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Question from Andrea: “I have noticed a lot of photographers do wedding receptions with numerous light sources which seem like speed lights to me…
Now if this is something you do, how do you set it up? How many do you bring? What power do you put it at?”
Ashley: I use one off camera…maybe two if I want both off camera. If I’m using two, I set them up at opposite corners of the dance floor (or further back against the wall if the dance floor is small). My background light is always at 1/16 power, and I shoot into it or more than 90 degrees from it, never less than 90 degrees from it. My one on camera (or sometimes off camera) is a NIkon SB910, and usually is on TTL…but sometimes on manual, and it just depends on the location. My off camera is a vivitar 285hv (cheap flash…does the job). They’re triggered with Pocketwizard Flex TT5s.
Brian: What they do is they set up multiple tripods or lightstands with cold shoe adapters… Then they mount a flash on each stand.
They can either trigger it with a radio trigger such as Paul C Buff Cybersyncs, Radio Poppers, Pocketwizards, etc.
You can bring as many as you can afford, and power output is dependent on what situation you currently are in. You probably want a light meter to set this up.
Tony: I’m hoping to do this when I shoot my first wedding in spring, what it can do is provide you with good back/rim lighting. You can also get some cool effects if you shoot so that your off camera flash is visible in the background. This website is some of my inspiration to try this: flash series part 1
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