[vievetrick]

All these awesome examples have me looking for my flash and some batteries. Dont worry zenimagery it is digital and you can practice all you want with it only costing your time.

[Peter Zack]

Yes and you can also have a second or third "light source" with reflectors. Go to the buck store and get one or 2 of those windshield sun reflectors from Mylar and mount (glue) them to a thing masonite board you can prop up. It will cost you under $10-15.00 it can be positioned anywhere opposite the flash to fill in the deeper shadow areas. You can also go to a fabric store and find some thick white vinyl and mount that on the reverse side or another board. That gives you a second choice of light reflection look or a third light source.
While at the fabric store see what they have to translucent pure white fabric. You can streach that over a wire frameor a circular plastic tube (go to a hardware store for a narrow diameter and flexible plumbing pipe). This can be used as a shoot through diffuser.

Finally you can use Daylight CFL's with regular desk lamps as constant lights. 3 will cost less than $100 for the whole kit. You can cheaply diffuse them, snoot them etc. Get the desk lamps with the flexible shaft and a clamp on the end. I have a couple that cost me all of $12.00 each.

If you want a couple of cheap lightstands, I have a few older spares that you can have for the cost of shipping/packing material from PEI. I've got more than I need. They aren't great but they will do the job fine if you want them. Send me a PM.

[richard64]

one flash setup:

Great images Dan. Just out of interest, can you give details about where you positioned the flash, what power and any diffusers/reflectors you used on the insect photo?

Richard

[alohadave]

Great images Dan. Just out of interest, can you give details about where you positioned the flash, what power and any diffusers/reflectors you used on the insect photo?

Richard

Look at the direction that the shadows are coming from, how hard the shadows are, and what the reflections (if any) look like. That will at least tell you where the flash is and if the light is diffused or hard.

[khardur]

Great images Dan. Just out of interest, can you give details about where you positioned the flash, what power and any diffusers/reflectors you used on the insect photo?

Richard

See Dave's comments above. Look at the shadows - are they hard or soft?
Then look at the shadow of the spider body - now imagine where the main light would be based on the shadow and body position. Check out the pic again and then read on:





Okay, as far as modification, that won't be so obvious, just that you know based on the soft shadows that it was diffused somehow. Maybe if there were eyeballs you could tell if it was a softbox vs. an umbrella, but in this case there isn't anything you can do to really deduce what I used, beyond that I used something.

Here are the details:
Vivitar 283 flash to the above right of the camera position, shot into a homemade beauty dish at maybe 1/4 or 1/2 power, I can't remember.



ps. For anyone who may think they don't have a use for that el-cheapo tripod you have laying around, it makes a great lightstand that works on uneven ground because you can adjust the legs. I originally brought out my normal lightstand but quickly realized the bank behind my house was too steep and a normal light stand would not do, it would just fall right over with the flash mounted on it.

I have tent stakes that would have held it down but I didn't feel like rooting them out.