoramas are cool. They can depict a landscape in a vert unique way. They can, however, sometimes be a bit of a pain to stitch together. Well, that isn’t the case any longer for anyone with Adobe Photoshop CS3. Besides being the industry standard for serious photography, this most recent version does an AMAZING job automatically stitching together a series of shots meant for a panorama. You have to see it to believe it.

You can pick up a copy of Photoshop for about $649 and can learn more at Adobe’s web site here.

About Stringpods

I love tripods – I own several and always like to go and browse through others when at the camera store. Recently, one particular tripod has received a lot of attention. More attention that Gitzos (a particularly great brand) or any of the others. And, to boot, it costs about $2.

What are these popular little things? Stringpods. Recently, I’ve seen at least 5 or 6 articles on Stringpods, a small, very portable tripod-like device. All are DIY (do-it-yourself) products and involve a string, screw and washer-type object. You put the screw in your camera’s mount area (the part in the bottom where you would screw a tripod in), the washer under your foot, connect the two with the string, and pull the camera up until the string is taught. As a result, the camera is supposed to be much more steady, which can come in very handy. I’ve seen reports that it can give you an extra 2 or 3 stops of light.

So, if you are at your camera’s fastest aperture (let’s say 2.8) and your shutter speed is at 1/60 of second. Anything below that can often become blurry (unless you have very steady hands). By using the stringpod, you can handhold the shot all the way down to 1/30 without loss of sharpness. This could be very cool.

Stringpod Results

I decided to put it to the test and build my own. It cost about $2 and took a little over 20 minutes to assemble (I made several – after the first, they went even faster). I’ve tried a few shots and it definately feels more stable and does allow you to handhold at slower shutter speeds. I’m not sure about the 3 stops, but at the price and size, I’d recommend putting one together and tossing it in your bag.

Build Your Own Stringpod

The following are the steps I took when putting it together.

1. Collect your materials. I found all mine in the same hardware aisle at Home Depot. The total cost was about $10 and I was able to make 4 strinpods, and had lots of string left over.

Piece of nylon string. Cut it to about the same height as you are (so that when you pull the string taught the camera will stop around eye level). A little longer is okay – you can trim as needed.
1/4″ bolt with larger threads. Mine was 1″ long and seemed to work well. It also had a nice head at the top for twisting.
1/4″ Washer. This is optional I suppose – I wanted something that would snug up against the bottom of the camera to hold it in place a bit better. I chose one that had metal on side and rubber on the other.
Larger Washer. This is the piece you step on. I choose a $1 carabiner

2. Tie one end of the string to the bolt, leaving about 1/4 of the bolt without string on it. I used a special fishing knot, called the Snell knot.

3. Once tied, I trimeed the string and singed it, along with the other, untied end. It helps keep the string from unraveling. Nylon string singes nicely.

4. Place the washer on the bolt, pushing/twisting it down snugly to the string.

5. Tie the other end of the string to your washer or other item. I chose a carabiner for several reasons. First, it was larger – I played around a bit and had a tougher time stepping on a small washer. Also, it provides some more meat to wrap the string around for storage or to shorten the stringpod when holding the camera a little lower.

That’s it – your stringpod is now finished.