Photo Happy Hour

Making the transition from natural light to flash

June 10, 2020 Michael Mowbray, Carl Caylor, Dan Frievalt Season 1 Episode 14
Photo Happy Hour
Making the transition from natural light to flash
Show Notes Transcript

It's a big step, right? Moving from using only available light (often called "natural light", but isn't all light "natural"?) to learning off-camera flash can be daunting. It's a question we often get as we mentor other photographers. So we took on this tough subject and hopefully made it a little easier for you to understand and make the transition. Of course, along the way we get derailed on some interesting tangents. Michael shares what Froot Loops and pizza have to do with light placement. Carl waxes poetic about the way the light hit his fishing buddy. And Dan shares his secrets for making a great mojito (slap that mint!).

Informative and entertaining, grab your favorite beverage and press "play".  And don't forget to subscribe!

Your Hosts:
Michael Mowbray, M. Photog., Cr., owns Beautiful Portraits by Michael in DeForest (Madison) Wisconsin and also owns MoLight. Learn more at:
www.beautifulportraits.com
www.gomolight.com

Dan Frievalt, M.Photog., M. Artist, Cr., owns Frievalt Photography in DePere (Green Bay) Wisconsin and also runs Seniors Unlocked. Learn more at
www.frievaltphotography.com
store.seniorsunlocked.com

Carl Caylor, M. Photog., Cr., ASP-Fellow, Kodak Alaris Mentor, owns Photo Images by Carl in Iron Mountain, Michigan and also runs Carl's Coaching Corner.  Learn more at:
www.photoimagesbycarl.net
www.ccphotocoach.com

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Michael Mowbray :

Recorded live from a lemonade stand in your front yard. Hey, kid. How much if you add some vodka? It's the federal happy hour podcast. Hey, welcome everybody on your total happy hour bartender Michael Mowbray I've got my blender set to shred up some photography tips and whip up some fun. Joining me behind the bar are Dan Frievalt and Carl Caylor.

Dan Frievalt :

Hey guys, how's it going?

Carl Caylor :

Hey, everybody. There's always like a big

Michael Mowbray :

lag.

Dan Frievalt :

What are you waiting? Like, who's gonna say something first, we don't want to talk over each other.

Carl Caylor :

Oh, there's that but I was also trying to think of something intelligent to say too. And

Unknown Speaker :

we may be here a while.

Michael Mowbray :

It's right here. I'm gonna get comfortable then. In case you're just joining us for the first time. More of the 17th time actually this is Episode 14. So if it's the 17th time, you can't count

Carl Caylor :

for two weeks.

Dan Frievalt :

We Oh, we Math Math so early.

Michael Mowbray :

On that note, we are three professional photographers who have been around for a while and we get together and we drink and we talk about photography and the more we drink. I was gonna say the more intelligent Carl sounds but he already blew that this week's that's gone out the window. Hence the photo happy hour. So grab, grab your own favorite beverage and join us for the ride. I don't know if we're going anywhere. I mean, that would that's illegal, right? We can't really be driving right now for drinking. Well, we are Wisconsin. So it's just it's just like a misdemeanor. It's it's a warning.

Dan Frievalt :

In Wisconsin. It's called a roadie.

Michael Mowbray :

It is. So each week we've got a topic and this week we're going to be talking about transitioning, transitioning from being a natural light photographer into maybe incorporating some off camera flash or off camera LED, or doing something other than just natural light. So we see a lot of people doing this and get a lot of questions on how to do that. So we thought, Hey, why don't we talk about it? And then when we get these questions, we can always say, hey, go listen to the podcast. The reason why I do videos by the way, is like anytime I do a video is because I've got the damn question too many times I'm like, damn it I'm going to do a video is like, I get those questions like go watch a video. I've done the same thing with with blog posts, you know, and in videos are nice too, because

Dan Frievalt :

I am not as we discussed in previous podcasts, my grammar and writing structure, it takes me weeks to like write out a blog posts on like, I'll just do a video. Not that it's the grammar and the pronunciation is that much better but it Lisa's done. True.

Carl Caylor :

Like last week, you're making up words. So I was

Dan Frievalt :

I was I was trying to tell Stephanie I made up some word. It sounded pretty cool. I think I'm not sure what what it was, but very rarely.

Michael Mowbray :

Very rarely very.

Dan Frievalt :

Oh, I have to write that down. Yes, yes, that's gonna be the word of the year

Michael Mowbray :

to find ways to do that, everyone, so I'll just make up words and see if people and repeat them over and over again, and see if people would start to use them. It was fun.

Dan Frievalt :

That's so fetch

Unknown Speaker :

a new word.

Unknown Speaker :

Okay,

Carl Caylor :

Amy, it's one word, it just maybe

Dan Frievalt :

we should also have some sort of contest and to see if if people can catch all the pop culture easter eggs that we throw in throughout the

Michael Mowbray :

podcast. There's a lot

Carl Caylor :

how many and where'd they come from? both great.

