Training for lighting

TWIP

First and foremost. If you are into photography and you aren't aware for this show. You're in for a treat. This podcast is produced by some brilliant talent. 

This Week In Photography or TWIP picks apart current developments, news, and equipment releases in the photography world. One of the best features of the show in my opinion is their discussions also include techniques and tools (tech and software) they've found useful.  

I've been listening for about a year now and I'm still catching up on back episodes. However check them out on iTunes and you'll see in the early shows they have some video podcasts mixed in. 

I highly recommend watching the episodes on studio lighting. If this is a direction your are interested in. This is a perfect primer.

Expodisc

Recently I picked up an Expodisc, which is a tool that will be very handy for setting the white balance (WB) on my camera. This is crucial for getting accurate color,straight from the camera, which should help tremendously withone step of my post production work flow.

How does the expodisc work? To boil it down into a nutshell. It turns your camera into an incedent light meter. (IE instead of your camera reading light as it bounces off your subject, you read the light directly hitting your subject). 

If you want to learn more about the expodisc, this website by Ken Rockwell lays out exactly what type of results you get from an expodisc and how to set up the WB on Nikon Equipment. 

Sekonic L358

Speaking of measuring light. If you're interested in working with Monolights or getting into the strobist movement. One crucial piece of equipment is the light meter. 

This little gadget helps you determine the shutter speed and aperture of your camera based on amount of light produced by your equipment.

While intimidating at first. Walking through your equipment with someone else, can really make the difference with getting up to speed. 

This site by ilovephotography.com is a great tutorial for understanding exactly how to get up to speed quickly and with as  little pain possible. 

State Fair - pt.2 (Sales)

So one of the greatest opportunities that the Minnesota State Fair provides, is to get the word out to the world about your product, invention, or idea. This series of photos was taken with that in mind. This is just a small selection of what caught my eye.

Every image you see in this set was taken with a fixed 50mm Lens usually with a shallow depth of field created with the aperture set somewhere between 1.8-5.6. I believe all the details are available if you click into my smugmug gallery.