Light Painting

[Chris V]

Here is a link for a pretty cool light painting done on this B-25. His stuff is very nice! I emailed back and forth with him a few years ago about his technique and he has since put out a E-book. I have it and it does give some decent info in it but don't expect it to be a here is how its all done deal. I have no affiliation with him so I am not promoting anything just passing along something that my be helpful to people.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efDH6xSg4P0&feature=channel&list=UL

[Jeff D. Welker]

Thanks for sharing Chris. It is an interesting approach of what appears to me to be light painting combined with layering multiple bracketed exposures - almost like a very complex HDR image. Definitely has my mind working 

[Chris V]

He uses like 400 to 500 shots on some of these to get the final end result! A lot of processing to do, might take like a 6 pack of 16oz Redbull to complete lol!

[Joe Copalman]

I watched this a while back before our PASM night shoot.  Pretty impressive stuff, and it's awesome to see it all come together, but the final result is a bit too "Where's Waldo" when it comes to the details, but that's just me.  Almost like one of those Hieronymus Bosch paintings with a dozen or so things going on. 

[Joe Copalman]

How about this?  $500 flashlight made specifically for light-painting: http://www.protomachines.com/#

[Chris V]

I gotta think thats WAY over priced!?    lol

[Joe Copalman]

I know, right?  Troy Paiva is apparently using one (I think those are his shots on the website), and his shots with it don't look much different than the ones he took using gelled flashes and LED flashlights.  Yeah, it's work to use different illumination units and to change gels out on flashes and flashlights, but it's far from a $500 inconvenience. 

[Chris V]

My thoughts exactly! I bet you could assemble something as good or close to that contraption and still have plenty of happy meals left in your wallet.

[Jay Beckman]

My one knock on the B-25 Project: It's not really HDR

Consider: When you approach an existing subject that's not lit in an optimal fashion, you draw on HDR in order to have details in the blacks (1,1,1) and still be able to avoid blowing out the whites (254, 254, 254)

With that B-25 "Build An Image" project, the photographer has complete control over every aspect of the image.

Dog too bright?  Use less light or choose a shot that's 1/2 under.
Nose Art Too Dark?  Use more  light or choose a shot that's 1/2 over.

Short of a complete bracket/blend job (which is obviously doable, but far more labor intensive), you don't have that kind of fine control over shooting something using only 3, 5 or 7 frames to dump into software and see what comes out the other end.

[Joe Copalman]

My thoughts exactly! I bet you could assemble something as good or close to that contraption and still have plenty of happy meals left in your wallet.

I have a single flash and two LED lights, all velcroed-up for quick on/off of gel sheets, and I have snoots for both flashlights.  All told, I've invested about $400 in that gear, and the majority of that was on the flash, which can do things the Protomachines light can't do, so it's not even and apples-to-apples (or happy meal-to-happy meal) comparison.