Dan Frievalt :

Exactly so transition a transition Oh, we're

Carl Caylor :

talking about now we're recording it we still record transition from natural light. Well, you know, you did most recently, Carl. I did a couple of years and well, you know, it's kind of funny like quickly down under if you ever talking about referencing movies,

Michael Mowbray :

pop culture quickly down under

Carl Caylor :

that pop culture but movie trivia, okay. You know, a long shooter, he's a rifle marksman and you know, said well, he can he did say he didn't know how to use a six shooter. He just said he preferred not to use them. And so at the end, you can tell that he was very good at both but I've always used lights. I understand how to use lights. I just never. I chose not to. I chose to use natural because it was more of a comfort level to me. It was you know I couldn't afford equipment at all was a lot more expensive back then. It was well and technology even a few years back, didn't even pertain to me. I didn't, it didn't matter to me because it was too much to handle too much carry, it wasn't going to do what we needed to. Now it's got high speed sync, it's very mobile. It's lightweight, it's powerful enough to do to do what we want. It's a lat has a power that we can turn down enough to do what we want. Because power isn't always about, you know, excess, it's about just what we need as well. So Exactly. It's all those little things that are now available for us that made it worthwhile to head that direction. So, but the thing is, you know, natural light if you understand natural light portraiture, the quote unquote transition addition, intuition, camera flash only allows us to do more things and be more versatile. But light is light, you still use it the same way you're still trying to accomplish the same patterns on a person's face to create their portrait to be appealing to them. So it's the transition is was somewhat easy, except for, you know, the technical aspects of some of the products themselves, but that's what we got Michael for. So that's why I'm here for made it easy. That's why he has videos. We watch his videos because he gets tired of your calls. Hey, yeah, how do we get back on high speed sync again?

Michael Mowbray :

Yeah, you can tell if I send you a link to a video. I was like, I really don't feel like answering that question right now. You have

Carl Caylor :

too many times. Here's a video. Here's your link. Here's your site. Here's your link.

Dan Frievalt :

Go here. Yeah. And Carl hit the nail on the head by saying technology nowadays makes it so extremely easy to make the transition. And you know, I know all of us have kind of run the gamut through the years, because we've been around a while, as Michael said in the opener, you know, from using natural light, and then then the batteries came along. So we all remember the 20 pound battery that we had to lug outside. Yeah, and we still didn't have, you know, we're still tied to that shutter sync speed of 200 or 250, depending on your camera. So then, you know, I'll try neutral density filters and then can't see anything or it's hard to focus and then, you know, you you transition into hyper sync, which worked 2% of the time and then maybe, you know, and then radio poppers and things like that, which was that that works, but it was like hacking the technology and different rounds of batteries and oh my gosh, yeah. small little less powerful lights. So you'd gang them all up and then

Michael Mowbray :

I even went to those of

Dan Frievalt :

Yeah, and Elliot's expensive. Yeah, and LEDs are like making a comeback, and I transitioned Li You started using LEDs will probably six seven years ago like super powerful battery powered LEDs to get a natural light look but have control over the lighting especially on or overcast days and stuff where the reflector isn't doing a whole lot. So to be able to have that shallow depth of field and use LEDs, and then when the Holy Grail I kind of say was broken where you could have a super powerful strobe with a small battery, high speed sync TTL it's like that busted everything open. And it's like, Okay, I'm not looking back at this point, and I still do natural light things and I kind of still consider myself kind of a hybrid natural light because I always still look for good natural light to start with. And because I photograph just seniors and one senior day I have the luxury of shooting later in the afternoon. I can pick my own schedule. I mean, or I can shoot in the middle of the day, but I just prefer to shoot Where it's a little bit easier, a little bit cooler, temperature wise and in Wisconsin, it does get warm, believe it or not.

Carl Caylor :

Our snow is gone now, you know? Yeah. Last week was like the end of it. So

Michael Mowbray :

it was 91 here yesterday. But um, yeah, and Dan mentioned the holy grail, the Holy Grail, believe it or not guys, that was almost four and a half years ago, at home, and that was the Goldilocks ad 362. So 360 watt second flash, that for those of us who have been around for a while, has kind of built like a quantum flash, but better build quality than the quantum the ball, the third the price, and more power and very, very lightweight lithium ion battery pack. And when do TTL and remote control from the transmitter and it's like it was I did all those things that were like, this is everything we've been asking for forever, you know, and it's lightweight and portable. Where does Where's where was this? All of our life, you know? Yeah, that's four and a half years ago, which is scanning things isn't that long. But look at how many innovations have happened in the last four and a half years. It's crazy.

Dan Frievalt :

Look at everything that has happened in the last six months.

Unknown Speaker :

Talk about that. Now.

Dan Frievalt :

It's kind of mind blowing. It's like Wait, what? It's It's June. It's what? Huh? Oh, yeah. Yeah. middle of

Michael Mowbray :

June, somebody posted something about you know, is it? Is it too early to drink on them on a Monday like Monday? We're back to having days again. So we ended those back and back in March, no more days of the week.

Dan Frievalt :

Right, right. I only drink on days that end with Why

Unknown Speaker :

Why? Just

Dan Frievalt :

Why not? Because why not? Whoo. Yes.

Carl Caylor :

So here's the thing that I kind of have in the back of my mind when I'm Entering a scene enter an area as far as trying to think of the light. In my mind, I'm thinking I want I want to try to find natural light First, if it's at all possible there, and that to me is naturally portraiture. But then sometimes I really want to work in that area but the light isn't great. So then I use the strobe assist. So I call that natural light with drove assist, and then there's times when it's just absolutely no even beginning of a good part of natural light and it's just gonna be all about strobe and so some of his examples of that would be if you're out in broad daylight and you're like high speed sync, trying to overcome the sun and, and a lot of like what Dave Davis used to do, or damla kind of had with that wide angle stuff and guys really low down on the ground and they got the whole card on there and the angle and they blast it so they got blue sky and you can see the So in the sun come through, that to me is all out strobe. And but there's those three different things are what I kind of roll through my mind as I'm deciding on what I'm going to do in that area. So you don't have to go all at strobe you can do a little bit above

