The Portrait Photographer

Consulting With The Subject

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 18:08:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Understanding and Controlling Strobe Lighting: A Guide for Digital Photographers by John Siskin. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

A great portrait depends on more than just light—certainly, the pose and the mood created in the image are also important. If you define the subject’s face well and create lighting that is appropriate for your subject, you will make more successful portraits.

This is one of my favorite portraits. I call the shot What?

Before I take a single shot, I talk to the subject about how they want to appear. Listening to the client voice their expectations gives me time to study their face and decide whether I want to work with hard or soft light. I also try to identify features I want to highlight or hide and consider what background might complement the clothes. I make it a point to ask the client how the image will be used. A shot that will be in an annual report should be carried out differently than a portrait made for a loved one.

Light creates definition, shape, and color to any shot. Each portrait should be lit to suit the subject.

Since all people do not look alike or want to be shown in the same way, lighting should be customized for each subject. While department store studios don’t do this, it is one of the ways an independent photographer can add value to their services.

All people have different facial features and skin tones, which depend on their ancestors’ origins. I use a longer tonal scale with pictures of people of African origin than persons of European origin. For persons with Asian ancestry, I build more contrast into the face to make the image more three-dimensional.

Sometimes character is what makes a shot compelling.

Finally, when you are making decisions about how to light your subject, you should consider his age. We might create character lighting for a man using a small light source, say just an umbrella. For someone who wants to appear more youthful, I would use a large light source and a reflector, just as a start.

Not all portraits are about the face.

LIGHTING IDEAS
There are a few things that I do for most portraits. I start with a large light source (usually the umbrella/light panel combination) placed to one side of the face to accentuate the shape of the face. Sometimes this is the only light, but I typically add a smaller, harder light near the camera. This gives me catchlights in the eyes and changes the contrast in the face. I might use a warm filter on this light. I may even mount this on a camera bracket rather than a light stand, so the light travels with me. The third tool I have is a reflector, usually a light panel. I have a silver cover on one side and gold on the other. I don’t use this setup constantly. Nothing works for everyone. I would set this up if I didn’t know anything about whom I would be shooting. Since I do commercial shooting, this happens pretty frequently.

For this shot, the only light was a snoot. I used a large reflector for fill.

A simple setup was used to create this soft and delicate image. There are three lights: an umbrella/light panel (large light), a beauty dish (this smaller light was used for the catchlight), and a reflector (background light).

In this shot, the hair light was important. It added definition and sparkle to the hair.

There are many special-purpose tools for portraiture, and there are other ways to use the more typical tools. The basic tools I use are the large light source, a hard light for contrast, and a reflector. I may use a hair light on a boom or a rim light positioned behind the subject. However, I start with a simple setup.

Flawless Indoor Portraits With Flash

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 19:28:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Studio Lighting Unplugged: Small Flash Techniques for Digital Photographers by Rod & Robin Deutschmann. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

There is nothing as intimidating as photographing a living subject. So far, our journey has been nonthreatening to our egos (the wall in front of you has yet to complain about a bad photo).

When you photograph people, they are going to want to see the image—and they may give you feedback about your work. This may make you uncomfortable at first.

You may want to invest in a “shooting” stool. This gives your model a chance to rest between shots and keeps them at a comfortable height for the photograph.

Ask someone who loves you very much to help with the fol -lowing experiments and let them know that you are simply trying to better yourself as a studio photographer. Smile a lot, be positive, and when you do get an image perfect, make sure to let your subject know it had everything to do with their winning smile and not just the lighting you created.

Exercise: Freezing Motion
• Work in a room that you are very familiar with, one that you have already had photographic success in.
• Ask your model to stand or sit several feet from you.
• Start with an aperture of f/5.6.
• Set the camera’s ISO to 200
• Set the camera’s shutter speed to its flash sync speed.
• Point the flash toward the ceiling.
• Turn the power of the flash to full (1/1).
• Take a test image and examine it.
• Adjust the power setting of the flash until your model is lit perfectly.
• Examine the image closely. Check out the focus and look at the colors. Adjust the white balance if needed. Do what you can to improve the shot. Make it perfect, then move onto another room and do it again. Devoting just an hour of your time to this exercise will yield some great benefits— confidence and pride in your abilities.
• Now, move the camera a bit when you shoot. Try to create motion blur. You’ll find it’s impossible to get a blurry photo when shooting with a flash in the studio. Imagine never again having to worry about your subject (or you) moving when you take a photograph indoors.

Off the Wall
The light on your portrait subject looks great when it is bounced off the ceiling, but what if you could bounce it off of something farther away, like a distant wall? What effects could you achieve with an even larger light source, coming from a different angle? Let’s check it out

Notice how the shadows from a bounced flash are much more flattering on your subject and background.

By bouncing the flash off a nearby wall, you are both enlarging and scattering your light source. This creates a very pleasing quality of light. Notice the difference between this image and the previous one where the light was bounced from the ceiling. Look closely at the differences between the shadows, how they fall, and the difference in the level of detail that can be perceived in the shadow areas.

Exercise: Off-the-Wall Lighting
• Set the same aperture, shutter speed, and ISO setting you used in the previous exercise.
• Rotate and spin the flash head toward a wall. Ensure the flash is pointed directly at the wall, at a full 90 degrees.
• Take a shot and review the results. Adjust your flash settings and take another photograph. Repeat the process until you are happy with the lighting on your subject. Don’t be surprised if you have to increase the power from the flash dramatically. As the distance needed to illuminate your subject increases, so does your need for power.

Working In A Client's Home

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 21:07:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Family Photography: The Digital Photographer's Guide to Building a Business on Relationships by Christie Mumm. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

The high ISO capabilities of today’s DSLRs have made shooting in clients’ homes much more feasible. I love the excitement of heading out to a client’s home and knowing it will be an utterly unique shooting location. There are always special areas to photograph the family. An added bonus is that their images will be even more significant because they represent their lives in such a personal way.

Evaluating the Light. Some special considerations with shooting in clients’ homes may include the lack of control you will have over lighting quality and color, working with pets, and learning to be comfortable asking clients to move furniture for the portraits. Many clients will have an idea of where in their home they would like to have portraits taken; sometimes, however, these
locations will not be the best for lighting. As I noted earlier in this chapter, lighting is much more important than the background. Try to prepare your client in advance of their session by letting them know that you will be asking to see all the rooms in the house to determine the best light. This will avoid the potential embarrassment if certain rooms are not tidy and ready for photography.

It is also a good idea to speak with clients in advance about the direction their windows face. This can help you plan the appropriate time of day to hold their session. If the home has many large windows facing due west, I would not recommend shooting there late in the day. At that time, the light will be harsh and hard to control. A morning or early afternoon session would be a better idea. Naturally, the opposite is true for east-facing windows. North-facing windows are great all day long in the northern hemisphere; southfacing windows are, accordingly, good all day for the southern hemisphere.

Locations to Try. Portraits of kids in their own bedrooms can be very fun. Most children love to show off their stuff and will enjoy the personal attention they get. Backyards can be nice—especially if the yard has some sort of play structure (trampolines are particularly fun for kids and grownups alike). I also love to take portraits of families flopped down on Mom and Dad’s bed—cuddling, reading, having a tickle fight, etc. Big, comfy beds are also great for baby and maternity portraits—so encourage your clients to allow you to shoot in their bedrooms if the lighting allows. Other good places can be bathrooms (tubs and showers make clean, simple backdrops) and kitchens, which usually have beautiful light and nice floors.

Lighting is more important than the background—but here the coordinating cool tones of the wall and the parents’ clothes make the warm skin tones the focus of the image.

Creating A Photojournalistic Atmosphere

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 20:45:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Engagement Portraiture: Master Techniques for Digital Photographers by Tracy Dorr. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

To be truly photojournalistic, your portrait subjects need to be totally at ease and unaware of your presence. Since engagement sessions are scheduled and consist of only the three of you, there is little opportunity for this to occur naturally. They are only with you for a half an hour to an hour and they know that you are shooting their engagement photo, so of course they are more than aware of you and your camera. If the subjects are properly distracted, however, they may momentarily forget all about you, creating a truly photojournalistic moment. So what can you do to encourage a photojournalistic atmosphere?

When you begin the session, select a few poses that allow the couple to loosen up and get comfortable. That will create the open atmosphere needed for them to improvise. Be sure to comment to them that you want them to do whatever comes naturally. They should not feel constrained to a pose—you want them to ad-lib as much as they would like. Offer up examples such as, “Feel free to pick up your fiancée or move to a new location. You don’t need my permission or instruction to try anything that comes to mind.” By allowing them to dictate what pose comes next or be creative in how they interact, you will inspire natural moments—and totally photojournalistic moments will be born out of those.

You will also benefit from welcoming any and all distractions that occur. If a dog runs through your shot or a huge gust of wind blows, don’t put down your camera and wait for the distraction to pass! Utilize that moment to its fullest extent—be ready to capture the couple’s reaction to whatever distracts them and see how that encourages them to relate to each other. Those moments will be totally unscripted and demand that their attention be withdrawn from you for at least a few moments.

The Characteristics of Light

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 21:01:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Jeff Smith's Studio Flash Photography: Techniques for Digital Portrait Photographers by Jeff Smith. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

Educators often talk about the quality of light that is produced by a light or light and modifier. I always thought this was confusing, as the term “quality” can also be used to refer to something that is a high quality—or better than others. Light has no quality, only quantity (the intensity or amount of light), but it does have characteristics—and it is these characteristics that are being referred to when a photographer says that a certain light or modifier was used to create a “quality” of light that was well suited to a subject.

In the studio, I have used everything from a spotlight to a cheap umbrella to light my clients’ portraits. Working outdoors, I have used soft light from the open sky as well as direct sunlight to produce the look I wanted. No single light source had a better quality than another. They all worked beautifully for the portrait I wanted to create. However, each source did have different characteristics.

When you conceptualize your portrait, you’ll need to decide whether you want a hard or soft lighting effect. Once you’ve made that decision, you’ll need to choose a main light source that produces light with the characteristics you are after. Let’s take a closer look at soft light and hard light so you can learn to identify and create the right lighting for the kind of portrait you want to shoot.

Soft/Diffused Light. Light is called “soft” or “diffuse” when there is a gradual transition from the highlight area of the image to the darkest shadow. In portraiture, soft light can diminish the appearance of harsh lines and wrinkles. It also produces less shine on the subject’s face than hard light will. The majority of traditional portraits are made with soft light. It is the most flattering light for portraiture and is more forgiving of poorly placed light sources. When I was a new photographer, I thought I should use the softest light possible. I was wrong. With a main light source that is too soft, the light lacks directionality and contrast, and the final image looks flat. It lacks the “pop” that you want in professional images.

Soft lighting is the most flattering option for most portraits. As you can see in this trio of images from a single session (left and facing page), it can be used to create an array of great, salable images.

There are many modifiers available that will allow you to create the degree of softness you desire in your portrait. For studio and indoor location portraiture, most photographers use softboxes as a main light source. There are a wide variety of softboxes available on the market—from extra small to extra large or long but narrow. They are also available in various shapes. Some softboxes have a single layer of diffusion, and others have double diffusion. There are many variables that affect the characteristics of the light. Let’s take a look at how changing some of the variables will affect the look you’re after.

In general, a larger light source provides softer light than a smaller source. However, moving a large source farther from the subject makes it smaller relative to the subject. Therefore, when a large softbox is used close to the subject, it will emit a much softer light than it will when it is moved to 10 feet. (This is due to a shift in its size relative to the subject.) Therefore, if you are new to the profession and can afford only one softbox, you should realize that changing the light-to-subject distance will change the effect of the light on your subject.

The light-to-subject distance affects the look of the lighting in the image. The closer the light is placed to the subject, the softer the light.

There are other ways that you can manipulate your softbox to make its light a little softer or harder. If you are using a softbox with the flash head facing the subject, the light will be harder than it would be if you aimed the flash head at the back of the box, as the light would bounce off of the back of the box before passing through the diffusion panel. Also, directing the light through a single diffusion panel would produce a less diffuse light than you could create by adding the second diffusion panel that most softboxes come with. Also, with everything else being equal, a softbox with a silver interior will produce a light that is harder than a softbox with a white interior.

If the light from your softbox is too hard, you can create a softer lighting effect by using just the light from the edge of the softbox, rather than the harder, more direct beam of light emitted by the full front panel of the modifier. This technique is called feathering. I tend to select softboxes that produce more contrast than I typically want and feather the light to soften it. Feathering is a great technique that allows you to create workable light from sources that would not otherwise be usable.

I like to use a softbox with a silver lining and a thinner front diffusion panel (thicker material diffuses the light more, making it softer). This fits my style of photography and my clients’ tastes. The majority of my clients are high school seniors, and they like portraits that have more contrast and a higher color saturation. If you are using a softbox like mine but want more contrast, you can glue mylar or aluminum foil to the interior of the box. If your light is too contrasty for your tastes, you can add an inner diffusion material or replace the outer diffuser with a thicker fabric.

Hard/Directional Light. Hard light is characterized by hard, sharp shadows and high contrast. There is a quick transition from highlight to shadow. As I mentioned earlier, soft light is the choice of most portrait photographers. However, hard light, when carefully controlled, can be used to create dramatic portraits. The Hollywood photographers used hard light to create their classic, high-contrast black & white portraits.

