Andriy Zolotoiy Photography Blog

While some might say that this lens is no good for portraiture I will disagree. Certainly, it’s not razor sharp as 70-200 VR2 but you can still get good subject isolation at f/5.6 and pretty decent sharpness.

The lens is flare resistant, shooting against setting sun didn’t cause any issues.

There is an option in D700 (and many other Nikon cameras) to set flash sync speed to 1/320 sec. While originally intended to be used with built-in flash it works for me with Alien Bees / Einstein and Cybersync triggers. Getting to 1/320 sec. allows to cut significant portion of bright daylight without closing aperture too much. While I was shooting outside under midday sun I could still see a little bit of darkening beside one edge of the frame but nothing too serious to even crop it. I’ll try this next time with D300 and see if APS-C size sensor makes any difference.

I’ve updated main website and this blog color scheme and made some small changes in the layout. Up until now I’ve had black and dark gray color schemes which seemed good at the time but eventually I got tired of them therefore goes white. Photographers’ portfolios are usually restricted to only neutral backgrounds that do not interfere with image viewing. Some say that black is the best background as it helps image to stand out, some say it’s white since everything looks cleaner. Anyways, change is always good.

And to wrap it up, the shot of beautiful Mina. Used SB600 with umbrella to balance daylight from the window.

That’s what happens when one single picture gets onto Flickr Explore. Suddenly bunch of dormant photos that’s been there for months or even years get a lot of attention. That’s Internet fame, read all emails and accept  good wishes.

And Stop the Seal Hunt! This photo is couple of years old, I stumbled upon it accidentally when going though archives. Anyways, the cause is right, kudos to Healing Heart Designs for making amazing dress for the campaign.

Two weeks ago during the location photoshoot my Vagabond II started acting up, making long beeps and taking its time to re-charge the strobes. Luckily it was almost the end of the shoot when this happened and we didn’t get annoyed as much during 20 seconds interval between taking the shot.

After I came back home I re-charged battery, set camera to auto-interval shooting and fired it off. About 150 shots in the same behaviour repeated itself.

The battery is either died of age or misuse. The sticker on it shows 2008 and I always kept it plugged in a power outlet but what was different during that last shoot is that I’ve put VB II into my roller case and then dragged it for about 500 meters by gravel road. It was shaky, my hand actually hurt after dragging it. It might be coincidence but might be the cause for battery’s sudden death.

Finding a replacement for one of these babies is not that easy around Toronto. And if you mention that you would use it to power photographic lights you would get big eyes from most of sales people. But your local auto shop might be dealer of Interstate Batteries and you just might be able to get SLA1116 through them.

To finish it up, here are few images from that photoshoot that almost ended badly. I used here Einstein strobe with 8.5” reflector and 1/2 CTO gel, white balance set to Daylight. The rest is just balance of ambient and flash.

Model: Megan Barber
Makeup/hair: Nicole Ostonal

More on flickr

Photos are from few months back appeared in June issue of Canadian Hairdresser.

Auxilliary magazine featured an Cassia Sparkle in their June 2011 issue. I had a chance to work with Cassia, Robyn Elizabeth Hancock and House Of Etiquette to produce featured photographs for this amazing magazine.

One of my photos has gotten to a cover of Toronto Russian Guide.

Hair, makeup, nails – Orange Tree Beauty Centre
Body art – Natasha Kudashkina
Model – Nikol Ginga

Couple of weeks ago I purchased brand new Einstein strobe. I won’t go into much of technical specs but there are couple of points in this flash unit that should appeal to many photographers.

• 9 stops power range from 2.5Ws to 640Ws. This range gives you ability to overpower the mid-day sun on one hand, and use your lens wide open with very little light leaked from the strobe when needed.
• Color and Action modes allow to switch between consistent color temperature across whole power range and high speed flashing for sports and other fast moving subjects. Information display shows current light temperature in Kelvins in both modes, though I mostly mostly use mixed light sources so final temperature would rarely be equal to the one indicated.

Einstein unit is equipped with receptacle for optional Cybersync CSXCV transceiver which costs “whopping” $30 (compare that to Pocket Wizard!). This transceiver draws power from the strobe itself so you don’t need to worry about batteries. Form factor is quite strange with all those pins sticking out open. It is fragile design but it is probably the simplest form they could think of with pins going straight into circuit board. While in studio this form factor is not an issue, but taking it to location and assembling / disassembling the thing might cost you a pin or two.

Now, on the negative side Einstein strobe has very weak accessory grip. When you put large softbox or beauty dish onto it you can see that attachment gets crooked vertically, and you need to use it with caution until we’ll get some kind of fix from Paul C. Buff.

Considering all of that I took tiny 16×24 softbox with me for this fashion photoshoot on location. We got lucky and it was first nice weekend in Toronto after long winter. After doing initial makeup and hair at the salon we drove to Guildwood Inn in Scarborough where I was notified by the worker that free ride for photoshoots will soon be over and they will require permit for everybody that wields “professional” gear. Certainly, Einstein with softbox attached to Vagabond II looks professional enough

The day was a mix of clouds and sun, and I was shooting at 1/250sec. f/8-f/11 ISO200. Einstein was set mostly to -4f, Color mode. We did few tests with flowing fabric and all shots appeared quite sharp on camera LCD screen so I didn’t even bother to switch to Action.

As we had only two looks for this shoot I didn’t have to conserve battery life and Vagabond II was set to Fast recycle. Recycle time in this mode is minimal and I had to wait only for the model to switch position between shots.

The shoot went smoothly, strobe performed about 400 fires without a hitch (this is expected behaviour). I still need to test performance with faster moving subjects where I previously resorted to small and fast Nikon speedlites. I especially would be interested to try liquid action stopping.