[Canis Vulpes]

A day with Don Hoey to take receipt of the amazing flash adaptor shown being constructed above and photographing Nikon's finest and to learn more about flash photography. I am sure many here are in awe of the camera body shots that Don seems to produce with effortless ease. Every time I look at one I think brilliant, simply brilliant - I wish I could do that with the same quality. Yesterday I did just that, in the gallery is my effort supervised by Don. Below is its method and thoughts during its production.

Firstly the two camera bodies are not simply placed on a table then photographed. Almost an hour was spent placing, angling, considering and moving around with a camera and lens looking for that WOW shot. While considering a WOW position I noticed that the Nikon legend on the rear camera was reflecting on the upper LCD display of the front camera. This decided composition; although I had been found by chance I would never found it if I did not sample various positions and angles to photograph using different lenses. Once composition had been decided both cameras went for a good clean and so they were perfect ready for the photo.

Flash lights are added step by step, first is the main light above and left of the subject to generally light the subject using flash adaptor and brolly using shoot through technique. Part of the criteria was to use only my equipment and it was noticed that flash output was a little low by halving the distance doubled the light to subject and adding a second brolly to collect wasted light from the shoot through brolly solved the problem. The main light is now originating from a quasi-softbox much closer to the subject. Another criterion of the day was to bring life to a lens and by placing a reflector/diffuser perpendicular to the front lens element that element approx 15º from camera lens axis did the trick this also bounced light back to the subject. Adding a second flash behind this reflector/diffuser at high power boosted the artefact in the lens element. Lens artefacts depend also on the lens itself the lens photographed is a 17-35mm wide angle which has a large front flat element and bulbous element behind that so little light reflected through it. This lens was selected as it was fairly short and suited the cosmetics of the D2 series cameras in the subject.

The photo took nearly five hours to produce from start to end. All it needs is a Nikon ‘Heart of the image’ slogan and it would look at home in a Nikon dealership.

Photo here...
http://www.worldphotographyforum.com...hp?photo=10599