Digital Ash

Today I was able to use the flash equipment with Danny. I had a ridiculous amount of fun, almost too much (and I think Danny would agree). Luke basically told us to set everything up and figure it out. Having that freedom put us in a situation with good feelings/energy. We weren't worried that we would take shitty pictures or mess up. If the lighting didn't satisfy us, we played around with it. This whole experience was fantastic; it was filled with new knowledge and laughter.

I specifically learned about the general use of all the equipment we were given. I think a major part of flash photography is getting a feel for what the "ideal" lighting would be. If there was a shadow, we'd have to reposition the light to get rid of it. Certain times we found ourselves adjusting the cloth over the umbrellas so we could get better lighting.

I also learned about histograms (I forgot the exact name Luke called it) on photos. Histograms are an accurate representation of exposure for a specific photo. Here's a visual representation:

The left most part of the histogram indicates a dark exposure, and the right most part indicates a very light exposure. In the histogram above, the picture is an almost perfect distribution of tones. There really is no just thing as a bad histogram (in some cases highlights may be blown out), but histograms are just, well, histograms. In some cases, you might want a picture that has more darks than lights, and that's perfectly fine. But of course if you want to get the best picture, the histogram is really useful tool.

Shooting with the equipment today was such a great experience. I can't believe how much fun we had and how much we learned. I personally think it was all that light and heat that got to us, but that's another blog post...  I can't wait for what's in store for tomorrow.