Lighting for african american skin

I am photographing a friend's wedding in November and was wondering

what type of lighting and how much do I need in order to make

african american skin look great in my photos, especially when my

friend refers to her fiance as dark chocolate? Any and all advice

is much appreciated.

 

I have a Cannon 20D with the kit lens and no flash at the momoent.

 

Thanks.

I'd say that different types of light can give a color cast to any type of skin so make sure you have your white balance set correctly for the light you are in or using. Also if you use a hand held light meter you won't have a problem since the way the meter works it will give the proper exposure. If you use the meter in the camera you might want to purchase a grey card and meter off it in the same light as your subject. If you don't want to do that then you can try metering off the subject and closing down a stop from what the camera reads as the camera's meter will tend to overexpose dark skin...much like if you take a shot of a black tuxedo, the camera will try to make the tuxedo grey, thereby overexposing it to do so. Keep in mind that the camera's meter works by trying to make everything grey so it will underexpose whites and overexpose blacks to get the average grey. Hope this helps some.

If you have photographed weddings in the past and were able to photograph a white dress beside a black tux with detail in both, you won't need to do anything different. If you've never photographed a wedding, you might want to get a flash and do some practicing.

 

Other than that, the best advice I can give you is to shoot in RAW mode.

Sandra,

 

I have photographed many african american wedding and the thing to do is to try to use your flash on auto mode, the camera at the same set stop and drag the shutter at least at 1/30 of a second do there is enough separation between the subjects and the background.

 

The biggest problem with this weddings is that african american skins colors are normally all over the map as oppose to caucasian subjects where the skin color is more uniform (at least as the camera is concerned), but if you drag the shutter and meter the venues prior to the atual wedding you can came out with beautufull shots.

 

Regards

 

Hugh

Sandra, I agree with Hugh. Make sure that you slow down the shutter speed to brighten up the background... (I ran across this picture while surfing the internet..)

I'll second the use of the gray card and/or incident readings unless you use reflective

meter and adjust your exposure properly.

 

The problem is (as previously mentioned) there are over 30 shades of African-Americans

and you need to figure out what "hue" your subject is. Being an African-American Woman

myself, I'm about 2 shades from the darkest side. My mother on the other hand is about a

shade darker than the lightest.

 

If you stick to the technicals, you shouldnt have a problem. My Caucasian husband has no

problems photographing me but we do have a lot of trouble being photographed together

(not sure if your subjects are an inter-racial couple) because of the high contrast situation

:D

Do a search on this forum. This topic has been discussed many times before although you are getting some good answers above.

I live in Miami where people of Jamaican, Haitian, and a dozen other ethnicities bristle at the term Afro-American. Now that that's out of the way, people of African decent tend to have oilier skin than most people of European and Asian ancestory. The sheen can be quite bright compared to the dark skin. The women tend to use make-up, base and powder, to give their skin a more matte look. If you can convince the men in the bridal party to let the ladies dab a little powder on their faces they'll photograph a lot better. Otherwise I just incident meter the available light as normal and with either B&W or color film maybe give an extra half stop exposure if the skin is fairly dark. Same with the flash. If your prints end up with less detail in the veil and embroidery on the dress than you'd like it can be toned down via Photoshop, but for the most part dark skinned people are used to their photos being that way and probably won't notice.

In addition to the above:

 

Get as much diffused light as possible on the subject. Two flashes, one bounced and the other straight on with a diffuser like a sto-fen lightdome, or lumiquest is ideal. I've found this works best for a mixed bad of skin tones. Straight on flash will make either overexpose fair skinned, or underexpose dark complexions.

 

The bounce light is also helpful here cause aids in defining hair lines.

 

For the men I've carried those facial towelettes wrapped in individual packets, or just used paper towels to help with 'facial sheen' in the summer months.

 

Use fill flash outdoors to bring out facial details.<div></div>

Here is an example of fill flash outside.<div></div>

Grrrrr.

 

"I've found this works best for a mixed bad of skin tones"

 

SHOULD READ:

 

I've found this works best for a mixed BAG of skin tones"

 

Sorry for the sloppy typo's!

OK, I'm bored...here is a better Fill Flash example that's a PJ style shot grabbed at the end of the portraits session. No pose.

 

In addition to improved facial detail the tux's show more depth because of the artificial light. The only unwanted flash effect is the jacket shadow from the groomsman who is looking at the ring.

 

Used right it will unflatten darker tones and add edge detail.<div></div>

You CAN attain pro level photographs with the equipment you already have IF you understand how lighting properties work. In a nutshell, the goal is to avail yourself to soft, even, diffuse lighting. On-camera lighting can work, but typically fails (especially indoors) because the photographer is asking something from the on-camera flash unit that is impossible from a physics standpoint.

 

So, take your camera and flash outdoors, out of direct sunlight (a shade tree, for example), use auto exposure lock, use a tripod (ALWAYS a good idea to bolt that camera to Mother Earth), then fire away. Don't worry about flash output, as TTL-OTF will take care of that.

 

Is bright, direct overhead sunlight not avoidable? Then slap a ND filter in front of your lens, and repeat the above. This will minimize those "raccoon eyes".

 

And yes, there are many other approaches to what I've just described. I'm certain that other experts will weigh in with their sage opinions. My objective is to get you going with as little additional investment as possible.

 

Lastly, learn your craft! Read books on lighting. Good luck.