Lighting

TOGCHATS

Udi Tirosh — The Creative Mind Behind Spiffy Gear Lighting

Episode #236 of the TOGCHAT Photography Podcast - Recorded January 27th, 2021
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TOGCHATS

Eli Infante – The High Speed Sync Portrait Master

Episode #230 of the TOGCHAT Photography Podcast - Recorded December 16th, 2020
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TOGCHATS

How To Improve Your Portrait Lighting With a Circle and Some String

Episode #221 of the TOGCHAT Photography Podcast - Recorded October 14th, 2020
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

The Importance of Catchlights for Portraits

If you are going to shoot portraits, don’t overlook the importance of catchlights. They’re a small detail that can easily make or break your shot. So what’s the big deal about catchlights? Catchlights play an important role in creating dimension and depth and in adding life to a portrait by…
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DIY Photography Tips from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

Livestream Setup in My DIY Home Studio for Photography Videos

A lot of folks have asked me for the details on the livestream setup and gear that I use to produce my photography videos for YouTube. I’ve been doing YouTube videos weekly now for just about 4 years. The home studio setup that I am using now is the result…
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DIY Photography Tips from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

The Best DIY Photography Reflector for Less Than $2.00

Bet you didn’t know that Walmart sold professional lighting accessories. Here’s an inexpensive and effective DIY photography reflector that you can find at any Walmart or Dollar Store. If you’ve read many of my articles or attended my workshops, you have heard me talk about my famous DIY photography reflector,…
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Events From My Photography Career

Fashion Portraiture with Simple Lighting Presented at WPPI

Since switching to Olympus cameras, I really have been having a ton of fun shooting without sacrificing features or image quality. The Olympus gear has met and exceeded every one of my expectations and even saved me time in post production. I have also been very fortunate – Olympus has…
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Photography Gear

The Honey Badger by Interfit Photographic

I was wrong. A few months back I wrote this article and told you that I thought the Paul C. Buff DigiBee was potentially the most underrated flash unit on the market. I was simply wrong — for a bunch of reasons that all involve the Interfit Honey Badger from…
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DIY Photography Tips from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

DIY Strip Light Modifier for Speedlights

Grab your Jedi robes and your stuffed Ewoks, because I’m about to show you how to make a bigger, brighter, light saber than any of the ones you see in the Star Wars movies–perfect for photographing Princess Leia. These lightsabers are even daylight balanced and great for shooting portraits both…
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Photography Gear

LED Lighting for Photographers

I have been having a ton of fun shooting with these LED lights and even learned some cool stuff along the way. I wanted to close by sharing my thoughts on LED lighting for photography, and, of course, I’ll take you behind the scenes for another shoot using ALL of…
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Photography Gear

Smith Victor CooLED Lights

In this article- Part 4 of my LED light series- I’m gonna show you some lights from the Smith Victor CooLED series. These include three LED studio lights that look more like studio strobes that you can attach modifiers to like you do with a strobe. I’ll also add a…
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Photography Gear

Spekular LED Photography Lights / What Is Cri?

Spekular is a new modular LED lighting system that is being referred to as the Swiss army knife of lighting. For the second part of my continuous lighting series, I am going to put Spekular to the test and I am going to do my best to demystify those three…
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Photography Gear

LED Continuous Lights vs Strobes for Photography

LED this, LED that, hybrid lighting, CRI, constant vs strobe… are you getting a headache from all these headlines and videos and kickstarter campaigns about these revolutionary new lighting gadgets? Is it causing you stress because you are going to have to spend a ton of money to keep up…
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Photography Gear

RapiDome by Photoflex

The RapiDome by Photoflex is a lightweight speedlight modifier which is changing the way I approach portrait lighting both on location and in the studio. I’ll explain why and I’ll even take you behind the scenes as I put it to the test. The folks at Photoflex were kind enough…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

Beauty Dish Lighting from an Umbrella

The irony of a beauty dish is that it makes harsh light that is not really that beautiful… unless, of course, you use it properly. I’ll break it down for you and even show you how to make your own very portable DIY Beauty dish for less than $7. Go…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

