Photo Shoot on my Doorstep: A Walk-Through

Following on from a few requests I thought I'd post a short 'walk through' for the recent 'Photo Shoot on my Doorstep' Post so here goes....

Firstly, here's a shot of the location used taken as the camera sees it ... no flash, no exposure compensation, nothing, nil, zilch, rien, nowt ... just plain old 'P'rogram mode:

With the camera now in 'M'anual mode I brought down the exposure a couple of stops to give the sky a bit more 'mood'. I did intend to use just the one light i.e. my trusty Alien Bees 1600 fitted with a large Octabox but the colour of the motorbike just meant it blended in with the background and all it's detail was being lost, so the solution ... throw some light on it.

Here's a diagram of the lighting set up:


The extra light on the bike came from a 'George' Stand i.e. a V.A.L. (Voice Activated Light Stand in the form of my next door neighbours son, George) holding a Nikon SB800 Speedlight aimed at the bike from the right of the camera.

... and here's the resulting image along with the final edit following a short time in Lightroom and Photoshop:


And that, as they say (whoever 'they' are) is all there was to it.

Bye for now ;o)