The night photographers and light painters from National Parks At Night workshop series have put together one of the best night photography holiday gift guides I have seen. All of the items in the guide have been used by the guys in the field, its not just a buy this so I get a % type of gift guide that we see sometimes. The extensive list of gear in this guide has been thoroughly tested by some of the best night photographers in the business and its got their stamp of approval. Some of my personal favorites were the Atmosphere Aerosol (which I have wanted to try out for ever but always forget about it) and of course Light Painting Brushes and Coast Flashlights… Here is a link to download the full PDF version check it out!

DOWNLOAD THE NATIONAL PARKS AT NIGHT GIFT GUIDE

In 2016 RGB Light Experience – Roma Glocal Brightness was the first urban festival of light installations, light art and videomapping in Rome, Italy. This year the RGB Festival was held over an area 4 km long. National and International light painting artists came together to create a series of stunning light art installations making the city glow. One of the artist invited to take part in this event was Maria Saggese so I caught up with her to find out more about the event.

LPP ∇ Hey Maria thank you for taking the time to answer some questions! How did you become involved in RGB Light Experience?
MS ∇ I have known RGB Light Fest since the first edition, but I had attended the event only as a visitor. I was impressed, it was the first Light Festival in Rome, and one of the few in Italy. I had the pleasure of meeting the event’s managers Diego Labonia and Emanuela Bellezza at the first Light Painting Meetup in Rome last March. They admired the magic of Light Painting and we decided to collaborate to spread the light painting in this new edition of RGB festival.

LPP ∇ It looks l this was a large event with a lot of people! Was this a one night event or were there several nights?
MS ∇ RGB Itinerary was 4km long, accessible by feet and/or by bike, from Pigneto to Tor Pignattara. It was a great event with about 60.000 visitors in 3 days!

LPP ∇ What types of light painting events were there?
MS ∇ There were many Light Painting activities we held Light Painting Workshops, Light Painting Photo Booths and Massive Collaboration for the last night at Acquedotto Alessandrino.

LPP ∇ Do you have the light painting photo booth every night?
MS ∇ Yes, every night. The first night it was held by Children of Darklight, the second night of me and last night by me and two other Roman light painters, Ilaria Toscano and Luca Romano. Every night there were a lot of visitors who waited for the photobooth, about 200 people every night who were fascinated and amazed by the technique. Everyone was happy to be portrayed with this technique and It was a great experience to involve them in this creative way.

LPP ∇ What other Light Painting Artist were involved, who did you work with?
MS ∇ I worked with one of the best Light Painting artists from Spain: Alfredo Àlvarez (Children of Darklight), Patricia Díez & the great artist Sfhir. It was a great team and we worked all together to create something special for the Festival.

LPP ∇ I also saw a really cool collaboration image of a woman pouring water into a field can you tell me about this, who was involved and how was this image achieved?
MS ∇ Yes we created a colossal picture, performed on October 29th in Acquedotto alessandrino. The main team was made up of me, Frodo Álvarez Dkl, Sfhir Ogt Lcsiete, Patricia Díez. The idea was evolving until the final sketch performed by sfhir. It wasn’t an easy job. There was hardly time for planning due to the shortage of facilities and means. But our commitment is always to do something big, different and… colossal. We were supported by Es Olympus and Olympus Italia and we used Olympus cameras with Live composite mode. We did several shots and tests of this image, and we worked many hours to get the best result. The model was Patricia Díez, we first illuminated her in the foreground, then Sfhir and Frodo created the “river” crossing the aqueduct. After that we illumined the background, the aqueduct, the lawn, and trees. Sfhir created some hand drawing of fishes and a moonlight effect. It was a an hard job, but finally at 4am we had the perfect shot!

LPP ∇ Sounds like it was a great opportunity to collaborate and share the Light Painting art form with many people. Is there anything else you would like to add?
MS ∇ I want to thank everyone for the amazing work and all the RGB staff for giving us the opportunity to participate in the festival and spread the Art of light painting.

Light Painting Photographer Mart Barras creates some mind blowing images and one of the techniques he frequently utilizes in his light painting work is the Lens Cap Technique. If you are not familiar with what Lens Capping is, basically you are covering your lens with something while the exposure is still running so that you can move the camera or otherwise change the scene without the camera recording any unwanted lights.

One of the problems with lens capping is that you either need to cap the lens yourself by walking back to camera or you need to have an assistant do it for you. If you don’t have an assistant and you are shooting an image where its difficult to back to camera, especially in the dark, then this can become a major challenge to creating the image you envision.

Mart has come us with a simple yet genius solution that he calls the Gimpomatic 2000! Mart says it’s a work in progress and he hopes to revise it to make it better as the idea progresses. He is also happy to see how other light painters will modify it and use it in their own different ways. The Gimpomatic 2000 is basically a remote Pan head mounted to a light stand (or tripod) and a 3D Printed Black Flag, simple and genius! Check out the images and video below of this innovative contraption and a the bottom of the page is a full list of the parts you need to make your own! Make sure to throw Mart a thank you and tag him in your images if you use this technique so he can check them out! Thank you Mart for sharing your ingenuity! Check out more of Mart’s incredible light painting work on his Facebook and Instagram too!

Here is a list of the 3 parts needed to create the Gimpomatic 2000.
1. Remote Pan Head

2. 1/4″ Aluminium tripod screw

3. 3D printed flag, probably best to paint this even if you print in with black material.
Best print in PLA and print with the face with the hole down on the bed, no supports needed. Weight of this part 98-99 grams
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2511632

You can have this file printed for a few bucks at any place that has a 3D printer in your town if you don’t have one yourself. You could also make a similar flag out of cardboard and glue if you do not have access to a 3D printer, but it obviously won’t be as cool.

This could be an interesting light for Light Painting. Spekular is an innovative new lighting system from Spiffy Gear. This system tags itself as “The Only Light You Need”. This is not specifically for light painting, Spekular is geared more toward the traditional photo and video maker market however I can think of a few ways this could be utilized in the world of Light Painting. My first thought was as a tool for long exposure portrait images. Holding the light bars in a line you could “Scan” your model creating an balanced and even light over your entire model in one pass of the light to ensure a sharp image. This system also can create some interesting shapes with the way the light bars attach together, and I really like the catch light they can create hmmmm……

As far a light painting tools go this one is on the pricy side, however if you’re a light painter who also does commercial photo and video work this versatile lighting system is interesting and definitely worth checking out, more right here.