Illuminate's February night out

For February's, Illuminate Workshops night shoot, we had quite the turn out. Seventeen photographers of all caliber, creativity, experience, and gear, all got together to run through the night with tripods and cameras in hands.



We started off shooting the Denver skyline off a parking garage off Spear & 14th. After it got dark, our band of merry photogs lugged their sticks & glass around to shoot the Cherry Creek bike path.



Once done trolling under the 14th street bridge we moved east towards Pints Pub for some red phone booth shots, a group shot and a pint.



Along the way we stopped at interesting places to photograph things that cought our eye. Here, I asked Wendy to model for us, which she greatfully did. When we get the model release I'll show her face. (since she's a minor).



Then whisking right along onto the Denver Art Museum for some flash fun using the the talents of the other photographers to do jumping jacks or attempting that YMCA thingy. (Mary, ? , Kris, Efrain, ? , Armondo, ? , Sage)



Then some portraits in front of these giant rocks. (Kris, Mary, Efrain, Me)





Heres the set up: one Vivitar 285hv, Efrains PocketWizards (sonce mine broke), Sages white jacket as a reflector to bounce some light back into the subject. (Thanks everyone for your help!)



Finally, we arrived at the capital building about 10pm before everyone called it a night.



For those of you out there wanting to get some more saddle time with your camera, lenses or want to meet some unique like minded individuals. Maybe your worried about going out at night. You know what they say "about safety in numbers".

Contact Efrain at Illuminate to get more info on the next night outing. We usually go out once a month.

The middle of No Where, California.

Have you ever driven to the middle of no where to hang out with family?

That's what I did two Monday ago. Athena's neice lives over in Lake Havasu, Az. She wanted to see us and we haven't seen the in a long time so, after some planning we decided to meet in Ludluw, CA. It's not much of a town, in fact there isn't a standing building even on Main Street. Ludluw is one of those old dying mining towns that still have a gas station and a cafe. The food was pretty bad but then again we shouldn't of had high hopes with a "B" rating from the health inspector.



However, there is some old burned down buildings and the old Mercantile building is barely still standing. So we all went out exploring. I tried doing some walking portraits as we went along.

Then decided I wanted a family portrait with everyone infront of the Merc. This part callapsed in one of Californias many earthquakes.



I set up one of my trusty sh-w Vivitar 285hv flashes connected to a PocketWizard classic. Shot through an umbrella on a light stand just out of the frame on camera left.



Here I used my lovely wife to model for me as I attempted to get the setting sun in the background and a nice portrait without using any flash.

Then we walked over by the railroad tracks and I used a voice activated light stand (thanks Josh) for these by the train. The sun had already set and I was trying to find a nice balance.



Even though Ludluw doesn't have much to do. Being in the middle on no where with some subjects, a camera and lighting gear you can make any place fun.


Click on any of the photos to see the rest of the pictures.

Making Mom look good.

I spent last week out in California visiting my wife's family and friends. I'll be posting more about that soon.

Since, Las Vegas is only four hours from Orange County I decided to make a road trip to spend a day with mom. I got to Vegas about 3pm and waited for mom to get home from work. She's a manager of show tickets at the Excalibur. I didn't have to wait to long and the weather in Las Vegas is awesome this time of year. When she got home I told her I wanted to do a quick portraiture of her all dressed up in her business suit.

I ask her to stand our on the balcony with the late afternoon sun in the background. I wasn't to impressed with the plain light so I pulled out my special hard-wired Vivitar 285hv, a lightstand and an umbrella. I Set the 285hv to 1/16 power since it was about 3 feet on her right. I decided to get up high and shoot down on her to eliminate the roofs in the background. I took several shots thinking I got what I wanted. I told mom that would do it and started looking at the shots. I didn't like the darkness on her left, so I yelled to put her jacket back on, I wanted to try one more thing.

I pulled out another specialty hard-wired Vivitar 285hv (set at1/8) with a LumoPro LP653 Studio Clamp mounted to the storage door on the side of the balcony. I took a couple shots. It was to much light, so I dialed it back down to 1/16 then closed the door to make it as far away from my subject as possible. A few more test shots a step this way then, that way and boom that's the exposure.




Mom looks really nice and professional. Not bad for a lady who spent 15 years of her life cleaning other peoples houses to raise two sets of twins.

Later that night we went down to The Strip for some night shots and ice cream.
-Thanks Mom!



Click on any of the photos to see the rest of the pictures.

Lightning in a bottle or was it bottles and lighting?

One of the nights I was out in California last week, I got together with some of my wife's old friends. It was the first time for me to meet all them so I had to make a good impression.

Avery & Joe opened their house up to everyone and we all hung out drinking beer, eating Avery's awesome lasagna and playing pool. I met so many really cool people that night. I know when we go back to Cali they be all good friends.



Somewhere along the night Athena and Avery convinced me it would be fun to pull out my camera & lighting gear and shoot some.



I bungee corded one of my specially hard-wired (sh-w) Vivitar 285hv flashes to the garage door guide rail on the right side of the garage. Then put another sh-w Vivitar 285hv onto a light stand on the the garage left. I pointed them both at the roof of the door to bounce the light off it. Using my PocketWizard Classics to fire the flashes I shot away.

This may have been a little lighting overkill for a garage party. But I enjoyed setting it up and I think it looks good. Plus it looked quite impressive to all my new friends.



Look I even pulled out the tripod and put the camera on timer so I could get in the shot. Then I strolled around that night shooting this and that.



The night was quite a blast and ended after lots of beers and way to many shots. I even walked backwards down their driveway. (which is steeper then Vail pass!) Then Athena drove me home.

Special thanks to Avery & Joe for throwing a great party.

Click on any of the photos to see the rest of the pictures.

Vivitar 285HV mod for PocketWizard.

Last week I was educating myself on Strobist and found instructions for a modification to the Vivitar 285hv flash. Over at Shutter Snap Studios they posted a way to modify these flashes so they could plug straight in and fire them without the Vivitar proprietary jack.

This has been the number one reason why I can't trust my 285's 100%. Once I read the article, the light bulb went off to change their design from a female 3.5mm (1/8")mono jack to a male 3.5mm (1/8")mono jack. This would make it so the flash would fire 100% of the time when connected to my PocketWizard receiver.

I decided to make a video of what I did so everyone out in webland can see what all it takes and how easy it is.

**** I am not liable for any damage you do to your flash, camera or gear. By following these directions you take full responsibility.****

Light Education....

I'm so excited for this weekend to come. I've signed up for the lighting class Small Strobes, Big Results, with David X. Tejada. He is an amazing photographer who can command the light to do exactly what he wants.



The class is all day Saturday and I cant wait!!! I want to see how he gets such great lighting with only little speed lights. He uses the Nikon SB-800s, and even though I have only 1 of those I'm looking forward to using the 4 Vivitar 285's I have.

If you haven't seen what David does check out his blog and watch his videos he's putting up on Youtube.

I'll let you all know how the class goes next week. I'm also looking to go downtown for the Democratic National Convention and see what I can get.