How would I achieve a look like this?

I'm shooting a Halloween party later this month, and I really like the look of this guy's photographs: http://www.tylersheare​rphotography.com …-and-Indians-Dance-Party/ I'd like to get a similar look.

How would I achieve a look like this? It seems to me that he was using a single speed light, mounted to the hot shoe, and then used a fisheye lens. Does that look right? I don't have a fisheye, but would I be able to achieve something like this with a 17-40mm and a 430ex II? And what about the grunge-looking effect?

Many thanks!

brycematheson wrote in post #17192176
I'm shooting a Halloween party later this month, and I really like the look of this guy's photographs: http://www.tylersheare​rphotography.com …-and-Indians-Dance-Party/ I'd like to get a similar look.

How would I achieve a look like this? It seems to me that he was using a single speed light, mounted to the hot shoe, and then used a fisheye lens. Does that look right? I don't have a fisheye, but would I be able to achieve something like this with a 17-40mm and a 430ex II? And what about the grunge-looking effect?

Many thanks!

Some of the images have the EXIF intact.

From a wide-angle image:

Camera Maker: "Canon"
Camera Model: "Canon EOS 5D Mark II"
Lens: EF8-15mm f/4L FISHEYE USM
Image Date: 2014-09-27 22:40:52 -0700
Focal Length: 15mm
Aperture: f/4.0
Exposure Time: 0.0063 s (1/160)
ISO equiv: 5000
Exposure Bias: none
Metering Mode: Spot
Exposure: Manual
Exposure Mode: Manual
White Balance: Auto
Flash Fired: No (enforced)
Color Space: sRGB
GPS Coordinate: undefined, undefined
Software: Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5.5 (Macintosh)


From a less than wide image:

Camera Maker: "Canon"
Camera Model: "Canon EOS 5D Mark II"
Lens: EF85mm f/1.8 USM
Image Date: 2014-09-27 20:53:14 -0700
Focal Length: 85mm
Aperture: f/1.8
Exposure Time: 0.0063 s (1/160)
ISO equiv: 1000
Exposure Bias: none
Metering Mode: Spot
Exposure: Manual
Exposure Mode: Manual
White Balance: Auto
Flash Fired: No (enforced)
Color Space: sRGB
GPS Coordinate: undefined, undefined
Software: Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5.5 (Macintosh)

Note the use of a less than absolutely new camera body and high ISO's that others avoid.

I'll let others speculate if a snoot was used.

Oops! I should have thought of that! Good ol' EXIF data!

So it looks like no flash was used at all? Or at least not on the images that you selected. I'm fine with bumping up the ISO to achieve an exposure. I can easily hit 6400 with the 6D.

Looks like it's all ambient lighting

I'm still seeing a little bit of a "grunge" effect. A simple preset in Lightroom, I'm guessing?

http://www.tylersheare​rphotography.com …s-Dance-Party/i-FfQcVVW/A

There is a bright light source to the left and there has to be something on the right, too (look at the shadows on the left speaker).

How about the white balance? The scene seems a bit blue I think? I think the smoke "needed" to be grey and the top half of the curtains white. The crowd seems to be a bit blue as well.

brycematheson wrote in post #17192176
And what about the grunge-looking effect?

Could you please explain what you mean by "grunge"? I haven't a clue.

To me, people's faces seem kinda grainy, even dirty almost. It could just be me. It seems like a different kind of grain than just noise from using high ISO.

Looks like they're shooting with a 4-5 light setup: 3-4 small flashes near the corners of the room with coloured gels, set a little above head height and pointing down into the crowd. Then one (usually ungeled?) on camera flash set to a narrower spread than is needed for the lens (If not a strict snoot effect).


Given how crisp stuff looks I would say it is probably hard to do it with mostly ambient lighting as you would usually get far more motion blur.

Especially with the crowd shots, the photo is relying solely on available light. It appears there's some kind of spot light shining on the crowd.

Here are a couple from a few years ago I shot at a charity concert. I relied totally on available light. Both shot at 1600 ISO.

Luckless wrote in post #17193476
Looks like they're shooting with a 4-5 light setup: 3-4 small flashes near the corners of the room with coloured gels, set a little above head height and pointing down into the crowd. Then one (usually ungeled?) on camera flash set to a narrower spread than is needed for the lens (If not a strict snoot effect).

Agreed.

Look in the wide shots - there are Speedlights on lightstands on the sides of the room, looks like four of them. Put some gels on them, or maybe just set the global white balance to be cool and greenish, or maybe both.

I'm seeing at least five Speedlights, bare on tall lightstands - two on the stage on either side of the DJ booth, two on the left side (facing the crowd), one on the right side (facing the crowd).

Note, not all of the shots seem to have all the Speedlights firing. Whether this was intentional or not, I'm not sure - maybe he was intentionally using multiple groups so he could turn them on and off in sets. Or, maybe the triggers weren't reliable, or maybe the batteries were running low and they weren't recycling fast enough, dunno.

For this type of "grunge" effect, crank up the Clarity in Lightroom, around +50 ought to do it. The cool white balance helps with this effect too. And do a heavy dark post-crop vignette, too.

Kind of reminds me of LucisArt; duplicate the image, run LucisArt then lower the opacity of that layer so it's not as harsh.

The exif is only part of the puzzle. He is using multiple off camera strobes across the room. And one off camera flash on his other hand, probably a snoot modifier. High ISO is to ensure sufficient ambient light to fill up the background. That's why even at 1/160s he could freeze people dancing...