Michael Mowbray :

and see I'm more of the all out strobe. And that's actually where I start first. In most cases, not that I can't shoot available light and I do shoot available light. But I'm, I'm wired to think strobe first. So I always look for I look for the cooler, the cool location where I've got lines and composition and color. And then I go Okay, what can we do to make the light better? And that's where I use stroke. So and, or can I use it to be dramatic and cool, because that was one of the things that set my work apart was to make it more dramatic and cool and different than other people weren't doing that other people who are Me shooting available light or natural light, especially at noon, or two o'clock in the afternoon when I was supposed to more weddings. Yeah. Or you know, for for me. I'm based in the Madison Metro market. And when I was photographing more weddings are really heavily into weddings. The thing was everybody want to go down to one of our two beautiful lakes, usually Lake Mendota, which is the prettier one, and they'd be down there two o'clock in the afternoon, or they'd be at the Capitol in the middle of the afternoon and you gotta light it otherwise, because that bride knows that that that water was blue and she was there and the sky was blue. And she gets her images back and she looks good, but the waters blown out and the sky is blown out. She's like, What happened here? Well, that was one of the things that set me apart was okay, I can make her look great. And we'll make the groom look great too, but you know he's a prop and lighter and get true Or even deeper blue on the sky and hold the blue of the water and it made my work stand out. You know, it was it was more dramatic and that was you know, mid mid 2000s because that was kind of a new back then.

Carl Caylor :

That was your style you know and it still is too by the way I think and sure um, but I find this kind of funny that because of COVID you watch there's gonna be a lot of people that wish they understood natural photography because there's a lot of people that are going to grab their gear to go out right now that they finally got to open and realize their batteries aren't working anymore. Make sure you charge him buggers or no because all that time we had off, man I'll tell you we might not be what we thought when we get there with our equipment.

Michael Mowbray :

And as an aside on that if you're using lithium ion batteries, especially if you're using the godox ones, go join my go Doc's flash help group on Facebook and in their eyes. Got a lot of articles, a lot of topics and one of the topics I have is on how to take care of your batteries. Because you do have to manage your batteries when you're using lithium ion. They don't like sitting around for six months or even three months being unused and uncharged. So, you may Yeah, just as Carl said, you may go go to pop it on your flash, you know, an hour before the shoot and find out. Oh, yeah, yeah, it's not charged. Oh, wait, it won't charge. Yeah,

Dan Frievalt :

I mean, I've had that happen several times. Pre COVID. Just because, you know, my, my scatterbrain nests are, you know, they The good thing though, about the godox batteries in lights, I mean, they last forever, like, I like I get several sessions out of them. And, you know, it's like, man, I still have to charge this up. So that you know, that is a really cool benefit. Again, I have nothing really good to say about speedlights because personally, they just aren't powerful enough. I hate double A batteries even the chargeable ones it's nothing but a pain. So having the lithium ion rechargeable, it's just an amazing piece of equipment. something so simple but so, so powerful.

Michael Mowbray :

And I'm glad you brought up speed like Dan because I think that's an important part of this whole conversation of transitioning from natural light to, to off camera flash or something because that's usually the first thing people do is like, Okay, well, I'm going to try speed light. And this is coming from the speed light guy. This is from the guy who had 21 canon speed lights at one point. It looks about them, wrote two books about them taught all over the country, you're talking about speed lights, you'll often I use a speed light now, very, very, very rarely. I still have a ton of them, but I very rarely use them because now we have the more powerful lights that give us more flexibility and such but tying this back to the to the topic is when people come to me and they say they're going to make the jump from natural light to off camera flash and the first thing they say is speed light. I only say that's, that's a good idea. If you're photographing events and weddings, if you're doing nothing but portraiture and you don't need an on camera flash, it's really what a speed light is. Skip it, you know, you really should jump up to something that has more power like a godox 8200, which is the power of three speed lights, or an ad for hundreds is even better. That's the power of let's do the math. six speed lights.

Carl Caylor :

Or oh wait math,

Michael Mowbray :

or math we have a rule if we have if we make you do math, you have to take a drink.

Carl Caylor :

Hey, what are you drinking today, Mike are

Michael Mowbray :

I am drinking some Bowmore scotch because I had a dental work done this morning, and my jaw hurts my head hurts. I figured this is like a anesthetic. So there we go.

Dan Frievalt :

It smells the same. Yeah.

Michael Mowbray :

I'm gonna say it was prescribed by my dentist. There you go. Four out of five dentists recommend more scotch. Yeah.

Dan Frievalt :

Sounds like a new sponsor.

Michael Mowbray :

It is I think it should be a new sponsor. Okay, I'm gonna keep doing math though. So if we go to the godox ad 600 That's the power of a little bit over eight speed lights. And guess what guys? I'm thinking about getting in the new ad 1200 Have you guys seen this, which is the power of

Dan Frievalt :

the sun equals pretty much

Michael Mowbray :

one of my pet peeves I have many pet peeves in case you don't know me. I have many pet peeves. I just don't talk about that much. But one of the pet peeves I have is people say I'm gonna overpower the sun's like, Well, unless you're gonna make the sun go away. Really what you're trying to do is you're trying to balance use flash to balance with the sun and thank you for you did a live Facebook this last week Dan, you said that and I'm like, I just want to actually give you a COVID hug through Facebook when you said that, but yeah, you're not really trying to overpower the sun unless you're trying to make the sun go away. Guess what? With the ad 1200 you can overpower the sun. Yes, but they're going to be like 1600 bucks.

