Long-time viewers of this site will likely be familiar with San Francisco-based reader Jason Lee’s long-term project photographing his two daughters, Kristin and Kayla. If you’re not, you are in for a treat. Hit the jump for some of his work, links to more and some thoughts on his project. ________One of the best things about running this site is seeing all of the wonderfully creative family photos that come upstream. But I’d be hard pressed to find an example better than Jason’s. He is embracing the concept of fatherhood with his camera, and I admire him for it.He has spent the last few years documenting his kids with photos that are beautiful, funny, whimsical and poignant. Dinnertime, sick days, water fights, Christmas — anything is fair game for one of Jason’s photos. Or a little after-the-fact fun with Photoshop to whip up an illustration.He shoots them, throws them up onto Flickr, and frequently adds a pithy title. (At left: “Kay-Wi”).Having a long-term project is the best possible engine for an endless series of ideas and opportunities to make photos and grow as a photographer. And what better project than your kids? Forgetting for a moment that they are always around and are supposed to do whatever you order them to do, how valuable would a shoe box full of these kinds of photos be to you in twenty years?And a few years later, how cool for their kids to curl up on the couch and look at photos of mom we she was little?But the benefits don’t stop there. As a shooter, the experience you gain from shooting regularly just makes you that much better. Little secret: Much of what separates the pro photos from those of amateurs is simply the built-in advantage we have from getting to shoot nearly every day.Not only does Jason get to play with his cameras and lights all the time, but he doesn’t even catch (too much) flack from mom for it. How could she, with a family album like this?Jason shoots for other people, too. The photos on his portfolio site are beautiful. But he also points people to his two blogs — one devoted to his work and the other to photographs of his daughters.My guess is, the personal blog gets him as many wedding gigs as the wedding shots do. I’d sure hire him.I caught up with Jason via an email Q and A this week and he was good enough to share some thoughts on his photo project._____________Have you always been a small-flash lighting photographer, or is this something you have moved into more recently?I guess I’ve always been a small flash photographer. It started with seeing the amazing work coming from Dave Black and what he was able to achieve with his SB’s. I picked up my first speedlite (Canon 550EX) and an off camera shoe cord in 2003 and I’ve never looked at flash the same way again. My bank account never looked the same again as well. I’ve experimented with mono-lights in the past but I always found myself coming back to small and portable speedlites. I haven’t had the requirement for the big lights yet, so I’m still sticking with the speedlites for now. OK, who am I kidding………my wife won’t let me spend money on profoto equipment and my kids need to eat so the big lights have been put on the back burner. When did you get the idea to make your daughters an ongoing, themed project, and what is your goal with the photos?I started the project of documenting my children for a very special person in my life, my mother. She was diagnosed with non Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 2006 and I wanted her to be able to ’see’ the kids without the risk of the little germ buckets getting her sick. If I can get her to smile or laugh at one of my images, I’ve reached my goal. If I can get a smile or laugh from some random viewer, that’s just icing on the cake. This project has also made me re-evaluate my photography goals, and I’m hoping in the near future I can bring a smile or some laughter to other peoples lives through photos of their children. How do they react to being photographed in such a sophisticated way?Well, it really depends on the shoot. I try to set up everything beforehand so the actual shooting only takes a few minutes. At their ages, that’s all you can really hold their attention for. Also, I try to incorporate something that they find fun or interesting, so they are always involved in the shoot. Cheerios and Goldfish crackers help too. You shoot weddings — and very well, I might add. Has the experience of shooting your daughters on an ongoing basis changed the way you shoot your other assignments?Most definitely. This project has really taught me to look at light, both natural and artificial in a whole new ‘light’. Although my current wedding work is not exactly flash intensive, I am starting to incorporate more and more off camera lighting. Also, seeing folks like Ed Pingol and Matt Adcock rocking the small lights at weddings has really changed my perspective.How does their mom feel about the photos? What do their friends’ parents think? Do you get requests to do those kinds of photos for other people?My wife looks at some of my images and shakes her head and says, “Did you really do that? I hope that was Photoshop!” In all seriousness, she has been really supportive of my project and even helps out sometimes, but Cheerios and Goldfish don’t work as well with her. So far, I’ve received very positive feedback on my work and I believe there is a definite market out there for this niche. I’ve had requests for these types of stylized shots in the past but turned them down for various reasons. In the recent months, more requests have been coming through and I’ve been revisiting this as something I’d like to offer, so we’ll see. What advice would you offer photographers who want to start long-term projects of their kids?Start shooting them as young as possible. Get them involved in the whole photography process. Make it fun for them as well as for you. Stay fresh, and have an open mind for ideas. Oh, and stock up on Cheerios and Goldfish. __________Related Links::: Jason’s Website :::: Jason’s Flick Stream :::: Photo Set: Kristin :::: Photo Set: Kayla :::: Photo Set: Sisters :::: Dave Black: Workshop at The Ranch ::This is a full RSS feed post from Strobist.com, the off-camera flash blog. This month’s feeds are sponsored by:

Easy Ways to Find Models
Photography: Northcountryboy Some aspects of photography are easy. If you like shooting landscapes, the countryside is full of them. The hills don’t move, you don’t have to pose them and you don’t even have to ask their permission. If you’re into still life photography, the grocery store is full of fruit. All you have to do is [...]

High-Speed + High Power = External Battery
UPDATE #2: For those of you offended by the machine gun video linked below, better not click on the Diet Mountain Dew button at the bottom of the sidebar either…_________UPDATE: Someone dropped a pretty good test of various relative battery recycle performance times into the comments of this post._________ I prefer using Ni-MH batteries in my speedlights. Especially the “pre-charged” ones, because they hold their charge for much longer between uses.They do a full-power recharge in less than four seconds in most flashes, which means that at, say, 1/4 power, you can shoot away with almost no regard for recycle time. As long as you are averaging about one shot a second, you are fine for moderate bursts.But what if you want to shoot fast at 1/2 — or full — power? I am a big fan of the Lumedyne rechargeable, high-voltage battery packs. They are not cheap, but they give you the ability to shoot quickly when you need to on higher power settings. They can charge your flash in as little as 0.7(!) seconds for a full-manual power shot. If you are shooting in fluid situations, and your paycheck depends on those flashes being ready, they are worth their weight in gold.But you have to be careful — these batts can deliver enough manual flashes, quickly, to overheat your flash. So work in bursts — don’t just turn on the garden hose or you will pay the price.The Lumy’s I have used (since back when the earth was still cooling) are big and clunky compared to the sleek little ones they have out now. Lumedyne has started a video channel on YouTube, and one of the videos gives a basic run-through on their new, smaller “cyclers”.To use these (or any other hi-voltage batt packs) your flash needs to have a high-voltage socket. I do not use them very often (not shooting to much hoops these days). But when you need them, they are golden.Related::: Lumedyne YouTube Channel :::: Lumedyne Cyclers Info ::-30-This is a full RSS feed post from Strobist.com, the off-camera flash blog. This month’s feeds are sponsored by:

Bus Spotter = Terrorist
Boing Boing reports of another unfortunate photographer having to give up because of the war on public photography: A Gloucester bus-spotter (”omnibologist”) is being forced to abandon his 40-year-old hobby of snapping pictures of busses and trams because security kooks keep calling him a terrorist and even a pedophile. The sad thing is none of us [...]

