seeing the light | by Belle {Greater Vancouver Photographer}

one light, that is! I was one of the lucky few who made it to the OneLight Workshop in Seattle this past Monday. There was a waiting list 100 names long and being one of the 12 photographers who made it… well.. sweet!

I was looking forward to this workshop, taught by lighting guru Zach Arias, a passionate photographer with a phenomenal portfolio and a simple approach to photography: minimal gear, great results. I walked away with so much knowledge that my head was spinning… an intense day (I was back to my hotel @ 2 :00 a.m.!!) with tons of great info, lots of shooting and to top it off great people – I even got to finally meet a long time flickr friend, Leya of Little Monkey Photography.

If you are a fellow photographer and are reading this… I strongly recommend this workshop. Zack is very open and humble and his perspective of the photography industry is encouraging – I can’t say enough good things about him and his workshop.

I am an “available” light photographer – sometimes only my flash is available– but I have to be honest I much rather prefer shooting in natural light. There’s something about natural light that you simply can’t replicate with other light sources. So it felt really liberating getting out of my comfort zone and truly understanding that – yes! there are options – and being able to really understand and control light – one light – is well… liberating!

enough techie talk.. let’s go to the images!

one of my absolute favorites from Monday… honeycomb grid over a strobe spotlighting our willing model, Doug:

the master in action, doing his magic…

killing just enough ambient light here to set the mood…

our beautiful model in a… hmmm… smelly alley

bunch of shooters

shooting into the sun, flash to model right, with some crazy sun flare going on… gotta love lens flare!

and the “Vogue” shot, downtown Seattle skyline as a backdrop

and finally some “behind the scenes”…

alright folks, on the next post I’ll share a few favorites from our family trip last week!
now I’ll get prepared for an exciting shooting this weekend… will share the images next week – hopefully! lots of catching up…

enjoy your sunny weekend everyone!