Carl Caylor :

And isn't that when an external battery to

Michael Mowbray :

Yeah, it's it's really? To me it's targeted more at commercial photographer so yeah like the I mean the people who are promoting big time for godox right now are the admin sons down in Texas right Lucan David David Yeah. Who do fan work? Ooh,

Unknown Speaker :

mad mad.

Michael Mowbray :

So if you guys don't know the admin sins Ed m o n s o n, look up amazing work, but they are. They do portraits. But it's commercial work. I mean, they're building sets. They've got a lot of people on set. And in those kinds of situations, you know, they're used to using power backs and not moving lights around like we do for our senior portrait session. It's, you know, it's more constructed. And it might take four to six hours to take a shot.

Carl Caylor :

Or a week, or a week. Yeah,

Michael Mowbray :

I'm just being on the short side of it. Yeah.

Dan Frievalt :

And I'll come on raising stuff. Amazing stuff. Yeah. And I kind of want to rewind a little bit when when you talked about from stepping up from a speed light to a 200, for instance, at 200. And how it's three times the power of a speed light, but yet, it's like only one and a half times the size of the speed light, which is pretty amazing. Yeah, right. Yeah.

Carl Caylor :

And here's the other thing when people transition, whether it's a speed light or the 8200, or even the for 600. What a lot of people don't realize when they're transitioning And I've been noticing is that it's not just the light, you need to need to go forward with the modifier. Oh, that's a really big part about the new technology and new things that we have is that these work with bone mounts and we can put on our softboxes and, and match the lighting situations that we're in. So whether it's you know, bright stuff and we're using more deep throw cabinet situation for the harsh, more more harsh shadows, but, or a softer shadow to help coordinate with open sky type of lighting situation, you have those but you need those two, you can't just buy the flash and say, Hey, now I got a flash and point that little flash at somebody and expect it to look appealing because it's just not gonna,

Michael Mowbray :

right. This morning, you know, the smaller the flash out or even the smaller the light source, the more really, really specific you have to get with light placement. Otherwise, you're going to create some really harsh, and often cases, bad shadows, especially if that light placement is off skewed just a little bit and you get those weird, I always call it the sundial effect, you'd put a like a speed light or a small light source on somebody. And you take it off center a little bit from the nose, and you get that weird triangular shadow from the nose coming across the cheek. It's like a sundial and it's

Dan Frievalt :

a Sunday. Yeah, look at the clock. Right?

Carl Caylor :

Like 415 actually, but yeah,

Dan Frievalt :

yeah. Hey, yeah, and it takes a little bit to get used to I mean, no one where the place to light or getting used to getting that light in the right area and the right modifier in the right situation. Maybe sometimes I think the misconception is, I'm going to buy this light and it's going to just instantly solve my problems in it. It makes it a lot easier, but it still takes finesse and it takes a little bit knowing light patterns and you know, you know, putting your nose towards the light, you know Moving the light with with the with the nose and things like that. So like, I always train my assistants first with like an LED light and we go into studio and I show the light patterns and be like, okay, you're not going to see this outside. But, you know, if they turn we're going to move that light this way, move it that way and that's the benefit of also finding good light to begin with, but then also like playing to your subject. So if a subject we talked about this, I think last week posing and stuff like the good side of the face, or if they turn a certain way, if their hair is part of a certain way. It's kind of hard to move the sun. Right? You can you can, yeah, kinda kind of hard. You know, I've tried I've done the Jedi, but it doesn't work.

Carl Caylor :

Yeah, believe man, you gotta believe you gotta believe. Yeah,

Michael Mowbray :

you really have to squint your eyes and hold your hand all that to

Dan Frievalt :

do the Superman and go around the earth like really fast in opposite direction and turn back time.

Michael Mowbray :

You guys the second time we've had that that reference in this body Yeah I think I did that a couple weeks ago I think

Dan Frievalt :

you did now that you say that Yeah.

Unknown Speaker :

Just repeats

Michael Mowbray :

it does

Dan Frievalt :

Yes. Yeah. So you know keeping those things in mind I guess when when you're starting out and and just you know I always recommend this to whenever you you if you take a workshop or you you know go to convention or or whatever you do if you're just learning this you know, pull in a past client, someone you know where you can just experiment with light and you don't have the pressures of, you know, performing and giving images to them and you know, just kind of just looking at things and use if you see when I do workshops or if you see my videos in my my membership and stuff I'm chipping a lot in with the Sony it's kind of cool, because even in bright sun, I can look through the viewfinder and zoom in. I don't need the hoodman are back in the day I made my own out of PVC pipe and a magnifying

Michael Mowbray :

glass. I remember number that you paid you painted a black dude and how I even painted a black Of course yeah

Dan Frievalt :

in fact my Texas go class they they they gifted me a hood man at the at the end of the week was really nice card and all this stuff. I was playing like my you know Home Depot hoodman because I was too cheap to buy admit I was all excited to get a hoodman when they came out and I I remember picking one up at a convention. Yeah, I picked one up at convention and I went the checkout. They're like $75 or something like

Michael Mowbray :

what more than that?

Dan Frievalt :

Was it? Okay, gotcha. Okay.

Michael Mowbray :

Hundred 20 150 bucks.

Carl Caylor :

pricey.

Dan Frievalt :

Okay, so see, I don't feel so cheap now. But I'm like, Yeah, okay. I think I've been a pass.