Announcing: Shoot! The Day, New York Lighting Seminar and Strobist Stone Soup
Lotta stuff in this one, but it is all tied together. You’ll especially wanna make the jump if you live near NYC. But there is also lots for the other folks, as well.________Shoot! The Day and School of StockThe PhotoShelter guys have been whipping up something really cool, and I am very happy to be involved with it. Basically, they have spent the last several months researching what, exactly, photo buyers are looking for right now. Then they have distilled this info (and much more) down into an online resource called School of Stock. If you are even remotely interested in shooting for stock (RF, RM or micro) this is fantastic stuff. There are tutorials both from the perspectives of buyers and successful shooters. I read through them all last night, and it’s really good info.Having identified under-served areas in the stock libraries (’cause, you know, that’s where the money is) and created a how-to-shoot-better-stock school, they are orchestrating a mass, one-day shooting event. It’s called Shoot! The Day, and it is happening on July 20th. In S!TD, people from around the world will be shooting in teams to create exactly the types and genres of photos that thousands of buyers are looking for. No one has ever done anything like this before on such a scale. And for those of you looking to get into shooting stock there could not be a better opportunity.Groups are forming up based in various cities around the world. All you have to do is register for the PhotoShelter Collection (free) and the Ning-powered forums (fora? - also free) where the groups are organizing. There will already be geographically-based groups signed up. If you see one form your area, join up. If not, start one.There are prizes involved for the really kickin’ groups, too. And I would suspect you guys will be well-represented.If you are local to NYC, there are some cool events happening there, too. I will be teaching, along with several other photogs. You have to apply to be selected (by portfolio) to participate in one of the free classes, which are structured around various themes. I am teaching a still life class, likely because Grover has seen my craptastic follow-focusing skilz.New York Strobist Lighting Seminar: Sat, July 19thSeeing as I will be in NYC for the S!TD, time for another lighting seminar. We’ll be at ShootDigital on Saturday July 19th. It will be a similar format as the previous seminars (although hopefully not as hot as in Dubai). Registration will open on this site at 10:00 a.m. (Eastern Time) on Sunday, June 22nd. Please do not call Shoot Digital for more info - it will all be right here. This one will probably sell out pretty quickly, so I’d be on it ASAP if you want to attend. Dress is ridiculously casual.School of Rock: Strobist Stone SoupI am almost mad at myself that I did not think of this idea sooner. I am heading up to NYC on the 17th, in advance of the seminar and S!TD. Therefore, I have one free day in NYC. (Don’t tell Missus Strobist, please…)Stone Soup is a play on the old folk tale, wherein someone comes to town and facilitates something of value happening by cobbling together something from nothing.I am looking to shoot something while in NYC on Friday, July 18th. And reading this post, I presume, are some people with some cool connections in NYC. Hmm… what could we do?Here is what I offer: A one-on-one shoot in which you assist, and we make some cool photos in an environment in which you have access. I provide the shoot, you provide the idea/access, and your contact/connection/etc., provides the subject matter.Are you a firefighter? Are you in an acting troupe? Is your roommate a mime? Or have a pet albino tiger? I dunno — you tell me. Let see what comes in, and I will choose a shoot for Friday, July 18th - time is variable. Figure a couple of hours at the most appropriate time for all involved. We get to shoot and learn, and the subject gets use of the hi-res photos for whatever means they wish, except for third party commercial use. Use it for the wall? Fine. Publicity? No prob. Website? Cool. Annual report? Yep. Give to Nike for an ad campaign? Um, have them call me on that one.Who knows - we might get something interesting. Only way to tell is to try. And I hope that this will be a model for others doing this kind of thing, ad hoc, as a way to bring photographers and subjects together. If it works, I will be doing a write-up on it and putting days aside for repeating this idea on future trips. If not, we’ll just pretend it never happened. If you have an idea to throw out, do it here. Let’s see what comes in.And please, don’t stick the stone soup suggestions in the comments of this post. Using Flickr makes it open, and gives me a way to contact you. It is fast (and free) to sign up.This is a full RSS feed post from Strobist.com, the off-camera flash blog. This month’s feeds are sponsored by:

