Portrait Photoshoot with Mr. F/2.8 70-200mm

I had the opportunity to score a two-fer tonight. This evening at our local photo club I had a chance to use my new Tamron F/2.8 70-200mm lens during a portrait photoshoot. Not only did I get to workout my new lens, but I also borrowed one of my clubmate's PocketWizard Multimax transceiver flash triggers .... SWEET! I have never used a PocketWizard instead relying on my Nikon's built in Commander mode to trigger my flashes. Here's the PocketWizard.



The photoshoot used 3 flash units in softboxes. One on each side of our model, and one on the ground behind the model pointing slightly up.

This series of portraits used the same setting on my Nikon D200. I was in Manual mode with F/11, ISO 200, and 1/100 of a second. White balance was manually set at 5300K.



This portrait was shot at 70mm. The effects caused by the 2 softbox flashes was to give gentle light full face, and darken out our model's hair and background.

This portrait was shot at 90mm.

My general takeaways from the photoshoot were:

1. I need lots-o-practice working on portrait photography,


2. Its really amazing to work with a model who knows what's she's doing,


3. The Tamron lens is 8 out of 10 after it's first hard workout. The only issue I had was the AF seemed a bit sluggish occasionally. Other than that I like it. (One lady at the photoshoot came up to me and said she had lens envy ... made my night)


4. I like the PocketWizard, especially with a higher end flash unit (i.e. SB-800 or 900). The only downside is that they are uber expensive. Did I mention this is an expensive hobby!

Grab your camera and take pictures....I do!