Photographing means technique, creativity and eye. We can photograph well even in low cost with a very limited budget, let’s start from the light
The art of photography has become increasingly accessible in recent years thanks to the infinite photographic equipment that has been added to the classic reflex or compact cameras.
You can photograph digitally with reflex, mirrorless, compact, bridge and smartphone with high quality lenses available. And thanks to this equipment you can photograph in any situation, because photographic tools know how to be smaller and more functional without the professional quality being excessively sacrificed.
Do you have to invest large sums of money to photograph at high levels?
But there is always the thought, especially for those who want to make photography their job, that to photograph at high levels you have to invest large sums of money. Camera body, lenses, filters, flashes, lights… and that these must have important prices in order to guarantee the quality of the photos.
Obviously it is partly true that adequate equipment can improve the quality of our work, but it certainly cannot always guarantee it. The preparation and also the ability to invent are added, therefore technique, creativity and eye.
It is precisely the capacity for inventiveness that we want to deepen. In other words, how to best manage with the situations and tools that you possess.
A topic dear to photography lovers is that of light.
Photographers love light, they consider it fundamental in their work, because is able to change the emotional intention of a project, thanks to all its nuances.
For this reason when they are made shooting in studio you need an equipment of headlights and LEDs positioned so as to illuminate the subject and cancel the background which can usually be white, black or with a green screen. For the same reason, when yes photograph outdoors, he always dedicates himself pay close attention to the weather conditions, essential for the success of a photographic project.
Low cost photography: and when you don’t have the opportunity to take advantage of professional equipment?
But let’s see, without this very expensive equipment to buy and in some cases even to rent, how can we organize ourselves to take indoor photography with the lights we own?
First of all it is good to recover any luminous instrument that is present in the house, if we want to take photos or a video recording indoors.
Second, make the most of the natural light coming from the windows.
The subject must necessarily be in favor of natural light, frontally or from the side, if we want to give our shot a particular light effect with partial illumination of the face.
We start here from the good and old rule of analog film photography according to which the photographer must always have the light behind him to take a good photo.
If the light is too strong, you can help yourself with curtains and objects that block the entry of light from the window.
At this point you start playing with the available lights, then table lamps or even battery-powered torches.
The game is going to recreate the same structure of a studio photo shoot
Two side lights next to or behind the photographer pointing to the background and two side lights next to the subject of the shooting.
Given this structure, you can give free rein to the creativity and intention of the lights, built not as a simple illumination of the subject, but as tool capable of giving him a precise emotional intensity.
In fact, the lights can be frontal, to illuminate the subject as a whole, but they can also be partial to illuminate only a part of the face or of the subject concerned.
It is also possible fantasticating on colors and light effects, covering the bulbs with scarves or other fabrics that give the final light not only a different color, but also a different grain, thus recreating the effect of a filter.
These home made tricks they are also very useful if you decide to buy some accessory equipment for our photographic tool. Because by playing and creating, you can do better understand what kind of tools we need, thus avoiding hasty expenses.
If we need light, to add to our reflex or mirrorless, for example we can understand if we prefer a cobra flash or a continuous light led.
External light, flash or led light?
The latter, for example it is an excellent solution for shooting because it offers a cold LED light with continuous, adjustable light, with the possibility of adding colored jellies to replace the post production step of the photographic filter.
The same goes for the cobra hotshoe flash, not easy to use if you don’t have some practice behind you first. The cobra flash can be directed and the light intensity must be adjusted, otherwise you risk burning the subject white or creating excessive shadow behind it.
Home made photography tricks can help us make a more informed purchase
The same goes for the infinite world of neutral filters, or those lenses to be screwed to your lens. These are non-colored lenses and precisely neutral in consistency, which are able to filter the light that enters if there is too much of it in particularly strong natural light conditions.
The range of choices is so wide and with so many similar features that it is good to start playing without it, to understand what you need.
Low cost photography and learning to govern light
The light, therefore, is a friend of the photographer, but when is able to better govern it.
And to do this we can certainly use external technological tools, but first it is better to understand with a little art in arrangement and inventiveness what we really need.