Like modifiers designed to diffuse light, light attachments that create harder, more directional light have subtle variation in design and functionality, but all produce harder light than a softbox. A flash unit fitted with a parabolic (metal) reflector is the tool of choice as a main light source for most traditional portraits. These reflectors come in a variety of shapes and sizes as well as different interior finishes. There are a great number of accessories that can be attached to the parabolic reflectors to allow enhanced control over the light (snoots, grids, etc.). You can also modify your parabolics by changing the finish of the interior or putting diffusion material over the end of the reflector.

The effects produced by window light will vary depending on the direction the window faces, the time of day, and the type of glass in the window. Window treatments can further modify the light that strikes your subject.

When used correctly, parabolic reflectors will help you re-create that old Hollywood look. The best part of parabolic light is the amount of control it offers. When you can add light precisely where you want it, you can create a dramatic portrait.

A hard light setup and final image.

Shooting Up, Down, and Across

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 19:36:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Christopher Grey's Lighting Techniques for Beauty and Glamour Photography by Christopher Grey. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

Shooting down or shooting up are angles many of us don’t use. Why not? They’re dramatic or fun, depending on how they’re approached. They’re also difficult because you may have to angle yourself in an uncomfortable position to get what you want. Depending on her perspective to the camera, your model may have to do the same. Here are a few tips.

SHOOTING UP
The most important detail when shooting from any position is to carefully place the main light relative to your angle to the subject. In other words, if you light her so she looks great when you’re standing at full height, the setup will probably make her look awful when you drop to your knees and raise the camera. Set the light so it looks good from your shooting position, with the model in at least a basic pose, for better results. I can hear many of you questioning my sanity and asking why I would point out something so basic, but I’ve seen too many subjects lit badly when photographed from these angles that I felt I needed to address the issue.

Shooting up is more difficult than shooting down or across. The perspective problems you may encounter when the camera is so close to the model that the lower half of the image (the area closest to the lens) looks larger than the upper half might be difficult to deal with (see below).

Angling the model so that she leans slightly toward you and moving back a bit may be all you need to get an excellent image. In the first image, the light, a bare-tubed strobe, was placed at a typical height for her position. When she looked down at the camera, however, it was completely in the wrong position, creating deep shadows that hid her eyes and the underside of her cheeks and chin. Not very attractive. See imagebelow.

Angling the model toward the camera meant the main light needed to be lowered to get an attractive nose shadow. Consequently, the light stand holding the cookie (the flag with a quarter-moon pattern cut into it) had to be raised to get it to the same position.

The final image was augmented with an additional fill card at camera right. It filled in the shadows and added detail to her clothing. Net result? A beautiful image of a beautiful woman. See image below.

SHOOTING DOWN
Shooting down, at least from a perspective standpoint, is easier than shooting up. The same attention to the angle of light must be paid, though, or you may end up with lighting scenarios that are not flattering.

To create the image below, I used a 2x3-foot softbox for the main light (the only light necessary because the model was ringed with white cloth). It was set to the camera-left side of the set and angled it so it would produce an effect that would resemble butterfly lighting if the model had been upright to the camera. Two black flags, each 12x30 inches, were separately mounted to
accessory arms on light stands, cutting the light to the top of the pillow and the right side of the model’s shirt and body. The gobos were set at slightly different angles and close to the light, to avoid sharp shadows and deeper underexposure. This added a bit of visual interest that a typical viewer just can’t put a finger on.

I removed the gobos and moved in a three-stair stepstool to the side of the air mattress that kept my model comfortable. It’s difficult to position yourself directly over a model without building some sort of scaffold, something most of us (myself included) don’t have sitting around. The easiest way to simulate the effect is to get on a short ladder and lean over the subject.

Hold the camera in the landscape position (horizontally) and lean in as far as possible. You can rotate the image to the vertical position in postproduction. If the light is positioned correctly and you’re in the right place, you’ll be amazed how natural it looks, even though you might have been a foot or two off center. See the image below.

SHOOTING ACROSS
When you’re shooting across a reclining model, you’re subject to the same “rules” that apply when you’re shooting up or down, with one exception. Certainly, the main light must be placed in a situation that will render attractive light. That’s a given (or it should be). In any such situation, and regardless of the depth of field you may have dialed in, be sure to focus on the eye nearest the camera. Doing so will put the primary point of interest exactly where an eventual viewer expects it. This is especially true when using a telephoto lens wide open or with a large aperture. See below.

Tips for Photographing Babies

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 14:12:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Boutique Baby Photography: The Digital Photographer's Guide to Success in Maternity and Baby Portraiture by Mimika Cooney. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

Clothing Choices. Babies are best photographed in their birthday suits—just plain naked. Most clothing swallows up a newborn and disguises what’s so cute about their tiny shape. The parents’ own clothing choices should be simple and neutral. You want to highlight their relationship and special bond with their new baby, not their outfits. Plain black long-sleeved shirts with jeans work very well.

Newborns are best photographed naked.

Moms just love seeing Daddy shirtless holding his little baby bundle—and there really is something special and heartwarming about seeing a dad’s strength in contrast with the delicateness of a newborn baby. So off with the shirts, Dads! Even if the father is not completely comfortable with his shape, you can use lighting to artistically hide the areas he doesn’t want highlighted (usually the arms and tummy).

Moms love shirtless dads—and portraits like these let you tell a story by contrasting the delicate with the strong. Using dramatic lighting you can artistically hide any areas that Dad isn’t comfortable having seen.

Accidents Will Happen! With most newborns, we’re tempting fate with those cute curled-up naked baby portraits. I always tell parents, “It’s not if but when.” Don’t panic; just be prepared for pee and poo accidents, keeping clean-up supplies at the ready. In my studio, we have an easily wipeable floor, loads of antibacterial wipes, paper towels, and hand sanitizer. Very often, the baby will warn you that they need to go by crying and wriggling. If they do, place a clean diaper loosely under their buttocks until they settle. It’s also advisable for the adults to bring an extra set of clothing; the probability is very high that someone is going to get wet!

With babies, accidents are a matter of when, not if.

What to Do When Baby Cries. Sometimes even adults wake up on the wrong side of the bed, so it is completely understandable that a child might cry during a photo session. If that happens, it’s best to pause the photography and give the little one a hug and cuddle to make them feel secure. The bright flashing lights, strange noises, and unfamiliarity can cause uncertainty. Crying may also be a sign that the child has passed their patience threshold. In that case, there is no use in forcing the matter; just wrap up the session quickly. They may even be unwell or coming down with a cold. If that is the case, reschedule the session for when they are feeling better. However, if it really is just a case of nerves, then a really talented photographer should be able to offer distractions to both the mom and the child and re-focus them when they feel at ease again.

Usually, persistent crying is baby’s sign that they are tired or about to fill up their diaper. If you can bear through the howling, swaddle them and rock them until they nod off. A great tip I got from the baby-whisperer Tracy Hogg is to use techniques in threes. For example, pat the baby’s back while “shooshing” loudly enough that the baby can hear it over their own crying, also while rocking. I like to use a sound machine that mimics womb sounds to offer that familiar heart-pumping the baby got used to in Mom’s tummy. Remember that, just days ago, the baby was tightly curled up in the womb, so all the flailing about they now find themselves able to do makes them feel insecure.

Naked newborns will cry.

Always have an assuring hand on the baby’s back or head to offer that feeling of warmth and security. Also, have Mom feed the baby in between poses; a full belly helps them sleep. Another great tip is to place a heating pad, gently warmed in the microwave, under a blanket and lay the baby on their side or tummy.

Posing Hands

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 20:18:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Doug Box's Guide to Posing For Portrait Photographers by Doug Box. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

You’ve heard it said that you can tell a lot about a person by looking at their hands. Likewise, you can tell a lot about the portrait subject by looking at his or her hands. Fortunately or unfortunately, you can also gauge the photographer’s skill at posing by considering the hand pose of the subject.

When posing the client, you should take care to avoid pointing the hands straight on to the camera to prevent them from appearing distorted. The hands are best viewed at an angle to the camera, and, when possible, care should be taken to photograph the side of the hand, which gracefully continues the line of the arm when the hand is bent upward at the wrist.

Avoid having the client curl their fingers into a fist. Rather, present the hand with the fingers somewhat outstretched and with a slight space between all of the fingers.

Notice the effect that the hand pose has on the overall mood of the portrait. In the image on the left, the hands are tucked under her arms. The image has a closed off look. In the center image, the subject’s left hand appears attractive. The wrist is bent upward, there is space between the fingers, and the hand has a graceful appearance. However, with the woman’s right hand hidden from view, the pose seems unfinished. In the final image, the woman’s hands seem to show warmth and grace and add to the pleasant mood of the image.

In this image series, we start with the hand in an undesirable position. The back of the hand is straight on to the camera and, with the fingers curled inward, the hand looks like a fist. The second image shows an improved hand position, but the third and forth images are more pleasing still.

The above images show several ways in which the subject’s hand can be posed resting on her face. In the first image, the back of the hand shows, creating a fist-like appearance. The second image is better, but her hand obscures too much of her face. In the third image, the subject’s right hand was placed on her far cheek, and we have a full view of the left side of her face. Her left hand is wrapped around her elbow. To improve the pose, the woman extended her left index finger; this draws the viewer’s gaze to her face or, more specifically, to her eyes. We see the edge of the hand, and if we follow the lines of her arms with our gaze, we can see that the pose helps to lead our eyes through the frame. Since the eye is drawn to areas of sharp contrast, we hid a portion of her left hand from view. It does not appear “missing”; rather, with less of her skin showing, the prominence of the hand has been visually diminished.

This image pair shows two views of the woman’s hands. In the top photo, there is a slight space between the fingers; this creates separation, providing a defined view of the hand. Unfortunately, the angle of the hands to the camera makes the hands appear too prominent. Posing the hands as if the woman was pulling the chair out, with her hands on the sides of the chair back, provides a more elegant, graceful view.

The photos above illustrate two more hand posing options. The image on the left shows too much of the back of the hands. The right-hand photo presents a more desirable, graceful view.

In general, women’s hands should appear graceful, and men’s hands are posed to show strength. When posing men’s hands, it is common to slightly curl the fingers. Be careful to ensure that the fingers are not tightly curled into the palm; again, in this position, the hands look too much like fists. In posing men’s hands, it is also important to show the side of the hand rather than the back of the hand, as the more streamlined view is more attractive.

Controlling The Shadows

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 20:35:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Lighting Essentials: A Subject-Centric Approach for Digital Photographers by Don Giannatti. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

I am sometimes amazed how many online discussions there are about the evils of shadows. Shadows are a natural result of light, so I’m not sure that killing all shadows is the best way to light everything. Sure, there are some cases when a shot requires nearly or completely nonexistent shadows, but for the most part, we define the light by showing the shadow—even a very faint one. Shadows tell us the direction of the light just as certainly as the highlights do. Shadows define and sculpt, create contrast, provide modeling of the subject, and can be used to add an air of mystery to a photograph. Shadows are very important to photography, so we need to be able to control them and their relation to the highlights also produced by the light that created them.

This image of Briana was photographed at a motel on Anna Maria Island. It was raining like heck and we couldn’t leave the little laundry room to wait for our ride to the airport, so we decided to make photographs. I placed one speedlight behind the fan (it was spinning; the strobe froze the blades) and one on a stand behind her to camera left, putting the shadow of her legs on the laundry sink. A third light was placed high and focused on her face. Each light was set to the same output, and their careful placement meant that she didn’t have a lot of leeway in her movement. The shadows are a big part of the feel of the final image, giving it a whimsical look that wouldn’t have been present with flat or one-sided lighting.

CONTROLLING THE SHADOWS
I love shadows. They give an image dimension and depth, mystery and grace. Shadows can be fairly faint and still help establish a background, the angle of light, or separation of the subject from the other elements in the picture. Conversely, they can be quite strong and add a hard “edge” to the image. Subject-centric lighting means knowing how to create the types of shadows
you need and place them to portray your subject in the way you have envisioned.

This shot of Richelle and the chair is made more interesting by the shadow on the wall. Shadows are not the enemy of photography, they are part of what we do.

The Angle of the Shadows. Shadows are created by a light source, so they fall away from whatever object blocked that light (creating the shadow) at the same angle as the light hit the obstruction. For example, if the light is coming in toward the subject at a 30 degree angle, the resulting shadow will also be at a 30 degree angle. Shadow is, after all, just the light interrupted. The Quality of the Shadows. Light sources that are large in relation to the subject (or, more to the point, the obstruction) produce soft-edged shadows. Light sources that are small relative to the subject yield sharp-edged shadows.

The Exposure of the Shadows. Shadows can be very light or very dark. One way to control this is by adding a light source on the shadow side of the subject. This light will “open” the shadow area—meaning that it will bring it closer to the exposure level of the main light side of the subject.

Many times, fill cards (reflectors) are used for this purpose. To do this, the card is placed on the shadow side of the subject and angled toward the face. Essentially, the card works like a mirror; light striking it from an angle (the angle of incidence) is reflected at an equal and opposite angle (the angle of reflectance). So when I put a fill card up next to a face, I make sure it is at the correct angle to receive as much light as possible from the main light and direct it onto the shadow side of the face, rendering the shadows brighter.

Alternately, you could add a second light source—or a third—to open up the shadows. There are boundless ways to have the subject be rendered by the light, and it is sometimes one’s personal style that determines what approach will be used.

