Nikonians 2010 Image of the Year
Nikonians March 2010 Contest Winner
www.amazon.com/Torchlight-List-Around-World-Books/dp/0958...
Tripod Mounted D700
Nikon 50mm 1.8 Lens
2 Second Exposure @ f/8
SB-600 in Umbrella, triggered with D700
Flash in TTL Mode with -0.7 EV
Self Portrait
For this shot I set my D700 up inside the house, facing outward. I placed my SB-600 unit up inside the metal frame of an umbrella and the sensor on the front of the speedlight secured it within that framework so that I didn't have to tie it down each time. This was a big deal because I didn't have to dig through the basement to find string or something similar...
I asked my wife to stand-in on a mark while I locked down the focus. After focusing on her face, I changed the camera to manual focus mode. From that point forward, as long as I stood on my mark, I was good-to-go with regard to focus.
The flash was set to TTL with a negative EV dialed in as to not overpower the shot with blown areas, and I began with the camera set to about 1/125th of a second. This produced some nice shots but the rain was frozen as round droplets and it didn't give the desired effect. So, I began to slow the shutter down to draw out the droplets into streaks as you see above.
Now, the flash is what freezes the action and not the shutter, in this instance. You might think that slowing the shutter speed down to 2 seconds wouldn't have an impact on the look of the photo because the flash should still do its thing for the fraction of a second it's firing. My guess is that the Nikon CLS was maintaining communication between the camera and the flash and when I slowed the shutter down on-camera, the camera then told the flash to extend accordingly, providing a longer period of time during which the drops could be seen.
I grabbed some glasses and a book from the shelf to add some weirdness, and to ensure that my wife called me a 'big dork,' and was good to go...
♫CoolMcFlash♫, Arnage, and 1097 other people added this photo to their favorites.
View 20 more comments
Sebastian Eichhorn 21 months ago | reply
Great Idea !
KartCK 21 months ago | reply
nice
Eric Adeleye Photography 19 months ago | reply
Excellent photograph and write up about how you set the shot up.
Ole G. 18 months ago | reply
Prima shot - love it! :-)
Andrea Garza ~ AKA zerohdog 18 months ago | reply
awesome!
R.H.Sumon™ 18 months ago | reply
One of the great photo ever i seen !! :D
Ashlee Guest 17 months ago | reply
This photo is incredible!
AleSSandrouS 17 months ago | reply
Stunning shot. Really creative.
Vivi_Barros 16 months ago | reply
Love it!!!!
Marfi. 16 months ago | reply
Beautiful shot, amazing B&W
vag..k 14 months ago | reply
very clever shot :) well done very good result .
Sam ♑ 13 months ago | reply
H-1 13 months ago | reply
very good. Thanks for showing.
fanigeor (for..zOOzART) off off off off 11 months ago | reply
Great!!
ac4photos ( More off than on - Computer Woes ) 10 months ago | reply
cool image !
mario forcherio 10 months ago | reply
great!!
Adriano Aquino 6 months ago | reply
Awesome!
joaorodrigues_carpediem [deleted] 6 months ago | reply
Good idea!
davide978 3 months ago | reply
Great b&w
Richard BIANCHI. 2 months ago | reply
Image exceptionnelle (Flash sur 2ème rideau non?)