Help with studio portraits

<p>John, have you tried a shot of her as a big face, cropping inside the ears, chin and hair? With a slight turn of the head and eye a bit more out of center, and perhaps more eye makeup, will make already large eyes even larger and really riveting. They are the feature I would emphasize. </p>

<p>Bob, I have one where I got a lot closer to her face, not as close as you describe, but just outside the ears, chin, and hair. She is still facing the camera though and the makeup is the same. </p>

<p>I have a few shots of a different model from last night I can post if anyone's interested once I have a chance to process the raw files, but I don't think my efforts at experimenting went that well and my first impression is I didn't get any great images from the shoot. </p>

<p>John, I'm a bit late in comming in on this thread, but I wanted to make one quick comment: the model's body language, both upper body and head, give the impression that she is pulling away from you and/or unbalanced to her rear. Try getting her to lean slightly forward instead of backward and incline her head in the direction of the camera...it will give a more balanced and comfortable look.</p>

<p>John, keep shooting and reviewing, you are on the right path and you have the courage to try using those light things most folks just leave in the bag. That will separate your images from so many others. Your are learning a craft, enjoy the journey. Plenty of folks here to help. </p>

A few things here, but first the photo shoot is not that bad. So be happy with the results and learn a bit from the advice from these good photographers.

 

The lights are too hot and at the lowest power settings - That's a real easy fix. Use a 2 stop or 3 stop ND filter for the lens and also plastic ND filters that can be placed in front of your lights. You will be able to knock down the Fstop to F4 or so.

 

Light control - Pick up barn doors to help direct the light tighter. Raise the lights higher. You can also get grids to soften the light a lot.

 

You are shooting in a slightly upward angle. By looking up at her nose the photos usually result in black spots on the nose. By shooting higher you will never get that look.

 

Sharpness - Your photos are actually too sharp! Check out soft filters. My favorite soft filter is called a Softar 1 Filter. Sometimes photogrphers want those really sharp expenive lenses, which is great, but they are too shap for most portrait work and even working with profesional models. I'm shot my share of models including Miss America.

 

Cropping - Look at a few portrait books at your local bookstore. In your images you've cut off the hands and at the knees. Most, if not all portrait books, suggest cropping at the 3/4 mark for the closeups and don't crop at the joints, such as the knees, the ankles, and hips.

 

Bob Bill has a wonderful image showing softness, shooting downwards, and control of light.

Slight adjustment using some softness, yet keeping the sparkling eyes. A person can go wild using photoshop! I darken the image, cropped, smoothed out the hard edges using Layer, then the blur tool, and then erasing the dullness of the eyes to bring out the sharpness. Any better?<div></div>

<p>Yes, the red was wrong, but seeing past that, and erasing the flawed background, I have chosen a tighter crop as suggested by Wolf.<br>

Her expression in this first frame you show us is the most relaxed. This display of her character is more important than any other technical aspects. So I have reshaped the final product to remove all of the distracting elements and let that lovely smile command the attention it deserves.<br>

Working in those group-shoot situations is pretty awful. Portraits depend on a rapport between subject and photographer/artist. It is a dialogue.</p><div></div>

<p>I also like what Bob Bernardo's approach.</p>

<p>Sorry, I meant to say: "I also like Bob Bernardo's approach"<br>

... with some skilled manipulation to simulate a classic portrait. Very nice.</p>

 

<p>Thanks, Bob, I have been learning from you for some time, so some of your instruction is probably in that photo. So many great posters here. John has come to the right place. He might also might want to check the lighting and wedding/event forums. More pros like Bob there. Nadine also makes a living doing this, so she's someone to listen to as well. Dont miss Matt either. Too many to name. We amateurs here have the privilege of the insight gleaned by pros through their daily work. How did that ad go, when they talk, we listen. </p>

Thanks Bob Bill and Kevin. Bob Bill, you are so right, there are amazing pros on the wedding forum. Some of the people there have been shooting weddings and portraits for 30 plus years.Nadine and Matt, along with some others such as Marc Williams are true masters.

<p>You can try to compensate for the harsh specularity with PS. I only see one example of good solid pro lighting in this thread........</p>

<p>BTW, out of curiosity, what are you setting the ISO on for those first two portraits.....I couldn't see the EXIF data. You may be able to reduce the light power by upping your ISO.</p>

<p>David says: "I only see one example of good solid pro lighting in this thread........"<br>

No, what you see is a <em><strong>Photoshop simulation</strong> </em> of solid pro lighting.</p>

David Schilling is a top photographer. He gets the portraits right the first time, with and without the use of Photoshop. David is also one of the few people that have a very keen understanding of photoshop techiques, so his wedding and portrait results are excellent. He's a great artist that uses all of the tools together to get amazing results.

<p>I don't question David's expertise as a photographer at all, and both of you are no doubt more skilled in Photoshop than I could ever hope to be. This is certainly clear from your very instructive, manipulated simulation of pro lighting. But that's what it is, a <strong>simulation</strong> .<br>

Or did you, via some time warp, attend John Ashby's studio on the day of the shoot, set up your professional lighting and make an exposure in a camera?</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Thanks Bob.</p>

<p>Kevin, I wasn't talking about the PS photo that Bob reworked. I was actually referring to my shot of Abby that I posted above. To be honest it's something of a "ringer", although I posed the model and did the after capture work on the image, the lighting is credited to Art Ketchum: <a href="../photodb/user?user_id=34733">http://www.photo.net/photodb/user?user_id=34733</a> It was taken in his studio during a portrait lighting workshop. The lighting ratios that I gave I first learned from Art and in later workshops with Frank Cricchio. Initially, I was surprised that the information and the image I posted could slip by completely unnoticed in this thread so easily. <strong> </strong></p>

Keven, point taken, I understand your comment now.

<p>If I were to rework any of the images above in PS, I'd go with this one:</p><div></div>

<p>And if you simulate a background light on the white backdrop, I think I like it better yet.</p><div></div>

<p>Thank you for your comments, and sorry I didn't reply sooner, I've done a couple of shoots since and been playing with the images.</p>

<p>Bob, I understand what you mean about it being too sharp, but my preference would be to shoot as sharp as my gear allows and then I always have the option to reduce sharpness in photoshop. You're right about the angle reacting with her nose, since then I'm trying to remember to look for it and have the model angle her head down a bit. I was using barn doors, so if there was a problem it was how I was using them and not that I wasn't. Can you give me more detail on what the problem is though, I'm not seeing it in the image. The light was too low though, I agree with that. And I do use a grid on my hair light, I just didn't use a hair light that shoot. Even on the next shoot I did, I have the same hand and croping problem, I really need to work on that aspect. I do like your edited version, there's a lot more focus on her. It seems a bit dark and a bit red, but both could be my uncalibrated monitor.</p>

<p>Kevin, I posted that one first because I thought I captured her the best in it. </p>

<p>David, I'm shooting at ISO 200 on a Nikon D90. I like the version with the lightened background too. It was actually grey paper lit with 2 lights. I did check the ratio at the time, but I forget it now (I should start taking notes of my setup). I think it was a stop brighter than on the model. In my most recent shoot I used white paper and lights 2 stops brighter so it was completely blown. I kind of like that effect too, though I've show the pics to some people who hate the effect.</p>