On the whole, this image was exposed correctly; I like the way her hair is rendering and the white fence looks white. Unfortunately, it is not a good exposure for her face. To use the lighting as-is, I would have had to open up another 2/3 stop or so to compensate—but that would have changed the exposure of the whole shot.

Instead, I provided fill light on her face from a large white fill card in front of her. By controlling this, I made sure the face presented correctly (returning more light to the camera). Because the fill card only affected her face and the front of her shirt, the exposure for the rest of the scene remained unchanged—preserving what I liked about the previous image.

Controlling Blur

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 19:37:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Painting With A Lens: The Digital Photographer's Guide to Designing Artistic Images In-Camera by Rod & Robin Deutschmann. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

As a society, we’re not accustomed to using blur to express a thought or feeling. As a result, when we encounter blur in our images, we tend to view it as a problem. In truth, blur can be a beautiful thing. It’s actually one of the most powerful compositional tools an artist has. As an artist with a camera, as a painter with light, you must master its use. Nothing says “brush stroke” better than a good blur.

PHYSICAL BLURS
In the previous chapter, we discussed depth of field. As it turns out, determining the depth of field we would like to see in our image is a critical first step in the image-creation process. It guides our aperture selection, the focal length we choose to shoot at, and the focus points in the image. With some practice, controlling the depth of field in an image and the resulting blurs (both in front of and behind your focus point) will become second nature. Once it is, you will be able to freely use it to your advantage to create a host of interesting blurred image effects.

BOKEH: AN EXPERIMENT
Bokeh (or boke) is the Japanese word for blur. Photographers use the term to describe the out-of-focus quality of lenses. Not all lenses produce the same amount of blur when used at similar focal lengths—even when the same aperture and focus point are selected. If you haven’t done it yet, check out your own lens’s maximum “bokeh.” If you’re going to be proficient with your paintbrushes, you have to know what they’re capable of.

The blur in this image (both in front of and behind the focus point) was made possible through the use of depth of field control. The photographer simply pre-focused his longer lens on home plate, checked his depth of field with his depth of field preview button (making sure he had at least two feet of focus), adjusted his aperture, then lined up the tiers of graphic information to tell the story (putting the pitcher in the scene). When the ball hit the focus point, the photographer shot. You will also notice (if you look hard enough) that this image was shot through a chain fence. The large aperture (f/4) and longer focal length (280mm) all but eliminated the obstruction and the given spatial distortion that occurs adds a wonderful painted “Rockwell-esque” quality to the image.

How to Do It. While in manual focus, rotate the focus ring of your lens to its minimum focus distance (i.e., as close as your lens will let you focus). Choose the largest aperture your lens offers and, if your lens is a zoom, zoom all of the way out. Find a small subject with a background that is uncluttered and far away, put your camera up to your eye, and move your body (camera included) forward and back toward your small subject (or away from it) until it falls into focus. Take a photo if you like. Look at the LCD and examine that background. Really look at the blur you’ve got. Analyze it. Make sure that you see just how shallow your depth of field is. What you’re looking at now (behind and in front of your small subject) is your maximum blur (bokeh). This is the greatest physical blur this particular lens can achieve. Now, repeat the exercise with each lens you own.

Blur can quickly isolate any individual intent. It also gives the photographer the ability to truly design an image—even if the image challenges our normal conceptions. Most photographers will not shoot an image in which the bride is intentionally rendered blurry, but an artist will take that chance. They do it all the time.

Different lenses offer different types of blur. It’s important to understand how close you can focus, what the minimum focus distance is for your lens, and what type of blur it offers, both in front of and behind your focus point. A 500mm mirrored lens produced the “painted” blur you see in this image.

Blur can be used to isolate your subject and wrap it in a blanket of color, tones, and meaning. Get to know what each lens you own affords, then use it well. Here, again, we see the “circled” blur effect that a mirrored 500mm lens offers. The “circles” stem from the construction of the lens itself. The blur you see is taking the shape of the mirror found in the lens.

Depth of field control proved vital in both of these images. In the top photo, a precise depth of field was chosen to keep the bride and groom in focus while blurring everyone else. In the bottom image, a shallower depth of field was dialed-in to blur the bridesmaids in the background.

WHAT YOU GAIN
When you start thinking about blur and controlling it, your pictures will change. They’ll become more controlled, better designed, and more artfully composed. You’ll stop worrying so much about simple subjects and their appearance in the frame and start being concerned with how that blur looks in your image. Eventually, you’ll do what you can to improve it. (Imagine being more worried about the blur in your image than the “stuff” that’s in focus. Crazy, huh?)

Once you’ve got it figured out, amazing things will happen. Take, for instance, an image of something nearly impossible to catch with your camera or lens set to auto. How about a picture of a bee in flight? Sound tough? It’s actually quite simple.

DEPTH OF FIELD CONTROL: AN EXPERIMENT
If you’re struggling with depth of field control, try this simple exercise.
Grab a water bottle and your favorite lens. Dial-in your largest aperture, turn your focus ring to its minimum focus distance (focusing as close as you can), and move your body (and camera) forward and back until the front-most part of the water bottle cap is in focus. You may discover (depending on your lens) that only a small portion of the cap is in focus. Adjust the aperture until the depth of field reaches across the bottle cap. Remember to check this by using your depth of field preview button. You may discover that you’ll have to use a very small aperture to gain the depth of field you desire. Adjust your shutter speed and ISO accordingly and snap the picture. The water bottle cap will be in focus. Great!

Capturing an image of a bee in flight is quite simple, as long as you don’t use your camera’s autofocus feature. It’s the same as shooting a moving baseball, only smaller. Simply dial-in the appropriate depth of field, choose a shutter speed fast enough to freeze a moving bee, and pick an ISO that allows you to illuminate the image as you wish. Pre-focus on where the bees are “hanging out,” wait for one to hit its mark, and snap! It’s a breeze.

Blur was a welcome part of this image. It illustrates the mood and feel of the event better than a static approach would. Sometimes allowing an image to blur is the right thing to do.

Now, imagine that we replaced that water bottle cap with a flower. Using the same procedure, dial-in the required depth of field. Imagine that there are lots of bees around you (hopefully you’re not allergic) and that they really like that flower. Now, wait until one of the bees flies into that depth of field and take the picture. Pow! You’ve got a photograph of a bee in flight!
Try that with your lens set to autofocus. We dare you.

Posing For Families

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 19:32:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Family Photography: The Digital Photographers Guide to Building a Business on Relationships by Christie Mumm. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

Most of my clients are looking for a good mix of casually posed and candid shots from their sessions. I begin by looking for the best light in any given location, then suggest posing that will allow the family to interact and reveal their personalities. Traditional posing rules for groups favor a balanced arrangement. I find that a few general rules serve me well.

The Triangle Rule. Posing families to create triangle patterns that are somewhat equidistant in spacing will feel balanced and keep the viewer’s eyes moving from subject to subject. It is human nature to be drawn to triangles, a shape that is repeated in nature over and over again. When you are looking at a family pose, be wary of groupings that place one subject out of balance or somehow “out” of the group. There are, of course, exceptions to this rule.

Families of three are very easy to pose as they will naturally fall into a triangle pattern.

With families that have an even number of members, be careful not to create a perfect square. With a family of four, a lopsided rectangle or parallelogram created from multiple triangles produces an intriguing yet balanced pose.

In certain cases, an offset subject can draw attention to that person in an interesting and narrative way. Typically speaking, however, you will want to be able to draw many different triangles with the placement of the faces in your composition.

The Linear Rule. Placing families in linear poses is a great way to draw the eye through the portrait in a fluid way. Try to use leading lines with these poses if at all possible; this will create a sense of flow in the image. Linear poses make fantastic panoramic or wide prints and can be placed on walls where vertical space is limited.

The “Groups” Rule. Posing families in smaller groups can make for fun, unique portraits. Whether you place the children separately from the parents or divide the boys and the girls, the “groups” rule can create poses that are fun and full of life. Encourage the smaller groups to follow either the triangle or linear rule; this will make each of the smaller groups feel more cohesive and balanced. One thing to consider with this rule is focus. When the groups are placed on different planes, you will have to make a decision about focal points and whether or not you want all of the subjects in focus.

Allowing this family to settle into their own personalities within the pose has made for a truly authentic portrayal of their family dynamic. I love how the littlest one is showing her stubbornness, the middle child is sneaking a peek at what everyone else is doing, and the eldest is picking on the little one. This image makes me smile every time I look at it and it ended up being their favorite from the session.

In this family portrait, the mother and father are positioned as the center of the group and their boys move out from them. The leading lines from the parents in the center to the outside children make the viewer’s eyes move back and forth through the image as they scan each face one at a time.

Here the “U” shape of the grouping has the eye moving from the father, to the daughter, to the son, and up to the mother—and back again.

This family portrait uses the “groups” rule, separating the boys from the girls to juxtapose their personalities. I love how the family clown in the middle is vying for Dad’s attention. Mom looks on, obviously amused at his antics.

The two groups are on different planes, rendering the parents and baby out of focus while the two big girls play it up for the camera in front.

The Lifestyle Portrait. The last posing rule I will talk about is the “unposed” rule. I try to capture a good mix of loosely posed images and candid shots in each session. When shooting in this fashion, you will be an observer and simply allow the family to interact and move around the shooting location. Walking, climbing, and otherwise being active is the name of the game here. Encourage your clients to play, explore, and try to forget that you are there at all. I will usually put on my long zoom lens for this portion of the session and shoot stealthily from a distance.

Allowing families to have some fun, unstructured play time during their session is a great way to capture images that convey the true nature of your clients’ relationships.

The philosophy of lifestyle portraiture is to capture the subjects in their natural environment. Interactions between family members are some of the most honest and authentic moments you will have the pleasure of capturing in your images. In fact, some of the most evocative and moving images you create will be those that are captured in moments when your direction is not present at all. I strive to be an observer of human nature and relationships. If you open your eyes to the world around you and allow the beauty of creation to wash over you in the present, your work will become a true representation of your subjects. Living life in the moment and appreciating your clients for who they are, and what they mean to each other, is paramount in this business.

Don’t be afraid to frame your subjects very tightly and even crop off portions of heads or faces. These shots create a sense of intimacy and can make for some beautiful, moving portraits.

Vintage Lighting- The 1930's

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 20:35:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Christopher Grey's Vintage Lighting: The Digital Photographer's guide to Portrait Lighting Techniques from the 1910 to 1970. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

1930s—The Dirty Thirties

The often-used title for that decade had nothing to do with sexual mores but rather with the incredible dust storms that ravaged the nation’s food belt. The Great Depression was in full swing at the start of the decade, with many citizens impoverished or, at the very least, in need of fresh food and clean water.

Photographically, lighting styles were evolving into the greatest burst of visual elegance to date. Movies had become the “great escape” for people, and audiences in the ’30s saw movie stars as even more “larger than life” than they did in the ’20s. MGM’s tag line, “More stars than there are in heaven” was never more valid, as actors became the elite royalty of the country.

Personally, I think the two great photographers that fully emerged during this decade, Clarence Sinclair Bull and George Hurrell, were geniuses at what they did, but I don’t think they truly understood their craft. After studying their work for years (I happily own several original and signed Hurrell prints), I’d have to say they understood the nuances of photography, especially lighting, but on only an intermediate level. They frequently made “mistakes” that would doom us if we used them today on, say, a high school graduate. Upwardly directed shadows, sometimes multiple shadows, could brand any one of us as a low-grade photo moron unworthy to wield any camera of more than two megapixels. Unless we’re shooting retro Hollywood, of course.

Hurrell and Bull were hired to photograph both the biggest and smallest names in Hollywood. Regardless, the people they shot had attitude. For historians to say that their results were timeless because the photographers were able to draw some monumental performance out of an actor, to look deeply into their souls, I say phooey. The stars could act; that was their job, after all. They only required a little direction and trust in the photographer to make things happen. Your clients will need more direction from you to acquire the attitude of a star and make the shoot successful.

Blown-Out Highlights
Two classic looks were achieved with three lights with grids, precise positioning of the main light to establish the contrast and specularity of the light, and serious overexposure from the kickers.
Two lights were set about 6 feet behind the model, each sporting a 40 degree grid, quite wide for many applications but perfect here because the lights will cover all of the body I wish to include in the images. I began by measuring each light separately and to the same power, f/16 as I recall, although that doesn’t matter as much as the final main to accent light ratio. I wanted these accent lights to be really bright, to actually burn out any detail that would be directly hit.

Because the lights were covered with rather wide grids, the risk of flare onto the lens was guaranteed. To remedy this, I moved black bookends into the scene, keeping light on my beautiful model while keeping it off my beautiful lens and saving my glass.

The main light was fitted with a 10 degree grid and placed on a boom so it was directly over the model, in a straight line to the axis of the lens, and about 4 feet from the model. This light was powered 1 stop below the two kickers, but this reading would be the working aperture for the camera. One note of caution here: you should not meter the light in the traditional sense, with the meter below the chin and aimed at the camera. The correct way to meter any light fitted with a grid is to meter with the dome placed between the model’s eyes, aimed at the camera. Diagram below:

Let me back up just a bit. When the light is placed in this position, directly over the lens’ axis, and the subject is looking directly at the camera, we get butterfly lighting, but when the subject moves her head to either side, the effect is more like broad or short lighting. This means that a light placed this way, along the axis, is extremely versatile, perhaps even more so than with actually using a set light scenario. It all depends on how you visualize the placement of your model’s face in your composition.

