I’ve been admiring photos using off-camera lighting for quite some time now. I came across strobist.com (what photographer HASN’T?!) and instantly fell in love with the idea. So I made it a mission to get into it!

My first step was to find equipment. Being the poor student I am (and one who tends to not save as much money as I should, haha) I didn’t want to spend much. So I got myself a pair of Nikon SB-24s, a couple 8ft lighting stands, two shoot-through/reflective umbrellas, and a set of AlienBees CyberSync remotes. I tried those out for a while on myself and couldn’t get enough. I later ended up making myself a ringflash, buying a third light (SB-28 this time… more on that in another post) and I was REALLY in business!

But I still only had myself to take pictures of.

That’s where this amazingly beautiful person comes in (I’m such a suck-up, I know) Being the awesome friend that she is, she let me use her to practice on. (Not that she doesn’t enjoy it too, haha) I tried several different lighting setups and just started shooting. But that wasn’t really a good idea. I wasn’t thinking enough about the shot. So we moved around some things, tried a different arrangement and I finally started to get somewhere! The shots were getting better, and she was getting more beautiful (if that’s really possible. Ok, that’s the last one, I promise…. in this post anyways, haha.)

So bare with me on this one. Not only did I try different lighting setups, I also delve into different post-processing styles so there is little (if any) consistency in these shots.

Enjoy this first half of our little shoot…
(You can just click the enlarged photo to cycle through the rest of the photos…)

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