UPDATE:
My entry for the week got first :) Thanks for the well wishes and here are the judges' comments as well as the first and second runner-ups: Learning (12 ~ 18 Sep 10)
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Thoughts
Many people all over the world are now learning the Chinese language to enable them to get on board the mega China economic train. Jim Rogers, the successful international investor, even said that "China is the only country that can dominate the 21st century" and he relocated his whole family to Asia (here in Singapore) in order for his young daughter to learn mandarin.
Of course, some beg to differ and think that China is a big bubble waiting to burst. However, the fact remains that more and more people are learning the language, even in America. As a Singapore Chinese, I remembered I used to prefer English over the Chinese language when I was young... because of its complicated characters.
From young, we were drilled to practice writing them over and over again and there is a specific order to the strokes... mix up the order and the characters will come out very weird and ugly. Its very telling when you made a mistake and in the olden days, the teacher may punish you by slapping your writing hand with a hard ruler :P
There is NO short-cut in learning how to write the characters... just got to keep practicing and drilling the individual characters into your subconscious mind. I confess that I can only manage writing simple common chinese characters like “我爱摄影” (I love photography) but I no longer detest it as much and had grown to like its form... and yes, I can proudly say that I am fluent in conversing and reading the Chinese language.
Getting The Shot
This was the original concept. I found this Chinese character practice sheet over at Arch Chinese and my girlfriend agreed to be my "hand model". A studio strobe with soft-box on camera left and a speedlite with diffuser + optical slave behind the hand on camera right for fill. The picture was static and frankly, looked very "posed".Decided to include some hand writing motion and thought of using the rear curtain exposure method. Tried it using my studio strobe and to my disappointment, it didn't turn out. Researched the web (i'm learning... get it? Haha) and found out that I can't do rear curtain exposure with studio strobe unless I get myself an
Robert Seale had a solution for this restriction but it involves moving the subject over a wider distance than what I intended here which is simply just some small hand writing motion. Finally, I got the solution to my problem when I found Gerard Maas' post "Wireless second curtain sync" where he explained the technicalities of the problem and provided a solution using an on-camera flash and another flash with optical trigger:
"The trick to achieve wireless second curtain sync is to use a flash on camera that will signal others with its flash burst at the right moment. Using an optical trigger on the 580EX II will allow it to sync with the timing of the on-camera flash, participating in the second curtain synchronized flash exposure... and for the best effect, choose a dark background and some continuous light source on the subject.."
For the continuous light source, I used a polarizing florescent lamp from 3M. Initially, I used my 580EXII on camera to trigger the studio strobe but it came out over-exposed even with the studio strobe set to it's weakest power @ 1/32. This was due to the white subject, bright lamp, as well as insisting on f4 aperture because I want bokeh all round with a sharp centre. Out goes the studio strobe and decided to use the lamp as main and the 580EXII as freeze & fill.
Because I have only one Canon speedlite (the 580EXII), I had to use the on-camera built-in pop up flash as a trigger. A DIY flash deflector was added to deflect the light from the pop-up flash (sending the light left, right and up) to prevent it going straight onto the subject.
However, the problem with the pop-up flash is that it will fire a pre-flash before the main one and this pre-flash will trigger the 580EXII pre-maturely before the required main flash at the moment of rear curtain closing. In other words, I will have two flashes, one in the beginning of the exposure and one at the end.
This will be a problem when using add-on optical slave because there may not be enough recycle time for the 580EXII+optical slave combo to be ready for the important main flash at the moment of rear curtain closing, especially when 1/2 or full power is required. The result will be one flash at start of exposure and a misfire at the rear curtain close.
For this subject, I was lucky because I just need 1/128 power from the 580EXII+optical slave combo. It was hand held near the subject to gently freeze the subject, as well as softly fill the shadows. The shutter speed of 0.3 sec was also more than enough for the combo to recycle. However, should I need the combo at 1/2 or full power in this kind of setup, it will not work... my test showed that it will work up to a maximum of 1/4 power before it misfire.
Well... this was certainly a very good learning (get the pun?) experience for this week's DPS assignment. In addition to practicing, constantly cracking the brain + researching are also important steps in the learning process. As the Chinese saying goes... “活到老，学到老” (Live till old, learn till old)... we can never stop learning :D
Shooting Information:
Camera Body: Canon 40D
Lens: EF 100mm f/2.8 USM Macro with Hood
Mode: Manual - Av @ f4.0, Tv @ 0.3sec
ISO: 100
Focusing: Auto
Tripod: Manfrotto 190XPROB
Ball-Head: Slik 800 Quick Release
Flash: Canon Speedlite 580EX II Flash with DIY Milk Bottle Diffuser
Light Setting: Main - Continuous polarizing florescent lamp
Fill - 580EXII Manual @ 1/128 power
Optical Slave: Sonia Optical Slave
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