My first series was very successful, absolutely duplicating a classic look of the ’30s. My model sat on a stool (which was cropped out when I went to 8x10), toying suggestively with her robe. Again, this is a classic look, as the female stars of the time were quite aware they were being exploited for their acting ability as well as their sex appeal. Note the splash of light on the model’s nose. This is often considered a “mistake” in traditional portrait photography, and it certainly can be. The trick is to keep it as minimal as possible. Too much light will make the nose look too prominent. A nose splash from both sides is visual death, as the nose will look huge. It’s important to control it completely, and the easiest way to mess it up is to place the two kickers too far away from the model’s sides. If that’s what you see, move the lights in and flag them more tightly. You can thank me later. Photo below.

My second setup was really easy. All I had to do was move the boom-mounted light within a couple feet of the model and power it down to the previously determined f/stop. There is no set formula to determine the distance, as it all depends on how much of the model’s face and figure you want to show. Remember that the kickers will define the rest of her shape.

My model was standing this time, with the circle of light much more clearly defined. I think you can readily see how cool and dramatic a grid-spotted main light can be. Photo below.

Parabolic reflectors with grid spots will produce beautifully contrasty, modeled light. Is this appropriate for a head and shoulders portrait? When dealing with retro light, absolutely. Even though this shot was cropped above the transition zone, the part of an image that recedes into shadow, the result is fantastic. Add a little sepia toning and crop to a traditional size, such as 8x10 inches, and you’ll have a product that your client’s friends will look at and say, “Is that your grandmother? You look just like her!” Your client will then tell her friends about the incredible photographer she hired to get the image (unless she’s protective and selfish, of course, in which case you’d better have an advertising program in place). Photo below.

One further note: in the 1930s, ’40s, and ’50s, Hollywood’s retouchers spent hours slaving over negatives to make everything perfect, working on the eyes and blemishes but spending the most time getting rid of flyaway hair. I typically do the same thing when I feel it’s necessary, especially on retro hair, because it’s worked and pinned, essentially beaten into submission to get the correct style. I clone out most of it, leaving a few stray ends just to keep it looking natural but still perfectly styled. The worst image you could produce would be one with every hair perfectly in place. It doesn’t ever work that way in real life, even with someone who is as follicly challenged as your humble author.

Engagement Sessions

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 19:18:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Engagement Portraiture: Master Techniques For Digital Photographers by Tracy Dorr. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

When planning an engagement session, you will have many stylistic options available to you. Those will be explored further in the next chapter. No matter what style you choose, however, you will have two main avenues for executing it: a formal approach or an informal approach. Although the formal session is usually shot in a more traditional studio setting, I suggest that you try to think more broadly of “formal” as your approach to dealing with the customers. The same goes for the “informal” approach.

Formal
The classic, traditional engagement photo is a formal portrait. In the 1800s, portraits were necessarily serious and formal due to the extremely long exposure times that were required by the photographic technologies of the day. As higher film speeds became available, portraits took on a somewhat happier vibe; the subjects were smiling and more comfortable, but still formal and looking directly into the camera. Since the digital revolution, photojournalism has deeply impacted the style of portraits clients desire, but there is still a large market for a more formal approach to an engagement portrait.

Choose your location wisely. Traditionally, formal shoots often take place in a studio setting with lights and backdrops. Pose your couple carefully and pay attention to everything from posture to hand positioning and hairstyling. You have total control in these situations so take advantage of that.

If your clients are interested in a more formal approach, or if you are more comfortable shooting that way, you will need to decide if the session will be done in a studio setting with multiple backdrops or props, or if you will go on location. Formal shoots are typically created in a studio sitting, but if you do choose to go on location, think about more formal locations—like a church or museum, as opposed to a beach or heavily urban setting that will define your shoot before you even begin. The location you choose will directly impact the formal mood of your photos.

Riccis Valladares used the dramatic lighting in a theater to design images that matched this couple’s interests. “I only had one overhead light (from the theater) used as a rim light,” says Valladares. “Both the bride and the groom are theater actors and we shot this image on the stage where they first played. I shoot engagement sessions around the couple’s lifestyle—whatever makes them who they are.”

Formal sessions are not limited to a studio setting. Creativity may lead you to an unusual location that fits the couple’s personality. Scout out the location to make sure it will enhance the formal mood, not detract from it.

When posing your couple, make sure to look for every flattering nuance and try out several different poses. They should generally be looking into the camera and their body language should be less relaxed. Think of an upright posture, folded hands, turned-in bodies, and seated or standing shots. Their bodies and faces should be angled toward the camera, not straight-on like a mug shot.

Even though you don’t need as many exposures for formal portraits as you would for a more candid session, you still have the opportunity to use the digital media to your advantage. Keep shooting. Feel free to experiment with as many different poses and combinations as you like. You can always choose only the best one or completely delete anything that didn’t work. Ultimately, you are ensuring that the couple will have more selection in the end. Clients looking for a formal sitting will be more detail-oriented and will be looking for perfection. You don’t have the same kind of creative liberty to make artistic “errors” as you do in photojournalistic portraits.

Informal
An informally styled engagement session can either be posed in a relaxed manner or it could take place as a totally photojournalistic shoot. You can also develop a combination of the two if you are skilled at directing and interacting with your clients. If your studio’s shooting area is limited in size, these types of sessions may work better on location. Additionally, the more relaxed atmosphere of an outdoor setting alleviates the stiffness of a traditional studio setting, something that is integral to a more informal approach.

Informally posed sessions are a popular choice. They allow you to modernize an old concept and flatter any couple or location.

A session that is still traditionally posed but executed in a more relaxed, informal manner is the most widely accepted type of session today. In this type of session, the clients may still be rather traditionally posed, but you will develop the poses as you go. You should give the clients direction and talk them through each pose, but allow them to be comfortable and to be themselves. This contrasts with a purely photojournalistic type of session, in which you provide little or no posing direction but concentrate, instead, on capturing your clients as they really are.

Informal sessions differ from photojournalistic ones because you will still be giving direction throughout the shoot. You may say, “Hold hands and walk toward me,” or “Put your hand on his cheek” in order to achieve the desired result. The clients will have some room to experiment and act on impulse, but you maintain control by giving direction. You are not trying to achieve technical perfection with these poses, just create a nice moment with excellent lighting, an attractive background, and an appealing overall mood.

Let the couple’s personal style influence how you shoot and what angles you choose.

During your initial meeting with the clients, educate them about informal and photojournalistic approaches. See which one they are truly looking for. They may be confused as to the difference.

Metal Reflectors

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 20:20:00 +0000

Today's post is an excerpt from the book Photographic Lighting Equipment: A Comprehensive Guide for Digital Photographers by Kirk Tuck. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

This section is focused on the accessory reflectors that are available for many of the studio flash heads and monolights on the market. (Most movie lights—and hot lights in general—already incorporate their own reflectors, and fluorescent light units are mostly used with softboxes and umbrellas or they have their own built-in reflectors.) Part of the appeal of these lighting systems is that they are flexible and adaptable. There are specialized reflectors for many different applications. These interchangeable reflectors can radically change the character of the light coming from the business end of your studio flash!

The electronic flash head is like a blank canvas for photographers. The most flexible systems allow us to choose the reflectors we need to best do the shot in front of us right now. I own Profoto, so I’m going to use their reflectors as examples, but nearly all of the flash manufacturers offer a good range of metal reflectors that are made to modify the light from the flash tubes in a certain way.

Different reflectors have different properties. The rule of thumb is that a bigger reflector yields a softer light. This is true most of the time, but the internal finish of the reflector and its shape also have a lot to do with the quality of light they reflect.

Umbrella Reflectors. These are also called “spill kill” reflectors. These modifiers have a small diameter lip that keeps light from the flash tubes from spilling back toward the camera. A bare flash sends light in all directions, and although the body of the flash head or monolight blocks some light, you’ll need an umbrella reflector if you want to keep the photons corralled into the front 180 degrees of your flash head. While the Profoto reflector (like all the light modifiers for the system) can be “zoomed” forward or backward to narrow or widen the beam, we mostly use them in a position that fills our umbrella with light and blocks any extra light from spilling around the edges. I call it “tuning the reflector” to the umbrella. Other manufacturers design their spill kills so that they work well for most umbrellas. Even the simplest and least expensive
ones from budget flash makers like AlienBees work well in its intended use.

I wouldn’t use an umbrella reflector by itself as the light would be too uncontrollable.

Top—Part of the charm of a well-designed system is the range of looks you can get with the combination of a good modifier system. Note the numbers on the side of the monolight shown here. The head can be slid forward or backward along the body of the flash to change the angle of dispersion for the flash. This allows you greater control when “tuning” the reflector and head for use with an umbrella or softbox. Bottom—Profoto 600 watt-second monolight with an umbrella reflector. The umbrella reflector can also be used in situations where you need a hard, almost barebulb effect, but with greater efficiency.

Standard Reflectors. As the name implies, these are the all-purpose reflectors that usually come with the flash head or monolight. They are usually 7 to 9 inches in diameter and restrict the beam from the flash tube to somewhere between 90 and 120 degrees. They provide enough light control so if you bounce your flash from the ceiling, no direct light will strike your subjects. They are useful when you need to bounce your flash off a ceiling, a wall, or a big hunk of foam core. They can also be used as a decent substitute for an umbrella reflector. Usually, the interior surface is a pebbled metallic finish or a silver matte finish, as manufacturers try to steer a middle course between light efficiency and softness. Standard reflectors are also available with a highly polished interior for use with grids. Keep your standard reflectors handy. You will always find a use for them.This is the standard AlienBees monolight package with the included standard reflector. Note the two “ears” sticking up near the top. These are spring-loaded levers that hold accessories in place.

Profoto lights offer an excellent selection of modifiers. This is their standard reflector, and it takes full advantage of the head design, which allows modifiers to be “zoomed” backward or forward on the body of the flash head or monolight. This allows one reflector to have a tighter or broader light pattern.

Magnum Reflectors. Every flash line seems to include one of these reflectors. Bigger than the standard reflector by at least a factor of two and a bit smaller than a beauty dish reflector, these allow for an output that is midway between the contrasty light of the smaller units and the very soft light of umbrellas and softboxes. Photographers who swear by these units use them because the bigger bowl and the wider diameter gives them more control when they want to use the edge or penumbra of the light. (The edge of the light can be softer and more interesting than the middle of the beam.) Master portrait lighters like to put a light over to the side and then rotate it so the main beam moves in front of the subject. At some point, they will see the penumbra effect and they’ll know they’ve got the light right where they want it. I try to do that, but it is hit and miss for me, so I use the Magnum reflector to produce a nice, even source of direct light on a background plane or as the “delivery option” when pushing an even light through a diffuser or scrim. It has a softer character than the standard reflector, but it will still give your light some edge when used correctly.

This is the front of a Profoto Magnum reflector. It is about 13 inches in diameter and does a good job of throwing a compact circle of light, which is slightly softer than the standard reflector.

This is a reflector size that seems lost in the middle region of lighting accessories—it is too big to be a hard light source but too small to be really soft for portrait work. Really, it is a very useful modifier that gives a good tonal rendering with snappy edges. Used in expert hands, it can be a very beautiful main light for dramatic portraits.

Beauty Dishes. A beauty dish is a large flat dish reflector in the range of 16 to 30 inches in diameter. Most have a white painted interior to reduce specularity and soften the light. Nearly all of them have a little panel that “floats” over the flash tube so that no direct light is emitted from the reflector. All illumination comes from the white bowl. One specialty manufacturer even makes a 40-inch version, but the price is outrageous. So, here’s the gist of the argument: I understand that the beauty dish is meant to be used close to a model’s face; my fashion photographer friends even have a formula that says beauty dishes should be used at a distance equal to about 2x the diameter of the beauty dish. That’s about 32 to 60 inches from the subject. What I’m supposed to see is “a soft, smooth light with crisp (but not hard) shadows that quickly falls off on the edges.” I’ve owned a beauty dish for years, and I just don’t see much of a difference between it and a well-tuned umbrella of the same basic size. But take this with a grain of salt. I’m not a professional beauty photographer, and I admit that they’re probably more sensitive to the nuances of their specialty. My biggest reason for choosing a small, black backed umbrella over the beauty dish is the difference between $22 (a little umbrella) and $300 (the cool beauty dish). My portraiture style usually calls for a much bigger and softer light source like a 60-inch umbrella or a big softbox.

The design of a typical beauty dish seeks to collimate the light from a flash into a controlled but soft beam of light that falls off more at the edges than light from an umbrella or a typicalparabolic reflector. Most beauty dishes are 16 to 30 inches in diameter and have a center reflector plate that keeps direct light from the lamp or flash tube from hitting the subject. The beauty dish evolved back in the late 1950s when glamour photographers were seeking a softer look from the very bright hot lights in use with the slow films of the day. The well-designed beauty dish has a look all of its own, and they continue to be popular with modern portrait photographers.

Play with a beauty dish. You might find it irreplaceable. Then again, you might find it about as useful as a 20- or 32-inch umbrella. With all light modifiers, so much is subjective and dependent on your style. That’s my two cents’ worth.

