Photo Adventure Transcript

Here's another idea for your photography. Try light painting! Here's my setup. I'm using the Canon 80D with the 18-135mm kit lens and a tripod. Next, I'll be using this simple LED flashlight. I'm going to use this paper roll and add it to the end of the flashlight to keep the cone of light small and focused. Next I'm going to setup my camera for light painting by doing the following.

  1. Focus on the subject then turn off auto focus
  2. Turn off auto white balance (I set mine to 4000k)
  3. Turn off image stabilization
  4. Put the camera in manual mode
  5. Use a 10 sec shutter speed and aperture f8 as a starting point but you'll need to experiment with your own settings.
  6. Use your 2 sec timer delay to minimize camera shake.
  7. Turn off the light, start the photo and wave the flashlight in a circular motion.
  8. If your photos are to bright, either reduce your shutter speed or reduce the time you use the flashlight

And this is what light painting looks like. You'll want to take multiple photograph and focus your light on one specific area at a time. Don't forget to do the background.

Next I'm going to bring all of the photos into Photoshop. Here you can see that the individual photos don't look that impressive. But if you leave your base photo layer as normal and change the photo layer above it to a blending option of "Lighten", then magic happens. This will blend the light of the photos together. Copy the layer style and paste it to all the other layers leaving your base layer as normal. and there you go. I'm going to turn on and off each layer so you can see the difference this makes. Crop the photo and you have a finished light painted photograph.

Here's another example photo using a sailboat. Here are the individual photographs. And I'll change the blending option to "Lighten", copy and paste that layer style to all the other layers. I'll turn the layers on and off so you can see the difference. Crop the photo and here you go.

And lastly one more example of light painting. Here are the individual photographs. Change the blending option to "Lighten". Copy and paste that layer style to all the other layers. And turn the layers on and off so you can see the difference. Crop and there's your photo.

Alright, there you have it. Be sure to let me know which photo you like most. Enjoy!