DINFOS Pt. 3 - Thinking Inside the Box
For the final DINFOS post we have flexibility artist Shelly Guy, who was brave enough to venture down into the bowels of the DINFOS photo studio for a series of photos shot by Joe McNally, the 2008 Advanced Lighting Team and myself.As you probably know by now, I generally don’t care much for shooting in a studio. Which is why we decided to do a quick change-up on our environment and stuff Shelly in a nearby locker.But that’s no problem — Shelly can get in there easily. It’s getting the light way back in there that can be a bit of a challenge…___________So, here’s the deal. We do not have a lot of time to shoot in the studio, as the building closes at 9:00 p.m. So Joe and I decided to bounce Shelly back and forth between photographers, with one person setting up with the other one shot. Shelly was a total trouper, and put up with this sort of thing way better than she should have. (Hey, she has to be flexible. She’s a contortionist.)While Joe was shooting down at the other end of the studio, I was looking for a neat place in which to pose Shelly. How can you turn down a half-sized locker?Next step is how to light it. I need to get the light all the way to the back. But the last thing I want to do is just blast a bunch of light right in from straight on — there would be no depth or shape to the photo. You need to light from of axis for shape.But I have to get in there some way, so I tried to have it both ways on my lighting direction. I decided to light it with an umbrella from camera left, and fill with a ring flash. By varying my lighting ratio between the two SB-800’s (we were totally nuking the ambient away) I could decide exactly how bright the back of the locker (and the parts of Shelly that were in shadow) would be.My other problem would be that the umbrella needed to be close to provide a nice wrap light. But that would mean that it would reflect off of the locker door on the left and create a big, distracting, umbrella-shaped hot spot.Problem two was easy to solve. We stuck the black cover on the camera left half of the umbrella. This gobo’d the umbrella from reflecting in the door (save a nice, thin sliver) and still let it light Shelly nice and close.With the gobo, there is a nice, vertical highlight that defines the texture of the locker door. If the gobo was gone, there would be a big, honker of a circular highlight there.So, specular reflection solved, we now needed to push some light into the locker. The Ray Flash ring flash adapter fit the bill perfectly, allowing light that was exactly on axis. This meant that we could not only push as much (or little) light as we wanted back there, but also create a specular highlight in the back of the locker to further brighten that area.The only thing left to decide is the ratio, really. And this is easy enough, in manual power, without needing a $300 flashmeter.But first, we needed a stand-in. Fortunately the room contained a mannequin. (Mascot? Late-night companion? Honestly, I don’t wanna know…) So naturally, we tried to shove him in there. But the dummy wouldn’t fit, so we were S.O.L.Then I hear, “I can get in there,” coming from A.L.T. member Luke Pinneo. (Yeah, right, dude, I thought.) But sure enough, he crammed himself in. No, it was not as elegant as later when Shelly did it, but still…So Luke wedges himself into the locker. (All the while, McNally is shooting glamour photos of Shelly, who has no idea what we have in mind for her…)I start without the Ray Flash — just a shoe-mount flash set at 1/64th and aimed up at the ceiling to trip the other flash optically. I bring the umbrella’d SB-800 in from camera left, set on 1/8 power. It’s set on slave mode, so the shoe flash will fire it.A couple of quick pop-n-chimps and we have dialed in the aperture that looks best for the main light. Just doing it by eyeball and histogram on the back screen. Nothing fancy.Now it is time for the fill light. I slip on the Ray Flash adapter and start out with the flash dialed down to 1/32 power. It’s real close to where we want to be, and a couple of quick power adjustments has us ready to go. Again, just turning the volume up or down until it looks best.Normally, you could also use a flash in an umbrella right behind your camera as on-axis fill. But a light that big would have given you reflection problems on the other door.I am finding I am going to the ring as fill pretty often these days, and I really like the result. I have a shot like Peter Yang’s “Fallon” portrait, with some ring in there, and it looks sweet.To be honest, I am not a very big fan of ring list as a main light. I think the photos all look the same. But as fill, it can add a neat layer to many different kinds of key lighting.So we got Shelly through our portion of the shoot quickly, and back to Joe well before we were to be kicked out. Which left a couple of us a few minutes with nothing to do in the DINFOS studio.If anyone happens to ask you how this DINFOS studio mascot ended up naked from the waist down and left in a very compromising position at a computer work station, we don’t know anything about that.___________Related: :: Shelly Guy, Flexibility Artist :::: Ray Flash ring flash adapter :::: SB-800 Slave Mode How-To :::: McNally’s Pix ::This is a full RSS feed post from Strobist.com, the off-camera flash blog. This month’s feeds are sponsored by:

