Saturday 22 January 2011

Unit 205 Accessories

In this blog entry i will be discussing the selection and reasons for choice of my equipment and materials, their function and operational knowledge, with consideration of alternatives.

Tripods
To enable crystal clear shake free shots, it is always best to use some method of steadying your camera, there are a few ways of doing this, hand holding whilst leaning against something and holding your breathe, resting your camera on something, using a fast shutter speed, a monopod.... the best way is the tripod....  have two tripods a Silk travel tripod and a Manfrotto heavy duty tripod.

My Silk tripod is really useful when  am traveling light it is a compact tripod of only 655mm (just over 1/2 a meter) whilst being able to extend to a full height of 1,550 mm and a low weight of 2.6 kg or a bag of sugar, a three way head and I have a ball head as well which I can change with an Allen Key. the flip side of light weight is it not being as robust and solid and steady as a bigger model , in saying that this tripod does a very good job the section on the legs do not flex with rubber feet with a spike in the centre which can be screwed out. the center column can be reversed and separated to enable the multi adjustable legs to flatten out for low level shooting.
My other tripod a  055XPROB with the famous Manfrotto-patented horizontal centre column feature, this is even easier to use than the previous models. You do this by extending the column to its highest vertical position, it can be swung round to horizontal without removing the head or disassembling the column itself, so switching between framing and positioning setups is more convenient than ever. The leg has an angle release mechanism and quick action leg locks which allows the legs to fully flatten out.
As with all higher specification tripods they do not come with any heads, so I purchased an  808RC4, this is a 3-way head to fit on the tripod legs. There are two balance springs in the vertical tilt (forward/backward) and horizontal tilt (left/right) movements. These springs enable you to more comfortably handle heavier camera loads (such as very long lenses) with minimal effort. Both springs can be turned off in case normal head operation is required. The head is comprised of aluminium and designed in a manner to support up to 8kg yet lightweight and small enough to pack in any camera kit. The standard quick release system is used to accommodate larger camera platforms which incorporates dual axis bubble levels to achieve level shots.

I will be using the heavier, steadier more robust Manfrotto tripod to shoot my images obviously because it will ensure total reliability and dependability of use.

Lighting Stands 
I use Interfit Lighting stands which came with my lights, they are well build with air damping so they don't suddenly drop down when the clamps are released. I have used various other type of stands and they are all basically of the same design of three legs which fold out from a centre column which is segmented parts which enable the top section to be raised and lowered.

 These are the soft boxes I currently use with my light, basically they do what it says on the tin they are boxes that soften the light. inside these boxes there are are two diffusion layers of translucent cloth which scatter the light, softening it
A flash though umbrella , similar to the one I used on the car shoot this works differently to a soft box, whilst still diffusing the light it creates more contrast and shadows at the light is more direct, there are a few other options with umbrellas such as reflector or bounce umbrellas, these types have a white (soft) or silver (hard) lining which reflect the light from the strobe.


This is what they call a beauty dish, this gives a similar effect to a ringflash, a shaddowless fill light, you can see in some fashion shots a circular light reflected in the models eyes this is from a beauty dish, there are adaptors which you can fit to these dishes to modify the light such a diffusion panels and honeycomb grids which channel the light.

1 comment:

  1. Hi
    I will be marking the blogs next week can you add your last blogs and any final work as by the end of next week all will be marked.

    Steve

    ReplyDelete