Left—A rear view of the AlienBees beauty dish gives you some idea of its relative size. Many location photographers are replacing their umbrellas and softboxes with beauty dishes because they are more stable in the wind. One problem with beauty dishes is that you can’t tilt them down very far when they are attached to a conventional light stand. Right—This is a side view of a beauty dish on an AlienBees monolight. The beauty dishes range from simple to elegant, but all do the same job: they throw crisp light on a close by subject while hastening the falloff on the edges.

Telephoto Reflectors. Some companies offer longer, narrower reflectors that are meant to throw a beam of light a long distance by concentrating it into a narrower pattern. These are usually marketed to sports photographers who are trying to get some light on an athlete at a distance. I’ve never felt the need for one, so I can only assume they do what they’re designed to do, and if you have a burning need to light something 50 feet away you’ll want to look into them. At least you now know that they exist.

All of the above reflectors are standards in most well-equipped equipment lines. There are lots more to choose from, but you needn’t own every article in a manufacturer’s catalog to do great work. My research tells me that most of my peers use one or two reflectors year after year and supplement those with one or two favorite attachable light modifiers.

Yearbook Photography- Sports

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 17:34:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book How to Create a High Profit Photography Business In Any Market, 2nd Edition by James Williams. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

My studio isn’t located in a large market area. However, there are more than forty photography studios listed in the Yellow Pages of our most recent phone book—and there are many part-timers who do not have ads in the business section of the phone book. With so many photographers competing for new clients, it can be really difficult to make a good profit if you limit yourself to photographing a single client group. At our studio, we photograph high school seniors, high school sports teams, school dances, underclassmen, weddings, family portraits, sports leagues and, occasionally, products.

Yearbook Photography
Working with high-school yearbook advisors for over twenty-five years has given me a little insight into what they want. I have been very fortunate to work with wonderful yearbook advisors. Several years ago, my all-time favorite advisor, Carol Mazanetz from Newton Falls High School, took over a yearbook that was tens of thousands of dollars in debt. Today, the school has a beautiful, debt-free yearbook. I still remember the day back in 1994 when she called us to do the yearbook photography. I hope we have contributed to her success in some small way.

“Service” is the key word when dealing with yearbook advisors. They have one of the most difficult extracurricular activities in the school; every year, they must deal with the yearbook publisher, a new crop of students, the photographer, teachers, and school administration, and, to top it all off, must sell ads to help pay for the book! For them, it is a year-long process, with very little extra pay. The yearbook comes out at the end of the school year or in the fall, then the whole process begins again. Needless to say, with all of this pressure, the last thing they need is a photographer who delivers excuses instead of service.

Sports. Most yearbook advisors want the same thing for their yearbooks: good, clean, sharp images of all of the sports action. We provide yearbook sports photography to several schools, including all the game action from football, track, cross country, volleyball, boy’s and girl’s soccer, boy’s and girl’s basketball, softball, and baseball. Photographing sports action takes skill, a little bit of luck, and top-notch equipment.

High shutter speeds are needed to stop the action in sports photography.

To get excellent sports action pictures, you need the following equipment: a 35mm digital camera that can shoot at least four frames per second with autofocus, a 200–300mm lens with a f/2.8 setting regardless of what zoom level you are set on, a 28–105mm zoom (again with a constant f/2.8 lens opening), and a dedicated flash system. It is likely that the only time you will use your flash is when you are photographing night football games. Using a flash during volleyball and basketball is sometimes prohibited by the referees. Although I don’t find it necessary, some sports photographers like using a monopod rather than handholding the camera.

Most yearbook advisors want the same thing for their yearbooks: good, clean, sharp images of all of the sports action.

Even with a 1600 or 3200 ISO setting on your camera, the f/2.8 opening is imperative for indoor volleyball and night football photography. Fast shutter speeds of at least 1/250 second are needed to stop the action, so you have to gain the light you are losing to the shutter speed by using a large aperture. Sometimes you can stop action with a shutter speed of 1/125 second, but I have found that 1/250 second works every time. You will use the long, fast lens on all of your game action except basketball and volleyball. Although the long lens works okay for these two sports, a shorter zoom is preferable.

The yearbook advisor will need images of all the teams, clubs, and other organizations.

If you have not done a lot of game action work, it is going to take some practice to get good results. Your biggest problem will probably be staying focused on the player or players and not the background. With fastfocusing autofocus cameras, it is very easy to have a player run past your focus point when you fire the camera, giving you tack-sharp spectators and a blurry subject in the foreground. Like anything else, the more you do it, the better you get.

Something that yearbook advisor Carol Mazanetz taught me was to be sure to get all of the players—even the ones sitting on the bench most of the time. After you have gotten the game action shot with a lot of the main players, get the other players in a huddle or walking on or off the playing field/court—but be sure to get all the players, not just the superstars. Everyone likes to be in the yearbook, so photograph everyone and let the yearbook staff decide whom they are going to include.

Students today want different poses for their team photos.

Also, it is best to give the advisors the game action as you photograph it rather than waiting and giving it all to them at the end of the season. With digital photography, it is much easier and more cost effective to give the advisors a CD/DVD of photos from each game. You can quickly delete the poor images and supply only the very best action shots. And don’t wait until the end of a season to start covering games. Sometimes outdoor games will be cancelled due to bad weather, so you want to leave yourself a buffer of time. Waiting until the last minute is usually not a good plan for anything.

Posing The Face

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 14:46:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Posing for Portrait Photography: A Head-to-Toe Guide for Digital Photographers, 2nd Edition by Jeff Smith. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

We will start off with the face, because the face is the most important part of any portrait. There are portraits created by photographers that have the face in silhouette or obscured from view in one form or another, but this is usually an artistic exercise for the photographer, not a portrait that would be salable to the average client.

The face has many parts—and sometimes it feels like some of the parts are working against each other to make your job as hard as possible. For example, imagine you are photographing a person with a large nose and a wide face. To make the face appear thinner, you could increase the shadowing on the side. Unfortunately, that harder light or reduced fill will also deepen the shadow on the side of the nose, making it appear larger.

Identify Problems, But Don’t Go Too Far
It is pretty easy to assess a person’s face and quickly see if there are problems that need to be addressed. If you look at a person and think “Wow, what a nose!”, that might be a problem you should do something to fix. For most people, however, their face is their soul. If you mess with it too much, they won’t look like themselves—after all, you don’t want to be messing around with someone’s soul.

Elevated camera angles can be very flattering and appealing—but only when the face is also turned up toward the camera to maintain an undistorted perspective.

Camera Height
The angle of the face is important—especially as the photographer uses more unique angles and elevations. It used to be that every client was photographed sitting down and the camera on a camera stand was slightly higher. Why? So the photographer didn’t have to bend over, of course! Then some forward-thinking photographers started to realize that by raising the camera (the camera angle Facebook made famous) or lowering it, you can create different looks for different clients. Unfortunately, some photographers don’t realize that, in most cases, you have to raise or lower the face as you raise or lower the camera position in order to avoid dramatically altering the appearance of the face.

Framing the Face
As photography styles changed, we also found that the face needed to be framed—especially as the camera was brought closer. There is nothing worse than the “floating head” look where only the face is showing without any framing/support from the shoulders, arms, and/or hands. When the shoulders are not going to be in the frame, or the subject has an extremely long neck, the face needs to be supported to look its best. You can bring the hands to the neck or cheek to create a base for the face to visually rest on. (This correction can also help conceal a common problem area: the neck and chin.)

Consider the Type of Pose
Your approach to posing the face will also depend on the style of portrait you are creating. In traditional poses, the face is positioned with only the neck for support. Slice-of-life poses capture people the way they really are when they are relaxed, so the head will often rest on the hands, arms, or shoulders. Glamour poses are posed for a sensual feel, so the shoulder will be raised toward the chin (also slimming the view of the shoulder) or the hands may be lifted to the neck, face, or hair.

Raising the arms helps to frame the face in closer views of the face.

The Connection to Lighting
The posing of the face is linked to lighting. Posing that will work with soft lighting and a low lighting ratio will look ridiculous with a harder light source or a high lighting ratio. For traditional portrait lighting styles or spot lighting you would have the face turned more toward the main light for impact. Using butterfly or ring lighting you would have the face looking directly at the camera.

With most Americans being overweight, it’s often a good thing to make the face appear thinner than it really is. For these subjects, the best view of the face is when the body is turned toward the shadow side of the frame and the face is turned back toward the main light source. This stretches out everything from the shoulder up and gives the face a leaner look.

Lighting From Below
As previously noted, my lighting has more of a glamour/fashion look than most traditional portrait lighting. For example, I like to have a light come from beneath the subject’s face, whether it is for a head-and-shoulders-, three-quarter-, or full-length portrait. For everything up to three-quarter-length poses, we use a trifold reflector to create this light; for full-length poses, this reflector is replaced by a light on the floor in order to achieve the same lighting effect.

This light coming from underneath the subject adds an additional catchlight in the eyes, brings out more of the eye color, reduces the darkness under the eyes that most people have, and smoothes the complexion. For our images of seniors, it has worked out very well. Because my clients are younger, they like the more fashionable look of this lighting.

Light from underneath the subject adds an additional catchlight in the eyes and brings out more of the eye color.

Flash Facts

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 20:25:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Photographic Lighting Equipment : A Comprehensive Guide for Digital Photographers by Kirk Tuck. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

There are a few basic things you need to know about flash that will make your life easier. Let’s go through them.

Synchronization Speed. Since a flash exposure happens in a really short amount of time, your camera can only properly use the light from the flash if the entire sensor (or film) plane is completely uncovered by the shutter curtain or blades and the mirror is completely up at the moment of the flash. All of this has to be synchronized mechanically. On most digital SLRs, there is a top speed limit for all conventional flashes, which is often 1/250 second (on bigger formats and on cheaper digital SLRs it is usually a bit slower, maybe 1/125 second). Once you use a faster shutter speed than your maximum sync speed, the shutter in your camera becomes more like a slit that travels across the sensor plane rather than a version of fully opened theater curtains. If you try to use a flash at a faster shutter speed than your max sync speed, only part of your frame will be exposed. This is good news if you are trying your hand at experimental photo art. It is bad news if you have a paying client in tow.

A shot for Texas Gas Service. We were doing several locations around town and I wanted the speed that comes from bringing your own power. I used a battery-powered pack and head system from Profoto called the Acute 600B. We put the pack on the floor, set it to ¼ power, and put a head with a standard reflector on a stand, and bounced the light off the ceiling. A Nikon SB-800 was aimed into a 40-inch white umbrella for fill. It was set up nearly on axis with my Nikon D700 camera. Diagram—(1) Window. (2) Kid with teddy bear. (3) Dryer. (4) Washer. (5) Storage. (6) SB-800 flash, at 1/2 power, fired into 40-inch white umbrella. (7) Nikon D700 with 28–105mm lens. (8) Profoto 600B with standard reflector at 1/4 power, bounced from ceiling.

Synchronization. This may seem obvious, but somehow your camera has to get the message to whatever flash you use that the shutter is open and now is the crucial time to fire. The simplest way to do this is via direct, physical contact. In the case of a hot-shoe mounted flash, the camera sends a triggering signal or voltage to electrical contacts in the foot of the flash that screams, “now! now!” The flash goes off immediately, and everything is great. Another option is a sync cord. The flash and camera are connected with a two-wire cable. The camera sends a signal through the wire, and the flash triggers. As long as the contact points are physically sound, everything works great. It gets a bit more complicated if you want to fire the flash without wires.

The low-tech method of wireless flash sync is the optical photo slave. A small “slave” unit is attached to a remote flash. This unit uses a kind of transistor that sends out a voltage spike or signal to the flash when it “sees” a quick increase in light. It is generally triggered by either a flash attached to the camera or an infrared signaling unit (or transmitter) which sends out an infrared light when the shutter is fired. Optical slaves are fairly inexpensive and work well indoors. They are much less effective in areas with high light levels and are especially bad when used in bright sunlight.

A variation on the white light optical slaves are the “pulsed” infrared slaves. These are more sophisticated than the optical slave because they can be triggered without additional white light contaminating the scene and, since they can be pulsed, the receivers can be set up on channels to reduce misfires caused by other people’s flashes being used in the vicinity.

A lot of photographers are scared to shoot in the sun—especially in the not so pretty hours of 10:00AM to 4:00PM. Who can blame them? The light is raw and contrasty and most shoe mount flashes don’t have the oomph it takes to push enough power through an umbrella and then compete with direct sun. But if you bring along a Profoto 600b, a Profoto 7b, a Hensel Porty, or an Elinchrome Ranger, you’ll have the power and the autonomy you need.

Just plug in your flash head, set the power levels, and find a camera with a fast sync speed. I photographed this image and the one just above with a Canon G10 compact camera. If you need sync speed, this is a great camera. You can sync nondedicated flashes up to 1/2000 second. It’s a good way to control how light or dark the background will be rendered.

Moving up the evolutionary ladder, we come to the newly ubiquitous radio slave receivers and transmitters. These are exactly what they sound like. A transmitter on the camera or attached to the camera’s sync terminal senses the triggering voltage and sends a radio signal to a receiving unit attached to the flash. The receiver triggers the flash. The Pocket Wizard radio trigger has dominated the market for the better part of a decade but is now being assailed on all sides by much less expensive versions made in China and elsewhere. With radio triggering, more dollars spent means greater distance ranges and more reliable operation.

