Lighting Reviews

Photography is all about light and photographers are always looking at ways to modify it. Visit any studio of a working pro and you’re bound to see softboxes, umbrellas, cones, snoots, grids, beauty dishes, parabolic reflectors, etc. Each has their purpose in changing the shape and/or character of the light. Using the same light source, you can modify it from a sharp, harsh, point light source with distinct shadows to a soft, even light source with very little or no shadows. With that in mind I decided to give one of these modifiers a test, the Paul C. Buff PLM v.2.

Shutterbug, a member of the Technical Image Press Association (TIPA), once again joined forces with 30 other member magazines from around the world to choose the winners of the annual TIPA Awards for the best photo/imaging products in 40 different categories. The award process began in early 2017 with an initial selection of a wide range of products conducted by TIPA’s Technical Committee, on which Shutterbug’s Editor-at-Large George Schaub serves. 

Here’s a loosey-goosey studio lighting tutorial from Photo-Me-Ike where he tests out the new Orlit Rovelight 610 TTL system to see if it’s a viable alternative to the popular and relatively inexpensive Flashpoint (aka Godox) system.

If Dustin Hoffman’s character in The Graduate were graduating from photo school this year, the advice he would be getting instead of “plastics” would be “speedlights,” and why not? When compared to a monolight, the biggest advantage of using a shoe-mount flash is that they’re small and portable, which means you can take them anywhere. Today’s shoe-mount flashes—or speedlights as camera manufacturers like to call them—are sophisticated, seamlessly blending natural light and flash as well as having the ability to group several flashes together, trip them wirelessly, all the while calculating the correct exposure.

Fresnel lenses are used to focus light. Many of the Hollywood glamour photographers of the 1930s and ’40s used them, most notably George Hurrell for his portraits of many of the screen legends of that era. Hurrell used 8x10 cameras, uncoated lenses, and bulky Mole-Richardson hot lights. You don’t have to go that route, but you can now replicate some of the lighting effects with this new offering from Photogenic.

One of the reasons you might consider a “third-party” shoe mount for your camera is simple—it’s usually less expensive, sometimes considerably so. Saving a few bucks is good, but perhaps some features are missing, or the construction isn’t as robust, or the resale value will be lower. But sometimes it just may be a smart choice, as I found when testing the Phottix Mitros flash for my Nikon.

While I’ve found Nikon’s wireless TTL system to be a great asset, I also understand that it has inherent weaknesses when used around obstacles that block the signal, as well as outdoors beyond a few feet or under sunlight. Enter PocketWizard’s ControlTL (Control The Light) TTL-auto radios for Nikon (originally introduced for Canon). These radios are designed to respond in every respect as a dedicated extension of the Nikon CLS/i-TTL system. And they have the potential to do that, provided you keep on top of firmware updates (www.pocketwizard.com/support). I conducted my tests using my Nikon D300 together with the Nikon SB-900 speedlight (verified by PocketWizard as compatible) and briefly an SB-700 (not confirmed at time of testing).