The KSPD WebLog

After my disaster with my Inovatronix ExplorerXT I decided to go with the AlienBees Vagabond II.  All I can say is that it performed FLAWLESSLY!  I have nothing bad to say about it. The recycle times were impressive (less than 1 second with 3 AlienBees B800 units at about 1/8 power).  It’s nice to be back in action in the mobile power department.

Rena did great and she is a long-time friend.   We sneaked into and shot in the old sub-level of Old Sacramento.  It was a fun shoot and I really enjoyed working with her!

Had another outdoor shoot with Veronika.  Typical AlienBees 2x B800 setup.  This location was more remote and there was no power available.  I used my Innovatronix ExplorerXT and it worked great for about 5 minutes then it went DEAD.  I finally realized that after owning the unit for about a year, the unit was deffective and it has never charged correctly.  I always thought it was wierd that the charging LED never stayed lit for more than about 30 seconds but I thought it was still charging because it had always worked fine.  After this shoot, I now finally understand that I have just slowly been depleating the charge of the batter over a year long period and that it has never really been charged since I have owned it.  I now have a completely useless, dead external power pack that is out of warranty and no longer a winner in my opinion.  Even better, I can’t get a hold of Innovatronix for support or anything.  I’ve emailed and called with no luck.  I guess you get what you pay for.

I purchased a Paul C Buff external power source today.  I have a feeling it will perform much better.

I am working on building my people portfolio this month and Laura was kind enough to pose for me.

These shots are very straight forward.  Alienbees B800 key light with large octodome with grid and another Alienbees B800 with medium softbox for fill.

Congratulations to Mr. & Mrs. Ellenberger.  They were married in Berkeley, CA on June 26th 2009.  The ceremony was held in an amazing redwood forest in the Berkeley botanical gardens.

People here in the valley were treated to an awesome electrical storm that spanned from the Sierra Nevadas to the Bay Area and lasted several hours.  Of course, I was out in the middle of it getting some shots.   This is something we won’t see again for quite some time and just wanted to share.

I saw a program on The Discovery Channel recently about photographing water droplets using high speed video cameras.  I thought I’d give it a shot using a traditional digital SLR.  This setup is incredibly basic and went something like this:

Setup:
Baking pan for water
C-Stand with grip arm to hold zip-lock bag filled with water over baking pan
Tripod
Camera (In this case, a Nikon D3 with a Micro Nikkor 60mm AF lens)
PW’d AlienBees B800 with 10 degree honeycomb grid
Sample book of Roscolux gels. (The free book of small gells that you can get from lighting stores, has about 500 free gels in them)
Reflective material behind the baking pan to reflect light down onto the water.  I used anything from a water color painting made by a friend of mine to a white piece of poster board.

I shot in manual, about 1/250th sec @ f 16 with the strobe at full power pointing at the background material.   I had to shoot A LOT of frame (about 300) to get these few keepers.  Its a very inexact science.  Mostly trial and error.  In a perfect world, I would have liked to have shot at a faster shutter speed, but my D3 syncs at 1/250, so I was somewhat limited.  A fix for this would have been to use a SB-800 or SB-900 with high speed sync enabled, but I just didn’t get around to it.  Stopping down a little more would have also helped with some focus issues I was clearly experiencing.

Enjoy!

Not much going on lately…  I found this guy in my front yard after some heavy rain.

Equipment: Nikon D3, Nikkor 60mm Micro, Nikon SB-600 (controlled by SU-800), Generic Shoot-thru Umbrella

Congratulations to Kim and Eddie Alcala!  They were married on New Years Eve in Woodland, CA.  A truely extravagant and elegant wedding.  They really know how to throw a party!  Best to you both!

Halloween has always been a big deal for as long as I can remember.  I have lots of fond memories of decorating the front yard with silly ghosts and other “spooky” stuff.  I am glad to be living in an actual house and not an apartment this year, because that means I can actually relive some old childhood memories by decorating my own yard.  This year I really wanted to cater to the darker side of Halloween rather than the fun loving and humorous Halloween.  This has really always been my taste and I’m glad I finally get to make a real attempt at having an exciting holiday.  I decided on scarecrows.  For some reason, I’ve always been fascinated by scarecrows.  I suppose it could have something to do with growing up in rural Northern California.  I grew up with corn fields almost literally in my back yard and I have fond memories of climbing haystacks and other farm paraphernalia.  Now that I think about it,  we really didn’t have a lot of scarecrows (in fact, I’ve never actually seen one in real life existing for the purpose of scaring off birds) but the imagery of these beings is just intriguing and inspiring.  They remind me of the changing seasons, fall colors, and cooler weather (all things that I really like).  I really find such things quite comforting.

Well enough about me, so I was finishing up working on this guy for the night and I realized that the moon was insanely bright and completely full.  It was just rising up over the scarecrow’s shoulder and I thought about how cliche the scene was.  I couldn’t help myself and I grabbed my camera and took a few quick shots.  I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to photograph a work in progress in such a “Halloween-ish” setting.

Talk to you soon

Getting ready for Halloween!

Full Moon on 10/14/2008 - Nikon D3 with 300mm IF-ED Nikkor Lens