Exposing for Skin Tones

[zfgauthier]

By accident, I came across what I think is a rather neat effect. A while back I

was working with a model and accidentally underexposed a shot by a stop(or

two?). As expected, the resulting negative looked thin and lacked good shadow

detail, but I liked the shot so I tried to print it. It's now one of my favorite

negatives. It looked nice to me at around grade 3.5. The interesting part is

how... different skin tones look when printed like this. The pale caucasian skin

of my model took on an almost metallic kind of appearance. Neat! I've never been

able to reproduce skin tones like this exposing "normally."<br><br><br>

Here are two examples. Both models' skin tones look very similar to the human

eye, but the first photograph was underexposed and had the contrast bumped up.

<br><br>

underexposed with normal development<br>

<a

href="http://zack.loseby.net/images/leah/reflex2.jpg">http://zack.loseby.net/images/leah/reflex2.jpg</a>

<br><br>

normal exposure, normal development<br>

<a

href="http://zack.loseby.net/images/bridgetlaugh.jpg">http://zack.loseby.net/images/bridgetlaugh.jpg</a>

<br><br><br>

If you ask me, the first image isn't "wrong" in any way... even if it was by

accident. I think it has a real dark and moody feel to it. Even being

underexposed, and in the prints especially, it looks to me like the skin still

maintains an appropriate range of tones. I'd like to get the opinions of others

on this. Has anyone else tried a similar process? And I realize my comparisons

here are far from scientific.

<br><br>

Any input is appreciated!

[Vlad Soare]

Yup. Underexposing and then cranking up the contrast will do that. <br>

And, of course, there's nothing wrong with that as long as you like it. :-)

<br>

You can get this effect with "normal" exposure and development if you use Delta 3200 at EI 3200 or higher. But then, Delta 3200 is not really an ASA 3200 film, which means that using it at EI 3200 would effectively mean underexposing and overdeveloping it, so we're back where we started from. :-)

[rustys pics]

#1 is a cool shot! Does that old camera around her neck work? If so put some film

through it and post over on the Classic Camera forum.

Now whatever you did to make that photo, write it down! Film, developer, ISO, lighting,

the whole thing so you can reproduce it again. You've discovered one of the joys of

analog photography. Sometimes by accident you discover something really unique.

 

The lighting could also have played a part. Photo 1 looks like "low key" light with lots of

shadow, while photo 2 seems to be not just more exposure but more light in general.

Try to duplicate the look again and see what happens. And it's true that the ISO on film

boxes are merely suggestions, not law.

[zfgauthier]

Thanks Russ. Oh yeah, that old brownie works just fine. A little lighter fluid and I had it working like the day it was made. It takes 620, but trimmed 120 spools work just fine. I've run quite a few rolls through it. The underexposed image is on HP5 in D76, while the normal image is FP4 in PMK Pyro. I attribute a lot of the low key look to the underexposure just totally dropping any tones in the dark background. <a href="http://zack.loseby.net/images/leah/leahkey.jpg">Here</a> is one from that same roll(as the first photograph) exposed normally. You can see a bit of tonality in the background there, plus the skin tones are <i>totally</i> different.

[rustys pics]

Yes, very different tonality. HP-5 is wonderful that way, very flexible and responsive to

exposure variation without turning into mud. So you probably "underexposed" it at ISO

800? Try shooing a whole roll that way. Upload some of the Brownie shots to your gallery

and drop a post into the classic camera forum. A lot of friendly helpful people over there,

and here as well.

[lex_jenkins]

Best metering and exposure technique for conventional results, according to traditional thinking, would be to rate the film conservatively (avoid underexposure), meter the skin and open up half a stop to a full stop from the meter reading.

 

But conventional approaches don't always make for interesting photographs!

 

I've seen - and gotten - this almost metallic effect you've described before, and pretty much the same way: underexposure, extended development, use of high contrast during printing.

 

Even with underexposure lighter skin tones tend to fall within the midrange where it's still possible to preserve detail and retain some separation in gradation. So while shadows and highlights may be featureless blacks and whites, some interesting stuff can occur in the midtones.