The current hot technology is the Nikon CLS and the Canon ETTL system. In both systems, the camera uses either a built-in flash or a hot-shoe-mounted controller to send pulses of visible light or infrared light to control the output of individual flashes. It makes off-camera flash quite simple, especially if you are willing to work with TTL automation. Generally, you’ll need to be using relatively current digital cameras and current flashes to gain this level of automation. In both systems you need to make use of the hot shoe on the camera as part of the control circuit for the lighting system. The camera meters the flash exposure through the lens, and when it senses the correct exposure it sends a signal via the hot shoe contacts through a digitally coding transmitter (either a system “master” flash or a dedicated system controller) which tells the flash to halt its output.

Whether to choose radio triggers like the Pocket Wizards or dedicated flash systems will depend largely on how you need to light and how big an area you need to cover. While the camera systems tend to be “line of sight” solutions (generally, they work best in small, bright rooms), the radio slaves have a much larger range and are much more reliable in areas with high light levels as well as outdoors.Most professionals use both systems on fully manual exposure settings, changing the relative output of the lights by setting different power ratios. There are trade-offs in both systems. The dedicated camera systems require the use of more expensive flash units and are not usable with other brands of flash units. The radio trigger solution allows you to use less expensive non-dedicated flash units, but the cost of the radio triggers and receivers themselves is higher.

The bottom line is getting reliable triggering every time, and that’s where radio units such as the Pocket Wizards have the edge for professionals.

Flash Duration. As mentioned above, most flashes don’t have instantaneous flash durations. They range from a duration of 1/125 second for bigger, older generation power pack systems to around 1/10,000 second for battery-powered units used at very low power settings. Here’s the relationship: the more power that needs to go through a single flash tube, the longer the burn time of the flash will be if all other things are equal. They are rarely equal.

This is a very inexpensive optical slave (think $30) that works very well indoors. It sees flash from a main flash or trigger flash and triggers whatever flash it is attached to. It has both astandard PC socket and a hot shoe so it can be used with a wide range of flash units.

What does this mean in real life? If you are a still life shooter, not much. If you shoot portraits, not much. In fact, where fast duration flash comes into its own is with sports, dance, action, and with products that need to be captured exploding (champagne bottles), being poured (beer, wine, water, Coca Cola), etc. Some portrait photographers actually prefer longer duration flashes because the potential for tiny subject movements makes the fine detail look a little smoother.

Radio slaves have a number of benefits: they “see” around corners, trigger reliably, and do away with the need for sync cords. Here’s one Velcroed to the side of my flash unit. I often use small flashes as accent lights in the studio.

Here’s how you shorten the duration: turn the power down. The lower the power, the shorter the duration. If you are using a pack and head system, plug in more heads. The more flash tubes the power is distributed to, the shorter the total duration. Be aware though that when you change the duration of the flash you will have changes in the color temperature of the light itself. Flashes tend to be at their lowest and most accurate color temperature when used at full power, becoming progressively bluer as the duration shrinks.

Hint: Many small pops add up to one big exposure. If you select your flashes correctly, you’ll probably have enough power for just about anything you might come across, but every once in a while you’ll find a still life project that calls for sharp focus from front to back of a subject that’s close to the camera, and that means you may have to really stop down. And in still life, most people use the lowest ISO they can find on their cameras to ensure the lowest noise and best color. So what do you do when you have your softbox covering your flash, the light is perfect in terms of direction and quality, but you do the math and figure out that you need two more stops of power in order to correctly expose the scene at the f-number you need to set? Well, you could rush out and buy a power pack that is four times as powerful as the one you are using or you could save money and do some math. If you add two pops to your first pop, you will get one more stop. If you then add four more pops to the last two, you will build up a cumulative exposure that will get you to that extra stop. It’s a simple logarithmic progression and a neat trick for doing more with less gear. It works with any size or type of flash, but you’ll need to subdue the existing light so that it doesn’t become part of the overall exposure. That means blacking out the windows and turning out all the lights including modeling lights. Obviously, this won’t work when you are shooting outside or in an environment where lighting can’t be controlled, but it’s a great quick fix for what seems to be a routine issue encountered by car and still life shooters.

A word to the wise: just because you have a very short duration flash doesn’t mean you’ll freeze motion in locations that have high ambient light levels. Most cameras can only sync to 1/250 second, and most smaller flashes can only deliver so much motion stopping power. If you are shooting in an environment like a sunlit exterior and you are trying to freeze motion your limiting factor will be the relatively slow shutter speed. At 1/250 second you won’t quite be able to freeze a runner moving parallel to your position or the swing of a hand in a golf swing. Be sure to consider these factors before you shell out a lot of extra money for a fast flash duration. Along the same lines, most of the stop action you see successfully done of leaping dancers, etc., is done in a dim studio or dimly lit location so that the ambient light isn’t a big factor.

Color Temperature. All manufacturers specify a color temperature, but the honest ones specify a range. That’s because, with few exceptions, the flash output tends to get bluer as the power gets lowered. Additionally, units without very precise voltage regulation tend to have variable color consistency from shot to shot. Even if you are buying the best units around, all of your efforts at getting great color could be jeopardized by the coating of the flash tube. If the glass tubes are uncoated, they allow a lot of ultraviolet (UV) light to be emitted. If whiteners or certain bleaches are used in fabrics (especially man-made fabrics) or in the fabrication of products, the high levels of UV will cause a fluorescence that turns colors either more blue or more magenta than they should be. These color anomalies can be very hard to correct for after the fact.

The solution is to buy flashes with UV coated tubes to inhibit the transmission of UV light waves.

Photography is never as simple as you might think. There are always details that can derail the best of plans. That’s why it is recommended that you test new flashes thoroughly before using them on important projects. There isn’t an option to buy UV-coated flash tubes for battery-operated units or most inexpensive monolights and power pack systems, but you can buy sheets of UV filtration and cut them to size if you find yourself with unexpected color shifts.

Whether you use electronic flash or continuous lighting, your most important decisions aren’t which gear to use but how to get the lighting effect you have in mind.

There’s another color “gotcha” to be aware of: We use a number of light modifiers in our quest to soften and manipulate the small light sources of our flashes and make them work for our vision, but you need to know that the quality of the fabrics used on umbrellas, softboxes, bounce reflectors, and scrims can be highly variable. The bleaching agents used to make the front of your softbox really white may make your images really blue or impossible to correct in Photoshop. You’ve probably realized that white fabrics also tend to yellow over time and make light sources “warmer” (lower color temperatures). This isn’t a real issue in the digital age until you need all the lights on a set to have the same color temperature. It can be maddening to use
several different brands of umbrellas to light a background while using yet another brand of softbox, only to find that different zones of your important image have big color shifts that defy the remedy of a “global” color balance correction. And this can be a major problem, which might cause you to lose a picky commercial client or spend a fortune in retouching fees.

I never seem to realize just how important reflectors are until I get into the middle of a studio shoot and start to fine tune. For this shoot, there was a white card on the posing table bouncing light up under my model’s chin, but it wasn’t enough, so I added a round reflector over to the right. The black panel to the left has white on the other side and works as a reflector. On the far side is a piece of foam core, which adds some side fill. A black panel in the back toward the center of the frame cut spill light from the hair light.

The answer is to test all of your accessories and understand what might cause a shift and how to correct it. Most umbrellas are so cheap relative to day rates, model fees, etc., that it makes sense to change them out en masse every couple of years and to replace them with units that come from the same manufacturer, and if possible, the same manufacturing batch.

BUY THIS BOOK FROM AMAZON

Posing the Body: The CSI Program

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 20:32:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Posing Techniques for Photographing Model Portfolios by Billy Pegram. The book is available from Amazon.com and other retailers.

CSI PROGRAM: A STARTING POINT
A photographer must understand the basics of posing each part of the body and be able to recognize the problems inherent in each area. While I don’t recommend memorizing thousands of poses, it is helpful to recognize a few basic starting points for posing the human body.

History and Purpose.
Years ago, a former model turned teacher named Loa Andersen created the CSI program to teach prospective models how to pose for the camera. This idea was based on methods taught by early European artists. Today, the poses used in her original photographs are considered stilted, stiff, and old-fashioned. Yet, the basic idea of the CSI program (named for the three major poses it identifies; see below) is still valid for photographers who wish to develop their posing skills. The program also enables a beginning model or photographer to analyze and re-create a pose selected from a magazine or catalog. Furthermore, it helps photographers to determine how the pose affects the focus and overall flow of a photograph.

Diagramming a Pose.
The CSI program begins with learning to diagram a pose. First, a line is drawn through the shoulders. Second, a line is draw across the hips. A third line is then drawn from the center of the shoulder line to the center of the hip line, creating the body line. Next, a fourth line is drawn from the center of the body line to the foot that has the least weight on it. The fifth and final line is drawn from the center of the shoulder line to the center of the head mass.

The C, S, and I Poses.
The diagrammed lines will create either a C, an S, or an I—hence the name of the program. If you pick up a catalog or magazine, you’ll see that many of the poses used do, in fact, loosely fall into one of these categories. For those that don’t, the act of diagramming will show how the pose was created—which shoulder was dropped, how the hips were angled, and where the weight was balanced. Knowledge of these factors will simplify the process of creating a similar pose when working with your own models. Additionally, the CSI program categorizes foot positions. This is especially useful when shooting for a catalog where space is at a premium and several models will be shot together. In the first position, the feet are close together. One faces the camera, while the other is angled slightly off camera. In the second position, the angled foot is pushed outward from the body. In the third position, the same foot is extended even farther.

Here are the three basic poses in the CSI program. As you can see, the lines form the letter shapes that are used to name each pose. The S pose is considered by many artists to be the most graceful and attractive position for a female body. Many of today’s most contemporary poses are softer versions of this basic pose.

Corrective Posing

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 20:12:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Corrective Lighting, Posing & Retouching for Digital Portrait Photographers, 3rd Edition by Jeff Smith. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

Personally, I think posing is the most fascinating part of what we do. If you put a person in front of a window, you can move their arm or their leg—or do something as simple as turn their head—and completely change their appearance. With light as a constant, posing the various parts of the body can be the difference between a happy client and one who walks out of your studio without buying.

The pose can make even the most basic type of portrait come alive. Other than the expression, nothing will sell more than the pose. Posing can also do more to hide clients’ flaws than any other technique—and probably as much as all of the others combined. Posing alone can hide almost every flaw that the human body can have. For every person, in every outfit, there is a pose that can make them look great. You just have to find it.

THE PURPOSE OF THE PORTRAIT
Your first consideration in posing is the purpose of the portrait, not just making the client look good. Too often, a photographer creates beautiful images that the client never buys—and the photographer never understands why. Usually, it is because the portrait that was created didn’t match the client’s purpose for having the portrait taken.

A pose like this makes for a striking image—but if this were my daughter, I might get a little creeped-out looking at it (and receive some strange looks if colleagues saw the portrait on my desk).

I have children, and when I see a photo of them I want to see them the way I see them everyday—relaxed and looking like they are enjoying life. I also have a wife. When I see her, I want to see the beautiful woman that God has given me to share my life. I am a business owner and author, and when I see photos of myself in this light, I want see a traditional portrait taken to fit a specific purpose. If you mix up any of these portraits and give them to the wrong person it doesn’t work. I don’t think my children want an alluring picture of their mother any more than they want a photo of me looking like a sober judge.

In the same vein, many senior portrait photographers struggle with the fact that educators and books present very sexy, fashion-oriented portraits of seniors. Photographers love these, but they don’t sell well to the client—because most people want senior portraits to send out to family and close adult friends. Parents don’t want to send out a portrait in which their teen daughter looks “sexy.” However you can incorporate a fashion edge in less alluring portraits that will actually sell.

This is the difference between thinking like a photographer and businessperson: a businessperson knows that pretty pictures don’t pay the bills, pictures that fulfill the purposes of the client do. Here is an interesting fact: You can take a somewhat crappy portrait that has so-so lighting and isn’t posed or composed very well, but if it fulfills the purpose of the client, in all likelihood they will buy that somewhat crappy picture.

To be salable, portraits must sometimes please two different people. In the case of senior portraits, this means pleasing the senior and their parent.

Conversely, if your portrait doesn’t fulfill the purpose your client had in mind, even if it is an award-winner, they will walk out without buying the portrait that helped put a ribbon around your neck. While I don’t advocate taking so-so portraits, I think photographers could live a whole lot better if they would just think of each client’s wishes when they create portraits—and make creative decisions based on the client’s wants and not their own.

CHOOSE THE RIGHT STYLE
Once you know the reason the portrait is being taken and to whom it will be given, you can design a portrait to fit that need. This is the first step in designing a portrait. The clothing, pose, lighting, expression, and set/location/background should all be selected to produce that style of portrait, for that buyer.

Keep in mind, however, that in some cases you may need to balance the demands and tastes of multiple people. In senior portrait photography, for example, we have two buyers. This means that two different styles of portraits are required. The senior is the first buyer, and she will want to look cool for her friends. The second buyer is the parent, who will want a portrait that makes her little girl look like the young lady she sees when she looks at her daughter. If you don’t consider both buyers, and the end use of each set of portraits, you will lose half your business—or never get the senior through the door in the first place.

