DaveMazz Photography

Obsessed with Photography

DaveMazz Photography - Obsessed with Photography

Creating a Lighting Notebook

I have finally created a lighting notebook.  There is so much useful information available on the internet, and it’s so disorganized, that I really just wanted to create a place where all the useful information could be easily accessible for me.  I had a few prerequisites that I wanted when creating the notebook.

1.  It has to be “digital”, and not a physical notebook.  This was for a few reasons.  I have horrible handwriting, and didn’t want to have to deal with me not being able to read my own!  I also wanted to have access to it from multiple locations, which brings me to number two.

2.  I need to be able to use it from multiple locations and devices.  Be it my Ipad, Iphone, laptop etc.

3.  It has to be easily modified.  I’m constantly scouring the internet looking for a particular lighting setup, or tips on composition, etc.  I want to be able to add images and techniques without a hassle and having to use 5 applications to do it.

So that’s it.  After fiddling around with several applications, this is what I ended up doing.  Check it out after the jump….

notebook image

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Basement Photo Studio Part I

I recently move my home studio from our sunroom down to the basement.  Oh, the dreaded basement.  I was a little leary to move it down there for two reasons.  One, it’s a freakin’ basement and there isn’t a whole lot of natural light.  the second reason is the low ceilings, barely seven and a half feet, ouch.  I didn’t mind not having the natural light, as I’m mostly using speedlights when I’m shooting indoors.  Plus if I really need natural light I can just go upstairs to the sunroom.  The second issue is a little trickier though.  So far what I’ve done is have my subjects sit a little bit lower than they normally would.  It’s not quite as limiting as I thought it would be, but again, I can head up to the 15 foot ceilings in our sunroom if I really need the height.

On the plus sides I don’t have to clean up and put everything away when I’m done for he day, SWEET.  This is convenient, especially if I want to continue testing out new lighting, or if I’m just exhausted and want to call it a day early.  I also have a ton of shelving in the basement, which I didn’t have in the sunroom.  It’s way easier to grab gear from there than from my huge duffel bags.  I just feel like I have more freedom in the basement, since it was just sitting there unused except for storage…it’s unfinished, but I threw down an old curly rug, a small tv, and BAM, good to go.  I’m going to post soon on the exact setup of the basement and some of the other tweaks I did to convert it.  It’s a great budget choice if you have an unused basement, more to come on this, maybe even my next post….