Masterclasses: Light, Portraiture and Inspiration

Erik Valind's B&H Event Space workshop covers the characteristics of light, manual camera controls and building an off-camera lighting setup with modifiers. In a live demo he reinforces that shutter controls ambient, aperture controls flash and ISO adjusts everything, dialling from f/5.6 to f/13 rather than walking to the flash.

Jerry Ghionis's Westcott-sponsored B&H seminar covers conventional and unconventional light sources, arguing that light matters more than place and that knowledge, not filters, separates serious photographers. Examples include diffusing harsh sun over a couple, a 65-year-old bride placed in direct sun under a diffuser, and natural diffusers on location.

Bob Davis, a former Chicago Sun-Times photographer, recounts at B&H how a blurred fire assignment convinced him to master flash, and how he replaced Broncolor packs with Vivitar speedlights, stands and umbrellas. He walks through speedlight-lit assignments including a pool shot with blue-gelled lights and a camera in an aquarium.

Lindsay Adler's B&H presentation reframes portraiture as photographing who someone is or wishes to be, through concept development, storytelling, styling and mood boards, citing a fantasy senior portrait and a ballerina. She shoots a stylised demo with a Canon 5D Mark IV and 24-105mm, then retouches and prints it.

Chris Knight, author of The Dramatic Portrait, shows in a Profoto-sponsored B&H talk how one light and a reflector create many portrait styles. Using a Profoto B1 with softboxes, octaboxes, umbrellas, beauty dishes and a five-in-one reflector, he covers dialling in modifiers, feathering light off the background and shaping shadow.

Jerry Ghionis, at CES 2018, describes pursuing one legacy shot at every wedding and spotting creative triggers, like a groom's reflection in glass beside the bride through the window. He breaks down a rainy backlit couple shot: exposing for dark trees, then flash held six feet high behind them.

Daniel Norton, live on Adorama's OnSet with Canon 600EX-RT speedlights, argues a speedlight should be any photographer's first light because flash is about shaping light, not rescuing darkness. With Marissa he builds a portrait: a background light at 1/8 power, a key light, then a snooted hair light.

Jerry Ghionis's B&H Depth of Field talk urges photographers to obsess over light rather than location, since shadow and darkness create depth. He defends wedding photography as every genre in one, reflects on the emotional worth of a single print and critiques audience shots as good, better or best.

Robert Evans, a Sony Artisan with 29 years' experience, argues that simplicity makes images stand out and that photographers must be bold, take risks and shoot largely for themselves. Examples include finding a couple's faces in a car mirror, barn cats on a farm and eye autofocus for sharp eyes.

Jerry Ghionis shows creative triggers in everyday environments: warped reflections under a Chicago bridge become a cinematic backdrop with an Ice Light and tungsten white balance, split light bounces from groom to bride, and couples stand away from walls for blur. He explains aiming flash past the far eye socket.