The Strobist Years: Off-Camera Flash on Location

Before the birds and the butterflies there was a period when I carried more light stands than lenses. This set is a retrospective of those off-camera flash years, pulled from several different shoots rather than one.

There were location sessions with models — yellow dresses against a gnarled old tree and a graffiti wall, and a two-model evening shoot balanced on a fallen log as the light went down. There was studio work too, portraits of a blonde model against clean backdrops, and a suited man photographed against a flint wall. And then the frame I still enjoy most: a BMX rider frozen mid-air over a graffiti-covered ramp, fill flash holding him crisp against a blue summer sky.

What ties them together is the lighting — small flashes, off camera, shaped and placed on purpose. It taught me more about light than anything before or since, and even now, working mostly with natural light, I am really just applying the same lessons without the stands.