Tag Archives: EF 100 f/2.8 Macro

Ezybox Hotshoe in action

Posted by gerard.maas on May 2, 2007 9 comments

Last weekend I had some time to do work some more with the Ezybox Hotshoe. Here’s a sample of what can be achieved with it.

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Portrait taken with Ezybox
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Natural light
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setup: Ezybox Hotshoe ‘charged’ with a 580EX on a standard Manfrotto light stand

This image illustrates few important points of using the Ezybox Hotshoe:

- Color Temperature – using a flash as main light provides us with a consistent color temperature of about 5500oK, the shadow where the girl is placed is actually much colder, which is visible on comparison image on the right. The portrait is much pleasing with the neutral-warm tones

- Light Control The light of the moment was quite harsh, coming slightly from the back and leaving most of the face in shadow. The Ezybox+580EX were used as main light. This was achieved in this case by decreasing the ambient exposure by 1 stop and using the flash without exposure compensation

- Portability Sorry to state the obvious but it’s really nice to have creative control over the light in the middle of the garden

The flash was used in automatic exposure mode (E-TTL) triggered by the controlled wireless ST-E2 on the camera.

is this info useful to you? Drop me a line with comments or questions. A more detailed review on handling the Ezybox Hotshoe is coming. If you have questions, now is the moment. – Gerard

Backlight

Posted by gerard.maas on November 27, 2006 None comments

Outline effect

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To create this image, we used a Lastolite Ezybox fitted with a speedlite and we masked the middle of it with black velvet cardboard. The composition was placed in the blacked out area. The diffused light coming from the sides of the softbox enter the transparent surfaces at an angle, creating an outline effect on the coloured water and glass jars.

The speedlite was used in E-TTL mode, and was triggered using a ST-E2 on the EOS10D. We used a EF 100 f/2.8 Macro lens to take the image. For this technique, it’s very important to use a hood, to avoid flare from the side light.

Use a hood

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To achieve a great backlight effect, the light source will be behind or almost behind the lens. In this case, it’s the natural light from the sun is enhancing the colours of this cactus rose leaf and flowers. We include here an image made with the same setup, but removed the hood from the EF 100f/2.8 macro lens to show the effect of flare on the image.

Focal Lenghts and Picture Styles

Posted by gerard.maas on November 22, 2006 None comments

Focal Lenght

Certainly one critical decision point in any photography is the lens to be used. While it’s actually distance which determines the perspective on a subject, a focal lenght of a lens will allow you to play with that distance to achieve the desired perspective and composition.

This is a small comparison of four focal lenghts on a portrait of Anne Sophie.

Thanks to Anne Sophie for being such a great model!

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17mm [EF 17-40 f/4L] 50mm [EF 50mm f/1.8 MK1]
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100mm [EF 100 f/2.8 Macro] 200mm [EF 70-200 f/4 L]

All images were exposed: 160/f5.6 ISO 200 using the quite unstable natural light (fast passing clouds) combined with a very reliable speedlite 580EX diffused with a portable Lastolite Ezybox

Picture Styles

A new feature in the latests EOS Digital SLR’s. The Picture Styles allows you to tune the response of the sensor for specifical rendition of tonalities. It’s the digital equivalent of choosing different films like de saturated Velvia or the subtle Portra.

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Standard Neutral Portrait

Litchee

Posted by gerard.maas on November 21, 2006 1 comments

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Still exploring every day stuff from another point of view. This time, with another kind of light. I masked a 580EX speedlite flash with a black card where I made a hole in the middle and placed it behind this litchee skin. The result was a great red glow like a SF cocoon that is about to explode.

Splash

Posted by gerard.maas on November 21, 2006 None comments

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We wash our hands many times a day, but how many times we realize how the water moves, splashes and flows around? Our daily life is full of wonders and details that we so often overlook.

The movement of the water on this pic was captured using flash to ‘freeze’ the action. The flash was positioned behind the hand to offer back light, both increasing the visual impact of the image and allowing to use as few flash power as possible to obtain the fastest response. I’ll be explaining this technique in more detail in the future.
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EOS 5D + EF 100f/2.8 Macro. Speedlite 580EX flash in wireless ETTL mode, controlled by a ST-E2 on the camera.