Big Light from Small Flashes: Excerpts from The Hot Shoe Diaries

[Editor’s note: The Hot Shoe Diaries is an immensely popular book about the lighting exploits of Joe McNally, an internationally acclaimed and longtime National Geographic photographer. The book is primarily about using small flash units and the myriad of ways to interface multiple small flash units to create big, dynamic light. But it also takes you into the thought processes of McNally and how he conceives the lighting for his great images. It’s a fun, entertaining read but more than that, it is loaded with good technical info on how to master speedlites and their application. The following sections are excerpted from the book.]

1. Light ‘Em Dano!
Ever since watching Hawaii Five-O on TV, I wanted to ride in one of those outrigger-type canoes. Finally got my chance by figuring it might be cool to put a bagged SB-800 out on one of the outrigger struts, lighting a rower, and shoot at dusk, with the sun setting and the waves crashing.
So that is how I got to be an ass-backwards, 200-pound hood ornament perched in the front seat in one of these boats, facing the crew, who were understandably struggling to keep the boat stable and moving despite having acquired something akin to an anchor in the bow.

First things first. Figure out where the camera is gonna be in relationship to the lead rower, your primary subject. In this case, I had to be riding backwards, watching the action with a wide lens, in this case a 12–24mm f/4 zoom attached to a Nikon D2X camera. I have a long and unfortunate history when it comes to expensive electronic equipment and bodies of water, and I was a tad worried, to be sure. The rowers did nothing to allay my fears by telling me, “You know, dude, there’s no absolute guarantee the boat’s not gonna tip.”

2. Pride of Midtown
That’s what the 54 house calls themselves. They are unquestionably the most popular and most photographed firehouse in New York City. I got to know this house a bit after 9/11. Richie Kane, the driver on 4 Truck, and a heckuva shooter himself, always told me, “Hey, you wanna hang a camera and roll the truck, we’ll do it for you.”

The gear needed to do this pic (below): Four Bogen Magic Arms, each with two Bogen Super Clamps; heavy-duty Gitzo monopod; one SC-29 Off-Camera AF TTL Cord; one D700 with 14–24mm f/2.8 lens; one SU-800 Wireless Speedlight Commander; three SB-800 AF Speedlights with SD-8A High Performance Battery Packs; three Justin clamps; gaffer tape; gels; ballhead; metal cable lanyards; zip ties; PocketWizards.

Get the main light positioned first. Here, that is pretty much standard placement— something on the dashboard, affixed with  a Justin Clamp and a full CT warming gel. The flash from here, muted and adjusted properly, simulates instrument-panel glow, at least in theory, though these shots have been done so often that everybody knows a flash is down there.
Okay, one flash is not enough. The cab of the truck is large, and black. More punch is called for, or the driver will look like Dracula on a high-speed run to the blood bank.

I had the notion that I could maybe hide a flash behind and somewhat obstructing the rear view (which is okay, given the way Richie drives). This flash got a heavy red gel, and then some gaffer-tape treatment, and a series of zip ties to make sure it didn’t go missing during a run.
The first few tests showed we had to bury a third flash in the cab, filling the passenger side just a touch. But three SB-800 remote flashes have to see the monitor pre-flash from the SU-800 Wireless Commander. We hot-shoed it—no go. This is where the SC-29 off-camera AF TTL cord is invaluable. Pop the SU-800 out along the monopod, lock it into place with another Bogen Super Clamp, and boom—the Speedlights see the signal and you still have full wireless i-TTL. I could have programmed the flashes into SU-4 mode and popped ‘em with PocketWizards, but then I’ve got three flashes to ratio manually, and I’m crawling all over the truck, sometimes in the street off a run.

The main thing to remember—whether you’re hooking your camera to a fire truck or to your son’s bike handlebars—is to get the camera angle nailed right where you want it. Then reverse engineer the rigging you need to get the camera to that spot. Once you have the angle, the logic of the light flows naturally. Where are the dead spots? Where can I hide a light? It’s kinda like reading a treasure map or looking for Jimmy Hoffa’s body. Forensic lighting!

3. Groups!
Every photographer’s favorite thing! The more people in the group, the odds that something is going to go wrong, or somebody will not look good, or someone will complain, or your lights will misfire, or the person with the striped tie and the checked suit and the white socks and the glass eye will be in the front row. Scenes like this are so daunting, so difficult, so spirit-breaking as to make even the most resolute shooters dream of engaging in another profession that would presumably be more stable and remunerative, like running a roadside vegetable stand.

Okay, quick survival guide. Do not shoot one of these with a straight flash. (Whenever I say stuff like that, I realize, if you are out there and you have one flash and nothing to bounce it off of, ya gotta do what ya gotta do.) But strive, mightily, to get the light off the camera, and if possible, use multiple lights. Shoot it straight flash, and the folks in the front row are two stops hotter than the folks in the back, and the unflattering light will make most everybody look about as happy as a group of folks at an Irish wake.

