Is your model standing out?

A beautiful model in an epic location with breathtaking light falling in through the windows. Is this enough to make a dream photo? I think in order to do our models justice we photographers have to make sure that we let our model shine in the photo much more than the location. We have to take care that the main light is on them and that disctractions are eliminated by cropping in tight or by underexposing the ambient. In this video I am grabbing an image submitted by the awesome Tony Sutton and applying some changes in Adobe Lightroom in order to hammer home the points that I personally would look for when photographing my models.

 

 

I wish you good light!

Michael

Photos © Tony Sutton Photography

Issue 17: Mirrorless Intimacy

Capturing intimacy in our photographs is a wonderful way to create something powerful. In Issue 17 we provide you with a variety of completely different approaches to this. The most important aspect for us is that everybody can do this. It does not hav…

Getting Published Fast

Many of you would like to see their work published in Good Light! Magazine. That’s really awesome. More often than not these photographers really can’t wait to see that happen. There are two ways to get published in our little magazine fast:
 
  1. You submit a photo with a layered composition to our current Viewbug Photo Contest. You got 3 days to do so. Deadline is June 15th. Entering is free, so there is no risk for you. Simply join the contest here: http://www.goodlightmag.com/photo-contest
     
  2. If you master a trick or technique that you would like to share with your fellow photographers and if you can show it in a way so that other photographers can recreate it, then just approach me with that idea. You simply send me an email to michael@goodlightmag.com and let me know what you would like to publish.

And there is nothing wrong with doing both, options 1 and 2, just saying.

I wish you good light!

Michael

Flexible Location Lighting

Here’s how you use a transceiver speedlight to to keep all your options open when lighting conditions are tricky and you have to adjust quickly.

 
This video is part of the trouble talk article in Good Light! Magazine Issue 07. Check it out!
I wi…

Issue 16: Her Photography

Issue 16 is all about makeing photos of women in a way they are charming and flattering your subject. The most important aspect is the angle your light is coming from. Fortunatly, this one is easy to master:
 

This video is part of an article in …

Shopping Bag Portrait Light

It’s time to pull off an effortless yet impressive trick. First, set your speedlight to 1/16 power and place it inside a white shopping bag, facing upwards. Next, place the bag about 60 cm (2 feet) away and slightly to the side of your nice model, at a 45-degree angle – so when the flash goes off it will light her up nicely. Adjust the camera to 100 ISO and f/2.8, then pick the shutter speed that is right for your camera (we used 1/200s.

At last, point your camera and shoot away! If you have done everything correctly, the resulting picture will feature a lot of soft light in the foreground and a substantially darker background.

This type of lighting is very flattering; it never fails to leave the model thrilled and asking for more!

 

You find the long version of this tip and many more in Good Light! Magazine Issue 02.

I wish you good light!

Michael

 

Image above

Model: Fredau Hoekstra
Photo: Michael Zelbel

 

Issue 15: Urban

In Issue 15 we explore urban environments and turn them into your studio. We also feature one last article in our series for your Spicy Holiday Photo Tips. We thought that you probably don’t want to miss the video of that article. So here it …

Using EXIF information in photos online

Update: Please use the German Image search: https://images.google.de, because Google might not show the EXIF data in all countries. Looks like some countries have a newer UI (thankfully Germany is far behind, like so often with Google ;-). Thanks a lot to Fernando Manuel Inácio Carreiro for checking this out! 
 

How did the pro shoot that photo? Chances are Google tells you in the right sidebar of image search. Like many photo communities Google provides you with the EXIF information of the photo given, that it is embedded in the file. Just that you can actually search for nearly every photo on Google. If you don’t find one particular photo, then at least Google is coming up with very similar images. Awesome for cases when you are wondering about appropriate camera settings for a given scene.

 

 

I wish you good light!

Michael

 

Image above

Model: Coco
Photo: Michael Zelbel

 

Playing with your camera DOES matter!

Your Quick Daily Photo: Open on April 1st only!

Sometimes we photographers spend much more time dreaming, thinking, reading or maybe arguing about photography than we do actually making photographs. Overcoming this camera inertia is key! Using our camera should be second nature: no real thinking or effort required, just like we don’t have to think about which pedal to press when we are driving a car.

On coach.me, I created a little motivational program for photographers. It leads you to shoot at least one very quick photo every day. In the program I will take away all excuses for not finding the couple of seconds it takes to do this one single photo.

I’ve developed and tested this program with some awesome fellow photographers, who signed up for my 1-on-1 coaching. What we found is that picking up your camera every day, dialing in specific settings and shooting a random photo makes handling your camera feel “natural and effortless.” From experience, I can tell you that this is the state of mind you want to be in if you would like to improve or if you want to create a high volume of work like I do.

Coach.me is offering this 30-day program at the super low, one-time charge of $9.95. It’s open for people to join until tomorrow evening because we want everybody to start on April 1st. After that, it closes as we bring the first group of photographers through the program.

If things go well, then coach.me will reopen the program every first of the month from there on.

If you join it right now, you can go through it as often and as long as you like, without paying again.

Check it out before April 2nd:

==> Your Quick Daily Photo

See you and YOUR CAMERA on coach.me!

I wish you good light!
Michael
 

Issue 14: Outdoor Lighting

In Issue 14 we looked into various examples for lighting outdoors. One of them being the third installment of our spicy holiday photo series that so many of you love. In our last two issues, we looked at how you can create beautiful holiday pictures with any camera, even if all you’ve got is a smart phone or a small mirror-less camera.

But what if you don’t believe in shortcuts and compromises? What if your DSLR camera is your travel camera? In that case, kudos and watch what happens:

 

I wish you good light!

Michael

 

Image above

Model: Emily Wei
Photo: Michael Zelbel