Once you understand the purpose of the portrait, you need to select a posing style that will be appropriate for the final portrait. Basically there are three posing styles to work with: traditional posing, casual (or “slice of life”) posing, and glamorous posing.Within a single person’s session you may use a variety of posing styles. This is a business decision you must make. But to learn posing you need to be able to distinguish between the various types of posing and know what type of situation each is suited for.

Traditional Posing. Traditional posing is used for business and yearbook portraits, as well as for photographing people of power or distinction. This style of posing reflects power, and to some degree wealth, respect, and a classic elegance. Whether these portraits are taken in a head-and shoulders or full-length style, the posing is largely linear, with only slight changes in the angles of the body. Whether sitting or standing, the spine of the body stays fairly straight and the shoulders stay fairly square. The back is straight and the chest is up (unless photographing a woman with a large bust).

Casual Posing. Casual poses show the person you are photographing as they really are. Watching people as they relax, read a book, watch TV, or have a picnic at a park will give you some of the best posing ideas you can find. Notice the way people lay, lean or rest their bodies, legs, arms, and even faces. See how people use one part of the body to support another. They will bring up their knees to support their arms and bring up their hands to support their heads. Casual poses are used when the portrait is to be given to a loved one, like a sibling or parent.

Glamorous Posing. Glamorous poses make the person look alluring—the way they wish they looked all the time. Ideas for these poses can be found in sources from fashion magazines to lingerie catalogs. If you want to add to your glamour posing style, look at a Victoria’s Secret catalog. Your clients may have more clothing on, but the structure of the posing will be the same.

The purpose of defining each type of pose, as well as determining the reason the portrait is being taken, is to have a direction for the session. This is the point at which a photographer’s own style and experience take over. For example, many of my traditional poses are much more glamorous in their look than what the average photographer would consider traditional. This is because, as human beings, I think we all want to appear attractive.

If you don’t have a great deal of time to spend with your client before a session, ask them to tear out images from magazines or catalogs that show what they have in mind for their portraits. This is a great way to get new posing ideas that are handpicked by your target market. (I keep all these tear sheets for my next test session.)

BASIC PRINCIPLES
Less is More. The less you show of a person, the fewer flaws you have to correct. I can create a beautiful and salable portrait of a woman who is a hundred pounds overweight, provided I compose it as a waist-up image. With the right clothing, the correct lighting, and a cool pose to help hide the signs of weight gain, it will be beautiful. If this client wanted me to create a full-length image of her, however, it would be much harder. It could be done, but beyond a certain weight, it is extremely difficult to provide the client with full-length images her ego will accept.

The idea of “less is more” isn’t just for minimizing the flaws that the average paying client has. Some of the most requested poses for all clients, at least as of this writing, are the extreme close-ups. In fact, head-and-shoulders poses make up 75 percent of the portraits that people actually purchase. While photographers have always thought that full-length poses should be included in a session for variety, there are clearly times when they shouldn’t be—and from a business standpoint, spending time on portraits that are less likely to sell doesn’t make sense.

Stand, Don’t Sit. When weight is a concern, which it will be for about 75 percent of your clients, standing is often better than sitting.When someone sits, the legs push up the stomach, the stomach pushes up the chest, the chest hides the neck, and before you know it you have a lady with her head sitting on top of two large breasts. When you stand that same person, gravity works in your favor and pulls the weight downward, away from the face.

Camera Angle. When photographing larger people, elevate your camera angle so you are shooting down toward your client. With the client posed normally, simply raising their face up toward the elevated camera stretches and smooths the skin of the neck and face. This is very effective—and it’s all the rage right now even for subjects with average builds.

This technique works on portraits from head-and shoulders to full-length. With the camera in an elevated position (yes, you will need to stand on a ladder), the body can be included in the shot—but its size will be minimized because it is partially obscured by the face and shoulders.

Tighter shots make up 75 percent of what people actually buy—and, for most subjects, they are the most flattering type of images.

Avoid Mushrooming. When the subject’s body touches or rests on a surface, it should only rest on bone. If you have a client sit down, the butt and thighs are going to mushroom out, adding weight and inches to them in their portraits. If, on the other hand, you have the client roll to the side and shift their weight onto one hip (where there is a bone) the hips will look thinner and the bottom will be hidden from view.

The same is true for resting an arm on a column or tree branch. The average client will rest their forearm on the surface, making it mushroom out and appear larger. Instead, have them shift their weight to the elbow and slightly raise their forearm off the posing surface.

If a pose has a client sitting squarely on their bottom, lift their knees up. Bringing one foot or both closer to the camera keeps the pressure points on the two hip bones, lifting the thighs so they do not mushroom out.

Turn the Body Away from the Main Light. No matter what style of posing you are using, start with the body facing away from the main light. This is the thinnest view of the body and creates shadowing in which we can hide flaws. Then, turn the face back toward the main light to properly light it and stretch out the loose skin that most clients have under the chin.

Posing Variations

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 24 Jun 2011 20:15:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Posing for Portrait Photography: A Head-to-Toe Guide for Digital Photographers, 2nd Edition by Jeff Smith. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

When I was first learning posing, I had such a hard time with it. I would sit someone down and my mind would race, trying to figure out how to make the subject look comfortable and yet stylish. I would go to seminars and look in magazines to get posing ideas, but it seemed that when a paying client’s session started the ideas went right out of my head.

We live in a world that has us looking for immediate solutions to long term challenges. I see my sons trying to learn something new, and they get frustrated because they don’t master it in five minutes. Whether it is lighting, learning digital, or especially mastering posing, you won’t get it the minute you put the book down. That would be like picking up a book on karate and thinking that reading it could make you a black belt. Posing is a learning process and, like all learning processes, it takes time and practice.

I realized, early on, that if I was going to become effective and comfortable with posing, I needed to practice often and in the same situations that I would be needing to use this skill. I needed to practice under the pressure of a session, not as I was fooling around shooting a test session of someone I knew. I also had the realization that I didn’t have ten years to get good at posing my clients—I needed to get as many poses down as I could, and do it as quickly as possible. This led to what I call variations.

Practicing with Variations
Variations is an exercise I make every photographer in my studio use (including myself) in every session they do. It provides practice in posing by maximizing each of the poses you know. It also gives your client the greatest variety from each pose they do.

Variations are simple, effective changes you can make in a single pose to give it a completely different look. By changing the hands, arms, and/or legs in any pose, countless variations become possible. In the two sets of photographs that follow, you can see how variations work. You start out with a basic pose and come up with a variety of options for the placement of the hands, arms, and/or legs. This takes one posing idea you know and turns it into five or ten different poses.

Demonstrating Variations
We have each client select the background and poses they want done in their session. These ideas are written on the client card for the photographers to follow. With each pose, the photographer is to demonstrate the client’s selected pose, as well as show the client at least three other variations on the pose.

Male photographers absolutely hate this. I have heard it all—“How am I supposed to pose like a girl?” or “I feel really dumb!”—but I don’t care how they feel. Until you can pose yourself, feel the way the pose is supposed to look, and demonstrate it to a client, you will never excel at posing. Yes, you get some pretty strange looks when you’re not a petite man and you’re showing a young girl a full-length pose for her prom dress, but that is the best learning situation I, or any other photographer, can be in.

Working In A Client's Home

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 18:26:00 +0000

Lighting is more important than the background—but here the coordinating cool tones of the wall and the parents’ clothes make the warm skin tones the focus of the image.

Small Flash on Assignmnet

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 20:00:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Bill Hurter's Small Flash Photography: Techniques for Professional Digital Photographers by Bill Hurter. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

Christian LaLonde received an assignment from Reader’s Digest to photograph a high school auto mechanics teacher and his class who were making a car for regional races. LaLonde drew a sketch of his ideas to help his assistant visualize what he was imagining. The main light was a Lumedyne 400w pack triggered by a Pocketwizard with an umbrella on a Manfrotto Mini Boom on a stand. to get the depth of field he needed, he set his main light source for f/8. He set up four nikon Sb-800 and two Nikon Sb-80dX Speedlights to create accents and separation on each person. He set up one light at a time, having the students stand in for test images. This helped in the end because the students clearly understood what LaLonde was trying to achieve.

The first light was positioned on the left side of the camera in front of the car. the second Sb-800 was placed on the right in back of the car to light up the entire side. As LaLonde was setting his lights, he made test images to see what his lighting was doing so that he could find the perfect exposure. Next, he positioned three of the students on the car and set up the third Sb-800 Speedlight in a doorway on the left side of the camera. Initially, this was splashing the light in too wide an arc, so LaLonde made a snoot with black foil.

After positioning the last student on top of the car, lalonde realized that he needed more light on her. He set up the fourth Sb-800 Speedlight with a snoot in a storage room at the back left of the car and pointed it through the glass directly at the back of the student. He added two Sb-28dX lights underneath the car to give separation between the wheels and floor.

Because of all of the lights and the wide-angle lens, he was having a flare problem. To solve it, he used two lightshaper sheets clamped on stands on either side of the camera.

Shooting with his camera tethered to a laptop lets LaLonde see and play with his raw files immediately. He applied a Camera Raw effect that he created called “Cartoon,” which made the subjects jump out from the background and gave the images depth and a cartoon-like feel.

Before he was done, LaLonde did several different set-ups, modifying the lighting and moving the camera and subjects. This session took approximately one hour and 45 minutes from setup to break down. Before leaving the garage, the files were backed up on an epson P3000 portable drive.

LaLonde used a nikon d2X with a Sigma 15–30mm lens. image photographed in raw/neF mode and converted to dng format. Main light was a lumedyne 400w pack, four nikon Sb-800 and two Sb-28dX units were also used. The flash output was 100w/S with various output settings for nikon strobes (from 1 /8 to 1 /2 power). The computers used were a Mac Powerbook and a Mac g5 Quad Core and the software included nikon Camera Control Pro, Bridge, Adobe Camera Raw and Adobe Photoshop.

How to Pose Your Subjects

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 19:01:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Studio Lighting Anywhere: The Digital Photographer's Guide to Lighting On Location and in Small Spaces by Joe Farace. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

When I was learning the professional photography business, I asked my mentor, “What’s the worst mistake I could make when photographing a wedding?” His answer surprised me. “The worst thing you can do,” he told me, “is not talk to the people.” I’ll pass his words of wisdom along to you so you’ll know that when it comes to photographing people, it’s not just about the equipment, it is mostly about your interaction with your subjects. Often, I see photographers working with models and expecting the models to do all the work. Though it may be okay to assume that experienced models can be self-directed, the occasions when you will be photographing professional models will likely be few and far between.

Victoria is a high-energy model. All you have to do is tell her where to stand and take photos. Models like her will toss poses and expressions at you faster than you can click the shutter. The camera was a Nikon D700 with a 24–70mm f/2.8 lens. The exposure was 1/125 at f/6.3 and ISO 200. © 2011 Paul Peregrine.

For this shot of Victoria, Paul Peregrine used two stacked Grin&Stir’s (www.lightware-direct.com) 30-inch FourSquare light-banks each with a single Nikon Speed-light mounted inside one. A reflector was placed at camera left. Backdrop was a “Joe Farace” carbonite muslin background that’s available from Silverlake Photo (www.silverlakephoto.com).

I believe there are two types of photo subjects: those who are inner- directed and those who are outer-directed.

Inner-directed people are the Energizer bunnies of photo subjects. You tell them, “Stand over there,” point the camera at them, and they will change poses as fast as you can click the shutter. You will get lots of good poses, some great ones, and a few that are not so good because the model is not getting any feedback, except from themselves. The downside is that you will shoot a lot of photos, which will require a lot of editing time and bigger memory cards. These experienced models can make you look like a better photographer than you are, but it’s still your job to get the lighting right. Unfortunately, this type of subject comprises only 20 percent of the models or subjects that the average shooter photographs.

Outer-directed subjects represent the other 80 percent of photo subjects or models. These people expect you to tell them what to do. Shooting this type of subject takes longer, but taking the time to communicate what you want the subject to do will help get great results. The best subjects will respond better if you show them what the photograph looks like on the camera’s LCD screen—big screens really help with this. The bottom line is that it’s up to you to tell them how to pose and in order to do that, you need to know what you want.

There is as much conflicting advice on posing portrait subjects—and typically the person giving the advice claims his is the best way. You should select poses that you think you’ll like, try them, and improve on them if you can. Your model will have her own ideas too.

Keep in mind that there is no one perfect way to pose every subject. They come in all sizes, weights, and abilities to understand your directions. Keep the pose simple, and if the subject is comfortable and the pose looks good, it’s a good one.

Kent Hepburn photographed Maria Eriksson using three lights: One Photogenic 150 watt-second monolight was used with a 42x78-inch white scrim to the model’s right, another light with 24x24-inch lightbank was placed to her front left, while the third monolight was aimed at the white background to push it to high key. A Calumet radio trigger was used to trip the lights. Camera was Canon EOS 40D with EF 28–135mm lens and an exposure of 1/200 at f/8 and ISO 200. © 2011 Kent Hepburn.

Nicole isn’t wearing much, but I asked her to “rip off” her clothes, and this is the pose and great smile she gave me. The photograph was made in my basement studio using two Flashpoint II (www.adorama.com) monolights. The camera was a Canon EOS 40D with a 50mm f/1.8 lens that I bought on eBay for $50. Exposure was 1/60 at f/10 and ISO 100. The background was a Belle Drape muslin.

