Anyone know of any books specific to shooting women of color?

[d_price]

I'm interested in shooting portraits mainly of women of color. Be

they black or of another descent. Due to the various exposure issues

and techniques that can be used, can anyone recommend a good book for

technique? Thanks, I really appreciate it.

[edward_h]

Why would one need a whole book to be able to shoot colored people? How many pages does it take to say "underexpose"?

[link]

Mr./Ms. Price,

 

I think the answer is a book on how to use a reflected light meter, such as a spot

meter.

 

Basically, you've got to learn how light or dark a given reading will appear in the final

print or scan or neg or whatever. Once you know this, you'll make you're own

adjustments to your lighting without the need for specific techniques.

 

The trick part is when you want to photograph a dark skin to look dramatic and

darkly lit. To avoid the skin disapearing, yet preserving the illusion of darkness, kick

the light off the skin so that you see the reflection of the light on the skin, rather than

the skin itself. The lightmeter stuff above is the real key here.

[d_price]

Thanks for the intelligent response BG.

[GerrySiegel]

Since every skin is colored, then you are asking how to expose so that black is black, brown is brown,pink is pink, and so on. Almost any book on portraits will tell you how to compensate for reflected readings natural urge to make everything the same medium shade. And also why some people prefer an incident meter for that reason. The other things that effect color rendition of skin,(which is critical in the long run), is the reflections from colored surfaces, the time of day, and even the film emulsion. Likely there is one in the Kodak series (who publishes same nowadays,not Kodak but still out there) will still do the trick. Good luck, and truck on- or rock on,whatever..

[twmeyer]

BG is correct, a spot meter and knowing how to use it is critical. <p>"Kick light", that is, light that strikes your subject at an obtuse angle (greater that 90 and less than 180 degrees) and reflecting <i>toward</i> the camera, will give great detail and contrasts well with a shadow side of the face that more accurately reflects the subjects skin tone. Be sure to sheild your lens from this sort of light. <p>The main light in my example is from a 36wx50h inch window. The center of this window is just slightly behind my subject. The background is a curving "wall" that bends back behind her to keep the lit side of her in the dark but curves to catch the window light on the shadow side of her face. There is a large reflector panel placed several feet to camera right. She has quite dark skin, that would probably be about zone 4 (one stop darker than a grey card). This was a demo for my students... she was in that class. <p>Photographing dark skinned people <i>is</i> different than photographing very pale people, and it's <i>not</i> merely a matter of exposure... t<div></div>

[twmeyer]

hmmm. Not quite right. All that stuff about the background curving wasn't too clear. The idea was to keep the background dark on her lit side, and lighter on her dark side by curving it to create shading of the window light on her lit side and back into the light from that window on her shaded side. (that was harder to say than it should have been)...<p> Mr. Seigal makes a good point about incident meters. But be aware that using a glancing light will fool an incident meter, as glare is very different than diffused reflected light from the camera's point of view. Measure a glancing light by pointing the dome directly into that light source, rather than at the camera, as you would for a diffused reflecting light source... t<div></div>

[d_price]

One of the specific problems that I've had is that I have a model who has a reddish tone to her skin. It really shows up on film and I figured that it must of been my lighting, but when shooting her outside, I used a polarizer and it helped, but her very red skin tone still came through. I will try the various things that you guys have suggested and should find a solution.

[Spearhead]

You can see some nice lighting in <a href="http://images.amazon.com/images/P/3822880973.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg">this book</a> but I'm not sure that you need to do that much special work. Since I can't shoot my own family without shooting "women of color", I've got a lot of experience at it, but I've never done anything different. The only thing I find needs a lot of attention is oily skin.

[GerrySiegel]

A nice dramatic lighting, Tom. Windows and softboxes, rather large ones. I never thought about the obtuse angle thing,still experimenting. But it makes sense. I will try that approach.And use a bellows lens shade that I have.Q: Is it mainly useful for the very dark complexioned, I am wondering,or does it mainly give the range of contrast you so well display in this head and shoulders.

[GerrySiegel]

D.P.:Red skin tone you say?.Help.Rosacea.Call in a dermatologist.Seriously, Is this not correctible in the graphics program somewhat?...And then, what is your light source color temp? Are your umbrellas white- white or low end yellow or reddish white. I am grasping...the polarizer comment makes the puzzle just more confounded.

[grant_.]

what about blacktail magazine?

