The Canon Magazine 45
SMOKY PORTRAIT IMAGERY
PROJECT 1
VIDEO ALSO ONLINE
http://bit.ly/photoplus16301 INCENSE STICK
Set up an incense stick vertically using a
piece of Blu-tack on a table. Place a dark
backdrop behind the stick for the
backdrop. Once lit, gently blow or fan the
smoke to create interesting shapes. If you
don’t have an incense stick, you could try
using matches or a vape.02 FLASH LIGHT
Place a Speedlite behind the incense and
off to one side. Angle the flash so that it’s
trained on the stick – we don’t want the
light spilling onto the backdrop. Set the
flash to manual and begin by choosing 1/8
power. If the Speedlite has a zoom feature,
set it to a wide angle for maximum spread.03 CANON CAMERA
Set up the camera opposite the stick.
A tripod isn’t essential, but it frees up your
hands. Focus on the incense stick, then set
the lens to manual focus to lock it in place.
As a starting point for your exposure, set
the camera to Manual mode, ISO100,
aperture f/8 and shutter speed 1/200 sec.06 SMOKE SHAPES
After lighting the incense stick take a test
shot to check the exposure of the smoke.
If it’s too bright or dark, adjust the manual
flash power accordingly, or change the
aperture to allow for more or less light.
Take some shots as the smoke curls.05 FLAG
By backlighting the smoke with the flash
we can make it stand out. But any time a
direct light is angled at the lens there’s a
danger it’ll cause flare, so we need to flag
the flash by placing a board between it and
the camera to block off the light.04 TRIGGER AND RECEIVER
We need to fire the flash remotely – a flash
trigger and receiver will do the job. If you
don’t have one, you could use a sync
cable, or you could set the Speedlite to
optical slave mode and then use your
camera’s pop-up flash to set it off.ON LOCATION PHOTOGRAPH SMOKE SHAPES
Set up an incense stick and a flash for alluring images of climbing smoke
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