Sequoia National Park: Outdoor Portraiture and Key Shifting

The sky was stormy and I wanted to take advantage of it. To increase the moodiness of the background, I used key shifting, which is increasing or decreasing the exposure time to either show more or less of the ambient light. In this case, I decreased the exposure time to make the sky look darker. Mark is not affected by the key shifting, because he is lit by the flash. The flash is on for a much shorter time than the shutter is open, so changing the exposure time does not affect the amount of light the camera records from the flash. Put it another way, the ambient light and the light from the flash can be controlled independently. Exposure info: 52.5mm focal length, 1/320 sec, f/22, ISO 100, 5:18 pm. Flash info: Bare flash at full power, 105mm? zoom, 4:00 camera right, 5 feet away from subject. I like the photo, but if I could do it all over again, I'd make the following changes: 1. I'd recompose the photo to reveal more of the sky. 2. I'd make him put on something other than his very dark jacket. The jacket was so dark that it blended into the background at camera left. Digital Photography One on One has a very good online video explanation of key shifting in regards to outdoor portraiture (you can skip to the four minute mark). It's time well spent. Or you can go to my favorite blog, Strobist. To see some of my other attempts at key shifting go here and here. I apologize if my explanation seems a bit vague. I am working on a more thorough set of instructions and will post it shortly.