Lighting 102: CTO Assignment | Discussion
Report from June 3rd, in which you were asked to use a CTO filter to do something other than correct for incandescent light. The CTO is maybe the most useful CC filter in the whole pack, as several readers demonstrate in their photos, after the jump.___________Leading off, _JRP_ used a CTO to create a nighttime look. If my spanish (and reverse engineering) is working today, he used a Canon 420EZ flash high and left, in a snoot, ungelled. Then he gelled a snooted Vivitar 285 with a full CTO filter and lit the munchkin’s face.By setting his camera on the incandescent WB setting, the front flash went to normal and the rear flash shifted to blue. Taken all together, the look evokes a night look rather well, I think.Greg Cee used a similar balance shifting setup, but went with an additional 1/2 CTO (full CTO plus a 1/2 CTO) gel on the thin sliver of light coming from camera right. This is important, as it puts the light past normal and into a warm color, which is nice when you are making it try to stand out against teh blue you have gotten by shooting on incandescent WB. Fill was from an umbrella, no gel, and pointing up to feather the light off of the bottom of the frame.Takeaway: If you are trying to do that cool-light shift thing, with a CTO on your light, go past full CTO to either (2) CTO or (1.5) CTO to get that warm-on-cool light that usually looks better than white on cool.What’s the one day a year when you can cover your kid in spaghetti and not catch trouble? Father’s Day, of course. Especially your very first Father’s Day, which is when Brad Herman chose to reproduce a photo he had seen done long ago, this time using his kid as the model.Brad used a palette of warm-to-neutral light: Full CTO on the spaghetti monster, half CTO shooting through the tree in the background, and a no-CTO rim. That last one is assuming he was on incandescent WB, but looking at it now I am not totally sure. Reason is, the full CTO front flash looks pretty warm for a straight CTO in tungsten WB mode. And the rim light does not look quite full CTB. I am guessing he either walked the WB around a little in between, or shifted the color a little bit in post. Maybe Brad will clue us in via the photo’s caption.Either way, this is the kind of photo that will make someone pick up the phone and call someone at a kid’s modeling agency. Or social services. We trust the bath followed shortly thereafter.Also going for the 1+1/2 CTO thing on tungsten WB was jgentsch, which allowed him not only to deepen the sky’s blue tone, but to contrast it nicely with warm light (even after the WB conversion) on the flowers and window.Thanks much for the setup shot, too. Those are always helpful for people to see. Although there is a bit of a setup shot in the original photo, in the camera left window…Shutter-Think skipped the incandescent WB shift and decided to go warm and warmer in his photograph of a woman practicing yoga. He went the other way, balancing to shade. The half blue gel on the main light brought it back closer to daylight. But it caught a lot of warm bounce fill and warmed up from a backlight gelled full CTO, made even warmer by the camera’s shade WB setting. Remember, with the combination of full and partial CTOs and CTBs, you have quite a range of options to dial your photo warmer or cooler. And you can do it for the whole photo, or vary the shift with each light.And finally, this self portrait by nikonbhoy works all around the warm/cool scale, using a full CTO front light, a blue backlight, and daylight ambient fill. It was shot on tungsten WB, which shifted everything toward blue.__________As a group, these photos do a great job of showing some of the different looks that are possible using a couple of sheets of orange-ish acetate, once you realize that stuff is far more useful than just correcting for tungsten light.Really nice work, guys. You can see the original assignment here, and all of the entries here.___________UPDATE: From the comments, a little confusion as to which Rosco filters are what, WRT CTO’s, CTB’s, etc. Also from the comments, a heads-up about an excellent Rosco publication containing such info. (Check out page nine.)This is a full RSS feed post from Strobist.com, the off-camera flash blog. This month’s feeds are sponsored by:

Canon 1000D XS Beginners DSLR
Canon 1000D / XS is here, no rumors! Canon has announced their new entry-level budget DSLR and what a beast it is. 10mp Cleaning system 3fps 7 point AF 2.5″ LCD with Live View SD card slot That’s a pretty good bundle for the entry model I am sure you will agree. No news on UK price but expect it to [...]

Shooting and Selling Through a Recession
Even during the last economic boom, times have been hard recently for professional photographers. The price of digital equipment might have fallen, cutting expenses, but with high-end cameras now within reach of amateurs the result has been an increase in the supply of photographers and of images too. At the same time, the Internet [...]

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