Quote:
Originally Posted by Curtis Cunningham  Here's some results from another hurried test I did yesterday. I've tried to incorporate as many of the great suggestions I've received here as I could. My hope is that in time and with much practice, this can all become intuitive as it appears to be for those who have suggested things to try. Thanks for your patience as I learn.
Anyways here's the test shots with their respective histograms. I hope the shoots today at church go better than they did last week. |
Curtis, with the greatest of respect and notwithstanding all of the good advice offered in this thread, you just don't appear to be listening... I don't understand how a professional photographer is shooting work on the basis of hope. You state that these results are from
"another hurried test".
You apparently want to improve your work and yet... you don't seem to have assimilated anything of the methods that people have been kind enough to offer to you for free in these columns, along with their good advice. Curtis, if you want to improve, you have to realise that you need to cover the syllabus for yourself.
I do not know of any individual, who is working as a professional photographer, who would go on a shoot and
hope for a good result. I gave up wondering if any of my images would 'come out' when I became a professional. Accepting money for what we do means that we must deliver our contracted services to the standard required by the client. There is no hoping for a good result... it has no place in the realm of the professional photographer.
Both of the images, which you have posted from your hurried test, do not reflect work at a professional standard..
image one:
Background lighting uneven - do note the colour on left is different to the rest of the backdrop. The staining of the backdrop above the woman's head draws the eye as well - You should consider lighting the backdrop with a little more power so that you can have an even spread of light (or just rearrange the light) in addition to using a clean backdrop.
The hair light is spilling onto the woman's arm and it has become a burnt out highlight in addition to having rim-lit her arm as a highlight. The spread of the hair light is way too much. Consider a snoot or a grid and move the light much closer to the subject so that you can cast a pool of light where you actually want it to be. I also suspect that the uncontrolled hair light has caused the burnt out detail on the side of the subject's face.
There is a red colour cast in the image. The white point is 25 points away from the start of the histogram and the black point has been clipped. The net result is an image that is far too dark and the detail and texture in the black 'T' shirt is barely readable.
The dark shadows cast on the woman's face are not considered to be good portrait lighting. The nose shadow shows an incorrect placement of your light. If you must light the face in this way, then move your light as close as you can to soften the shadow detail. You also need to consider a reflector placed low down out of frame to remove the dark shadow around the woman's chin because five o'clock shadow on a woman's face does not belong here and is very ugly.
The shadow on the boy's face is apparently caused by the hair light and you need to arrange him so he is in better contact with his mum. Have him take a slightly forward position because her size makes her the most important element in the image and you need to find a way to bring some balance to the composition. They are too far apart for family. It would serve to block the spill from your hair light but a snoot or a grid would be the professional answer to this issue.
Both of the subjects are posing rather woodenly for the camera and you need to avoid this ugly rabbit in the headlights look. Get mum to put her arms around the lad or drape an arm across his shoulders. It will feel more natural to her and she will relax, Get her and the lad to talk to each other and catch them unawares.
Not "watch the birdie and say cheese" but "just ignore me and I will tell you when I am ready" and then you will be able to capture nice natural poses, body attitudes and live and animated expressions... instead of the type of portraits that are just what people expect to see when you tell them 'I shoot portraits'.
The image suggests that you are not using a light meter and thus do not see where the light is falling. Look through the viewfinder and when the scene is arranged as you want, step away from the camera and look at the scene with half closed eyes and try to see where the shadows are falling.
If you do have modelling lights on your kit, for pity's sake, please use them! They may only be 100 watt bulbs but if you turn out all of the lights in the room, then you will see what lighting will fall on the subject and what areas will be shaded.
image two:
My comments for image two are that same as those which are applicable to image one. The hair light is still illuminating the shoulder and you need to smooth any clothing down before the shoot. This ruffled garment appears to give the woman a deformity on her back. Take care when getting models to rest their faces in hands or on body parts such as arms.
If they actually do rest upon them, then the weight of the head will mean that the line of the face is deformed. Look at the straight line between the boy and the mother's face... too much weighty contact has caused that. A reflector to the right of the woman would have lifted the dark shadow on the side of her face.
Encourage your sitters to sit proud and tall. Slouching does not look good in photographs. By now... you should be aware that subjects will get tired (and may well have become bored) if they are waiting for the photographer to capture the image and they will not stay in place where you arranged them. Do not bring them to their shooting position until you are confident that you are ready to press the shutter release as soon as they sit in front of the camera.
There can be little worse than the subject sitting in the position requested by the photographer and then waiting another 5 minutes while the photographer fiddles around and makes adjustments to the set-up. It does not look professional and the photographer is not in charge of the situation. For this reason it is important that you set up the shot first. Know where your light will fall and what shadows it will cast, sit your subject down and press the shutter release while keeping up a flow of talk designed to relax the sitters. You should not have to look through the viewfinder at all. You will know when it is the right moment to release the shutter. Use a cable release so that you do not have to touch the camera and when you stand away from it, the sitters will not feel like they are being scrutinised under the unblinking gaze of the camera lens.
You may have missed my earlier imprecation, where I advised you to move the lights nearer to your subject. They need to be near to generate sufficient light for you to choose your aperture. They need to be near to soften the light and reduce shadows. You should look at coning down or gridding the hair light because, right now, it is uncontrolled and not contributing anything to the image.
You should be using a flashmeter because it is without doubt, the number one (absolutely essential) piece of kit for setting up studio flash. You measure the flash with it, it gives you a reading and you set your camera body and lens to that reading. It cannot get any easier than that. Chimping via the review screen on the camera body or shooting tethered and studying the histogram and the image... is not a reasonable substitute for the multiple functions of a competent flashmeter. Among those functions are contrast ratio, flash readings with and without cord, averaging multiple readings, incident readings, flash trigger via cord or radio via pocket wizards or similar.
I don't want to seem harsh and unsympathetic, Curtis, but you have taken on a task without having the requisite skills. Exchanging a few words over the internet with 'the experts' is hardly a substitute for getting the education; which you need to complete work that you have accepted. Are there no formal courses of instruction, near where you live?
You really ought not to be taking on work that you don't have the personal resources to complete. It will lead to frustration for you and worse... dissatisfaction in your client group. You should not be trying to pick up the skills you need on your client's dollar. It will ruin your reputation with them.
Let me repeat that multi-light settings are NOT the way to learn about studio lighting. The more lights you use, the more variables you have to cope with. I wont say that it cannot be done but it is an unusually complex way to start learning how to use lights. The biggest advantage that studio lighting has over any other form of lighting, is that you, the photographer, control how much light, the colour and quality of the light and where it falls for whatever duration you decide. In other words, Curtis, you tightly control every single variable that is within your power to control and accordingly, there is no easier way to light subjects than with studio flash.
Linear Mode
