I was pretty surprised at the power of my speedlight when I wandered around New York City at night. This was in Greenwich Village.
It was the old-time, tried and true Vivitar 285. I knew I could light up street scenes and more intimate subjects. But an entire building?Yes, it could.
I wish I could remember how wide it was set but I actually think it was set to its longest setting so I could get the most power. Check out how much width the beam covered. I was knocked out.
You have to experiment with your own speedlight on manual settings. And you’ll also have to balance your ISO to the power to get the most illumination. High ISO’s bring in more ambient light so the flash won’t have to work as hard and the batteries will last longer.
So if you want to do something dramatic at night, be a flasher and see the light!
And as always, please help me keep this site alive by browsing through my ebooks or photo galleries of beautiful New York City black and white photography. There you can select a gorgeous high-resolution print file that you can download for only $20 and print it anywhere yourself. And I’ll donate 20% of the purchase price to one of the global humanitarian charities that you can select on checkout.
Until next time, happy shooting.
Bob