Lighting your flashlight photos... with a flashlight!

jch79

**Do Not Feed The Vegan**,
Joined
May 2, 2006
Messages
3,663
Location
On the asphalt.
In the Dark Room welcome thread, ElectronGuru brought up the concept of using a flashlight to light your photos with, and after exchanging a few PM's with him, I learned that the technique he's developing is much more refined than anything I've done (and hopefully he'll share with us what he's up to!), so I figured I'd show a few photos and say how I did 'em.

The two techniques I use are:
1) Painting with the light - basically just taking a longer manual exposure (in a darker room), around 15-30 seconds, and pointing the flashlight at the stuff I want to be lit up. It can yield really cool results, but can also be frustrating due to lack of control.
2) Using a flashlight as single point source of light, to create a more dramatic look.

Basically all it takes is a camera that can be set to a long exposure and a flashlight (you'll at least have one of the two!).

:green: I make no claims to be a great photographer, but rather I'm just sharing a few of my methods so people with better skills can make something that really looks nice!

Here are a few examples, most of which are old, as I now use the Strobist method to light most of my shots. But using a flashlight to light your photos is fun and easy, and certainly has its merits on a forum about... flashlights! :nana:

mg8955smjk9.jpg

This is a McGizmo "rubber" Aleph 3, with a TB Ti bezel ring. It was taken with the light painting method, which let the subject really stand out. I can't remember what made the red light in the reflector, but I like it!


tb123cliptritsm.jpg

This is a TB 123 Aleph 1 light with a shortened clip on it. I took this using the "spot" method, just with one light from the left. It also does cool things with bringing out the details in an object, such as the texture of a bead-blasted light & clip, and the grain on the wood it was standing on. This was also an easy way of showing one of the trit slots off, as that part of the light was in the dark (although that particular vial wasn't as bright as the rest of 'em).


mg0010bsmvy0.jpg

This is a photo of my (outdated) TranquillityBase collection. It was taken with just one light from the left - which, in retrospect, might not be the best approach for a group photo, as the subects closest to the light source are much brighter than the ones furthest away. It might've been a good candidate to combine the painting & spot method.

Please share with us your methods & results of using flashlights to light your photos of flashlights! :duh2:

:thumbsup: john
 
Last edited:
ooh! I tried the painting with light thing.. shouldve used a completely white surface, and gotten rid of more dust,but here we go:
I already posted this pic a few times:

_MG_7462-800.jpg


..and a bit of exif info:

Aperture Value:29.0
Mode:Manual Exposure
Exposure Time:10
Flash:Off, Did not fire
Focal Length:30.0 mm
ISO:100
Metering Mode:Average
Camera Model Name:Canon EOS DIGITAL REBEL XTi
White Balance:Manual
 
Last edited:
Nice job csshih! :thumbsup: That's a cool looking light.

Out of curiosity, why do you think you should've used a completely white surface? For black/dark colored lights, I prefer using neutral/gray backgrounds, so you can see the background as well.

Anyways, if you have Photoshop, you can easily whiten your mostly white background, by using either levels/curves, the eraser, or the dodge tool - or a combo of those, which is what I did here: (I hope you don't mind - if so, I'll happily remove it!)

mg7462800.jpg

(I kept some of the shadows, just for the heckuvit)

If you don't have Photoshop, try Gimp - it's an free open-source image manipulation app (Windows, Mac, Linux), that apparently is very well liked.

:thumbsup: john
 
Of course I don't mind!
haha, I know how to use said programs.. but I have a laziness problem :p
 
Thanks! It was a bit tricky to make... I put the Novatac on a treestump out in the woods, positioned my camera on a tripod, held the lights in my hands while triggering the cam via a wired remote between my teeth...

I should take more pics. But unfortunately, finding the time for such operations is usually the problem and most pics I take end up being of snapshot quality...
 
nice pic, Coop :D


I have another one I was trying out.. the GID/trit job kinda killed it.

_MG_7541-800.jpg
 
Not exactly a lighting setup,
I just wanted to demonstrate that this flashlight could be operated without the head.
I used a film container as diffusor, otherwise it would have been hard to depict both,
the light and the object.


