Visiting my hometown Bardejov (very far north-east corner of Slovakia) during New year time – of course armed with our gears. As our new PPSOP.cz course about flashes is approaching, I can’t miss any opportunity to flash around. We are opening on February 1st and myself and Bryan are thrilled to welcome you there!And when is heavy snowing outside – that’s the best occasion to pull out the flash and bring the snowflakes into a picture! Following shot was made straight in the camera. It was really snowing heavily, but with a longer shutter speed you need for a twilight time picture, snowflakes wouldn’t be visible. So during my 1 sec exposure I have fired my SB 900 (off the camera, triggered with Pocket Wizards and with amber gel on) at full power – and voilá – snowflakes are here 😉Beautiful evening. Even it was 3rd of January, the air smell and looked completely like it was just a few days before the Xmas!Nikon D7000, Nikkor 24-70mm at 32mm, ISO 250, F/6.3 @ 1 sec. Nikon SB-900 at full 1/1 power.

It is amazing what you can find, when you’ll get close enough.

Like all my fellow photographer friends, I couldn’t resisted to go out and shoot ALL THE COLORS of this beautiful fall. Obviously, my chosen spot was romantic enough to attract those teenagers, deeply looking into each other eyes for a long time.  They were so involved in their agenda, they didn’t notice myself aiming at them with my tele-zoom at all. Anyway, thank you for being patience models, and if you by any chance recognize yourself,  let me know! Would love to give you a credit! 😉PS: Nice example how to bring a scale into a picture, right?

Reflection reflection reflection. A loooooot of reflection! And zero Photoshoping. All you need is a car – and a reflective material o course. In my case, all that was available at my location found last weekend. That building is soooo nice and so easy to take pictures in it…

Have you heard about a special photo equipment, which will help you improve your pictures tremendously?It’s called VADH. And it stands for Voice Activated Difuser Holder. You say, and VADH will listen and will do whatever you will ask. Perfectly automated, no wires, no wireless triggers required. VADH has several other similar products in their portfolio, like more famously known VAL (Voice Activated Lightstand, terminology courtesy of Joe McNally and Bryan Peterson 🙂 Yes, and that’s me and my new role 🙂 While hanging out with Bryan in Chicago and preparing other videos for some new courses coming to PPSOP.cz I have become a very handy VADH. and WITH the help of difuser without difuser Full PPSOP phototip available here.

If there’s no beach nearby, why not to create one in the middle of the city? Literally. A bit of sand, beach chairs and something what should evoke beach umbrellas – and voila! Kids with sand toys are welcomed…Oh, and BTW, did I mentioned absence of the sea? Colorful umbrellas caught my attention immediately when I was driving around. In order to keep a nice color of the sky in sunset and “umbrellas”, I faced a situation with a pretty dark chairs, more like a silhouettes. So I’ve called for a help of additional, miniature sun. Remotely connected off-the-camera flash with amber gel, placed right behind the purple pole… Definitely more interesting, as to my taste orange colors well fits to the overall colorful image. So when you miss sun – bring your own one 😉 And while in the next picture I am definitely missing something more eye-catching (like Monika pointed – a cat sitting in the middle of the chair would be charming), I just wanted demonstrate a BIG difference between the shots WITH and WITHOUT a flash…  As you can see, I’m in a “flash mode” now. This will keep me for a while now 😉

I love you sweet heart!

Hneď v úvode nášho vlajkového kurzu Naučte se exponovat kreativně na PPSOP.cz sa obšírne venujeme názornému vysvetleniu rozdielu medzi správnou expozíciou a KREATÍVNE správnou expozíciou. Pri každej fotografickej príležitosti sa môžete rozhodnúť pre niekoľko kombinácii nastavenia clony a rýchlosti uzávierky. Aj keď tieto kombinácie zaistia správnu expozíciu, v našom kurze vás naučíme, ako nájsť a zvoliť práve tú z nich, ktorá je kreatívne správna. Tú, ktorá vás aj ostatných nadchne a zaručí vám úspech. Na názornom príklade nižšie máte možnosť niekoľkokrát vidieť kolotoč nafotený v tej istej dobe. Aj keď  všetkých 5 snímkov má rovnaké svetelné podmienky a ich expozícia je správna, je úplne evidentné, že výsledné zábery sú s použitím rôzneho času uzávierky diametrálne odlišné. A určite s nami budete súhlasiť, že zábery č.4 a č.5 zaujmú diváka viac, ako tie predchádzajúce a dovolíme si tvrdiť, že sú kreatívnejšíe v porovnaní napr. s “obyčajným” záberom kolotoča č.1.  Objavte svoj fotoaparát a naučte sa fotiť v manuálnom režime. Prejdite do módu “M” na svojej digitálnej zrkadlovke a prihláste sa k nám do kurzu Naučte se exponovat kreativně. Foťte s nami – naučíme vás to! photo © 2012 by Patrik Banas | blog.patrikbanas.com PS: A ktorý záber sa páči vám? Dajte nám vedieť v komentároch nižšie. _______________________________________________________________________ In our “Understanding Exposure” class I’m teaching with Bryan in Czech version of Perfect Picture School of Photography PPSOP.cz we are spending a significant time to explore a difference between Correct exposure and CREATIVELY correct exposure. Obviously, you can find 5 or 6 different combination of shutter speed and your aperture. And however all those combinations will give you a correct exposure, in PPSOP we will help you how to find and choose one, which will be the most creative. THE exposure, which will amuse you and your friends and relatives will adore. At the […]

It is not a secret, that I love playing with my shutter speed, so I couldn’t miss the opportunity to go the shoot carousels at city fair event in my home town over the last weekend. Then we end up 6 photographers together and we became main attraction of the evening with 6 tripods and big lenses playing around 🙂We had tons of fun, we asked kids around to be our models and  they’ve enjoyed it a lot too.Like for example this girl below. I do not her name – and if you know her – let her know I’m looking for her to send her pictures… The other one was taken same evening, just a hundred meters away, but it’s a clear prove, that the beautiful cobalt blue light last only few moments. Just walking there and setting up the tripod took us about 7 minutes.And while color is still pretty nice, the magic of the sky is gone and pitch black is starting to take over.Anyway, at least I know the name of this model with a blue umbrella and a sexy background! 🙂

Lantern festival in St. Louis Botanical Garden! What a splash of colors! And the worst part? I couldn’t decide where to be during those magic 20 minutes, when the sky was so beautifully cobalt blue. Well, looks like I’m going to have one more trip there!More info about Lantern festival can be found here. By the way, white dragon you can see in the middle is about 20 meters (apx 25 yards) long and has been crafted from thousands and thousands of china porcelain plates, spoons and egg bowls! Porcelain has been imported in huge wooden boxes directly from China, together with about 20 Chinese specialists. They were knitting it together for a few weeks. Amazing!!