Carl Caylor :

See? No, Dan, if you would have if you would have taught us last year the year after. at Texas School. They gifted every instructor. Oh, they did? Yes.

Dan Frievalt :

That's why there's one in my bag. And I will say it is pretty cool. It is really nice. It could mean if you want to sponsor us we love your product. We are not overpriced. I'm just I was just cheap. So yeah,

Carl Caylor :

it's but we're Yeah,

Dan Frievalt :

it's worth it is they are they are beautiful and if you do video, it's nice to have that. But you know like, again with the Sony if you look through the viewfinder, you can zoom in. It acts like a hood man. And what I'm looking for is the light pattern that either the shadow like like Michael said, it's like oh, I have the sundial that means the light needs to go up higher. And mainly what I'm looking for is the catch light in the eyes. Because I can tell where the catch light is if it's like at 10 and two I have a pretty good direction of light.

Michael Mowbray :

You know what I call that when you're using a you're using a hard light source and you've got that use you follow the you follow your nose or use the flash to follow knows follow knows with the flash whatever I'm trying to say I think I'm still under anesthetic from the dentist plus I'm having my own anesthetic now but it's fun

Carl Caylor :

to watch actually.

Michael Mowbray :

Anyway So what I'm saying is this you should follow the subjects nose with your flash if you're using a small hard light source and I call that what why you know culture reference right there yeah you go

Dan Frievalt :

there great. Oh wait no that's

Carl Caylor :

not that's the tiger guy but if he wants to sponsors that's fine too you know,

Dan Frievalt :

crackle pop, but we're just gonna run the gamut.

Michael Mowbray :

Exactly. Just keep rolling with it. I guess. I was gonna say something else here and I can't remember what the heck it was. Was here so this will be a good time.

Dan Frievalt :

Good time for a break.

Michael Mowbray :

Yeah, I think it was a good time for a break so we'll be back in just a moment. The photo happy hour is brought to you in part by MoLight and Golden Eagle, USA. Golden Eagle provides the best value and color critical LED lighting tools for photographers and videographers alike. Check out the wide array of LED options at the MoLight web store at www go molight.com. MoLight is proud to be the exclusive us distributor of Golden Eagle LEDs. And we're back. One of the things I wanted to talk about is light placement because we're just going through that and people struggle with where to put it. And one of the things when I teach and I'm going to be doing an upcoming webinar on this and start direction and quality of life is where to place that. And just one small tip with that is think of a pizza. And you're going to cut that pizza into eight slices, because we've all done that right. Now I want pizza but yeah, same pizza.

Carl Caylor :

Just like all meat topping or talking about pineapple on

Michael Mowbray :

it. We'll stick with cheese otherwise we can we can make it a little bit More complex and we put pepperoni on that we talk about how close and far away the pepper like bacon, we have bacon on

Carl Caylor :

it. No.

Michael Mowbray :

So thinking about pizza, we've cut it into eight slices. That's really no different than taking a circle and cutting it into 45 degrees slices because we a lot of times we talk about where do we put the light, we put it 45 degrees away from us. Well, really, that's if we're going to put this in pizza terms that's in between the first and second slice away from you. It's a lot.

Dan Frievalt :

There's a lot of math and I'm looking at Dan,

Michael Mowbray :

I'm going okay, I better do this in a webinar. So I'll explain this more in a webinar. We won't do this idea, visually. But this

Dan Frievalt :

is the most This is the most math we've ever had in one podcast. I'm getting drunk. Thanks.

Carl Caylor :

I'm thinking you you have a mohito

Dan Frievalt :

Yes, yes, it's Yeah, another mohito It's a fresh mint. It's Summer here, so I'm growing my own meant and modeling Mohit toes and yeah,

Michael Mowbray :

it's refreshing. So I mean because it's photo happy hour and happy hour is two thirds there's more math, two thirds of the podcast name. We should talk a little bit more about the drink. How do you make your mojitos?

Dan Frievalt :

Oh, that is a great question and I actually worked we may have brought this up before but in a martini bar for for quite some time I knew over 100 different martinis I believe and other things.

Michael Mowbray :

Yeah, that I did not know. Yeah, I know one. I put straight vodka into a shaker. I opened a bottle of vermouth in the next room.

Unknown Speaker :

Yeah, shake up.

Michael Mowbray :

shake up the vodka. And I pour a glass. That's a martini.

Dan Frievalt :

And, and yes, and that is a true Martini vodka gin, you know, extra dry and you know, which doesn't mean more vermouth. By the way. Means you like you said, You open it up in the other room or you, you walked the bottle over the top of the martini glass,

Michael Mowbray :

you take a drink of the removed, swirl it around, and then spit it into the glass. I think that's a Dirty Martini, isn't it anyway?

Unknown Speaker :

Yeah.

Carl Caylor :

I want to select my bartender.

Michael Mowbray :

Anyway, back to the Mojito back to what we did. So

Dan Frievalt :

yeah, along with that, there was mohito there was all kinds of different fancy drinks that we did all fresh juices, everything it was, it was high class, you know, and for me, you know, as you know, that was kind of their norm. But I learned a lot. So my mohito though is is norm norm Yeah. Is and I kind of cheat with it because it's us rum, rum. And well first I start with lime, so fresh lime, mint, you model that so you kind of crush it with a with a special modeling tool. If you put any sugar in there when you muddle or no, I don't because that's where I kind of hybrid instead of having a simple syrup and a soda, I just use seven up, which to me is, yeah, it's just sugary,

Michael Mowbray :

sugary soda. It's basically simple syrup and you know carbonated waters. Yeah,

Dan Frievalt :

I don't have to mix it and sometimes I'll have carbonated water where I kind of top it off if you like a little bit more fizzy, but that's the here's the key secret. This is worth tuning in for if you want to, okay while your friends and I'm

Unknown Speaker :

bringing it I'm weighing in

Dan Frievalt :

as well. Yes, slap your meant. But, excuse me, like

Carl Caylor :

before you model it or after I mean,

Michael Mowbray :

I think that's illegal in some states.