I can’t tell you the best way to pose people, so I’ll just tell you how I do it. In a studio—no matter where it is—posing against a backdrop is difficult because often there are no objects that the subject can interact with. The biggest mistake many photographers make is assuming that once a model is placed in a pose, all they need is one shot. Wrong! That’s just the beginning! Follow up by refining the pose with a slight head tilt to the left or right, have her move her chin up and down. Have her look at the camera then not look at the camera. Don’t just click the shutter. Watch what happens and follow up on a good pose with slight variations that can turn it into a great one. The most important advice I can give you—and you can take this to the bank—is to keep talking to the subject so the portrait becomes a collaboration between you and the subject.

Dave Hall originally captured this unique pose (you’ll need a limber model) in color in his living room. A monolight with a lightbank mounted was positioned at camera left. A second monolight with an umbrella for fill was placed at camera right. The image was shot with a Canon EOS 50D and an exposure of 1/80 at f/7.1 and ISO 160. © 2011 Dave Hall, Hall Photographic.

The biggest problem when working with new models or portrait subjects is deciding what to do with their hands. That’s when props, like the chains Jerry Bolyard used for his “blue” photograph in chapter 1, come in handy. One of my other favorite hand poses is to have them tugging at their clothing in some way. I ask them to look like they are ripping their clothing off, and this often elicits poses that I can refine.

No subject is perfect, and you can fix some flaws by posing. For example, heavier subjects should never be posed with their shoulders square to the camera. I believe that the purpose of any portrait is to idealize or glamorize the subject. If she has a few extra pounds, why not minimize them by having her stand at three-quarters to the camera rather than straight on? It’s also a good idea to ask her to shift her weight to the foot that’s farthest from the camera to avoid the flat-footed pose that makes her look like she is just standing there—even if she is just standing there! Conversely, you can pose thinner subjects so they are square to the camera to give their body more weight and depth.

Once a subject or a model is comfortable, I like to ask her to cross or fold her arms. As you can see by these six examples, each woman has interpreted this direction in her own way! With subjects who are outer-directed, establishing this basic position gives you a starting point for improving that pose.

Faces are not symmetrical, and we all really do have a “good” and “bad” side that will photograph better or worse than the other. Experienced models know this and will only give you what they think is their good side, but they are often wrong. So shoot a few test shots and determine which side of the subject’s face looks best to you. This pose may be lighting dependent, so what looks good under directional lighting may look completely different under soft or flat lighting. The important thing to remember is that even drop-dead-gorgeous models have a good side and a bad side. Learn early in the session which one works best for you.

One of my favorite posing instructions is to ask the model to twist and bend at the waist. They interpret this in many ways, including this pose. In this shot, the main light at camera right had a Westcott Halo mounted on it. The fill light at camera left had a 32-inch Westcott satin optical white umbrella attached. The third light was placed behind and to camera left. The camera was a Canon EOS 5D with an EF 135mm f/2.8 SF lens. The exposure was 1/50 at f/9 and ISO 100.

Just as it’s important to minimize any flaws your model might have, it’s important to look for her strong points and accent those features. Are her eyes beautiful? Then you should shoot headshots and close-ups. Does a female subject have long, shapely legs? Shoot several images from a low angle and don’t be afraid to use slightly wide-angle lenses to accent them. Watch your camera angles too. Don’t get too low. Nobody likes looking up somebody’s nostrils—no matter how beautiful they may be.

Adding Props to Senior Portraits

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 12 May 2011 20:10:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book Jeff Smith's Senior Portrait Photography Handbook: A Guide for Professional Digital Photographers by Jeff Smith. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

The one thing that you quickly realize when working with clients of high school age is that they are all individuals. While some photographers have you believing that every girl wants to look like a pinup model and every guy wants to show off his ripped abs and bulging biceps, it really isn’t that way. We have many girls who want to do the same painted-background session that their mothers did thirty-some years ago. We also have boys who absolutely do not want to be photographed for anything other than the yearbook.

These varying tastes will need to be evaluated and accommodated for in all of your sessions—and they’ll be particularly obvious when clients bring their personal props to the shoot.

The different props teens bring to their sessions show you how diverse your clients really are.

Personalize with Props
I love when seniors bring in their own personal props. We have photographed everything you could imagine—from guitars, to enormous snakes, and everything in between. To encourage seniors to bring in their personal props, we don’t charge a fee for including them and we mention it in all of our information and phone conversations. (Note: I should mention that even with a great deal of advertising, reminders, and no extra fees, the majority of our seniors do not include these items. Probably one in twenty brings something other that the typical letter jacket or cheer uniform. In other areas it may be more popular, but for our seniors it isn’t a major factor.)

When using large props, it’s especially important not to allow the prop to overwhelm the subject.

Keep the Focus on the Person
When we include a prop in someone’s image, we keep the focus on the person, not the prop. I, like most senior portrait photographers, went through the years of lighting props (like mid-swing baseball bats) on fire and creating what were basically portraits of props with people in them. Today, however, I prefer a simple approach. I like to think we are showing a little of the senior’s personality, not creating an episode of “When Photographers Have Way Too Much Time on Their Hands.” First and foremost, the focus of any portrait must be the person, not the stuff they bring in.When your eyes are drawn to anything in the portrait before you look at the person’s face, you really don’t have a portrait of the person; you have a portrait of the stuff the person brought in.

The Size of the Prop
The way in which we photograph a senior with a prop depends on what the prop is and its size. Smaller props are photographed in head-and-shoulders or waist-up compositions so they are visible. These props would be things like books, a football/soccer ball/basketball, or small stuffed
animals.

While some props are perfect to hold, like a guitar or other musical instrument, others are better displayed in the background or on the floor where the subject is sitting. Posters, paintings, jerseys, and uniforms fall into this category. These types of items fill the space around the subject to become the background/foreground.

Showing only part of the prop can help keep the attention on the subject of the portrait.

The next groups of props are the large ones—the quads, motorcycles, cars, trucks, buildings, etc. When I photograph these props, I minimize their visual weight by turning them into background elements. I do the same thing when I photograph seniors and teens with our studio’s Viper. If I were to put the subject inside the car, there would be a photograph of a huge car with a person’s head sticking out of it—not a real strong selling point. If, instead, I bring the person in front of the car, I can make the Viper fall into the background so the person remains the focus of the portrait. This is the same idea I use when photographing people with the Harley; the motorcycle either becomes the background or we isolate only a portion of the bike to form a foreground/background element in a head-and-shoulders pose.

While we have modified our studio to allow the Viper to be moved in and out, I don’t want to take the time to bring in seniors’ own cars and trucks—not to mention the fact that summers in Fresno are incredibly hot and the air conditioning has to work hard enough to keep the studio cool without large doors opening and closing all day.

When a senior wants to use a prop that is too large to get through the front door, we set up an appointment at one of our outdoor locations. Many seniors want to be photographed with their car or truck, and this is done outdoors. Since we live an area that has many farms and ranches, it is also very common for seniors to want to be photographed with horses or other livestock. The idea is always the same with these additions: reduce the apparent size of the larger prop by putting it into the background or capturing just the most important part. Horses are a good example. Not only are they huge, but horse owners are always very fussy about the placement of the legs and the position of the horse’s body. The best way to avoid investing undue time in horse posing is just to photograph the head of the horse. Of course, even this is hard enough, because horse people want both ears up and forward.

Props don’t have to be shown as they are usually used. Here, a creative pose allowed the skateboard to be incorporated into a casual head-and-shoulders portrait.

Final Thoughts
Whatever your subject might bring in, you need to find a way to position it somewhere in the frame where it will be noticeable but not overpowering.When you see the variety of props that come in with seniors, you’ll really begin to understand how diverse this market is. Your first senior will want to be photographed with a Bible, the next will have gothic props; one senior will bring a new BMW or Corvette, the next will wheel out an old tractor—you never know.

BUY THIS BOOK FROM AMAZON

Outdoor Photography

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 20:41:00 +0000

Today's post comes from the book The Digital Portrait Photographer's Guide to Natural-Light Family Portraits by Jennifer George. It is available from Amazon.com and other fine retailers.

There are times when working in a client’s home or at another indoor location isn’t feasible. When you are photographing a large group or want to use a more natural backdrop to create an environmental image, for instance, selecting an outdoor location might be your best option. For those who live in coastal communities, the beach is frequently the preferred session location. As J. Romero (www.rstudios.org) has noted, “The beach is an ideal location in southern California, as it is a familiar environment for the family and they are comfortable there.”

A GROWING TREND
In the past, when a family wanted an environmental portrait, they wanted an image that showed how the family members look in a pretty environment. They were not interested in artistic expression, creative poses, or emotion-filled images that depicted the interrelationships of the subjects.

Allowing the family to do what they want to can lead to fun and unique images. On the facing page, we see an image created while the mom was playing with her baby in between setup shoots for the session. The family shown in the image below was asked to walk over to this location and stand any way they wanted.

Fortunately, photojournalistic coverage, which has long been popular in wedding photography, has more recently begun to influence portrait photography styles, and clients are more interested than ever in purchasing relaxed and spontaneous family portraits. A wise portrait photographer will always capture the classic, posed portrait of the family along with the contemporary, unstructured, or unprompted portrait.

In this photograph of a family staring off into the ocean, a slight vignette was added to focus the viewer’s attention on the group. The family’s white shirts tie in perfectly with the ocean’s whitewash, ultimately unifying the photograph. This image was photographed with a Nikon D2X. The exposure was 1 /160 second at f/6.3 and ISO 640

ADVANTAGES TO WORKING ON LOCATION
Working on location is ideal for large family groups. The traditional portrait studio normally has a 9-foot background, and posing more than five people in front of a 9-foot background is difficult—especially when you’re working with adults. When doing a consultation with a client, either in
person or on the phone, immediately find out the number of subjects, as that will help you determine your best portrait location and posing options.

Working on location has a second very important advantage: being able to sell a large wall portrait to the client. One of the most profitable products for the portrait photographer is a large wall portrait. A large wall portrait is also a good passive marketing tool, as your client’s friends and family will see your work whenever they enter your client’s home.

FINDING GREAT LOCATIONS
Find several locations in your area that are ideal for environmental family portraits. The obvious choices are nearby parks and beaches, but also look for attractive landscaping in your neighborhood, playgrounds, bike paths, historic sites, and gardens. For state-owned and historic properties, you may have to get permission and possibly a permit before the session. Don’t exclude unusual locations such as open fields, rustic buildings, urban settings, and commercial development areas.

ENSURING THE BEST-POSSIBLE LIGHT
Open Shade. Upon arriving at your location, you should immediately look for the ideal place to pose the family. Choose an area where you can control the light. In a park setting, this may be an area with a full background of trees or other pleasing structures. The location should have an open sky that will illuminate the faces of the subjects. Note that shooting later in the day will allow you to work when the sun is lower in the sky and is coming from a horizontal direction rather than from overhead. When possible, pose the subjects near a large tree or other light-blocking object. This will produce the shadow side of the face, creating a pleasing light
ratio and a dimensional look.

Fill Flash. You can create great images on location when the sun is low in the sky. When the lighting scenario is less than ideal, though, you can often improve your images by adding flash to fill in the shadows that can appear under the subject’s eyes. When faced with a scenario in which the light on the background is brighter than the light falling on your subject, using flash can also help to balance the light and produce a more even, natural look.

It can be difficult to find open shade when photographing in a park setting. However, if you wait until later in the day, the sun will be lower in the sky and behind trees or hills. Here most of the park is now in open shade due to the setting sun. To add sparkle and life to the client’s eyes, fill flash was used.

Sometimes moving your subjects to another area of the location will improve the lighting. Here, fill flash was used to open up the shadows. Note the beautiful light coming through the trees due to the setting sun.

There are several ways to set your flash for fill. J. Romero sets his Nikon flash on TTL with an exposure compensation of –3 and his camera set to aperture priority. He sets the flash to –3 because he wants to add just enough flash to light the eyes. Mike Strickland sets his flash between half and full power and uses an exposure of ISO 125, f/8, and 1 / 250.

While on location, ask the family to do several simple activities that will provide numerous photo opportunities for you. Walking along the beach, walking toward you, walking away, the children running down the beach and the parents swinging or carrying a child are all easy, informal shots.

With digital cameras, it is much easier to use fill flash correctly. Simply set your flash on manual and take a meter reading, then set your flash to 1 / 4 power to start. Take a test shot and make an adjustment if necessary. When the sun is setting, you may need to reset the flash several times to achieve a perfect balance between the client and the environment.

Sweet Light. When you are shooting outdoors, timing is everything when it comes to finding great light. In the hour after sunrise and the hour before sunset, the sun is low in the sky and its rays travel horizontally, rather than from overhead. Many photographers call this “sweet light.”
Depending upon the location of your shoot, you may not need to use any fill flash during this time. J. Romero has taken hundreds of family portraits at the beach over the years. He likes to shoot 20 minutes before sunset to capture that “golden light.” He feels that the shadows produced by the sun when shooting any earlier than that are too harsh. His goal is to have the client be able to comfortably look into the sun without having to use flash. He shoots most of his images at ISO 400 on aperture priority. When the sun is low, he uses an ISO of 800 with a wide-open aperture. He feels that this allows him to create the most beautiful natural light images.

Good family portraits show the love and warmth the individuals have for one another. Having the family connect and touch gives the image a circular feel that can be cropped either square or rectangular for the finished wall portrait.