Tae Kwon Do Photography Shoot

[Andrea H.]

I've been asked by a customer to take some tae kwon do kick shots and I wanted to see if anyone has any experience with it. What he wants done is similar to a series his master had done and I have a pretty good idea on how to accomplish it.

He's wanting a black background with him in his uniform doing specific kicks. What he wants from me is to shoot at a fast shutter speed to catch the full sequence of the move in order to achieve the final shot. The final shot is of him with the start of the kick in full opacity with the later sequences in a lesser opacity overlaid on top of it, all in black and white.

This guy is pretty much a badass (6th degree black belt) and has been asked to appear in a major martial arts publication. I'm not clear if these shots will appear in this publication or not. Bottom line, I want them to be the best I can do. If anyone has anything that could help me, I'd greatly appreciate it. My equipment is listed below in my signature. I've got a black background, but I'm not sure if it will cut it (it's just black velvet fabric - wide bolt).

My forte is childrens photography, so this is a huge step outside my box. I'm always up for learning though!!

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

[unclejon]

I think the way you do this is by setting a long exposure (Like say 2 sec) and then you set you flash to fire multiple times.

If you look in your flash manual look up the multi stroboscopic flash. I tried to copy the page from the manual but it didnt look too good and plus I use a 580ex. So you will set the hz to a nice number and it will flash that many times for each second that the exposure is going.

Here is the description in the manual......


MULTI Stroboscopic Flash


With stroboscopic flash, a rapid series of flashes is fired. It can be used to
capture multiple images of a moping subject in a single photograph for later
study.
You can set the firing frequency {number of flashes per sec. expressed as
Hz}, the number of flashes, and the flash output .

Good place to start anyways. Give it a try.


Good luck! Let me know how it works out.

PS
Start at like 8-14 hz....I thought it didnt go up as high as it does so the I think with the lower hz it will be more defined somewhat. I am not a professional so hopefully this works.....