Dan Frievalt :

It is illegal in some states. Yes, yes. afterwards. So if I like to do the modeling everything and you think about this, so this is how I was trained, like when you model it, it basically destroys everything, you know, in the mint leaf. So then when you have it all mixed up, you take a leaf or two, and you slap it. And what that does is it it breaks the capillaries in the middle leaf and lets the oils the essence of the main extrude Yes, see now you can picture it because like, Oh yeah, you know, you think

Unknown Speaker :

flopping the meant

Dan Frievalt :

the I slept the night and you lay that on top. And when you give that to someone, they'll be like, whoo, this is good because they can just get the aroma that means everything that's modeled, it's just crushed and you know, it will release that in into the drink. But when you have that fresh smell when you bring it up to drink it. Yeah, that's what sets the pros apart from the amateur mohito makers that you'd like

Carl Caylor :

to juggle the bottles and stuff to like cocktail. I mean,

Dan Frievalt :

well, no, but so after my after this, since we're going on a tangent here after my my high class, Martini gig, I got a different bartending job and so on. My wife, Stephanie worked at this bar and it's called here the hipsters, and then the owners created the sardine can, which is they were brilliant marketers. And what it was is they actually had a moving wall. So the place is always packed. And if you've ever been to Cabo, there's a bar called the elbow room. It's only two bars, tools. And that's where he got the idea from, because he's like, Man, it's so cool, because it's always you want to go there, because it's exclusive and it's always full. Sure. So he made a bar that that, you know, was always full. And then as more people came to the wall, they could we could extend it out. And,

Michael Mowbray :

yeah, visually, it would always look past it would always look over eight people or, you know, 25.

Dan Frievalt :

Yeah. Because if you, you know, did you ever go to a bar and it's like, humongous, but then it doesn't feel like there's anyone there and it's like, oh, this place is kind of dead. And he also kind of got the idea from Spring Break where they would purposely have lines of people outside so it looked like it was full and then once you got in, you'd be like, oh, there's no one in here. But it's again, marketing things. I take marketing from all realms of creating demand and scarcity and like, you know, people doing something different. And you know, every bar in Green Bay is a sports bar because we're Packer obsessed. So what are you going to do the standout? You know, he had that he had other things like all kinds of things like the first person is free drinks until the first person goes to the bathroom in the bar.

Unknown Speaker :

Oh, yeah.

Michael Mowbray :

Yeah,

Dan Frievalt :

he had like, reverse cover charge, where he's like, our bar is so sucky. We'll pay you $2 to come into our bar, you know, which was like basically a free drink or something. And, and the point of this story is I went from all these high end martinis and drinks and stuff. It's like, the rules there was we had beer, and no cocktails that had more than two ingredients, or three ingredients. Sorry, and an ice was considered an ingredient. We tried the bottle thing we throw bottles and dance on the bar and yeah, do other things which I won't bring up here. It was crazy, crazy games, all all legal stuff, but yeah, in some states Yeah, they would do crazy things. Yeah, yeah.

Michael Mowbray :

listenership in Vermont is but we don't lose all Vermont listeners

Dan Frievalt :

and I should clarify it was all good clean fun but well I'll just say what it was he had vibrator races so it was Cooley they had a little ram set up and all different ones and you could you could pick the number which one you thought he would win Oh yeah, he had different names and they go down a thing and whichever one one you'd get a free shot and yeah, we you know, we do that now. National Anthem before and then I made like a paper airplane once because I'm like, we need a flyover for this. So then I downloaded like it and for whatever flyover sounds will replay that and throw airplanes across the bar like basically it was I

Michael Mowbray :

would, I would have so gone to that place.

Dan Frievalt :

Yeah, it was. It was fun. Yeah, yeah. One person asked like, Hey, I always come in here and never get a free drink. And in the owners like here, I'll give you a free drink token for you know, next you bring this back the next time you come in, you get a free drink. So he reaches in the ice pin and gives gives him ice cube. And here's the kicker, the person left. Went home because they must have live close and put it in their freezer. actually brought it back. He's like, yep, you'll get a free ride back like a week later. Like, yeah, I'll give you a free drink. He went through that amount of effort. So it was brought back

Unknown Speaker :

Yeah.

Michael Mowbray :

What spot in my pocket? Yeah. Oh, loves our topic. So here's, here's, here's the thing, you know when when we you know not not to talk about, like, we've been around so long, but we've been around for a while. Well, when we bought flashes when we bought speed lights were the first things that we could do TTL and battery power and all that kind of stuff. They were 500 and some bucks. Yeah, 500 and some bucks can get you now, a 600 watt Godox ad 600 Bm, which is just a man, worst name ever, by the way, but actually, yeah, that's I mean, Carl, you use one or two of them. And it's 600 watts and that's eight times the power of a speed light. And they're like $549. That's a bubble we used to pay for Canon we were all canon people. The Canon 600 dX RT or even the five a dx two

Carl Caylor :

those were I've ad a PS five yeah yeah if I pick up

Dan Frievalt :

I mean yeah my my first show with high speed sync it was two grand and the in the in the the transmitter to fire the doggone thing was like four or $500 450 bucks.