The Inverse Square Law for Photographers

The inverse square law is one of those phrases that strikes fear into the minds of new and even experienced photographers. Why? Because we are talking about physics, equations… You know…math! But don’t worry. I am going do my best to simplify this inverse-square law stuff for you. There are…
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Photography Gear

DigiBee DB800 by Paul C. Buff

I honestly think the Digibee – the DigiBee DB800 by Paul C. Buff, to be exact – is the most underrated flash unit on the market today. This DigiBee DB800 has been on the market for just about a year now and I will admit that I just started using…
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DIY Photography Tips from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

Portrait Lighting Arrangements With DIY LED Studio Lights

Now that you have your own DIY LED studio lights- or you maybe you are planning to build a set- you need to learn how to use it. I’ll walk you through a dozen different ways that I use these lights, plus I’ll give you some not-so-obvious tips that I…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

Direct Flash Glamour Shots and Beauty Portraits

If you have tried using direct flash without any modifiers or, even worse yet, put a speed light on top of your camera and aimed it straight at your subject, or even if you haven’t, chances are you’ve heard that direct flash is not a good idea when you’re photographing…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

How To Shoot a Casual Portrait With One Light and One Modifier

The casual portrait is taken in a studio… Which is not exactly a casual setting… So what does it really mean? For me it starts with an attractive subject, photographed in simple casual clothing, in a relaxed posture with simple, flattering light. This is a shot that I would do…
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Photography Gear

Light Blaster by Spiffy Gear

Stop! Don’t move! Now click that “like” button, or I’ll blast you with my Light Blaster! I bet you’re wondering ‘What the heck is a Light Blaster?’ The Light Blaster is a strobe-based image projector that will let you to turn a simple backdrop into an exciting new background with…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

Photographing People With Glasses – How To Avoid Glare in Eyeglasses

One of the most common questions I receive: what’s the best lighting to use for photographing people with glasses, so that you don’t have reflections or glare on eyeglasses? The answer is easy… and I can use any kind of lighting arrangement I want to. I just set my lights,…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

Learn How to SEE Light. Remember the Egg!

When I started telling the egg story in my workshops many years ago, I got the sense that people were just humoring me as they sat there nodding their heads as if they understood the message. So I went ahead and recorded a video to show what I was talking…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

How To Use a Reflector the Right Way for Better Portraits

Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! Seriously – PLEASE STOP using reflectors to create crappy unflattering light. TV shows, movies, and unfortunately even YouTube photographers seem to think it’s really cool to do that low angle gold reflector that blinds your subject, makes ridiculously bright catchlights in the bottom of…
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Photography Gear

DIY Fluorescent Studio Lighting

I have received an incredible response from the article and video series that I produced about the DIY Fluorescent Studio Lighting Set-up (See original video below). I have also received TONS of questions about the fixtures and how to use them so it is time to write a quick follow-up…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

High Key Lighting With Three Studio Lights And A White Room

“High Key Lighting is a bright even light that is designed to eliminate most of the shadows in a photograph“ This set-up is a high key lighting arrangement that uses three studio strobes (You could also do it with Speedlight’s or hot lights) and it takes advantage of the studio…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

Dramatic Beauty Portrait – Shot With 2 Lights

Here is a recent dramatic beauty portrait lighting technique that I did at the end of a modeling portfolio shoot. I did the shot with just 2 flash heads and one of them; was BOUNCED onto the ceiling. The model is a young 16-year-old from Cleveland, Ohio who traveled here…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

Lighting Setup for the Sci-FI Geisha Girl Shoot

Sci-fi Geisha Girl! That’s the name that my makeup artist gave to her latest creation. Let’s take a peek behind the scenes at my lighting setup and I will show you how we did this beauty shot. Let me start out by saying that this is one of those pictures…
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Photography Lighting Techniques from Joe Edelman (Cr.Photog.)

Backlit Beauty Lighting Setup

Let’s take a look at how we can make a really cool portrait or beauty shot by putting ALL of the light BEHIND the subject. Wait! Did I say behind? Ok… we’ll make it work. If you have read any books or taken a class about studio lighting, you have…
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