Dollar portrait ? off camera flash

frg

So I've been playing with umbrella's and speedlights off camera. (see Jon's tute http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=71206).

I did a similar shot to this, and got a comment back about dollar portraits from sears in another forum..... can't say I disagree completely..:dunno

so question is, how do we take it to the next level ..

setup is 2 umbrella's left and right pointing down , reflector from below..
(had to pp the cheek as it had blown a bit! wasn't too carefull with settings etc on this one)

SloYerRoll

Hey Francis,

Thanks for the bump!

It's really tough to reverse engineer your setup since you have so much light pouring in from all angles. I always reccomend taking a setup shot before you even shoot anyone. Make it a habit and don't delete that file. Store it away w/ rest of the shots you took. It may come in handy later (like now) Or when you have a fantastic light setup that you stumble on. Then you can share your true genius w/ the rest of us:D !

The first red flag when I was reading was that you used a beauty dish from down under (couldn't help myself ).

One of the main goals when you are using off camera light source(s) is to try and help the brain gain visual clues of depth. One of the main way's of doing this in portraits is by creating shadows.

What you did with the beauty dish is almost completely negate all the shadow that you were creating by having a light source from on top. That make sense? THis is a reason that Sears shots look this way. They have every possible light imaginable in the studio and they are instructed to just take the shot w/o much concern of the outcome. The lights are already set up and "should" give satisfactory results. The only problem the inside of one of those studios is about as bright as chernobyl and the light spill creates a huge field of light that doesn' have much direction.

In the image you have. You can see the shadows created by your brolly's on the forehead. Then your brain says, "there should be a shadow under the nose since the light is coming from the top". Your brain looks under the nose, sees no shadow, then says, "Sears Portraits".

Try dumping the beauty dish or pulling it further away for a start.
Now that you know why you want shadows. I'll let you come up w/ the rest.

Your getting into a truly awesome way to take photogrpahs. There are so many rules you can break. Take a shot w/ the sun right behind the subject? No sweat! Just break out a gel.... (I'll blog on that in a few days)

All the best,
-Jon

frg

Hi Jon,

Thanks for the detailed reply , very much appreciate it..... I will try it without the reflector "down under" ........
really enjoying myself experimenting with this!:ivar

urbanaries

SloYerRoll wrote:

Your getting into a truly awesome way to take photogrpahs. There are so many rules you can break. Take a shot w/ the sun right behind the subject? No sweat! Just break out a gel.... (I'll blog on that in a few days)

All the best,
-Jon

Hey Jon....has it been a few days yet!? D

SloYerRoll

urbanaries wrote:

Hey Jon....has it been a few days yet!? D

YUP! But I posted on snoots like my last blog promised.
Gels are next unless there's an outcry for something else.
Check it out!

cmason

Nice stuff SloYerRoll!

A request: can you list what gear it is you are using? (well not the snoots )

Would be nice to know what flash, or umbrella or stand that is in your pics. Hey and you could even link to B&H or Amazon and maybe collect a buck or two on the recommendation.....

SloYerRoll

I'll work that up. Dgrin and it's owners are very sensitive to spam.

I'll need to set up a page of disclaimers so everyone looking at my blog knows this is just how I got my gear and why I like buying from them.

Thanks for the compliment though. Makes it soo much easier to do when I know it's appreciated!

-Jon

SloYerRoll

A Special Request...
Is anyone intersted in helping out by proofreading my articles before they go live so they make sense and are gramatically sound?
It would be about once a week and take up roughly 10 to 15 minutes of your time.

It would be a great help to me since I'm not an english buff and I spend 45 minutes on something that should take about 10.

If yer good at english and want to keep this thing going. Shoot me a PM!

NOTE: I use google docs, so I'd just give you a login and you could edit from the source..

Thanks for your consideration.

-Jon

henryp

frg wrote:

setup is 2 umbrella's left and right pointing down , reflector from below.

IMHO you will have an easier time of you leave the reflector out until you have your umbrellas set better. (Don't get me wrong -- I love reflectors. It's just that you have too many variables right now).

One umbrella should be your MAIN light, set higher than the subject's head and away from the camera about 30-degrees from the camera-subject axis. It should be high enough so the shadow from the subject's nose touches his lip but doesn't come across his mouth and you should see a "catch-light" in each eye.

The other is your FILL light, set on the camera-subject axis. The MAIN light should be producing 2x the light you get from the FILL light. This provides a pleasing 3:1 light ratio. The "Sears" crack is because your lighting now is flat. lacking direction and failing to produce the shadows/highlights necessary to make the face look 3-dimensional.

His site is gone but if you put jayandriot into Google's IMAGE search you'll see the illustrations he did on a store dummy's head.

pathfinder

There is a very easy way to get the 1:3 lighting ratio that Henry is referring to, if you use two lights that are exactly the same light output.

