Joleen Tough Girl

A friend asked to have her picture taken. This is my first crack at studio portraiture. What worked? What can I improve on?

Thanks,
- Chris

lots good here. clever, classy pose with a sense of humor, great colors, good clarity. consider an off-center crop, like attached, where you crop down to what is essential for you about the image. also, move her away from the wall to lessen the shadow on the left; but the lighting looks very natural, like window lighting, and its very well done. how do you photoshop in skin glow? (take all this with a grain a salt, i'm a total amatuer!)

work - for me it is a 7/7 based on what you set out to achieve - well done

Very good, the harmonising colours are great and the lighting is excellent. I agree with the sharper crop advice. The attitude in it gets away from the usual "beautiful" portrait. Do post more! 6/6

That may be the longest, most thought out comment I've yet received on any photo. Thanks for taking the time.

Skin glow effect: open the image, duplicate the layer, gaussian blur the new layer, change blend mode to "screen", adjust layer opacity to taste. I also used layer masking. Read about the "Blend If" layer property... it does more than it might appear on first inspection.

Attached is an image of my lighting setup. I used 3 Nikon SB-800 speed lights. Dave Black posted an article about how great the SB-800s are for a portable studio. They seem do have done a decent job.

The speedlights take 3-4 seconds to recycle. I noticed that Joleen's most natural looks came right after the flashes went off - as though there were some tension and expectation for the flash to go off. It'd be nice to be able to instantly shoot another shot (even if just one) to capture those less posed expressions. I looked at some mono-lights and it appears that 2-3 second recycle times are the norm.

Do you have any tricks that you use to difuse your subject's expectation/tension of the next flash?

A lesson learned from this first first attempt - 5ft paper rolls are too narrow for taking picture of people. It's tough enough to frame the shot and talk to your subject - worrying about not shooting the edge of the paper seems an unecessary pain.

What other tips might you have about this lighting setup?

Five foot rolls are a bit narrow, but if stuck I generally put on a 135mm lens and then there's no problem. This also allows you to get her away from the backing a bit which stops the shadow.

The lighting set up is good. Perhaps a reflector to add a bit of light to her hair would help. People just have to get used to the flash. Taking lots of shots (digital) or spending 10 minutes taking shots before you put a film in, is the usual answer!

chris that is great stuff, thanks. i don't know much about blend and i really appreciate it. as for commenting at length, well, what are we here for anyways? about tension, etc. -- i do a lot of portraits as you can see in my portfolio, mostly wtih friends, but not studio stuff. my advice, don't start with posing. just shoot while you are talking with them, even while you are still setting up. tell them you are just testing settings. ask them what pose they might want to strike (and quickly suggest if they don't know). sometimes the shot is there right away. but most times, the first series of shots i throw away. as we talk i'm looking for a way to make them laugh or react to me as i'm hoping. i'm making jokes. eventually -- and it only takes a few minutes, they relax a bit and are MUCH better about taking direction. when i do something i intend to pose, i've strated shooting with a remote control so i can look at them, and seem more like friend and less like photographer. look at the guy with the cigar laughing in my portfolio (the wider angle of the two). that's perhaps the 20th shot. i don't have lighting tips -- have not attempted to conquer that world yet.

Here's a quick and dirty PS edit - I copied the right half of the background over the shadowy left.

Other junk: cropped it more tightly, Edited out the wierd dent in the front of her skirt.