Hi-Key Shot

RBrogen

Here's a shot that I took a few weeks ago. C&C welcome.

adbsgicom

Almost as much a question as a comment, but the catch lights totally obscure the pupil. Maybe that's common and I'm just noticing here for some reason. I like the image overall. though.

Hackbone

Very nice photo. Love the lighting. I agree on the eyes. Somewhat distracting.

RBrogen

Thanks for commenting Andrew and Charles. The lighting setup actually had a tri-flector just beneath her shoulders and a softbox above at 45 aimed down. The BG is actually a 6' octabank softbox that was angled up and the subject was backed up against the front of it.

Dupont24

Very nice photo and lighting.

RBrogen

Dupont24 wrote:

Very nice photo and lighting.

Thanks Dupont24

kris10jo

beautiful photo.

Mitchell

The lighting here is excellent. Very well controlled.

kdog

Sweet shot! Agree on the pupils thing though.

Cheers,
-joel

RBrogen

Thanks Joel, Kris10jo, and Mitchell.

D'Buggs

Does anyone else feel as though the image is a little overly sharped???
Other than that, I think its a very nice portrait - The light balance seems to be spot-on.

The catch lights don't bother me all that much. I find they add interest.

RBrogen

D'Buggs wrote:

Does anyone else feel as though the image is a little overly sharped???
Other than that, I think its a very nice portrait - The light balance seems to be spot-on.

The catch lights don't bother me all that much. I find they add interest.

Thanks for commenting D'Buggs.

dogwood

Not quite down with the tilt of the photo myself. You can use other posing tricks, in my opinion, to keep the photo looking good without the (again, in my opinion) cliche tilt. You'll never see a commercial beauty shot with this kind of tilt and there's a reason for that.

In terms of the catchlights, I've done a similar setup with no probs so here are some tips. Use a white reflector for fill below--and place it a little lower than you have it so it will show a little less in the eyes. I have this really crappy multi reflector that literally has the gold and silver surfaces falling apart but the white is almost a vinyl surface and works awesome for a fill.

The softbox catchlights might look more natural with a round scrim in front (I know photoflex sb's come with this). Personally I prefer a beauty dish over a softbox -- they give killer catch lights (note the subtle fill reflector catchlights)!

Here's an example:



A strip dome can also look great as the key-- and won't obscure the pupils as much.

RBrogen

dogwood wrote:

Not quite down with the tilt of the photo myself. You can use other posing tricks, in my opinion, to keep the photo looking good without the (again, in my opinion) cliche tilt. You'll never see a commercial beauty shot with this kind of tilt and there's a reason for that.

In terms of the catchlights, I've done a similar setup with no probs so here are some tips. Use a white reflector for fill below--and place it a little lower than you have it so it will show a little less in the eyes. I have this really crappy multi reflector that literally has the gold and silver surfaces falling apart but the white is almost a vinyl surface and works awesome for a fill.

The softbox catchlights might look more natural with a round scrim in front (I know photoflex sb's come with this). Personally I prefer a beauty dish over a softbox -- they give killer catch lights (note the subtle fill reflector catchlights)!

Here's an example:



A strip dome can also look great as the key-- and won't obscure the pupils as much.

Thanks for the great info dogwood. I guess I should have included in the initial post that this was not a planned or real shoot. A place down the street rents their studio space with all sorts of lighting equipment and my niece and a friend of hers volunteered to be my models for the day to test out every light setup they had. This particular setup was an exact replica of a shot that Scott Kelby had done a video on using 2 lights and a tri-flector. The only difference between his setup and mine was that I used a 6' octabank as the BG and he used a 4' square SB. The look is referred to by Scott as the "Oil of Olay" look. In a planned shoot I would have set it up a bit differently but given we were literally just goofing, and wheeling lights in and out it wasn't a biggie. Thanks for the comments.