Put the main light at 4 feet and the fill light 5 feet from the subject. The main light is now twice as bright as the fill, so the ratio of the fill to the total light is 1:3 If you use different reflectors, diffusers, scrims, these ratios will be off a bit due to tht of course.

Or set the main light at 5.6 feet and the fill light at 8 feet.

Or set the main light at 11 feet, and the fill light at 16 feet. There is a pattern here,isn't there?:D You already know these ratios they are on your lens barrels.

The fill light is one stop less bright than the main light - one stop less is 1/2 the light. 2.8,4, 5.6. 8, 11, 16 are the ratios that do that for lighting as well as aperture.

frg

Thanks for the responses Henry, Pathfinder......
I shall be playing with the lights this weekend and will certainly be trying out your suggestions

y'all have been very helpfull!

henryp

pathfinder wrote:

There is a very easy way to get the 1:3 lighting ratio that Henry is referring to, if you use two lights that are exactly the same light output.

Using f/stop values as distances is a great way to start, but ONLY if you're using full-manual flash. If you do this with TTL'd flash units or even with a rudimentary auto-flash like the Vivitar 283/285, the built-in exposure system will attempt to out-think you.

If this is a serious endeavor, there's a flash meter in your future.

pathfinder

henryp wrote:

Using f/stop values as distances is a great way to start, but ONLY if you're using full-manual flash. If you do this with TTL'd flash units or even with a rudimentary auto-flash like the Vivitar 283/285, the built-in exposure system will attempt to out-think you.

If this is a serious endeavor, there's a flash meter in your future.

Henry,
Thank you for repeating the importance that both flashes must emit the same exact output - or full flash output - to use this technique reliably. I did say that in the my first sentence, but maybe did not emphasize it enough since I tend to think in that mode for studio lighting.

My comment -- "There is a very easy way to get the 1:3 lighting ratio that Henry is referring to, if you use two lights that are exactly the same light output."

I find manual flash preferable for studio shooting, because the light never changes and you get to tell the subject where to stand and how far from your lights. Hence, the exposure never changes and TTL just gets in the way and messes your exposure consistency from shot to shot.

For candid, or more informal shooting, where the subject may decide their positioning and hence their distance from flash, ETTL really comes into its own - I strongly prefer to shoot ETTL with an off camera EOS system flash and trigger the flash via an ST-E2 IR trigger.

As for flash meters, the Sekonic 358 with a built in PW radio trigger is hard to beat

henryp

pathfinder wrote:

I find manual flash preferable for studio shooting, because the light never changes and you get to tell the subject where to stand and how far from your lights. Hence, the exposure never changes and TTL just gets in the way and messes your exposure consistency from shot to shot.

Properly metered manual flash will almost ALWAYS provide more accurate exposure than any type of TTL and weddings are a prime example. No matter how sophisticated a flash TTL system is a full length of a bride in her white wedding dress will skew the exposure. Same with any studio setup. I've seen experienced people stumble with TTL on a simple table top setup trying to shoot white china dinnerware and silverware high key on a white table cloth.

SloYerRoll

henryp wrote:

Properly metered manual flash will almost ALWAYS provide more accurate exposure than any type of TTL and weddings are a prime example. No matter how sophisticated a flash TTL system is a full length of a bride in her white wedding dress will skew the exposure. Same with any studio setup. I've seen experienced people stumble with TTL on a simple table top setup trying to shoot white china dinnerware and silverware high key on a white table cloth.

I personally find manual flash better 99% of the time. I also feel dirty if I shoot my camera on auto as well. (auto is fine, just not for me..)
Manual provides consistant results so I don't have to chimp on shots. I can dial in exposure and flash power and hammer down. I've tried ttl on my nikon setup and while sometimes it hits that sweet spot. I have allot more properly exposed shots onmanual. Not to mention if I have exposure set a stop too low or high. I can make global changes and tweak the few that the distance from the flash was different in Lr and call it a day.

Pathfinder definately knows this stuff (much better than I). I'm just chiming in on the truth in your words.

-Jon

Shudderz

henryp wrote:

His site is gone but if you put jayandriot into Google's IMAGE search you'll see the illustrations he did on a store dummy's head.

If you do the google search, the page may be gone, but google still has the article in their "cached" sites. It can be found here:

http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:4XBeyQEjfZwJ:mysite.verizon.net/jayandriot/Loop.htm+jayandriot&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us

It might be worth saving while you can. Who knows how long google will keep it in the archives. It was saved by google on Sept. 15.

SloYerRoll

Shudderz wrote:

It might be worth saving while you can. Who knows how long google will keep it in the archives. It was saved by google on Sept. 15.

Saved as PDF. TYVM for that Heather.

Cheers,
-Jon

cmason

any chance this can live on as a Dgrin tutorial? This is fantastic