Eden Harris
It's been a bit since my last post, needless to say, I've been crazy busy. This will be a relatively short post and will take the topic of the last post on two source beauty lighting in a different direction.
Last time, I talked about "clam shell" lighting. Basically, it consists of a diffused light source at 45 degrees above and below the subject in the portrait environment. Here, I've moved the sources into a cross-lighting setup. The interesting thing about this particular setup is that it incorporates no diffusion. The main light is positioned to camera left at about 45 degrees. The light is an Alien Bees 800 series strobe with a standard reflector and a 30 degree honeycomb grid attached. This concentrates the light, allowing for both limited spill and less power. One could use a beauty dish in this setting as well, though, without a grid, it will produce a larger light cast.
Erin Pierce
The second light is also and Alien Bee's 800 fixed with a standard reflector and a set of barn doors. The vertical doors are closed down allowing only about a two inch beam of light. The top and bottom flaps (the horizontal doors) are wide open. I find this allows more directional light over a longer plane than, say, a snoot or honeycomb grid. I wanted the light to travel from the head down the back and arm to provide a more complete rim light.
The lighting setup was the same for both models, but arranged in opposite directions for each subject. Eden (top picture in the post and last) was shot using the setup shown below. Erin (above) was photographed with the main light to the right and the rim light to the left. Note how much coverage the barn doors allow down the back of the subject. It is especially evident in the pictures of Eden as I have her positioned at a harder angle to the camera. Both models have easy-going and bright personalities which makes working with them easy and fun. The poses were done from a run of the mill school chair. The glare that the legs and back of the seat produced in some of the images was removed in post.
Cross-lighting setup
I failed to record the power output settings on the strobes, but it was significantly less power than required with diffusion. The images were shot with a Nikon D700 in RAW mode with a 70-200mm lens at f/8 at 1/250th. They were rotated and a few minor tweaks were performed in Aperture before dumping them off to Photoshop CS4.
The great thing about this setup is that it introduces virtually no light spill onto the backdrop. That is further controlled by the fast shutter speed. I have to admit, this was an improvised scenario. We began the shoot with the clam shell configuration - but this time in the vertical orientation (i.e. the lights were 45 to the left and right than from above and below). That setup produced some wonderful images, but I really wanted to go a different route, so for the last 30 minutes I decided to try this setup and loved it.
Eden Harris
When you have photogenic subjects, more than half the work is done for you, and when you throw in a talented makeup artist like Wendy Riley (whom I also had the pleasure of working with on the previous shoot on beauty lighting) things get even easier. But even the world's top models have their images retouched (heavily) for print and advertising work. These images needed some attention, but nothing super serious. Mostly I just removed a few distracting flyaway hairs and then evened out the skin tones. This was done using Photoshop CS4 with the healing brush, the clone stamp tool and layer blending with the blur filter, etc. I'm not a Photoshop expert, I just try to learn the techniques that best serve my style of photography and work with them. Photoshop geniuses like Scott Kelby and others are the defacto source for learning better Photoshop skills. Give them a Google to learn more tips and tricks.
This is a super simple lighting setup that is capable of producing some magnificent results. You have to be more careful with you r light placement and subject position when dealing with non-diffused lighting as it drastically increases shadows as well light hardness. The end results are worth the extra attention to detail as it produces a classic Hollywood sort of elegance, perfect for less traditional beauty lighting.
Until next time, be safe and happy shooting.
- R
[...] Diffusers for Grids and Barn Doors I was thinking about the lighting setup I discussed on March 2 and was contemplating the hard directional light put out by studio strobes when coupled with [...]
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