Blown out background

Hi I tried to get a pure withe background in this portrait:

<a href="URL">http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-16536247-young-woman.html</a>

 

I only got a hotspot in the background with a vivitar 285hv fired from behind the background and then I edited

the photo to get a full withe BG.

Any advices to isolate an objet or a person without photshop?

This is something I deal with daily. In order to do it without Photoshop, you really have to light the background separately with probably at least a couple of separate lights. In Photoshop it's easy to take care of the background, no matter what it is. One more reason to go digital. :-)

You have quite a few photos with white backgrounds on Shuttercock. What are you doing now to get that?

Ivan,

 

Your photo link doesn't work, so it's hard to see what happened, but as an old studio photographer, the traditional solution is for a white paper background to be two stops brighter (by reflected reading off background and incident reading off subject) than the subject. Go much brighter and the background will blow out resulting in lots of flare and blushing problems. Much less exposure will produce a "muddy" white instead of the bright one that you want.

 

With studio lights, the usual position is one on each side angled slightly toward the center but not straight at it. Lights powerful enough to use with umbrellas will give a smoother spread of the light on the background.

 

I'm a bit confused by your allusion to firing the strobe from behind the background. What kind of background and did you actually have the strobe behind it and somehow shooting through the background back toward the subject and camera? If so, and if the background was somehow translucent, could it be that it was not blocked by the subject and therefor fired directly into the lens? That would certainly account for blowing out the exposure range.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Tim

<a href=http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-16536247-young-woman.html>Image1</a>

 

<a href=http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-16725196-oung-woman-listening-to-a-mp-music-device.html

>Image2</a>

 

 

 

What Im doing now is firing 2 vivitars from behind of the background (a white fabric) trying to emulate a Hilite

background of Lastolite.

Then I try to separate the model as much as I can from the BG as I dont have a lot of space in my studio-home.

Perhaps the light sources are not wide enough and I dont get a full blownout BG (And Im trying not to use PS)...

I will find more difficulties when I go into the full body shot

Ivan,

 

This is all about balancing the brightness ranges of both of your background lights and your lighting on the

subject. Since you seem to be shooting digital and can therefore have instant feedback, do some testing with a

volunteer model.

 

First get things set the way you want them for lighting the subject without even worrying about the background.

Next, realize that by aiming your two Vivitars directly through the white fabric back at the subject and camera,

you are actually just creating two incredibly hot spots of light, especially if you have the strobes inside about

ten feet from the fabric (it doesn't have room to spread out and soften). If you had a pure white wall behind

the fabric, or just the wall itself (or seamless paper) to bounce the strobes off of, you would have much more

control of both the brightness range and the smoothness of the pattern.

 

Anyway, shoot your set up with the background strobes set and tested at different automatic power ranges to see

which gives you the best balance between the subject and background and remember to fire off the strobes after

each change in setting so you dump the capacitors and have an accurate charge for that power setting. Since they

are automatic, that step is redundant, but do it anyway to be absolutely sure of your repeatability. When you

find the combination that you like best, make notes of distances and power settings so you can go back to it at will.

 

Another thing that might help is to cut two pieces of milk jug plastic (translucent white) to fit just the lenses

of the strobes. They will slightly reduce light output, but have no effect on automatic functions and they

definitely will give you a more diffused light through the fabric.

 

If you are truly sold that this flash through system (as opposed to the white seamless) is how you want to shoot,

changing from fabric to a translucent plastic material like 'translum' might be a better way to go. If you have

the room, hang one sheet of the material about two feet in front of another so that when your initial flash hits

the first layer, it diffuses and goes through the second layer (which softens the diffusion even more and gives

you a perfectly even white light. Again, you will need to adjust subject and background brightness values for

the result you want.

 

Good luck.

Thanks Tim

I will keep you updated with the results

Ivan, this is a separate issue....why are your TIFFs converted from JPEG? I don't get the logic.Isn't it better to shoot in RAW and produce TIFFs and JPEGs from that?