2009-02-07 Guerrilla Lighting Workshop

On February 7th, 2009, I conducted a Guerrilla Lighting workshop for 10 aspiring photographers at the fabulous Azusa Pacific University. The full-day workshop was dedicated to teach new photographers about proper way to light a subject on location. The lighting gear we used is lightweight, portable and extremely effective. Here are are some images from the workshop.

As always, Andrea, model for the session was fantastic and posing hard for al the photographers all day. A special thanks to Janell Thurston , a great makeup artistic that came out to the workshop and helped Andrea with her makeup all day long.

I want to thank my assistants Brandon and Andy for helping out that day and my good friend Michael for videotaping the session.

Below images is a demo for “What Not to Do” in lighting. Notice the ugly shadows behind Andrea and the “Mug Shot” look.

Below images is when the lighting is changed to two median-size softboxes and a lighting ratio of 3 to 1 is established.

Next four images were shot with gridspots. This is a demonstration that without turning off the ambient classroom lights, by over expose Andrea and changing the aperture to a much smaller openings, I can properly adjust the exposure on Andrea while the background getting darker and eventually become black. This is a technique I use to simulate using a black backdrop. Also, please also note that the lighting on Andrea become very much more dramatic, moody and edgy. BTW, these four images are straight out-of-camera without any Photoshop work.

ISO 400, 1/200 at f/2.8