Westcott University — Balancing Sunlight with the LunaGrip

In the lesson above, photographer and educator Kevin Kubota uses the new LunaGrip Handheld Speedlite Mount to capture beautiful senior portraits outdoors.

When shooting outside on bright days, artificial lighting is necessary to properly expose your subject and background. By utilizing a speedlight as your key light source you can then utilize the sun as a hair light. Although this may be more difficult to achieve when the sun is directly overhead, you can use creative angles to position your subject properly with the sun slightly behind him/her.

Be sure to set your camera to 1-stop below what you would typically select for the ambient lighting. This will give your speedlight the ability to overpower the sun and act as a beautiful key light.

To avoid harsh and uncontrolled lighting, it is important to diffuse your speedlight. This is where the LunaGrip Kit comes in. Designed by Kevin, the LunaGrip is a one-of-a-kind speedlight handle that allows for instant and portable speedlight modification. This tool pairs virtually any speedlight with a standard diffusion disc for soft, appealing light.

The LunaGrip Handheld Speedlite Mount features an adjustable shoe-mount bracket, easy-to-grip handle, and three collapsible grip arms. Its super-durable construction is surprisingly lightweight, allowing for effortless handheld operation.

This speedlight modifier creates a stunning, ultra-soft output and an ideal round catchlight in the eyes of your subject.

To create the “chiaroscuro”-effect that he is aiming for (a combination or contrasting shadows and highlights), Kevin feathers the light by direct the LunaGrip toward his subject at an angle. This method allows the light to wrap around your subject.