Last week I was invited to give a workshop/demo at CameraTools, a camera store in the Netherlands. They organized a “Strobist” festival where 5 photographers showed their way of working with small flashes to around 100 participants.

I was asked to shoot some skaters. It’s something I had never done before but I’m not going to refuse shooting great pro skaters. Erwin and Joe were great to work with. They did the same thing over and over again, so I could go home with some cool pics. I decided not to focus on the technical part too much, instead I wanted to show the process of  building a picture. First of all, we wanted to showcase the spectacular nature of skating. Not an easy task with only a small skate ramp on a parking lot in an industrial area. Getting on the ground for a low and wide angle, allowed us to use the dramatic (underexposed) sky as our background.

Earlier that day I had a horrible tasting but very fun lunch with Moishe from Midwest Photo Exchange. I already have a nice arsenal of small flashes but being a geek and gearhead, I couldn’t resist testing out the Lumopro LP120, the flash MPEX specially designed for off-camera use (I’ll probably write a review later). I always prefer to start out simple, so we just lit Erwin with one single Lumopro.

Let’s get a bit more fancy than for a shot of both skaters. I went lazy and let the skaters light themselves with a flash each. I used an Orbis ringflash (another review I have to write) on camera to get some fill light because Erwin and Joe really didn’t mind how they were lit, as long as their skateboards where visible. By using a 15mm fisheye lens, we’ve got a free graphic element / frame from the Orbis. We experimented a bit to get the most out of the white circle.

Same setup but now with a bare flash, behind and slightly above camera for fill.

When I’m on a “real” shoot I always try to look at all my test images. Not just to judge exposure, flash power, etc. But also to see if a testshot might spark another idea for a picture. On workshops it’s often too hectic to notice those happy accidents. It was no exception here. The shot below is probably my favorite from the set but if I had noticed it while shooting, I know I could have made it even better in just a couple of minutes.

There also wasn’t enough time to fully enjoy the great food and the expertise and images of the amazing other photographers. But I got the chance to meet and talk to so many amazing people and enjoy the fantastic atmosphere. The guys at CameraTools are already talking about making it a yearly event, I just hope I get invited next year too.