[jon_loomis]

Your skin tone for the underexposed pic reminds of portraits by Yousuf Karsh. Very dark skin tones but by no means muddy or flat, retaining full detail. Not quite sure of his technique exactly (other than use of 4x5), maybe someone else is? I like how even after pushing your film like that you attained an interesting mid-tone range and yet the contrast is still very much under control.

[zfgauthier]

I'd just like to clarify that I didn't really "push" my film. Since the rest of the roll was exposed normally, I decided to process normally. With normally being what was recommended by the massive dev chart for hp5 at 400 in d76 1:1. 13 minutes. Since then however, I've found 13 minutes to be a tad hot. Now my time for hp5 in d76 1:1 is 11 minutes at 20c. So I guess technically the film did receive a small push. But I would guess the increase in contrast while printing is what brings out these neat skin tones. Would the tones do the same thing if I pushed the film so it printed at grade 2? How would it be different? I would like to find out.<br><br>

 

I'm definitely going to explore this technique further. I'll be TAing for a photo class and running the college darkroom all summer. All the D76 I could ever want. Planning on trying the same technique with 6x7 as well. Should be interesting with less grain. For good measure, here's <a href="http://zack.loseby.net/images/leah/reflex1.jpg">another example</a> of the same "technique" from that same roll.

[Vlad Soare]

Zachary, pushing does little more (if anything) than increase the contrast on the negative. You may have not pushed the film, but you increased the contrast during printing, which is (almost) the same. I recently saw a comparison between a negative with perfect contrast printed with a medium filter, a thin negative printed with a hard filter, and a contrasty negative printed with a soft filter. The results were indistinguishable in one case and very close in the other. I don't have the link, but if you google Paul Butzi you should find his site. Lots of interesting stuff there.<br>

<br>

Increasing contrast in an underexposed negative will give you that dark and grainy look. This was no accident, you'll always get that look through underexposure and contrast boosting (whether at the developing or printing stage). The trick is to find out how much to underexpose with your specific film, developer, subject, lighting and metering technique. The darker the area, the less underexposure and the more pushing it needs, and the more pronounced the effect will be. Up to a point, of course. This look may or may not suite your subject. In this case it does.

[Vlad Soare]

Here's the article: <a href=http://www.butzi.net/articles/zoneVC.htm>http://www.butzi.net/articles/zoneVC.htm</a><br>

It seems I remembered incorrectly: the results in the second case (overdevelopment and soft printing) were not very close. My mistake.

[keith_lubow]

Look up how reflected light meters work. They don't tell you the "right" exposure. They tell you how to expose something to make it middle grey. The beauty of knowing this is that you can take this reading that is a middle grey REFERENCE (that's all it is), and then expose off of it to make skin (or anything) whatever tone of grey you want it to be.

 

Just be sure that you develop to suit the amount of contrast you want. When you place skin tones low, it is easy for the whole pic to go dark unless you develop to raise the contrast. Vice versa. A tone placed high on a greyscale can make the whole image appear washed out unless you develop to tame the highlights.

 

You are simply discovering what photographers have been discovering, developing, experimenting with, and tweaking for ages. I suggest reading chapter four of the '80s edition of "The Negative" if you want more detail.

 

keith

[keith_lubow]

btw - adding contrast in printing is not the same as adding it in development. You lose the shadows more when you add it in printing...and if you print so that you don't, you get a washed out look. Doing it on the film lets you retain the richness and detail of the shadows better. You also get higher midtone contrast, and what most would consider to be better tonality, when you do it on the film instead of on the paper.

[lex_jenkins]

Vlad, those of us who have worked either extensively or at times almost exclusively with push processing would say that there are indeed significant differences.

 

I spent more than a year doing almost nothing except push processing in order to explore the possibilities, using various films, developers and techniques. Having come from a traditional background (including Zonie training in school), it was an eye-opening experience.

 

While I make no claims to superiority in technique, actual practice will show that there's more to it than simply increasing contrast and grain.