Studio Test Shoot

Initially, my idea was to take the slides on to the streets. I was thinking I could project them on to the spaces and then capture the subsequent image.

So before I wasted time going to London with lots of equipment and having a rather frustrating day carrying all this around and it not working, I decided that I would do some test shots in the studio to see what the technical requirements would be. I’m rather glad I did this.

To say that this would have been impossible during daylight, or indeed in any significant light conditions would have been an understatement. Projecting slides and balancing the exposure of what’s around it is beyond the scope of the equipment I have.

The image above was taken at a decent aperture and ISO value using one strobe to project the image and another one to light me as the real life subject. Without the strobe on me, I was too dark in this environment and not exposed properly, or just badly light with the light from the projection. The projected image is the strongest strobe that I have at full power, shot in a dark environment against a relatively clean surface. The more texture the surface has, the more power you need from the strobe to get a clear image. In addition the ISO on this shot was also much higher than I would like to maintain for quality. Also the image above was also taken in complete darkness, something else that would not be achievable on the streets, especially as I could not say how far I would also have to throw the projection.

After lots of trial and error and stumbling about in the dark, I concluded that I don’t have enough light power to be able to do this on the street! Back to digital compositing it is then.