Michael Mowbray :

Yeah those Profoto ones Yeah. And I just honestly don't mention pro photo here again

Dan Frievalt :

you know, and you might and so Miko might disagree but like I I don't have a problem with a pro photo I don't either. Right But for for so I can get I can get you know so many more lights so much less expensive and not worry about that you know if they do fall over and by the way, Michael has a two year warranty unlike other

Michael Mowbray :

non over okay. I misspoke there. That's defective. Break it. Yeah, to get a repair. Okay, okay. I'm glad I'm

Dan Frievalt :

glad you clarified You can do that too.

Michael Mowbray :

I just I just repaired a I just repaired a 600 Bm today somebody had dropped it in the creek and, and blew a capacitor. So yeah, but it's repairable yeah 100 $169 for dinner.

Dan Frievalt :

And I just pointed up because I was I was cheap and I was I loved my 360 did everything I could wanted to do with it as I always wanted to get the 400 and get the 400 and you know, I just purchased out like a month or so ago from you and I love it. I knew I would because I you I've used it before it workshops. But I was kind of like Ah man, I don't know if I want to spend the money and I was like I thought to myself, same thing. It's like I spent way more than this few years ago. It's like

Michael Mowbray :

beet light.

Carl Caylor :

And speaking of natural light though and buying stuff. Do you have any of the those rolling reflectors in stock? I think Amy oh geez. Yeah,

Michael Mowbray :

probably got 40 of them. Oh,

Unknown Speaker :

okay, yeah.

Michael Mowbray :

That's actually something that I want to talk about. Sometimes you probably can't really do it in a podcast, but it's called a rolling scrim flector. And it's one of the coolest things that I found in the last few years. It's a reflector. But you can take the reflector part off, it can be a scrim, or you can use the black part of it and it can be subtractor and or moves, and it goes up to like eight plus feet. And you can rotate it laterally. So I use it a lot for a lot of product shots. I'll use it sometimes for fashion kind of stuff. Just lighting from above, for that kind of top lighting thing. I mean, it's

Carl Caylor :

for blocking the light, you know, natural light situation. So I that's why I'm like, Natch, that that's a product that has benefits for both strove and for natural and for the combination, sir. So I mean, that's the next realistic Or, you know needed product that I that's going to add to my toolbox here I think so.

Michael Mowbray :

All the product shots I do for MoLight of the flashes Matter of fact, if you guys could see I mean you guys listening to this can see those but back on the screen behind me that's the scrim flector that's I'm shooting a softbox through the scrim flector as the background to get a very it's 255 all the way around that on 255 not overblowing and just getting a nice, nice clean white background behind a product shot and you could I know Jen Lewis if you guys know Jen Lewis. I know you guys know but I'm talking to the listeners. That

Unknown Speaker :

Who? Who is ha some

Michael Mowbray :

crazy crazy curly haired lady down in North Carolina. We'll see if she listens to the podcast now.

Dan Frievalt :

There she doesn't she used that for

Michael Mowbray :

headshots. I use it for headshots too. Because if you get that person that comes in, you're all set up and you talk to them on the phone is like yeah, we like a medium gray. Great. And then they come in, it's like oh, I was kind of hoping for White and you know how long it takes to set up a white sweep unless you've already got it set up. It takes take some time. This is roll the scrim flector over put a light behind it. meter done. So I can set up a basically a high key headshot in I don't know, a minute, maybe two. Yeah,

Dan Frievalt :

I think I've also seen pictures of you using it as like kind of like a tanning bed outdoor when you're in your Speedo.

Michael Mowbray :

Well, yeah. Because you know, I'm still trying to you know, this, this body don't tan. I should. I should probably get a T shirt that says that. This body don't

Carl Caylor :

say t shirt making long sleeve shirt.

Michael Mowbray :

That's right. Oh, yes, the shin flexors. Shin selectors. Yes. So any any parting shots this week on people trying to transition from natural light into flash or even we didn't really talk about By LED, but LEDs are kind of an option, you know, not as powerful as flash. So you got some limitations outside. But I mean, that's something to consider.

Carl Caylor :

I think the best piece of advice is this in making the transition, or even continuing as the quote unquote natural a photographer, take a physical workshop, go see somebody live and it'll take care of weeks or months or years of trial and error. Do yourself a favor, you know, spit out the cash and just go learn for a weekend or a week or whatever with somebody because it will make a humongous difference and less stressful for you. I agree.

Dan Frievalt :

Yeah. And just you know, take a look at natural light and what you're already doing and say, Okay, now if I would put a reflector here and just kind of replace it, you know, with a light or I know a lot of people can light or indoor used to like studio or even when Then stuff it's like it's not that hard of a transition then to kind of think of it in the same terms and just kind of get used to it so it doesn't look too flashy you know getting getting that dialed in so so it looks like natural light still and yeah you know kind of go back to what I said before along with Carl you know learn from someone because you when you can see and identify the light it allows you then to go home and see and identify light wherever you go. And you're in your kind of freak out your friends because they'll be like, oh, look that light over there. Yes. Oh my god, I light so beautiful over there.

Michael Mowbray :

bar so it's gorgeous.

Unknown Speaker :

Yeah.

Dan Frievalt :

You know, or fear or if you like, you know, single and you'd be like, Hey lady that light over. I'm a photographer and that light done there. It's really beautiful on your face.

