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This is my favourite $1 lighting modifier

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I’ve always been drawn to interesting looking light. The simple, soft and flat light of softboxes and other standard modifiers rarely hold my attention and I’ve often felt like that softbox lighting doesn’t exist outside of the studio. It’s always looked a little too clinical for me.

We’re shown interesting light all of the time when we’re observing daylight. Dappled light as it falls through leaves, dancing sparkles of light on water, rays of light through buildings and other structures, but we rarely try and bring that interesting looking light into the studio. In fact, many of us chase and covet this idea of ‘perfect’ light from a generic modifier and although there is certainly a time and a place for that, today I’d like to share a lighting technique that is a little more visually engaging.

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Aputure’s new colour-mixing Accent B7c LED bulb is every practical light you’ll ever need

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If you’ve shot video, or even sometimes if you’ve shot stills, you know what a hassle practical lighting can be. It’s always too bright or too dim to easily balance with the rest of your lights for the ISO you want to shoot at. Or, it’s completely the wrong colour. So, you have to get tricky with white balance, or gel things, or have a bunch of different types of bulbs on-hand to match to other light sources.

Well, no more. Now you just need one type of bulb to match with everything. Aputure has finally launched the Accent B7c, an RGBWW colour-mixing practical LED light that lets you simulate just about any colour or brightness you’ll ever need.

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How to shoot a night-to-day transition in a single take with some lighting trickery

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We’re not talking about the timelapse holy grail here. We’re talking video. One of the most difficult things to do in film is to show the passing of time in a single shot. There are many ways to do it, but rarely is it all caught in the same take.

This video from the folks at Aperture’s A-Team shows us how it can be done with a little forethought and some fancy trickery with your lighting setup. It’s actually not as difficult as you might think, although it definitely takes some planning and there are one or two tips that can help improve your odds of pulling it off.

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Vogue under fire over not hiring a black photographer for Simone Biles cover photos

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On its August issue covers, Vogue features the amazing gymnast Simone Biles, photographed by Annie Leibovitz. While people are thrilled to see her on the cover, the photos themselves have caused quite an outrage. People have called out Leibovitz over “poor lighting” and “washed out” skin tones, adding that Vogue should have hired a black photographer who better understands dark skin tones.

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Use household items to light your shot with this DIY approach to product photography

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If you’re still stuck at home and want to practice your photography, particularly small products, you might have been struggling if you don’t have a lot of lighting kit. Product photography often requires a bunch of different light sources to show off its different facets and surfaces. But if you don’t have a lot of gear, what can you do?

In this video, Jay P Morgan photographs a glass drinks bottle on his kitchen table using nothing but things he finds around his house (mainly the kitchen). Using parchment paper, flashlights, oven trays and even a diaper to create a pretty decent shot you can easily achieve in your own home.

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Three photography lights you can use for online meetings

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So, Covid-19 is upon us and we are staying home. Alone. This means that we make a lot of content and meetings in front of a monitor and a webcam.

If you are a photographer or a videographer, you know that the lights you use, matter at least as much has your webcam. I thought it would be nice to take three lights and show them in front of a monitor. Now, these are lights that are either low-priced or that you already have lying around anyways. Without further ado, here are my top three photography lights to up your online meeting game.

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You need to stop making these video lighting mistakes and this is how

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I always say that we all make mistakes and that it gives us an opportunity to learn as long as we’re willing to fix them. But some mistakes are more common than the others. Matt Esteron of Aputure takes three most common mistakes in video lighting, and he discusses them in this short, but highly informative video. He offers a few quick fixes for each of them, so if you make them too, this video will help you not to do it anymore.

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How to turn your single light into a multi-light setup… sort of

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If you don’t own several strobes or simply don’t feel like making complicated lighting setups, you can use just one light and still get professional shots. In fact, you can turn this single light into two, three or even more lights. Well – kind of. It’s pretty simple, but you’ll need some Photoshop magic. In this video from Adorama, Gavin Hoey will show you how.

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This software lets you shoot full fledged studio photos with multiple models even on lockdown

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If you are on the creative side, it’s hard to stay at home without any humans to shoot. If you are not familiar with Set.A.Light 3d, it’s a piece of software that creates realistic studio setups, including pretty realistic models.

So if you are stuck at home, and can’t transform it into a studio, or if you have no one to shoot, this can be a perfect way to feed your creative needs.

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