After I went to the heath on sunrise I was happy with the results. Yet it was another shoot with “only” a bike and not the rider. I decided to visit the same heath on sunset and include myself as a model in the shots.
I was alone, so my job was riding the bike, setting everything up, lighting, triggering the camera and modelling. All that in full riding gear and a 26°C ambient temperature. Don’t forget to bring enough water on such a shoot !
The two images above were made without flash as the setting sun behind the camera illuminated the scene perfectly. The camera was triggered with a set of Yongnuo RF-603N wireless triggers. Those are usually for triggering a flash, but by means of a connector cable it can also trigger the camera (With this setup it is also possible trigger flashes as well).
Then I moved to another location and shot against the setting sun, thus requiring artificial light.
I carried two tripods, one for the camera (a MeFoto Backpacker Travel Tripod) and a no-name cheap aluminium tripod for the flash. The flash is positioned off-camera to the right. I manually balanced the flash power, so that the bike and the rider were illuminated well but the flash was not dominant in the image.
The while shoot was (positive) stress in its purst form. I had to position the bike, set up the camera, compose the shot, place the flash, balance the flash power, take test images, review the images, make corrections… I constantly moved between the bike and the camera, making me sweat like a pig. Setup shot:
Third location, this time covering the setting sun in the frame. Same procedure as described above – position bike, set up camera etc. etc. Modelling was an interesting experience. It is actually not a god-given skill to pose in such a way that you don’t look like a total dork. There were many images I had to reject because the way I stood or sat on the bike looked awkward. Here is the setup shot:
As a final bonus I repositioned camera and flash for a driveby-picture. I made several test shots to see which are the flash would illuminat. Then I started the bike, drove on and triggered the camera when I passed the area I had identified.
Again the whole shoot was a lot of fun, although I nearly lost a litre due to sweating.
Bottom line:
A fun shoot, altough it was very strennous. Such a shoot won’t produce tons of different compositions as it is a lot of work moving and re-aligning everything. But the effort was worth it and I am happy with the results.
