Contents

A swimwear photoshoot with studio flash equipment

  1. One of the final photos
  2. Flash equipment
  3. The making of
  4. Camera body and lens
  5. The final photo
  6. A splash photo
  7. A photo with a standard reflector
  8. The making of
  9. More swimwear photos
  10. Summary of the equipment
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EOS 5D Mark IV
EOS 5D Mark IV
Canon EF 24–70 mm f/2.8L II USM
Canon EF 24–70 mm f/2.8L II USM
Canon EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS III USM
Canon EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS III USM

A swimwear photoshoot with studio flash equipment

In the evening, I met my model at a lake in Southern Germany for a splash photoshoot. The links in this blog post are affiliate links. I receive a small provision when you buy something via these links; however, that does not cause you any additional cost.

One of the final photos

This is one of the final photos:

A young woman wearing swimwear is standing in front of a lake.
Model Elena, F3.2, 1/1000 s, ISO 100

Flash equipment

At the end of this article you can find a list of all the equipment and where to get it. To create this photo, I used portable studio flash equipment. I used the ELB 500 TTL Dual to go Set.

ELB 500 TTL Dual to go Set
The ELB 500 TTL Dual to go Set

This includes a battery pack so that no electrical connection is required.

ELB 500 TTL battery pack
The ELB 500 TTL battery pack

I placed my flashlight just in front and to the left of the model and equipped it with an Elinchrom Rotalux Octabox 135 cm. The octabox requires a Rotalux Speedring, which has to be ordered additionally. You also need an adapter for mounting the speedring on an ELB 500 flashlight. Furthermore, a lamp tripod not included in the ELB 500 TTL Dual to go Set is also required. I used a Walimex Pro WT-806. I placed three sandbags on the lamp tripod to prevent the wind from smashing my octabox. I recommend sandbags from California Sunbounce. Moreover, you need a transmitter for firing the flashlight, for which I am using a Skyport Transmitter PRO for CANON.

Skyport Transmitter PRO for CANON
Skyport Transmitter PRO for CANON

The making of

This picture illustrates what the scene looked like. Elena is wearing her clothes in the making of photo because I forgot to take that one while she was wearing swimwear.

This photo shows the flash equipment during the photoshoot.
Model Elena, the making of

The following picture shows my battery pack. I almost set it to full power:

This photo shows ELB 500 battery pack.
My ELB 500 battery pack

Camera body and lens

For this photoshoot I used a Canon EOS 5D Mark IV. If you don't want to spend that much money, you can use an EOS 850D or an EOS 90D instead. The lens that I used was a Canon EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS II USM. The lens that I used was a Canon EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS II USM. This lens is large, heavy and expensive, but it does take great photographs. It allows apertures up to 2.8 at the entire range of 70-200mm. Furthermore, it has an image stabilizer. A more recent model is the Canon EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS III USM.

Canon EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS II USM
Canon EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS II USM

The final photo

This is one more from the final photos:

A young woman wearing swimwear is standing in front of a lake.
Model Elena, F3.2, 1/1000 s, ISO 100

You might notice that the shutter speed is 1/1000 s which is much shorter than my camera's maximum flash sync speed. This is possible because the ELB 500 flash supports HSS. For this photo, I set the camera to manual mode, the aperture value to 3.2 and the shutter speed to 1/1000. The ISO value was 100. How did I figure out these parameters? First, I set the camera to aperture priority and chose the value 3.2. To check, I did a test photo without enabling the flashlight.

A young woman wearing swimwear is standing in front of a lake.
Model Elena, F3.2, 1/200 s, ISO 100

However, that doesn't really look good. The background is far too bright, and the model is too dark. Then I reduced the shutter speed so that the background looks good:

A young woman wearing swimwear is standing in front of a lake.
Model Elena, F3.2, 1/1000 s, ISO 100

The background looks good in this photo, but the model is too dark. So, in the next step, I activated my flash.

A splash photo

This is one of the splash photos. For this photo, I used a much shorter shutter speed to freeze the water drops:

A young woman wearing swimwear is stitting in a lake.
Model Elena, F4.5, 1/4000 s, ISO 800

A photo with a reflector

I removed the softbox from my studio flash for this photo and equipped it with a standard reflector. The advantage of a reflector is that it reduces the flashlight to a lesser amount than a softbox. However, it produces a hard light, and you might notice the hard shadows in this picture. Furthermore, I equipped my camera with another lens - a Canon EF 24–70 mm f/2.8L II USM.

A young woman wearing swimwear is standing in a lake.
Model Elena, F8, 1/640 s, ISO 100

The making of

This photo shows the flash equipment during the photoshoot.
Model Elena, the making of

This picture illustrates what the scene looked like.

More swimwear photos

You can find additional swimwear photos in my swimwear photo gallery.

Summary of the equipment

ItemComment
Canon EOS 5D Mark IVThe camera body used for this photoshoot.
EOS 90DA less expensive camera body.
EOS 850DA less expensive camera body.
Canon EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS III USMSuccessor to the Canon EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS II USM
Canon EF 24–70 mm f/2.8L II USMA standard zoom lens
Walimex Pro WT-806A lamp tripod suitable for studio flashlights like the ELB 500.
ELB 500 TTL Dual to go SetA mobile studio flash set that includes two flashlights.
Elinchrom Rotalux Octabox 135 cmA softbox
Rotalux Speedring for Elinchrom
Bajonett Adapter MKII for ELB 500 TTL
Sandbags from California Sunbounce
Skyport Transmitter PRO for CANON
Standard reflector 50°