SMALL FLASH: ACCESSORIES BASICS
— RC Concepcion
Intermediate
English
English
About This Course
Joe McNally's compact flash photography course is a detailed, comprehensive course dedicated to the exciting field of small flash photography. McNally has designed this curriculum with the needs photographers, knowing that a critical aspect of successful learning is flexibility and convenience.
With these highly focused lessons, each dealing with a specific aspect of small flash photography. These lessons are carefully curated to make sure that you can easily pause, resume, or break your learning at any point. This design means you don't have to set aside large chunks of your busy day to learn. You can absorb the material at your own pace, according to your own schedule, ensuring that the learning process is a joy rather than a chore.
The course starts with a foundational introduction to the world of hot shoe flashes. This piece of equipment is a vital tool in a photographer's arsenal, and we provide you with an in-depth understanding of its functions and usage. We discuss why direct, or 'straight' flash, is often best avoided, highlighting the common problems it can cause, such as harsh shadows and washed-out subjects. The goal is to provide you with a nuanced understanding of light and its effects to help you capture the perfect shot.
You'll then dive into the preflash stage, where you learn to interpret the information displayed on your flash's LCD. We give you detailed guidelines to help you make the most of your small flash unit and how to make it deliver light like a larger model. This skill is essential for those times when you need more light but are limited by the size of your equipment.
As you progress, McNally guides you through the logic of light, which is fundamental to all aspects of photography. He illustrates the techniques of bouncing your flash off a white wall to create a softer, more pleasing lighting effect. This simple trick can significantly improve the quality of your images, giving them a professional look that stands out.
In addition to walls, the course also explains how to use the ceiling as a bounce surface. This technique distributes light onto your subject in a manner that mimics natural, ambient light. This lesson underscores the importance of observing and using your surroundings to your advantage.
A key aspect of advanced flash photography is the use of multiple flash units. A substantial part of the course was dedicated to explaining how your on-camera flash can control other off-camera flashes. This approach can create a multiflash setup, leading to more professional-looking results. And then guide you on how to navigate the on-camera master flash settings to effectively control these remote flashes.
As you move forward, you touch upon more advanced techniques and how you can experiment with using just one off-camera flash, programming the master flash to direct only this unit. This technique can lead to unique lighting scenarios and effects that can give your images a distinctive style.
As photoraphers, we believe that making mistakes is an essential part of the learning process. We encourage you to embrace your errors as opportunities for growth. the course also devotes a lesson to explain how to make critical adjustments to your flash settings to salvage a poorly lit image. These skills are invaluable in the field, where conditions can change quickly, and you may need to adapt on the fly.
You'll then discover some techniques to diffuse harsh flash light. As he demonstrates the use of a tri-grip reflector, a versatile tool that every photographer should master, and also show you how to craft a more elegant lighting setup using an overhead flash in combination with a handheld tri-grip.
The use of accessories to manipulate light is a central theme of our course. the course introduces the use of a c-stand with a skylight panel to mimic the effect of a softbox, increasing the volume of light in your scene.
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