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[OM] Re: Film or digital for cave photos.

Subject: [OM] Re: Film or digital for cave photos.
From: Tim Hughes <timhughes@xxxxxxxx>
Date: Sun, 20 Aug 2006 21:54:22 -0700 (PDT)
I have friends who sell cave calenders and a book on caving, who take their 
cave photography
fairly seriously.  So I have been along on cave trips as gaffer and "model" a 
number of times. 
Because they are "pro" they get to go off trail in commercial caves, which 
helps in placing
lighting, setting the cameras etc. Mostly they go to non-comercial caves where 
they can take as
much time as they like and go where they like. 

Traditionally they have used a small digital camera for testing exposures and 
then shoot slide
film, usually  Provia 100F.  I don't know if/when they will go completely 
digital.  

Their general setup is just set a manual exposure (1/60, or B if no artificial 
light) with
aperture for apropriate depth of field , with lots of remote flashes (hidden 
behind a rock etc) 
to fill in the formations. They just use an adjusted GN (assuming a lower 
reflectivity for rock)
to set each flash power locally. Mostly they use a bunch of flashes like the 
Vivitar 5600 but with
remote optical triggers. (5600 is like a T32 but with finer power control). If 
on a tripod on B
they just trigger all flashes by setting off one flash with the test button. 

If using B, you can also fake it by just walk around painting light with one or 
two flashes
repeatedly, since you won't fog your film from the background light! Placing 
flashes near
formations obviates having to have a monster array of really high power flashes 
which would be
impractical to carry and use.

Don't forget to take closeups of pools,translucent "bacon" and small growing 
formations etc, using
a bounce card or similar (for more even lighting) combined with ttl flash. 
Getting the flash off
camera with a cord often helps a lot to get side lighting with these too.

Putting people with bright clothing into the pictures, is often nice to give 
scale.

Tim Hughes


--- GFaulk7376@xxxxxxx wrote:

> 
> Hey guys,
> I signed up for a November 19 photography tour of Blanchard Springs Caverns 
> in Arkansas. The tour lasts four hours and is limited to 10 persons. Right 
> now, 
> there are seven of us. I've never attempted cave photography. So, the big 
> question: film or digital? With my OM's, I've got wide angles from the 14mm 
> Sigma, the Oly 16mm, Oly 18mm, and so on. With my E500, I've got the 11-22 
> and the 
> 50-200. The forest service person I spoke to said they will turn the cavern 
> lights on or off to meet our requests. She also said her typical exposures 
> with 
> the cavern lights on at ISO 100 are about 30 seconds.  Anybody done this 
> before? Thanks.
> 
> Gary Faulkenberry
> 
> 
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