Continuous Lights & Metering

[jurgenestanislao]

Hi,

I mostly shoot table top still life and use continuous LED lights (Godox etc).

I've seen lots of works, mostly in advertising, where a single sheet (and scene) is exposed multiple times—correct me if wrong but some photographers call it 'pop' photography.

Nonetheless, how to best emulate this with modern continuous lights, asking for tips and/or techniques mostly, as I would like to better control my lighting (and spills) and better sculpt my subjects.

If I may add, turning on all my lights to completely light a scene and take one exposure (which might work in digital photography) tends to come out differently in film especially as some areas might come out too bright etc and burn out. Hence wanting to adapt so-called 'pop' photography or lighting techniques with modern continuous lights (dimmable).

Any help is much appreciated.

Jurgen

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[Pieter]

Photographers use multiple pops because their strobes are not powerful enough to give them the f-stop needed for a given set-up. The equivalent with a continuous source is a longer exposure. assuming you are shooting B&W or the color temperature of your lights does not vary, you should could control hot spots by dimming the lights that are causing them, using flags where necessary.

[Drew Wiley]

Some people prefer flash, some are more comfortable with continuous. Some use both. I never liked flash, so had Arri and Lowell hot lights, but they are, er... hot. I've just recently gotten some decent LED panels, primarily for copystand work. There is also the option of expensive HMI continuous lighting. Why not continuous? Tabletop shooting generally involves a confined area that doesn't need a hydrogen bomb to adequately illuminate.

[LabRat]

Sometimes color interiors would be shot with different color spectra lamps with different filters over lens one at a time on the same sheet, with different lights on and off...

For B/W tabletop, just leaving the camera open longer is the difference between multi pop strobes...

This can also effect overall exposure even if correctly calculated, as some individual exposure conditions cause different extreme effects on film...

Possible, but not recommended for normal shooting...

Steve K

[Pieter]

I do know of one photographer who would light large rooms, hotel lobbies and the like, moving his strobes and lighting section by section on a single sheet of film. Nerve-wracking, to say the least, but the images turned out very well. I'm sure it took him a while to perfect the technique.

[jurgenestanislao]

I do know of one photographer who would light large rooms, hotel lobbies and the like, moving his strobes and lighting section by section on a single sheet of film. Nerve-wracking, to say the least, but the images turned out very well. I'm sure it took him a while to perfect the technique.

Was it Steve Simmons? I read about him doing something like this to light architecture and interior shots in his book.

[Pieter]

Was it Steve Simmons? I read about him doing something like this to light architecture and interior shots in his book.

I was referring to Fred Licht. https://www.fredlicht.com

[Drew Wiley]

"Light painting" was a big fad at one time.

[Pieter]

I believe Portland and later New Mexico photographer Aaron Jones, if he didn't exactly invent light painting, was a master and even sold light painting equipment, call the Hosemaster. It was a big deal in the early 90s.

[LabRat]

"Light painting" was a big fad at one time.

I had once seen a rareish 40's photo book covering commercial photography where one could light a locomotive or very large objects evenly by taking a floodlight in reflector and rotating it almost 360° circles near the surfaces to fill shadows and introduce even highlights overall...

Then there was "hose lighting" in the 90's...