[GerrySiegel]

Gosh Tom, I forgot,having taken my workshops,the few I took, 15 years ago,how a single source of light and a reflector can do so much. Another question. If you wanted the reflected light to be stronger, to get a generally lighter contrast on the right side, what would you first do? A silver reflector. A second light source. An even closer in reflector. I wish I could go to your class to re learn what I now need to know,since my notes are really cold. But the idea of a simple setup appeals to me so much nowadays. I just don't have time to set up and keep up in my lanai. Also,re the background,is this a kind of cyclorama,or something like a hanging backdrop that is L shaped? (And forgive my piggybacking D.P. We do it all the time I know.) Aloha and Mahalo, Gerry (devotee of livelong learning and people as the most wonderful subjects)_

[d_price]

Sorry, I should of elaborated. I used the polorizer when I was shooting outside at the beach. I think alot of it had to do with the sun angle. But on a previous beach shoot with the same model, I had no problems. I went through my old shots of her last night and I saw that on previous shoots at the beach I didn't have the skin color problem. When I talked to her about it, she said that she has always come through on camera with a slight reddish tone unless she's in the studio. I'm gonna continue to play with lighting and I'm sure that I'll be able to find a solution. I like the large softbox solution. I may go ahead and invest in that setup and see how that works. Does anyone have any other pictures where they've used this lighting arrangement?

[twmeyer]

Your skin color shift might be caused by a cheap polarizer. Singh-Ray or B+W are good but pricey filters. I've found polarizers give an artificial looking skin tone, which might work fine for fashion, but that's not for me.<p>Gerry, yep it's "range of contrast" that makes the difference in darker skinned people for me. They like to see their features clearly, I like to accurately convey what they really look like, so a controlled direct reflection from a light positioned and or sized like my examples really helps. I've also noticed some people are just more comfortable, and therefore <i>look</i> more comfortable when they aren't looking in the camera. This segues nicely with the above lighting technique, using a light at or greater than 90 degrees from the lens axis, they can look out at about 45 degrees between lens and camera and I stll get what amounts to short lighting.<p>As to the reflector, I'm pretty sure this was a big silver reflector, older and not very efficient. I don't really like even/perfect light, it's just too damn boring. Sometimes I'll get a 32x42 silver card and just crush it, then pull it open and clip it to a stand and move it around until it looks right to me. Had I wanted more light on her, I would have changed to a white panel to keep the specularity under control, and moved it as close as whatever... I wanted to keep her skin dark, as close to her real skin tone as possible. There's plenty of light on her features and no useful knowledge would come from increased lighting on the shadow side of her face.<p>The background is a roll of corrugated packing material, like corrugated cardboard with one side missing. It's 73 inches tall and the roll is huge, about 24 inches in diameter... t<div></div>

[steve_levine]

Kodak's "Professional Portrait Techniques",covers every aspect of portraiture.Once you understand things like:,"light ratios",'brightness recording ranges of film","scene reflective ranges",and "total scene brightness ranges",you will see that the color of a subject's skin,matters very little.

[d_price]

Great info Tom. And thanks for the book recommendations Steve and Jeff. I'll swing by the bookstore today. I sincerely appreciate all of the help and knowledge that you all have provided.

[vic_.]

If you're shooting black and white film, a Yellow-Green filter will help in differentiating skin tones. (I haven't used many color filters, so someone with more experience, please chime in.)

[GerrySiegel]

Thanks Tom. This sharing of 'how to do it' is the best part of PN for me. I will try some of the lighting you talk about. And also get away from my pat inclination to have subjects look at the camera. Or maybe I can just step a foot away and have them look at me. I chat a lot with , a nervous habit,-but I don't like the music they like much an mood is important,and another subject topic of course.You have somehow relaxed the folks,maybe its the student rapport thing... Yet back to getting a simple,strong light is my goal instead of the two umbrella flat approach that some fell into excusing it by saying subjects can turn any direction,blah blah... Anyway,thanks again for sharing.Gerry,Here's to color diversity,Siegel

[stephen hazelton]

While out at the local bookstore, I noticed "The Black Female Body: A Photographic History". I assume this is a history of the photography of black females, not a how-to book, but might still be of interest. It's at Amazon, too.

[roger_kallet]

D. Price

 

 

 

Do a Google search using "portrait photography tutorials" in the search window. There will be many interesting sites to look at.

 

Roger

[roger_kallet]

D. Price...

 

Do a Google search using "portrait photography tutorials" in the search window. Some great sites come up.

 

Roger

[roger_kallet]

D. Price...I posted the "Google search" message once and it didn't come up so I posted a similar message again and they both came up!

 

Sorry for the duplication.

 

Roger

[randy_skopar]

To get good shots of women of color, ask them to wear jeans of blue and lipstick of red. Use a camera of Nikon and watch out for boyfriends of jealousy.

 

:-)

[aka eve adams]

There is a really good article on taking pics of people of color, and it is similarly named, in the shutterbug archives for monte zuckers master class. he uses a lot of accent lights so that the whole face is accurately colored and visible. it is pretty good.