Carl Caylor :

Or if you're fishing with your buddy that, you know, that light on your face was really gorgeous. Just one time actually. We're fishing in my new boat because my wife gave us or gave me permission to get a boat. So I like poor are the dogs and whenever my buddy says that I just, I had met him, I photographed his kids. And, you know, here's a guy likes go fishing and stuff too. So we kind of went fishing a lot in his father in law's boat. But then when my wife said, Oh, you can get a boat. I wasn't gonna let her change your mind. So I was like, put my really, really believe me. Yeah. And I'll go with Chris, Chris. Chris, we gotta get we gotta go right now. We got to get a boat before she changes her mind. So we're out my new boat. And like I say, I only knew this guy for you know, maybe a half a year. And we're out fishing one night And like I mentioned before, isn't it sick? Whoa. We're out. We should be enjoying herself out fishing or just walk into, you know, sunset and stuff like that yet? No. We're photographers who are looking at all the light and the beauty that we could be Naked we're thinking I should be photographing somebody so look a turn around I saw he was catching a fish and it was a small fish so he tossed it back in but when he did it oh my god the light just hit him from behind those like random perfectly and the lake kind of like swerved around behind them and it was like great composition and everything was doing had great depth in the story and all this kind of stuff and, and I'm like, staring but I didn't realize I was staring at you know, he turns drums like, Dude, what are you doing? Ah, it's it's the light it's it's it's a Never mind is

Michael Mowbray :

wrong if a man loves another man. The answer is

Unknown Speaker :

no.

Carl Caylor :

It's we get caught up in Good call. And that's the thing is we do think about it. When you're people watching if you're sitting at a restaurant or in the airport or wherever you are, you're watching people go by, some people will become more noticeable and it's not just because of goodwill. Looking anything, but a lot of times it's because they walked through an area that had good quality of light. And so if you can find those times and look around and say what caused it, maybe you can repeat it later whether it's natural or the transition to strobe as well. So those are the moments that you can teach yourself these teaching moments. That watching people.

Dan Frievalt :

Yeah, I know. I'll do one more parting shot based

Michael Mowbray :

on a parting shot. We're doing a lot

Carl Caylor :

of shots. Yeah.

Dan Frievalt :

You know, you know, looking watching movies and analyzing the light, you know, like Carlos said, that's like, sometimes you watch a movie. I'm like, I'm so obsessed with the light. I kind of miss in the plot of this gate. Oh, because I got so full. You know, that scene is just lit, beautiful. And all these things are magazines. If you, you know, photograph seniors or fashion or you want to incorporate more of a fashion look into your seniors, like look into magazines, look at those catch lights and look at kind of analyzing say okay, where do you think these lights you know, were set up and you know, even if it's funny and you point out to a non photographer, it's like oh look at the umbrella, you know in her eyes, the catch light and you're like, oh my god i it is an umbrella you know or you know if I'm photographing outdoor a lot of times if I have the sun, not the sun, but the open sky to my back and you zoom in, you can see my, you know, outline my silhouette in their eyes, you know, in the sky. It's like kind of kind of crazy and if you learn to paint and all that you put those things in, because it looks more realistic is the catch lights.

Michael Mowbray :

My parting shot is kind of tying back to one of the things you guys said I think Dan did is trying to figure out where to place your flash is really the same place you're gonna put a reflector one of the added benefits of it though, is and one of the reasons why I use flash on almost every shot outside is anytime I've got what I would call really good available light. I've Almost always found I can make a better by adding a little bit of flash, even if it's just from cleaning up the color cast, because you'll get a light kicking up off the ground or anything else around them where it's throwing a cast of a certain color green whatever else onto their skin, use daylight balance flash on there, and it's just enough that it takes away the green cast from the grass or whatever else and just puts a little bit of pop into their into their face a little bit more catch light into their eyes, almost always find it makes the shot better. So that's my parting shot. Every week we have a fake sponsor, and this week's fake sponsor is geriatric hipster club beer from the brewery spelt with a you whether you are a mustachioed hipster, a world war two veteran or just a person who enjoys a well made drink this beers for you, Jerry geriatric his hipster club is a take on the old fashioned cocktail. It's a bourbon like base beer, aged in oak and bitters that were created using a number of aromatic herbs and just a hint of orange peel. And that added together to simulate a twist that would typically finish off this superb classic cocktail. So a geriatric hipster club beer, it's like drinking an old fashioned, make your mustache happy. And that's from a brewery spelled with a U. They must

Dan Frievalt :

have took spelling lessons from me.

Unknown Speaker :

Exactly.

Michael Mowbray :

That's all we got this week. Till next time, folks. Cheers to you.

Unknown Speaker :

Cheers. Last call.

Michael Mowbray :

You've been listening to the photo happy hour podcast. Be sure to hit that subscribe button to not miss a single action packed episode. And join our photo happy hour Facebook group where we'll post links to the stuff we all talk about. You can find my MoLight Gear Online at WWE ww go mo light com. That's geo mo Li gh t comm you can find the Facebook page under MoLight store and I also run the Godox flash help group on Facebook. You can find Dan SR unlocked website at www dot seniors unlocked.com. That's seniors with an S at the N unlocked.com. And the Facebook group under seniors unlocked and you can find Carl's coaching corner@www.cc photo coach comm cc photo coach.com Till next time, cheers to you.

Liam :

I don't know who you are. I don't know what you want. If you want me to pay you to subscribe. I can tell you I don't have money. But what I do have are a very particular set of skills, skills I have acquired over a very long career skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you subscribe now, that will be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don't, I will not for you. I will find you and I will annoy you