I have gone to extremes (hey, it’s me). I shot a group shot for Life magazine of virtually every well known jazz musician on earth on a sound stage out at Silvercup Studios in Manhattan, using about 70,000 watt-seconds of light. I had to bathe the entire set in light, and have about f/16 from front to back, ‘cause I had to shoot it on a panorama camera. That meant a lot of light, and a lot of diffusion. Got it done, though, and it looked good, and truthfully, I was under so much pressure the only thing I really remember is that jazz musicians don’t listen to anybody.

4. Let There Be Light!
If anyone ever deserved a set of wings, it is my friend Donald. Let me be clear—not in heaven, right here on earth. I want Donald to stick around for a long, long while, and keep spinning his honey on the dance floor every Friday night, as he always does.

But, with a face like Moses, and a presence in front of the lens that could part the Red Sea, he does make a perfect fit for this retired set of wings I’ve got hanging around (see pg. 50).

Lit ‘em from the back with two SB-800s, zoomed wide at 14mm and with dome diffusers on. As you can see they are banged right into the back of the feathers, and the happy accident here was that they backwashed light onto the old wall in pretty nice fashion. (Anytime you can get your lights to do two jobs at once, it is a good day in the field.)

Lighting the portrait part was trickier. As soon as any frontal light flies at those wings, the white feathers bleach out, and the backlit glow and romance are gone. They get flat as yesterday’s newspaper and less compelling. So, the trick is to light the face and nothing else. “Hoo Boy!”

5. How to Build a Backyard Studio
Tom had been through a lot of medical anguish and thought he was in the clear, that he could roll up his sleeves and get back to his life, which largely consists of being a father to his teenage son, Jared. Then, tragically, mysteriously, his body opened up a new wound—MS.
Like everything else Tom has faced, he squared off and began to fight it, but it had been an uneven match against a diabolical, unfair opponent.

A photo enthusiast, he has a visual imagination and wondered about this portrait—a portrait of himself as a fighter, holding the line and defiant in the face of all the bad stuff his body was telling him via scans and X-rays. He has dozens of MRIs. He envisioned himself—standing, capable, ready for a fight—in front of a wall of these scans.

This is not something you want up in your backyard all the time. It’s kind of like the tent you might set up once a year when the clan descends on your place for July 4th. They leave, it comes down.

One of the first mandates of the studio is control. When you walk into an expensive New York rental studio, there’s nothing there for you but four blank walls and your imagination (and if it’s a real nice rental shop, a cappuccino bar). Same thing here, except no walls—just grass and a backyard fence, and blazing, roaring sun.

First step: Fix the sun so Tom could stand in shade, and my flashes would have a prayer and I would have a chance of controlling the light and the exposure. Table-topped a 12 x 12-foot solid on four stands. Standard operating procedure. (A “solid” is an opaque version of a silk. A silk, of course, translates and softens light. A solid blacks it out. When you “tabletop” a rig like this, it means exactly that—you put it on four legs and make a table out of it. Or in this case, a roof.) Raised up high on sizable stands, we created an open shade environment. A place Tom could stand comfortably, and a space I could light effectively.

MRIs were taped to several pieces of white Plexiglas and lit with four bounced SB-800s.

6. What I Use and Why and
When I Use It….
Okay. Here we go. The whole Magilla, right from when I walk out the door with a small flash job in mind. Bit by bit, piece by piece, from the hardware to the software to the flotsam and jetsam of my l
unatic imagination.

Alternatively, you could read the user’s manual. Wouldn’t that be a non-stop good time? Pulls in somewhere around “putting razor blades in your eyes” on the fun meter.

Or, you could convince yourself that your photographic aesthetic precludes the use of “artificial” light and you only work with “natural” light. Going natural may be fine in other areas of your life. Hug all the trees you want. Grow hair everywhere. Eat lots of fiber. Run naked through the forest and howl at the moon. Start primal scream therapy. But here’s the deal. If you pick up a camera with any sort of serious intent, you will at least occasionally need to use a flash. Done deal. Lock solid. Take it to the bank.

The Hot Shoe Diaries: Big Light from Small Flashes, by Joe McNally, published by New Riders is available at bookstores everywhere and online.

Joe McNally is an internationally acclaimed American photographer and longtime photojournalist. His most notable series is “Faces of Ground Zero—Portraits of the Heroes of September 11th,” a collection of bigger-than-life-size Polaroid portraits. He has also photographed “The Future of Flying,” the first all-digital story for National Geographic. His award- winning work has appeared in numerous magazines and, in 2008, Joe wrote the critically acclaimed and bestselling book The Moment it Clicks.