 
It's a great technique that gives soft shadows and also allows you to highlight your GID and tritium items.

That's how I got the pic in my sig:
 
Great idea, Tom! :twothumbs A lot of pro photographers use the bottoms of those plastic rubbing alcohol bottles, to diffuse their flashes - instead of forking over $25 for a piece of plastic that's made for that same thing.
:thumbsup: john
 
Hey all,

This is such a great idea and it makes so much sense as well :cool:

So the other day I set up a little 'studio' and had a play...

This was lit using a fauxton 'UV' button cell light...

PurpleTorch.jpg


Once the studio was set up it was quite a fun little experiment.

I did find that using the self timer to trigger the camera gave me back a hand though.

I suspect this might be the start of something :naughty:

Regards,

WO

Thanks for the idea!
 
I posted this in another thread but why not...

this is/was my 9P project straight out of the sandblaster lit by my M6/MN21.

Misc%20015%20(Small).jpg


I anodized the body today, the rest is going to get done next week.



I have a ton of others on my work PC.. i'll post them when i get back from vacation.
 
Cool photos guys! :cool:

Witnessonly, I love that background - some sort of metal grip flooring? And it almost looks like you propped the light up on something? Very neat effect - I never have used my UV light for photos, but might have to give it a try now! The GITD stuff looks cool.

Superdave, I like the spotlight action on yours.

:thumbsup: john
 
SuperDave, it' looks like something out of '2001', very 'purposeful' and slightly ominous, great flavor to it :twothumbs

I'll be looking forward to seeing more shots then ;)

jch, thanks mate,

to prop it up, a couple of bits of bluetac and a toothpick (shhh don't tell anyone ;))

For this sort of stuff I was thinking 'industrial waste' would be a great source of 'interesting' BG material. This is just a bit of scrap checker plate, one of my favorite types of vehicular bling :cool:

I started out to only experiment with the UV, not really expecting to get anything interesting.
I have always hated red gels when it came to shooting bands etc, as the red doesn't record well on digi. So I wasn't expecting much from the UV, but as the results popped up on the monitor I though, hey there might be a shot in this.

And as a bonus I found that the UV just set the GITD stuff off like a rocket (the R2 LED in the M20 was a poor second when it came to charging the GITD up). I love it when you get an accidental win win.

Thanks for the positive comments guys!

WO
 
EV_007_SureFires_L358_MG_1057.jpg


Single SureFire E2E beam diffused with a F04 diffuser used to shine on both sides of the frame to "paint" this scene while the shutter remained open for a couple of seconds.
 
A couple of mine:

I think I used an A2 for this shot:

mBdXqBtI16AoNoCRNpgmjg
mBdXqBtI16AoNoCRNpgmjg
DSCN2326.jpg



...and that little light for this one:

9SNCRJFmNYCe2ICZH2i0hQ
A2%20painted%20with%20light.jpg


hey, nobody said pics had to be any good! :nana:
9SNCRJFmNYCe2ICZH2i0hQ
 
Last edited:
I tend to use multiple flashlights to photograph small objects, but it is trial and error and rather frustrating. I need dozens and dozens of pics to have a good one.
I like to add a little color to the pics for accents:

L6Porcupinesmall.jpg

SF L6P lit up by an Amber Photon II and two other white LEDs.


TiNcombo2.jpg

McGizmo Aleph ... a little red to make it look warm and golden


AlephX3Traw.jpg

Bare al Aleph ... red and blue in addition to daylight


Luce2.jpg

UV light


Multiple light sources, not diffused:

SFC3SW01front.jpg

SF Lego


But the best is still ... daylight:

PhotonColors.jpg


... with the help of flashlights:

Luce1.jpg



In the end ... a lightbox and 3 flashes would really be cool to have ... :)

bernie
 
:rock: HECK YEAH!

Cool photos of awesome lights, fellas! :twothumbs

Migs, I thought we had an understanding that you weren't allowed to show pics of a LL ("Little Light" < HA!), without sending me it? :nana:

:thumbsup: john
 
All my shots are lighted with flashlight(s). :p
Here're 2 from other threads.

ss4z.jpg
 
Top