The Last Speedlinks of 2008, Evar

Before you hit the party circuit for New Year's Eve, a batch of speedlinks that you will never regret reading the next morning. Drive safe, get the hangover remedies ready before you actually need them, and we'll see you in 2009...__________Speedinks: 12/31/2008• Do you brave the winter weather for your art when you are out to get photos of wildlife in snow? Do you go even further and drag lights out to amp the quality a little? Yeah, well, when you get back to the house Moose Peterson would appreciate it if you could not track all that snow in....

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As is Tradition for the Last Week of December

Twenty years ago, Tenney Mason (my first DOP) passed along the wisdom of not taking days off between Christmas and New Year's. No real work gets done, he noted. And you can just put your feet up on your desk and plan out your next year.That kind of thinking is why he was management and I was a grunt. And I have taken that advice to heart ever since....

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A Visit from The Man

For as long as my kids can remember (and longer than that, in my case) Santa has been paying a visit to our house every Christmas Eve. The evidence is as plain as the nose on your face -- the living room is littered with presents in his wake. But in 2006, that circumstantial evidence was not good enough for Ben, my (then) six-year-old chief investgator....

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Bite Me, Hallmark

UPDATE: Photo now links to Zach's walk-thru on his blog.__________Reader Zach Hodges, whose family was apparently really into the Twilght movie, decided to unload a full can o' Hollywood with his Christmas card this year. The up-to-the-minute spoof guaranteed prime refrigerator placement for every recipient under 30, with an equally resounding "What...

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From the Archives: How to Shoot Christmas

It's that time of year again, when you can spend quality time with the family during the holiday season and secretly be working on your light balancing skills. (Try not to be too obvious.)At this point, even the most serious procrastinators finally have their lights up. If you get anything really cool, stick it in the Strobist Flickr pool for us to...

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Today's Special: A Cuppa Joe, With a Squeeze of Lime

If you are into in-person, hands-on learning there are a coupla great new options on the radar. Hit the jump for details on new offerings from Joe McNally and Bert Stephani.__________McNally has just announced that he has revived the Dobbs Ferry workshops. If you are anywhere in the northeastern US, you'll want to take a look at the new one-day programs...

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Speedlinks: December 18th, 2008

In this most eclectic edition of Speedlinks, we feature: The "Crotch Flash," a "POS," a slideshow without slides, an inside job gone horribly wrong and a little piece of American history... __________• WTJ has a video interview with a shooter who was pretty much assigned to shoot an entire issue of a fashion mag. Of interest to the alternate-style lighting folks, the "crotch flash," which shows up at about the 8:00 mark.• You know how all of those photo gear review articles in magazines will sometimes tiptoe around the fact that they absolutely...

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November Winner Makes a Splash

Congrats to Haristobald, seen above at upper right, who despite all appearances did not do this photo shoot in the nude. There's a Speedo behind that 70-200.He shot photos of his local triathlon club's calendar, did a video of the shoot and earned himself the last set of Pocketwizards left to be won in the Going Wireless contest.This one jumped out at us the very first time we saw it, and it was a unanimous choice for the November winner. More info, including links to two more videos and Martin's site on the PW blog.Thanks to all who entered, thereby...

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Beers With: Rembrandt

EDITOR'S NOTE: With apologies to every single art history class ever taught, this post marks the first in an occasional series of bar conversations with some of the Old Masters. These guys were the first ones to seriously light their work, and always merit a second look from those of us who slept through our humanities classes in college.__________Netherlands-based...

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RadioPopper Introduces Gen 2 Products

Lots of announcements hitting the blog over at RadioPopper tonight -- new designs, 1500-foot TTL range, remote control of AlienBees and WL, the debut of the long awaited "juniors," etc. Way too much to quickly digest into one post. Prices start at $59/$69 for the JrX receiver and transmitter, respectively, and go to $249 for the full-blown PX units.RadioPopper has put a lot of the info into a video, embedded above. Full-line brochure is here with more photos and specs. Lotsa yakking about it going on here.-...

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Back From The Twilight Zone

I think that even if I were Joey L, I probably would have OD'd on seeing my own Twilight movie photos everywhere in London last week.Okay, maybe that is just sour grapes on my part. The Boy Wonder's work was plastered on pretty much every flat vertical surface in the entire city. Undeterred by teenage photographers with mega-movie photo assignments,...

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I'm Speechless.

With just one day to go before the big, cryptic December 12th RadioPopper announcement, the following pops up on Pixsylated:Twelve Canon 580 EX II's, all equipped with RP1's in high-noon, high-sync, sunlight-killing formation. I am pretty sure this is the first sign of the Apocalypse.__________UPDATE: What that bad boy looks like from the business...

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Nikon CLS Video: The Lost Footage

Joe "Mexican" McNally and Bob "One-Take" Krist scotch-taped together some of the good parts from the cutting room floor of the new Nikon CLS video, for your viewing pleasure.Hit Joe's blog for more, including a look at Bob's new travel photography book which I currently am studying in advance of next month's trip to Central America. Congrats to Bob and Joe on the video, which is finally in stock and shipping from Amazon -- complete with well-deserved five-star reviews. So if you are a Nikon shooter and are busy shopping for everyone else at Amazon...

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Cheap, Soft, 360-Degree Light

I was up in New York recently, and saw a video production unit filming in the lobby of my hotel. They were using cheap paper lanterns as light modifiers for their point-source continuous lights. Very cool thinking, IMO. They are so cheap as to be nearly disposable, and take a point light and turn it into a 360-degree soft box. Adapting this idea to...

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Four Reasons to Consider Working for Free

The U.S. stock market has been cut in half. And some countries have it worse than we do. Companies are shedding jobs like there is no tomorrow. And heaven help you if you work for a newspaper or a magazine.The US auto industry is on the verge of imploding. People are losing their homes to foreclosure. And, on the off chance that you had the nerve...

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Their Secret? I'm Guessing "Free Beer"

I go to London, and look what I miss: The Vancouver Strobist group did a collective double-take when none other than Joe McNally showed up for their monthly meetup.He was in town for a gig, and probably just needed a little help figuring out that CLS stuff. (The RainCity Strobists are really good at that CLS stuff.)Joe blogged about it, and you have...

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DIY Salad Bowl Beauty Dish

This one looks pretty darn OEM for DIY. Reader Tom Seibert has a detailed post on how to make a large DIY beauty dish for speedlights, including a bracket that takes the strain off of your flash by not using it as part of the structural support. In a second post, he shows how he was able to adjust the beam pattern of the dish to make for a much smoother...

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RadioPoppers Jr. Product Killed Recast; Updates to P1s Coming

RadioPopper has announced that the upcoming RP Jr. project has been killed redesigned(?) in a way that will integrate it into a bigger system. And there is apparently a big update coming to the current P1 design. All very cryptic at this point. Original blog post here.Syl Arena has seen the new units, (much likee) and is dishing with at least a little detail.__________UPDATE: Lots of yakking on this in the Flickr group. RP's Kevin King stopped by to set the record straight and add some detail, too.-...

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