Australian adventure photographer and Canon Master Krystle Wright is the subject of a new video from Canon in which she details photographing kayakers with the EOS-1D X Mark II. Wright captures the kayakers dropping down a 60ft waterfall in near darkness with help from a drone rigged with two 600-EX Speedlites.
'With the way the world is these days, there’s so many images being produced,' she explains, 'you really have to push hard to create something that is unique.' We'd say the unique approach definitely paid off with some memorable shots.
Nice photo and very creative thinking to use the drone to hold the flash units. Still, I'm more impressed at the video than I am the still shot. It makes me think of so many documentaries that I've seen where the focus is on people doing very adventurous and daring stuff and yet I'm very often thinking about how the film crew had to make the very same trek as the subject, cary all of the gear and create beautiful footage...
@Weegee, have you thought that through? The two speedlights (combined weight less than a kilogram) were attached to a drone. The Photix indra500 are 2kg each. I don't know what the weight limit for that drone is but my guess is that 4kg (2 flash units) might be stretching it.
Not the first time it's been done - some Nikon photographer (forgot the name) did the same for promotional pictures taken of big wall climbers with the D500:
It crosses my mind all the time! Unfortunately, most 'consumer' drones are designed to just lift themselves and not much else. As soon as you want to put a small ILC (and gimbal) in the air it can get quite expensive. That's why I think the star of this show is a drone that can lift a 1dx and zoom + 2 strobes!
It's a deep canyon, with not much daylight getting in there. Putting two strobes on a drone gives the photographer a level of control over the light that they could never normally achieve with daylight... and the outcome has been exceptional. It is called "taking control of the light" and this photographer has done it exceptionally well.
Yes! It really hit me when she said that the sheer mass of pictures taken means one has to really push the boundaries to produce a unique vision. I think it implies that the increasing competence of more artists spurred on by access to better equipment and inspiration from internet sharing has helped photography but made it more difficult to stand out. It seems lousy sameness has proliferated by a factor of 10000 and really good unique photography by a factor of 10 in the last decade.
Outstanding image, one of my new favorites! As an hobby adventure photographer myself, I could see the huge potential with drones and started investigating, but a 'basic' set-up with a Nex 5 was around 15k Australian - forget it. The days of it being about the photographer, and not the gear, are well and truly over. This shot is about technology and budget. I think a lot of photographers have 'ideas' about shots like this, but nowhere near the means. However, a basic set of remote transmitters have let me do all sorts of things on a small budget which has been a lot of fun (and adventures).
Sounds like she just approached Canon about doing this and they financed her. It must have been expensive for the help and especially for the drone set up (the real star). Get a project together and approach Canon, they seem to have money to burn.
Fair points. I'm jealous of whats possible when it all comes together, and for that I commend the photographer. As Rishi indicates above, this is also about how (certain types) of photography are evolving. This image was possible due to some amazing technology, and (from my lowly point of view) its associated considerable budget or backing. The vision and photography are the easy bits.
It's more about the team than a gear. I bet it took at least 4 people to carry such a big drone + batteries + lights. The photographer isn't a millionaire, she got a really brilliant idea and got the support of the sponsor.
Yes, I like the picture, the effort, and the tech leveraged to get the shot, but I'm not blind to this being a marketing video to highlight what can be done with fancy equipment.
And let's give some props to the paddler who shot a waterfall in the dark after being blinded by strobes. ;)
I must say, I'm confused as to why she thought she had to time each shot perfectly, with that much firepower. Though I am not a fan of the "spray and pray" method for getting keeper shots, in this particular instance I might have made an exception since there was a limited number of kayakers, and a limited window of time.
It was probably shot at f/2.8 and an extremely high ISO. Even at a great distance, two 600 EX's should be able to push enough light out at 1/128 power (especially zoomed in) to hit at least 10+ FPS for a handful of shots. Or heck, even at 1/64 or 1/32 power you ought to be able to get 2-3 shots off at 10+ FPS.
Yup, I just tested my crappy old Nikon SB80. At 1/128 power it hit 10 FPS for 3+ seconds. (I only stopped because I didn't want to burn my shutter.)
Also, thanks to the awesome Nikon flash interface, I can easily see that even such an old flash (with a lesser GN than a 600 EX RT) can hit ~50 ft when set to f/2.8 and ISO 6400, 105mm flash zoom at 1/128 power.
same thought. that distance, that spread, two speedlites, a modern camera - you should get at least two shots at half power, more likely four at quarter power.
but that is all just moot talk. the final shot is pure awesomeness and that is what counts.
She did specifically say the camera focused perfectly in low light levels. Also as you crank ISO up DR goes down, with all that white water and darker shadows for the Canoeist I expect she had the flashes on pretty full power ti get detail in teh water and the shadows. Plus if you want to print really big you still want low ISO.
DrJon, i understand all that, especially since i am more of a sniper than a machinegunner myself, if you catch my drift. but having that second shot available while shooting action sports with speedlights can make a huge difference.
I don't consider ISO 640 to be "low-light" at all WRT autofocus, if that was even close to the ambient light's correct exposure. Nor do I consider 640 a threat to dynamic range, especially on the 1DX 2 which apparently has great DR at both low and high ISOs.
Either way, my point was that if I were in this situation, I'd have at least attempted one set of shots where I pushed the envelope a whole lot more and trusted the camera to deliver great image quality at 3200 or 6400, popping the flashes at 1/128 or 1/64 so as to be able to rattle off at least one kayaker at ~8 FPS. (I'm not sure if the Canon low-speed continuous is programmable like Nikon's is, but I use it all the time on Nikon to hit a certain frame rate for all kinds of reasons.)
I do, however, greatly appreciate the "sniper shot" technique and the resulting image. If there were six kayakers, I too would not be able to resist the challenge of nailing at least one of them with a single click. :-)
It also occurred to me that it could have been an issue of blinding the kayakers, lol.
8 FPS of flash strobing you, even if it's just pointed at your general area, can be very bad when it is rather dark outside. I used to ride and photograph BMX dirt jumping, and after sunset things would start to get a bit sketchy as far as spotting your landing is concerned if a flash was going off repeatedly while you're in the air.
Considering the desire to let blacks go completely dark, I don't think DR would have been the limiting factor in such a shooting situation, not until at least ISO 1600 or 3200.
Besides, if you look at other tests such as ISO invariance for most Nikon bodies (and the 1DX II, (until you get to about +4EV pushing) you can see that starting at ISO 100 and pushing ~3 stops gets you roughly as good a result as shooting at 640 in the first place. That's why I was saying that I don't consider 640 to be "low light territory" at all, it's just not a challenge to either DR or AF.
Having said that, clearly 640 is totally under-exposed in the final result. So it may very well have been a serious challenge of the camera's AF capability. My point was that I just don't consider ISO 640 to be a particularly impressive challenge for a camera's image quality. Especially considering that I could do just as good (or better) by simply shooting a D810 at ISO 100 and pushing.
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