Written by: Rachel Durik from Savor Photography
I get a lot of questions about lighting. Except most of the time, the questioner doesn't realize that the question is about lighting. It's usually, "What kind of lens do you use so you have such clean and bright pictures inside your house?" or something along those lines.
Although I wish I lived in a house with that kind of super light, I usually need a bit of help. And I do it with off-camera flash.
Oh yes. I said the "F" word.
Don't run away scared. Flash is your friend, if used properly. I think a lot of us are happy to be natural light photographers because we simply don't know enough about lighting or are intimidated by it or have horrific images of direct flash ingrained in our heads. That was me before my husband bought me a flash for our anniversary. I about cried because I was so disappointed. Yes, it was a horrible, selfish thing to do, but I thought there were other things he could have spent all that money on. Turns out, it was one of the best things he could have bought me!
(On a side note, there are some natural light photographers out there who are amazing at what they do! They've chosen natural light not because they don't know anything else, but because that's their love. I'm not at all knocking natural light photographers.)
Anyway, if you're interested in starting to use some OCF, but don't have any idea what you need or how to put it all together, hopefully this video can point you in the right direction.
{Note from Angie & Amy: If you are having problems viewing this video, please go to this link and you might have better luck watching it from there: http://s302.photobucket.com/albums/nn88/racheldurik/tutorials/?action=view¤t=BasicOCFbyRachelDurik.flv }
Rachel Durik is a photographer located in Southwest Florida. You can learn more by visiting her photography site, Savor Photography, the Savor facebook page, and her personal blog.
